The Hill Family

Morocco We have been talking about going to Morocco for awhile now.  It is warm, has lots of outdoor child appropriate activities and isn't far from where we live.  We just never made it there.  It ended up being the last and perfect addition to to our month long adventure.  Simon started looking into transportation and found out that many Europeans rent their own cars.  He was convinced this was the way to do the trip.  He then convinced me, but honestly I was still very nervous about a road trip through Morocco.  There was never a reason to worry.  This country is set up so well for visitors.  The only place that it got really exciting on the road was in the cities.  Let's just say people don't stay in their lanes or give any indication that they are going to be turning.  I am a terrible navigator (just ask Simon) and I successfully got us everywhere we needed to go, without a GPS system.  Anyway, we flew into Marrakech an...

The second stop on our itinerary was Portugal.  We really wanted to go to the Algarve region on the southern coast.  The pictures looked amazing and although March wasn't the warmest time of year to go, it was still much warmer than Germany.  It was also nice to get pictures without the millions of tourists that visit each summer.  This area is full of so much natural beauty.  It was great to just get lost in it all.   We flew into Lisbon and spent a day showing the kids our favorite parts of the city and eating delicious pasteis de belem.  We then drove down the coast and spent the week on the beach.  We had a kitchen in our hotel room and it was nice to be able to cook just a little instead of eating out every meal. We also had a heated indoor pool which was nice to go for a little swim.  This area was great for kids.  They were able to do a lot of exploring and running around outside. T...

 Petra Simon has been talking about Petra for a couple of years, but I just wasn't that excited about it.  We knew that it was one of the New 7 Wonders of the World.  Honestly, we thought it was just the Treasury building, and I didn't want to go that far to see one building carved out of stone.  Simon then started doing some research and found out just how extensive and amazing Petra is.  We found out that we could fly from London to Amman for cheap and then take a bus (about 3 1/2 hours) down to the Petra.  Simon kept telling me that we would of been kicking ourselves if we had left Europe, being so close to Petra, and not going to see it.  He was absolutely right.  Petra is probably the most impressive thing that I have ever seen. Treasury The treasury is the first thing you see when you enter the city.  You pass though a long and beautiful Siq to see this masterpiece.  It is protected from th...