ITALIA

For midterm break I spent nine days in Italy with my roommates/friends Amanda and Kelsey. I've tried to include as many details about the trip as possible. 

ROME

            Saturday: Flew from London to Rome and arrived around 5:30pm just as it was getting dark. We checked into our hotel and found a place to eat dinner by the Spanish Steps. Then we went on a pub-crawl… I have a t-shirt to prove it. The back of the t-shirt says “I came, I saw, I crawled.”  It was surprisingly a lot of fun and definitely an interesting experience.

            Sunday: Kelsey has a family friend who is a tour guide in Rome, so we arranged for a private tour of the ancient ruins. We met Francesca outside the Coliseum and started the tour there. From the Coliseum we went to the Roman Forum and then from there we ended up at some giant white building that the locals call the “wedding cake” because it looks hideously like a giant cake… I don’t remember what the building actually is. From there we went to the Pantheon and then Trevi Fountain. We literally got all the big sights out of the way on the first day! For dinner we went to a restaurant close to our hotel that our host recommended and her friend owned it.

Coliseum

Roman Forum

"Wedding Cake"

Pantheon

Trevi Fountain

Spanish Steps

            Monday: Took a tour of Vatican City. We bought tickets for a tour in advance so we didn’t have to wait in the ridiculous lines. The tour started in the museum – the biggest attractions in the museum were the hallways of tapestries that used to hang in the Sistine Chapel, and the Rafael Rooms. From the museum we made our way to the Sistine Chapel. You’re not allowed to take pictures but everyone does anyway. I don’t care what religion you believe in or if you’re an atheist… you have to feel something when you walk into the Chapel. I literally just stood there staring up at the ceiling. From the Chapel we went to St. Peter’s Basilica. This was my favorite part of the tour – the building was beautiful and I loved the sculptures. I was really looking forward to the Vatican, but unfortunately there were too many people. It was actually ridiculous. I was beyond frustrated. The experience of being there was so impersonal because you were packed in like sardines. Every room was overflowing with tourists and you couldn’t even move. As much as I’m glad I got to experience the Vatican, it was a rather horrible experience. After getting lost trying to find our way out of the city, we were starving so we tried to find a restaurant that Francesca had recommended. Alas, it was closed on Monday, so we found something else nearby. After lunch we wandered around and slowly made our way back to the other side of the river. For dinner we went to a restaurant down the road from our hotel. It was hopping. So many locals.

Musei Vaticani

Famous Rafael painting

SHHHH! (Sistine Chapel ceiling)

Sistine Chapel wall - "The Last Temptation"

St. Peter's Basilica

            Tuesday: By this time we had conquered Rome and had seen pretty much everything. So we went shopping and found a cute market to putz around in. For lunch we had absolutely epic pizza. The last thing we had to see was the Mouth of Truth (famous from the scene in the Audry Hepburn movie, “Roman Holiday”). Amanda, Kelsey, and I all took turns taking our picture with the mouth. Then we went across the river but it was dark by that point and it was kind of sketchy-seeming. To end our Roman holiday we went back to the restaurant we had been to on Tuesday night… and it was just as delicious. We sat in the same table and they remembered us and it was fabulous.

Some real good pizza.

Some real good gelato.

            Wednesday: Woke up, packed, went to the train station.

FLORENCE

            Wednesday: After nearly missing our train from Rome and then almost not getting off at the train station in Florence (because we don’t speak Italian!!!), we finally made it to Florence. Our hotel was centrally located and after checking in we wandered around. Knowing we only had about five hours to see all of Florence, we got to work. We went to the Duomo, which is basically a Cathedral. You can climb to the very top of the dome… and we did that. It was the scariest time of my life. To get to the top you have to climb something like 500 stairs, which I guess wouldn’t be bad if we hadn’t been climbing through small cement corridors. Did I mention I’m extremely claustrophobic? I also hate spiral staircases. Oh and I’m deathly afraid of heights. But I dealt with my fears and the views from the top were totally worth it. Next (after a terrifying climb down) we found the museum where Michelangelo’s David is… so we saw him and Amanda got a sneaky picture of his butt. Then we went to find all the fake David’s throughout Florence. There’s a pop art one in the garden of the museum… he’s flesh tone with blonde hair. AWKWARD. We found the other one in a square outside the really famous (I’m not doing good with the Italian names) museum – Uffizi? – and all the tourists think this is the real one, but you actually have to pay for the real one. Then we met up with some BADA peeps, who were in Florence too, for dinner.

I survived "Duomo 2012"

The view.

Fake David.

            Thursday: A full day tour of Tuscany! We started out at the train station in Florence and got on the bus. The first stop was Siena, where we got a tour from a local guide and then had a little time to walk around. Siena has the third nicest square in the world and it’s shaped like a seashell. After Siena we went to lunch at a family owned farm/winery. Then we got back on the bus and went to San Gimignano, another town like Tuscany. This town was home to the world’s greatest gelato… so obviously we got some. Here we were free to walk around for an hour or so. And then the fun started. Our next stop was supposed to be Pisa. In San Gimignano, we were all back in the parking lot waiting for the bus at 3:45. The bus wasn’t there and neither was our tour guide. After like 20 minutes someone called the tour company and was told that the bus was held up and would be there soon. So we waited. When the bus didn’t come, the same woman called the company again and was told the police were searching the bus. Umm okay. Then the bus showed up (it had been about an hour)… our tour guide got out and was just about in tears. She got on the microphone and told us she couldn’t say what was happening, but we weren’t going to Pisa and we just had to follow along. Then the bus pulled in to another parking lot… filled with police. Turns out a couple on the tour had lost a cell phone and decided to call the police because it would make sense that one of us stole it. STUPID STUPID. One by one we had to get off the bus and be searched by the Italian police. The couple sat in the back of a police car looking out the window mournfully as we were searched. It was basically a big joke to everyone except them. We were giggling and the police were laughing with us after the search was over. The bus driver was laughing. The tour guide was in tears. It was a mess. Obviously the police found nothing. So then we were on our way to Pisa… in the dark… without our tour guide because she had to stay back and fill out the police report with the stupid couple. When we got to Pisa everyone was exhausted and pissed off. Ten of the 60ish people on the tour were from New Jersey – a couple of families there for a huge Italian family reunion. They were super entertaining and almost like a parody of themselves, if you know what I mean. The two mothers in the group were not happy. We get to Pisa and we have to take this little bizarre and unsafe train/trolley to the actual monument. Our new tour guide was Steffano. I don’t even know how to describe him. He was absolutely hysterical. We were all in such bad moods and he was trying to keep us somewhat happy, but we were all just annoyed. Steffano asked us how long we wanted to take our pictures with the Leaning Tower of Pisa and we all said 30 minutes because we just wanted to go home. Finally we went home. It was an epic day and we have stories that we’ll be able to tell forever. And the company refunded us some money because of the debacle. Definitely worth it.

Siena.

Wine tasting.

Tuscany.

           

It's pretty.

World's best gelato... yup.

Leaning Tower of Pisa.

Friday: After a crazy whirlwind two days in Florence, we got on the train to Venice.

VENICE

            Friday: First things first… after checking into our hotel we took a gondola ride. Well first we had to figure out how to get to Venice, because we stayed on the mainland (Mestre), so we had to take the train to and from the island. But when we finally figured it out, we took a gondola ride. It was so worth it. We then spent the rest of the day wandering around -- I think we went into EVERY Venetian mask shop on the island. Walking and shopping was the theme for the day and we spent a lot of time near the Rialto Bridge.

            Saturday: Today we did all the big sights in Venice. The number one most amazing and beautiful square in the world (remember we saw number three in Siena) is in Venice, so we spent some time there. A graduation of some sort was going on. We went to the top of some church right in the square and had a great view looking out over the graduation celebration. Let's just say, the Venetians take their college graduations seriously. For the rest of the night there were groups of graduates and their friends/families walking through the streets singing. Our last night of our Italy trip we got pizza to go and ate in our hotel room. Amanda had pizza with French fries on it. Classic. 

            Sunday: We flew back to London. Our flight was delayed for an hour but other than that it was uneventful.

Gondola ride.

Venice. 

That's nice to look at.

Hey there.