Italia

Sarah, Hillary, and I decided to take advantage of having a week off for spring break and travel to Italy. We left Friday afternoon and arrived in Rome with five other students from my program on the flight with us. Since there were eight of us, the tourist information booth encouraged us to take a shuttle that could leave right away. We followed her advice and loaded a bus with an Italian speaking man who only knew about Obama and Metallica. While driving, he pulled out the map and started pointing out landmarks for us to visit. We were all just glad to arrive in one piece! The three of us checked into our hostel, and then we set out to explore Rome. We of course had to stop and get gelato first :) We explored the Republic before heading down to the Colosseum. It was unreal to think that I was looking at a piece of history that I had studied for so long. It was lit up by orange and purple spotlights. It was quite the sight. We saw the Arch of Constantine and walked a little further to view the remain of the Circus Maximus.

We woke up early the next morning and were greeted with the sunshine. The sky was so blue and we headed out to meet up with our tour group, where we would explore the Colosseum, Palantine Hill, and The Forum. We learned that the Colosseum only took 8 years to build and over 5,000 animals were slaughtered the first 100 days. Palantine Hill, where Rome was founded, possessed beautiful gardens and remains of the Emperor's palaces. The Forum was also so amazing to experience, with many buildings still standing. Our tour lasted three hours and then we explored Capitol Hill. Later that night we met up with the five others we flew over with and ate dinner. After we went to the Trevi Fountain, where Sarah and I threw in our coins the wrong way. Instead of throwing it over your head, we just tossed it in. It wasn't until we saw other people doing it the correct way that we realized our mistake. haha woops! We then went to the Spanish Steps and then called it a night.

On the third day, we basically walked all over the city of Rome. We headed to the Castle Sant' Angelo which is located near the Vatican. The view from the castle was extraordinary. You could see Saint Peter's perfectly as well as the rest of the city in the distance. We decided to eat lunch in the castle where we could enjoy the view. After lunch we went to the Pizza Navona, which is a large square with musicians and artists. I bought some water color artwork, and enjoyed seeing all the talent that was located in such a small square. We then walked to the Pantheon. I turned around and couldn't find Hillary or Sarah anywhere. I followed my Mom's advice, "If you get lost stay exactly where you are." It worked because I found them, and they started giggling when they saw me completely still with a crowd of people all on the move around me. After we went and saw the Trevi Fountain during the day. It was packed, and we witnessed a man stealing coins out of the fountain with a magnetic wand. I informed Sarah that he better not of stolen our five cent coins hahaha. We walked to the Spanish Steps and then to Piazza Del Popolo.

On our last day in Rome we decided to spare our feet and bough metro tickets to Vatican City. The metro was so crowded that you really got to know the person you were standing next to fast. The Vatican Museum was unlike anything I have ever seen before. All the rooms were so breathtaking with intricate works of art all over the walls and ceilings. Truly unbelievable. The Sistine Chapel was wonderful. It was smaller than I anticipated, but was so amazing to actually see Michelangelo 's artwork that depicted creation as well as the gospel throughout the ceiling. We sat there for a while just taking it all in. We then headed to Saint Peter's Basilica. Again, magnificent. There was no comparison to its beauty with the other churches I have seen so far in Europe. We still had the whole afternoon so we decided to go explore a park that overlooked the city. Unfortunately we took a wrong turn and spent an hour seeing the tall wall of the park without being able to enter. We yelled up at a woman we saw and asked her how much longer. She started laughing and replied, "You have a while." We made it in and was so worth the walk. It was so green and had a wonderful view of the city. As we were walking back to our hostel an old man comes up to us and literally oinks. None of us have ever experienced someone oinking at us before. Haha but it was a wonderful last day in Rome.

We boarded a fast train to Florence and got there within an hour. We were greeted by snow and realized right away we were no longer in Rome. We climbed the Duomo, all 436 steps, and had an amazing view of the city. It was so cold we didn't last too long on top of the Duomo. Our hostel was quite the sight. A card table was used as the front desk. Hillary's bed was basically springs, while Sarah and I shared a full bed with two twin beds that were uneven pushed together. We couldn't help but laugh at our current situation. On top of that we bought some wine and groceries. and realized we didn't have a knife to spread our nutella and our wine had a cork in it, which we could not get out. Sarah had the brillant idea of trying to us a bobby pin to use as a replacement. It was unsuccessful. We ended up taking our wine to a sandwich/bar place, where the man was nice enough to open it up and give us knives. It was an hilarious situation to say the least.

We woke up the next day very sore from our sleeping arrangements. We explored the Uffizi, and then decided to get waffles with gelato in them. One problem was that the waffles were so hot that the gelato melted all over us. The woman only gave us a few napkins each so it was hard to clean up. An old man in the street started laughing at the spectacle. It was hilarious. We climbed to Michelangelo Plazza where we could see a wonderful view of the city.

The last day we all bought some purses in the market and went to the Accademia were saw Michelangelo's David. We were all exhausted and ready to take the train back to Rome for our last night. We got on the train and realized our seats were taken. The train was packed and the woman informed us to go sit in some empty seats while we try and figure out the situation. One of the ladies working on the train came over to us and informed us that our tickets were invalid. The tourist booth were we bought out tickets earlier in the week, had put down the wrong day. We couldn't believe this was happening to us and the woman informed us we could either pay 150 euros on top of buying new tickets or get of the train. So, we got off the train not knowing where we were. We bought new tickets for the slow train which was a four hour ride back. We survived and made it back. It was definitely an unforgettable event being kicked off the train.

Italy was amazing! We saw so much during the week, and had so many stories to bring back with us. :)