#evansfamilyeuropeanadventures

Chris just shared this on his instagram and I thought it was really neat to see a map of the places we went the 4 years we lived in Germany. 

Believe it or not there are still cities on our bucketlist that we didn't make it to such as the Matterhorn, Sicily, Bilbao, Porto, Warsaw, Gdansk, Telč, Český Krumlov... so I guess we'll just have to go back! I miss it so much already!! I blogged about all of our adventures here: http://www.paigetaylorevans.com/p/our-travels.html.

In every city we visited we got a magnet - I didn't take a photo before we took all the frames down, but we filled up all four of these frames plus half of one more. Hunting down and finding a magnet was one our favorite things to do while adventuring and I'm so glad we have a little visual reminder in addition to all the photos and map pins of the places we went.

"Better to see something once than hear about it a thousand times."

We really tried to make this our motto while living in Germany. We knew it was only temporary and we had to make the most of our limited time. One of the first things I did when we moved to Europe was print 4 years worth of calendars and penciled in everywhere we wanted to go, then every 3 or 4 months we would plan the trips: book flights, find airbnbs, get pet sitters, and hash out the detailed itinerary so we knew exactly when and where to go so we'd see it all! The Army in Europe has 4 day weekends every single month, sometimes even two a month - we went somewhere nearly every single 4 day. You can see a LOT in 4 days! We swore by Rick Steves travel books for where to go and what to see and LOVE his self-guided walks through town that hit all the major attractions. I often get asked how we could afford to travel so much but the thing is traveling in Europe is so much cheaper than in the US. Budget airlines such as Ryanair had flights for $9.99 round trip sometimes, I kid you not!! Airbnbs are the way to go instead of expensive hotels and we brought our own food. Also... savings... more like what savings?!? Again, we knew this was a limited time in our lives and focused more on seeing and doing than scrimping and saving. Maybe not the wisest choice but we're happy with our decision. Towards the end of our time in Germany I was simply DONE traveling and Chris had to drag me out the door to get to Iceland and Norway, but I'm so very glad he pushed me to go. Now I just want to stay home for the next 4 years to recover! (as I'm simultaneously planning our trip to Mexico City to teach and sightsee, lol). We are so grateful for the time we had in Germany, I can't say it enough!