Some trips are about the destination. This one was about the moment. We packed up the kids, caught a train to Rome, and shared the news with Jen's parents: we're expecting baby number four.
Back to Rome — This Time With News
Jen's parents met us in Rome for a long-overdue reunion. We hadn't seen them since Italy started feeling like home, and picking up where we left off was effortless. The laughter started immediately, the kids ran straight to their grandparents like no time had passed, and we spent the afternoon wandering toward one of the most iconic sights on earth.
The Colosseum. Even after everything we've seen in Italy, it still stops you in your tracks. There's something about standing in front of 2,000-year-old stone that makes the world quiet for a second. The kids ran ahead, we grabbed our moment, and that's when we told them. Baby number four is on the way.
The reaction was everything we hoped for — cheers, hugs, and the kind of joy that makes a whole trip feel worth it before it's even really started. Having people you love nearby for news like that? There's nothing better.
The Long Haul: Rome to Bologna to Innsbruck
Our route north took us first to Bologna — a quick transfer stop, but one that reminded us why we love train travel in Europe. You watch the landscape change through the window, the kids settle into their rhythm of snacks and card games, and the journey itself becomes part of the adventure.
From Bologna we crossed into Austria, rolling into Innsbruck and trading Italian warmth for Alpine crisp. The air felt different the second we stepped off the train — clean, cold, and impossibly fresh. We grabbed a bus toward Natters, a small village tucked into the hills just south of Innsbruck, where our hotel waited.
Natters was one of those accidental discoveries that turns out to be exactly right. Quiet mountain streets, views in every direction, and a pace that felt deliberately unhurried. After Rome's beautiful chaos, we needed it.
Garmisch and the Edelweiss Lodge
The next leg took us from Natters back down to Innsbruck, where we boarded a DB train for Garmisch-Partenkirchen. The Edelweiss Lodge — the Armed Forces Recreation Center in the Bavarian Alps — had been on our radar for a while, and pulling up to it did not disappoint. Mountains on every side. Snow-capped peaks filling the windows. The kind of setting that makes you wonder how you got lucky enough to be there.
The kids discovered the pool within approximately four minutes of checking in. That was that. We spent a full afternoon doing laps, cannonballs, and the kind of loud, splashing kid chaos that echoes off tile walls and sounds like pure happiness. The outdoor hot tub was ours once the little ones were down for the evening — sitting in steaming water, looking up at mountains going dark against a winter sky. No phones, no noise. Just mountains and stars.
Lunch on Top of Germany
The Zugspitze — Germany's highest peak — has a restaurant at the summit. We took that as a personal invitation. The gondola ride up was spectacular in that white-knuckle, breathtaking way that makes your stomach drop and your eyes go wide at the same time. At the top, the world spread out below us in every direction: Bavaria on one side, Austria on the other, nothing but sky above.
Lunch at altitude, surrounded by snow and silence, with the kids pressed against the glass trying to spot landmarks below. One of those meals you remember not for the food but for everything around it.
Neuschwanstein: The Real Fairy Tale
The next day we drove out to Neuschwanstein Castle. You've seen it in pictures — everyone has. But pictures are lying to you, because they can't capture the scale of the thing rising out of a forested ridge with snow on the peaks behind it. The kids stood with their mouths open. Honestly, so did we.
There's something almost surreal about standing in front of a place that looks like it was pulled from a storybook. Ludwig II built it as a retreat from reality, and even now, 140 years later, it does exactly that. For an afternoon, the whole family stepped out of real life and into something that felt genuinely magical.
One Last Ride Down the Mountain
We ended the trip the way all great trips should end: with something slightly ridiculous and completely unforgettable. The alpine coaster — a sled on rails, winding down the mountainside — was the unanimous choice for our final morning. One by one, kids and adults alike launched themselves down the track, whooping through the curves and arriving at the bottom breathless and grinning.
It was a perfect ending. Loud, fast, a little cold, and exactly the kind of memory that sticks. The kids talked about it the whole train ride back to Naples. We're pretty sure they're already planning a return trip.
Baby number four announced, Alps conquered, castle visited, coaster ridden. Not a bad week for this never-settled family.
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