St. Peter’s Basilica, Vatican City

After Amsterdam our next stop was Italy.  Now, Italy was different from our other destinations because we were spending a full week here and doing a road trip from Rome up north with stops in Pisa, Florence, and Venice. This first post from Italy though was too good to sit on any longer.

This is St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican in Rome. It was finished in 1626 after over a hundred years of building.  I was in absolute heaven walking around this modern wonder.  It’s sheer size and scale truly took my breath away.  If you’re ever in Rome, this might be my number one recommended site to see.  Enjoy the photos below, I’m going to be printing some of them for myself at some point.  If you’re interested in prints, please contact me: dankelleghan(@)gmail.com

Amsterdam, Netherlands

We ended up staying in Amsterdam for about 4 days and that seemed to be a perfect amount of time. I had heard about the bikes before I went and it was all true! Everyone rides a bike which is especially cool because I love bikes too. Our hostel ended up being in the red light districtwhich was pretty hilarious. I took some photos there but it wouldn’t be right to post them because it’s disrespectful to the working girls there. We also spent our last day in Utrecht which was a really great little town with a wonderfully old church. It was so pretty! Here are the photos below, enjoy!

Dam Square

Dam Square

Mini hot air balloons going into the sky

Lighting mini hot air balloons

Amsterdam at night

Little car in Amsterdam

Horse drawn carriage

Man walking in the street

Riverfront boats

Dam Square

Coffeeshop

Buildings facades

Cathedral tower in Utrecht

Kitty and a bike in Utrecht

Window abstraction

Colorful tunnel in Utrect

Berlin, Germany

Here are some photos from my trip from Berlin, Germany. It was an eye opening trip that included going to a concentration camp, seeing the Jewish Memorial, and going to my favorite museum that I’ve ever been to, the Pergamon. It houses complete reconstructions of ancient buildings. I’ve never been to a museum like this before in my life and I was blown away by the scale of these amazing buildings, which included my personal favorite, the gates of Babylon.

I absolutely love Berlin and it may be my favorite spot in northern Europe.  It has a huge “artsy” feel to it and they really know how to have a good time!  There’s a ton of history here and a lot to do.  Can’t wait to go back!

Jewish Memorial in downtown Berlin

Berlin Cathedral

Sachsenhausen concentration camp outside Berlin

Sachsenhausen

Sachsenhausen concentration camp sign that was in "no man's land". If anyone stepped foot in this area that we immediately killed

Sachsenhausen bathroom where hundreds of people were forced to shower in the baths

Sachsenhausen watchtower

Sachsenhausen bunks

Sachsenhausen

Sachsenhausen furnaces

Sachsenhausen memorial

Sachsenhausen

Sachsenhausen

Man in the forest

Pergamon Museum

Berlin Catherdral at night

London, England

London was a sort of neutral experience, with some pretty cool random happenings.  Going out and shopping on Oxford Street (which saved my life because my bag had broken) was a blast! We also went to Amy Winehouse’s favorite bar which was a crazy experience, especially since she had just recently passed.

For me though, the best thing that we did by far was sit in on a session of the House of Commons.  This is the equivalent to sitting in on an American Senate session.  It was absolutely an amazing experience.  Unfortunately they didn’t allow cameras in otherwise I would be posting photos from there as well. It was also being broadcasted live on BBC which made it that much more special! The London Tower Castle was really neat too, especially being in the middle of a completely modern downtown area. It was completely out of place! Those were the highlights… Oh and Tate Modern was a photo frenzy for me :) Enjoy!

St. James Park with the London Eye in the distance

Ministry of Defence

Guard in Royal Horse Guards headquarters

Palace of Westminster with Big Ben on the right.

Buildings along the River Thames

The London Eye at night

Big Ben

Tower of London Castle

Tower of London

Tower Bridge

Tower Bridge

The River Thames looking west from the London Tower Bridge

Street in Southwark

Tate Modern Museum

Random buildings

Occupy London at St. Paul's Cathedral

Do you have an iPhone? Consider getting Instagram!

Lately I’ve been obsessed with a new kind of digital social media called Instagram.  If you haven’t heard of it I highly recommend that you explore it for yourself.  Instagram is an iPhone specific application that allows users to post photographs with different photographic effects and share with their followers and friends.  There are about 20 different filters that you can use to enhance your photos and then share them.  It is absolutely fantastic and positively addictive!

An Instagram photo of Barcelona from my trip to Europe last month

I came across an article today on CNN.com that talked about Instagram’s success and I think it’s absolutely wonderful.  In fact, they just hit 27 million users! Some people are saying that it makes photography too accessible and too easy but I think that those are coincidentally why I lovethe app! I think that it gives you non-photographers a chance at expressing yourself in ways that have typically been reserved for photographers. What’s wrong with more people doing photography? Read the rest of this entry »