Growing up, my family traveled a lot and I had a lot of wonderful places to choose from for my favorite childhood summer vacation. I’d have to say my favorite, though I wasn’t really a child anymore, was our trip to Italy, Turkey, and the Greek Isles.

We started off in Italy (my ears didn’t pop from the plane ride for two days), where we took a land tour of the beautiful countryside for about a week. I could actually live there. The climate is perfect and the people were hospitable and very helpful – not to mention the amazing food. So we visited Venice, Florence, and Rome. I’m an only child, so my family is very close, and we love taking trips like this.

After our tour through Italy, we caught a Royal Caribbean cruise that made port near Rome. We saw Sicily, Athens, Crete, and lastly Ephesus, Turkey. Out of all the places I’ve ever been, I’ve never been in a country like Turkey. In many ways, it was a cultural shock, but I thought it was fascinating. Mother and I love to shop, and between those cities and countries, we picked up enough souvenirs to last a while.

I probably won’t go back to places like those anytime soon, but I was so glad I got to experience them after my freshmen year of college. Happy travels!