Lynn Gibson - I love that! planning a trip for 8 years with your 12 year old granddaughter! I hope I still have the health to travel with my not yet born grandchildren!

I loved almost every minute of our 2 week trip to Italy in 2007, but the one moment that will be forever engraved in my mind was standing out on our vast balcony at Eden Roc at midnight, completely mesmerized by the brightest, fullest moon shimmering down on the Mediterranean Sea and lighting up the orange umbrellas on the beach and the gentle waves of the ocean for miles and miles, while listening to the peaceful nighttime sounds of Positano. A feeling of awe and beauty filled my soul.

Thanks for allowing me to share my magical moment missypie!! Happy 2008 to all!

A sunny afternoon in October, riding a rented scooter along the Amalfi Coast, with the arms of a girl I had just met at the hotel around my waist, returning to the hotel after sunbathing on a secluded beach in Maoiri.

Yikes Padraig....I must have overlooked that slight "European" word! Must have been all of that champagne at the holiday get together...

Okay then, my favorite European travel moment would be driving around the Ring of Beara in Ireland with my mom and aunt. Beautiful and quite mesmerizing!

Tracy

This thread is really making me smile...

I've done a lot of european travel this year (New Year's resolution to write trip reports!!) as we moved to Zurich last New Year's Eve. Like a number of posters, I think my favorite moments were those I saw through the eyes of my 2 daughters.

like nolefan1 - night time under the Eiffel tower with my 17-year-old - loved seeing her fall in love with PARIS.

the Gornergrat train ride to see the Matterhorn with my 13-year-old..."mom, is this the one we always see in all those pictures?"

Lynn Gibson - both my girls loved the Sound of Music tour. I thought I would find it corny, but Austria was so beautiful I was enthralled. The girls especially loved the gazebo and did a little "16 going on 17" singing and dancing there which was very appropriate for my then 16-year-old!

The first "moment" (actually a few hours) was our first night at Oktoberfest in the Oksenbraterei tent. The second would be our second visit to the Marienbruecke and actually being able to see Neuschwanstein. Our first time we could barely see an outline of the castle.

After touring Blenheim Palace and grounds, we went into the village of Woodstock, and had afternoon tea at one of the hotels/inns there. Despite all of the problems getting there from London in late March, it was a wonderful experience!

Barcelona for me too Missypie!

Our first night's venue was the Maritime Museum, tapas and cavas under skyward majestic arches. How can a shipyard look like a church?

Eating smorrebrod and wienerbrod (separately!) in Copenhagen. The free community of Christiania. Visiting the Amalienborg museum. Humoring the locals with my attempts at (poorly) speaking a few words of Danish.

London, November 11 on Armistice Day or Remembrance Day, at the Cenotaph in Whitehall. Remembering the past, on the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month. The two minute silence (not even one cell phone or cough it seemed and the crowd was enormous), brought chills and tears to my eyes.

Thanks everyone, for sharing such lovely memories! May the new year bring many other treasured moments.

Eating at Cal Pep in Barcelona with my 18-year-old daughter. She still talks about it.

while we visited garmisch-partenkirchen and took an afternoon hike to the lake. What a beautiful view. I felt like julie andrews, " the hills are alive...

This is one of the very best threads I have ever read. We remodeled our house this year so could not leave the country but I feel like I've been many places and seen many beautiful things through your experiences. Especially loved the photos!
Thank you fodorites. Happy Travels and Happy New Year.

What a wonderful list to read! The first of my favorite moments happened when my mother, sister and I spread some of my grandmother's ashes at a beatiful 16th century relic of a church on the bay in Schll, Ireland. The second favorite was the moment I'd been waiting for - to commune with Botticelli's Birth of Venus. I just had to sit and stare...

One moment and one "experience"

My moment was in Paris in February: the night was very cold and clear, and there was a bright moon and the twinkling lights were on the Eiffel Tower. We were walking across the Pont des Arts, and my brother and husband (both were kind of grumpy) were walking fast, far ahead of me. I looked at them and just laughed at their grumpy backs, and something grabbed me and I started dancing around on the bridge, spinning and twirling. It was weird, but so freeing. No one else was there to see, of course, or I probably wouldn't have done it.

And the experience: the Biennale in Venice. I have always wanted to see it, and it far surpassed my expectations. Going in to buildings that one could not normally enter was great. One palazzo had its windows over the Grand Canal open and it was a lovely day. That was probably the best Biennale moment, but all of it was wonderful.

This is a delightful thread.

I have two favorite moments.

The first moment was seeing St. Chapelle for the first time. After I walked up the stairs to the second floor, I was so astonished by the stained glass windows that I actually stopped dead in my tracks (fortunately, no one was behind me, so nobody walked into me)and the little voice that keeps thinking in my head actually was silent for a while as I just stared around the room in amazement.

My second favorite moment occurred a few days earlier, when I tried to go to St. Chapelle but arrived at the head of the line at one minute after closing time. Not sure what to do instead, I noticed a bunch of people were all walking in the same direction. If someone had asked me if I knew that Notre Dame was near St Chapelle, I would have said yes, but for some reason it never occurred to me that was where all these people were going. So I decided to follow them, turned a corner, and there, totally unexpected, was Notre Dame. There is something absolutely wonderful about seeing Notre Dame for the first time without realizing that you're going to see it.

In this case, I didn't stop walking - but was so absorbed that I walked right off a curb. Good thing I didn't sprain my ankle.

After not having gone to Europe for 13 years in favor of India, Africa, South America and Asia, I went back to Spain.

The highlight might have been standing at the highest point in the Alhambra, the watchtower in the Alcazaba, and knowing that this was basically where the European reconquista of Spain was completed and Islamic rule in Spain ended.

Riding the London Eye w/ 9 dear friends from all over (States, Canada, S. Africa, Ireland, London) at dusk -- Champagne flight in our own private capsule celebrating several individual milestones (B'days, retirements, promotions) - and just as we got to the top the hostess poured all of us another glass of Champagne - the lights of London coming on below -- magical - and the most wonderful couple chose that moment to announce their engagement. More Champagne all around

Drinking sangria and watching flamenco in Sevilla with my sisters.