Greetings from Zagreb, Croatia!

But wait before we get started let’s talk about getting here.

So we are at it again. Since having our very first baby (Celeste) we have decided traveling is a huge part of the experience we want to continue to have and to offer our girls. So every two years we take a nice long vacation to a new destination. Which brings us to our 2018 travel adventure.

Six months ago we booked this three week long vacation. It all began by deciding to book our very first cruise. Eek!! And to get the most of our money since air fare tickets don’t run cheap, we decided to arrive in Europe one week before our cruise and visit Zagreb and Dubrovnik in Croatia.

One of my first greatest traveling lessons with kids is to pack light. I learned this lesson the hard way when I way overpacked on our first trip to Japan back when we only had Celeste, and of course my husband wouldn’t let me hear the end of it. Rightly so though since he had to lug it all around haha.

So here’s what our luggage looks like for the 4 of us now when we travel.

One of the most helpful things to keep things light is we use the laundry service at the hotels we stay at.

With everything ready to go we set out on our flight very early Saturday morning. The first leg would be Los Angeles to Toronto, Canada and from there we would switch planes to go direct from Toronto to Zagreb, Croatia.

Unfortunately our plane left an hour late from LAX so that when we arrived in Toronto we had just 30 minutes to make our connection.

As soon as we were able to get off the packed plane we ran our hearts out to the opposite end of the airport. It was easily 3/4 of a mile, but when you are trying to run with a 6 1/2 year old and a 3 1/2 year old, it may as well be a half marathon. I told my husband to just run ahead so he could at least let them know we were en route. I’m so proud of my girls because they kept running and running as fast as their little legs could take them.

But they wouldn’t let us on the plane even though there was almost 15 min left before departure because our luggage had to follow us. Our throats were on fire from the intense run and we were upset they wouldn’t let us aboard.

Long story short they put us on a different connection flight so now we would be going Toronto to Amsterdam and then Amsterdam to Croatia.

After a long day of flying we finally made it to Zagreb! The girls were total rock stars the entire time. Thankfully they slept well on the Toronto – Amsterdam connection which was 7 hours.

But our luggage didn’t arrive with us. And of course it has all our clothes and hygiene items.

Which brings me to a new travel lesson. I should make sure in the future to pack at least an extra change of clothes for each of us and hygiene items. Because on the carry on I did take a change of clothes for the girls in case they had any bathroom accidents. But nothing extra for us.

Well hopefully our luggage arrives today and in the meantime, all this aside, today we are taking our first tour to Plitvice National Park.

Can’t wait to experience this beautiful place!