Cinque Terre (Italy Spring Break)

[Monday March 7^th – Wednesday March 9^th]

The train ride to Cinque Terre was a couple of hours and was our most exciting ride thus far.  At the end of the trip the train was mostly going through tunnels so it was very dark and we were all very sleepy.  But then all of the sudden the train came out of the tunnel and the three of us were instantly against the window peering out! All we saw was crystal blue waters and the train was literally right on the coast of the mountain. It was a breathtaking view and we were very much awake after seeing it!

Cinque Terre means “five cities” and it is a collection of five coastal cities that are built into the cliffs of a mountain.  Our hostel was located in the city of Monterosso and we picked it because it is the only one with a beach.   We arrived in Monterosso in the late afternoon and the water was even bluer than what we saw from the train! The city had such a small town feel and was so peaceful.  We picked up the keys to our hostel from the adorable manager that gave us a map about all the hiking trails and told us about some of the best restaurants in town, insisting that we should go to his brother’s restaurant if we had time.  Our room could not have been cuter; it was an individual three person room with spacious beds, a private bathroom and an ocean view! Our plan was to do a big hike on Tuesday since we had all day, but we wanted to warm up our legs and went for a short hike Monday night after getting situated in our room.  The hike we chose started in Monterosso and went to the top of the neighboring mountain, and my oh my was it a mountain! We were all chatting during the hike until we got to this one part and all you could hear was huffing and puffing because it was a straight up hill of rock climbing with huge steps that seemed to continue forever. After about thirty minutes the trail leveled off and at the same time there was a break in the trees and we saw the ocean on the other side.  We ran to the edge and saw the sun setting over the water and it was absolutely breathtaking.  We all were in awe and sat down just taking the scene in.  Such a surreal moment and definitely one of the most beautiful things I have seen. We all knew it was something that we would never forget and waiting until the sun was completely set before walking back down the mountain.  We grabbed a quick dinner and went to bed early on Monday because we knew we had a big day ahead of us.

Tuesday morning we woke up at 6am in order to watch the sunrise! Unfortunately the sun rose behind one of the neighboring mountains but the three of us still sat on the beach and admired the sky because it was a brilliant shade of pink and orange.  Around nine in the morning we took a train to one of the other coastal cities because it was the start big trail.  Our intended hiking trail was a five hour hike that passed through all of the five coastal cities.  Sadly all of the trails were closed except between two of the cities because of rock slides.  We were really disappointed for about a minute but then realized we were in Cinque Terre and would make the best of our time! We started out on the one trail that was open and it was amazing.  It was a much more casual hike than our endeavor the day before because it was very flat and did not scale the mountain instead it was a path along the side of the mountain.  In each direction we looked it seemed like a postcard and the water was so crystal clear that you could see all of the rocks at the bottom.  Since the only trail open was supposed to take thirty minutes we decided to take some excursions along the path and for one of them there was an access down to the water and we went climbing on the rocks! When we finally reached the second and final town of the hike we went exploring and it was just as adorable as Monterosso.  All of the houses were different bright colors and were built into the mountainside.  After hiking back to the first town we took a train to Monterosso because we wanted to hike in the opposite direction.  Our second hike of the day began with the hike of the previous day so we got our exercise in again! However this time we did not stop at the top of the mountain and continued to hike along the mountain and down to the other side because we wanted to reach the town of Levantos which was another beach town.  Two hours and twelve kilometers later of steep hiking we made it! It seems almost too clique but we were walking along the trail and all the sudden the trees separated and we saw the magnificent beach.  We strolled along the beach and enjoyed the best gelato we had of the trip.  While on the beach we realized that everything really does happen for a reason because if the first trail wouldn’t have been closed we would have never had the opportunity the hike to Levantos which was our favorite trail by far! Overall we got some amazing pictures from all the hikes and more importantly memories we will never forget.  

Exhausted from the long day of hiking we came back to our room and took showers before grabbing dinner.  Since our hostel manager was so helpful and nice we decided to try out his brother’s restaurant, Ely’s.  There seemed to be no people out on the streets after dark, but we found them all at the Ely’s! The brother was so sweet and he served us himself as well as gave us a 10% discount.  Tricia, Laura and I collectively bought two different pizzas and a pasta so that we could try everything.  It was by far the best meal in Italy and we ate every bit of it! Afterwards he told us that his mother-in-law made each dessert from scratch, so how can you say no to that? It was delicious and the perfect ending to our amazing trip in Cinque Terre.

Because our initial hiking trail was closed I am taking that as a sign that I have to go back one day! I absolutely loved it and would definitely recommend it to anyone that is traveling through Italy :) 

Watching the sunset on the first hike

Hiking Trail along the cliff

Out on the rocks watching the sunrise bright and early!

After climbing down to the rocks

Best Italian mean at Ely's =)

Pisa (Italy Spring Break)

[Monday March 7^th]

After having such an amazing time in Florence and Viareggio it was hard to say goodbye to Tara but we continued on our Italy adventure early Monday morning.  We took our third train of the week for another day trip but this time it was to Pisa.  Fortunately when we arrived at the Pisa train station we were able to check our bags so we didn’t have to lug them around with us while walking.  We briefly looked at the map but decided that if we wandered we would run into the leaning tower eventually. Over an hour later we finally found it! Needless to say we got a little turned around but I wouldn’t say lost because we enjoyed just wandering and seeing more of Pisa. When we finally found the leaning tower we also found all of the tourists.  The square with the leaning tower and Duomo was packed with people and everyone was doing the classic picture of “holding” the tower up! We read about the history of the leaning tower and it actually was quite impressive to see in person how much the tower actually leans.  We had another beautiful day so after taking pictures of the tower we laid down in a grassy area in the main square and soaked up the sun.  About four hours was sufficient enough for all of us in Pisa and we headed back to the train station to pick up our bags and catch our train to Cinque Terre!

The Leaning Tower of Pisa

Viareggio (Italy Spring Break)

[Sunday March 6^th]

Tara, Tricia, Laura and I caught a train around one o’clock on Sunday from the Florence train station to Viareggio which is a small beach city on the coast of Italy.  One of Tara’s roommates had heard about this city because it is known for their Carnevale celebration and the floats during the parade.  Other than buying our masks in the leather market none of us knew what to expect when we got there! An hour and a half later we got off the train and were immediately surrounded by a large mass of people. It seemed as if everyone on our train was heading to the parade and they all were dressed up in crazy outfits.  It looked like our Halloween because all the kids were dressed in cute outfits and the adult costumes ranged from smurfs to crazy wigs to animal suits. After finally making it through the train station we had to walk a couple minutes to the beach and could hear the loud music in the distance.  There were palm trees everywhere and it was the perfect setting with the sun shining =) Upon reaching the beach we saw the floats that Viareggio was known for and were blown away.  The floats were HUGE!! Not only were the designs impressive but they all had moving parts and a ton of people dancing on the float as well.  All of the people on the floats were dressed to the theme of the float and tossed confetti everywhere! Every person there was COVERED in confetti and it definitely added to the atmosphere. There are pictures of some of the floats below but they do not do them justice.  It was unreal.  The best part was that everyone was just dancing and hanging in the streets with the floats! We could literally touch all of the floats as they went by because we had great spots right on the edge of the street. 

Another aspect of this Carnevale celebration was that it was not touristy at all. There were only Italians there and one person even asked us how we had heard about the parade because no other Americans had heard of it.  That made it all the more exciting for us because we were able to experience a true Italian parade! The most noteworthy float for us was near the end of the parade when we noticed a large float of Barack Obama, yes our American President.  At first we did a double take but after noticing the “yes we can!” sticker we knew they were mocking America. On the top hat of Obama was a terrorist with a machine gun as well as a gay pride flag.  The theme of the float was that Obama was the ring leader of the American circus! On the back of the float were numerous other Presidents either swinging on trapeze or riding around on tricycles.  It was very interesting to see their impression of Americans and when that float passed so many people threw confetti at us, guess we looked American!

After all of the astounding floats had passed us we headed to the beach as the sun was setting to relax.  It was a breathtaking view because right beside the waves crashing on the sand you could see the mountains in the distance.  It was such a fun day and I am so happy we decided to take the trip out to Viareggio.  Carnevale was so much more than any of us expected and definitely a day I will never forget!

In our masks

Confetti everywhere!!

One of the magnificent floats

The Obama float

The mountains behind the beach

Florence (Italy Spring Break)

[Saturday March 5^th – Monday March 7^th]

The three of us packed up our backpacks and were at the train station early Saturday morning in order to catch our first train of the week.  It was a three hour train and we slept most of the way which was convenient because all three of us had seats in separate cabins.  I was especially excited to arrive in Florence because we were staying with Tara, one of my sorority sisters, that is studying abroad in Florence.  She met us at the train station and it was so much fun to see a Clemson friend in Europe!  Tara lives in an adorable apartment with four other girls and loves studying in Italy.  It was really nice to be able to stay in an apartment instead of having to worry about locking up our belongings in hostels.  After meeting her roommates she walked us around the city and we realized that it Florence is actually quite small.  It is beautiful though and we had a sunny day to enjoy the surroundings.  She took us to her favorite pizza place for lunch and we all enjoyed our margarita pizzas that came straight from the oven.  Afterwards we accomplished our “touristy” deed of the day and toured the Pitti Palace. It is a vast palace that was the home of the Medici family during the height of their rule.  It now contains an immense amount of artwork and other luxury possessions of the Medici family that were remarkable to see in person.  After walking through most of the palace we took the rest of the day to explore more of Florence.  This included a large amount of time in the leather market which is HUGE! There were covered stands as far as the eye could see down this one road and they sold every type of leather product you could imagine. It was really entertaining to just meander through all the stands and look at the items up for sale. We finished our night by going to one of Tara’s favorite pasta restaurants for dinner and all greatly enjoyed our meals :)

Sunday morning we woke up to another sunny day! Our main goal for the morning was to walk to Piazza Michelangelo because it is known to have the best panoramic view of Florence.  We began the journey to the overlook by walking up many, many steps.  We were all about to break a sweat when we finally reached the top and the view was definitely worth it! The city is magnificent and we obviously took the opportunity to take some pictures.  After walking back down the stairs we went to the Duomo which is the famous church in the center of Florence.  It is one of the biggest churches in Italy and has spectacular decorations on the outside of the building. My friend Tyler was in Florence a couple years ago on vacation and explicitly told me about this one calzone place that he loved so we made it our mission to find it for lunch on Sunday.  Luckily he gave us great directions and it was a phenomenal suggestion because it was the most delicious calzone I have ever had. They were absolutely massive though and all of our jaws dropped when they brought them out.  With our bellies more than full we made a pit stop one more time at the leather market in order to buy face masks because we were taking a day trip to another city that was celebrating “Carnevale”! My next post will describe our trip to Viareggio.

Florence was such a cute city and Tara was the best host! It was really exciting to be able to see another Clemson friend abroad.  We were able to share the similarities and differences of our study abroad experiences and loved going to all of her favorite local places.

Beautiful bridge

The many steps we climbed up to Piazza Michelangelo

Alpha Chi Omega sisters overlooking Florence

Yummy calzone from the restaurant Tyler recommended

The ladies in Tara's apartment

Rome (Italy Spring Break)

I spent my 2011 Spring Break in Italy with just my roommates, Laura and Tricia. It was everything I could have hoped for and so much more! We went to six different Italian cities in nine days, and each only took one backpack for all of our belongings. In order to keep my blog organized I am going to put each city in a different post starting with Rome.

[Thursday March 3^rd – Saturday March 5^th]

We began our Spring Break bright and early Thursday morning because our flight was at 6:20am. With our bags packed the night before we rolled out of bed at three in the morning and were out the door by 3:15am.  Because our flight was so early both the metro and train station were closed so we had to walk thirty minutes to the bus station and catch a 4am bus to the airport in order to make our flight.  When we were getting our tickets/passports approved we ran into our Clemson friend Bruce that is also studying abroad in Brussels. Somehow we did not previously realize that we’d all be in Rome the same weekend (he was meeting his mom there), but were excited because we were all on the same flight and now had a fourth travel buddy! The flight went smoothly and upon arriving in Rome we had to take another hour bus to the center of Rome, but were in the city by 11am and ready to see the sites.

Our hostel was in a great location so after dropping our backpacks off in the hostel we headed for our first taste of Italian food. We stopped at a small pizzeria and devoured our brick oven, thin crust, yummy margarita pizzas. Next stop was the Coliseum, my first world wonder! It is absolutely remarkable. We paid for a tour of the Coliseum and it was captivating to hear all about the games and gladiators.  While most of it is in ruins, it still has the original shape and is more massive than I imagined. This was definitely another surreal experience for all of us because it is so old and there is so much history within its walls. In addition to the Coliseum, the paid tour took a group of us throughout the Palatine Hill and Forum.  The Palatine Hill is the most famous of the Seven Hills of Rome and the emperor Domitian built his enormous palace on this hill around 81AD.  There is barely any of the actual structure left however the tour guide took us around the area that was previously occupied by the house and told us of all the extravagant things that were at one point in the palace – included a miniature stadium where they raced ponies instead of full horses.  The tour ended overlooking the Forum which is the oldest part of Rome and was at once the center of city life.  It now includes statues of honored Roman men and architectural fragments from that distant time. Laura, Tricia and I went down and walked throughout the ruins after the tour.  It was hard to grasp that some of these artifacts were built in B.C. times because we were able to walk all throughout them.  

We ended our historical day by treating ourselves to a real Italian dinner, since it was our first night in the wonderful country of Italy after all. The three of us split a bottle of wine and had bruschetta as an appetizer.  I ordered a spaghetti with meat sauce while the Tricia and Laura got spaghetti with tomato sauce and gnocci with pesto respectively.  Our favorite thing to do is all get a different meal so that we can try a little bit of everything. :) Our first meal would not have been complete without our first Italian gelato! Ice cream has always been a weakness of mine but after we tried our first real gelato we knew that it would not be our last over our week in Italy.

The tour guide that took us around the Palatine Hill and Forum had a tour of Vatican City at 10am on Friday so we woke up early and were on the metro by 9:30 Friday morning.  Unfortunately the Rome metro is not as fast as the metros we are accustomed to so we arrived at the metro stop at 10:15 and the tour had already left.  While we were momentarily disappointed we realized that there were probably many more tours available and started walking toward the infamous Vatican City.  As expected, there were people lining the streets with flyers for tours to go on. All of the options were very expensive because you have to pay to get into the Vatican period and then of course have to pay for a tour guide fee on top of that.  I was wary at first but we stumbled upon the best tour ever and it was definitely worth it.  Laura, Tricia and I were the only three to go on the tour so we had a personal tour guide throughout the Vatican City! He was from Amsterdam, spoke great English, and had a degree in art history.  We started the tour by walking through St. Peter’s square and learned about the history behind this small country.  He knew more information than we could have every asked for and since it was only the three of us we were able to ask as many questions as we wanted which made the tour much more personal. He then took us through the entrance of the Vatican City Museum and pointed out some of the most famous pieces.  The museum is a collection of the gifts and purchases of the popes throughout the years.  If you spent one minute at each of the pieces inside this museum for eighteen hours a day, it would take you over two weeks to see them all! Needless to say we did not see everything, but all of the things he pointed out to us were amazing.  There were statues, paintings, tapestries, and even a collection of huge marble bathtubs that were evidently very expensive.  One aspect of the museum that really baffled us girls was that all of the ceilings appeared to have intricate moldings however it was all actually flat! It is hard to describe but the depth perspective technique was the best I had ever seen.  Our tour guide then gave us a lengthy history about the Sistine Chapel and Michelangelo before we actually walked into chapel.   It was interesting to understand what each panel of the ceiling meant and the stories that went along with some of the unique characteristics of his work.  The next twenty minutes of our Rome experience was spent looking up at the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in awe – it truly is remarkable.  We tried to take pictures with our minds and remember it all because you are not allowed to take pictures inside.  Our three and a half hour tour ended after the Sistine Chapel and loved every minute of the tour! Firm believer in everything happens for a reason because if we had not missed our first intended tour then we would have never had the opportunity of having a personal tour.  The roomies and I then waited in line to go into St. Peter’s church by ourselves.  It is the world’s largest church and breathtaking inside!

After the Vatican City tour we went back to our hostel for fifteen minutes in order to quickly change clothes but then met up with our second tour of the day at 5pm.  This was a free walking tour (our favorite kind) around the city center and showed us the Pantheon, Trevi fountain, and Piazza Navona.  The Trevi Fountain was by far my favorite and so much larger than I expected! The water was crystal blue and the fountain itself was magnificent.  There is a myth that if you throw three coins over your shoulder you will return to Rome one day, so of course the three of us did!  The tour ended at the Piazza Navona which was a large open square with three fountains and several restaurants along the edges.  In the middle was the “Fountain of the Four Rivers” which was another remarkable fountain representing the four river gods – the Nile, the Danube, the Ganges and the Plate.  We met Bruce and his mother in the Piazza and all ate dinner together at one of the outdoor restaurants.  It was a perfect night outside so we all sat there for three hours and enjoyed another delicious pasta meal.  Laura, Tricia and I then walked to the top of the Spanish steps and saw the city at night.  After a long and filled day we took the night bus back to our hostel in order to wake up early and refreshed for our train to Florence.

Everyone says that you need three days in order to see all that Rome has to offer, however I can proudly say we saw almost all the sights in only two! Unfortunately it was raining for the majority of both days, but we did not let the bad weather slow us down. I saw my first world wonder and loved touring the Vatican City. We saw different ruins at every corner and had delicious Italian pizza and pasta each day. I threw a coin into the Trevi Fountain and am crossing my fingers that the myth is true and I will someday make my way back to Rome! 

Coliseum

In St. Peter's Square with my pink umbrella because of the rain!

Just hanging with the Roman ruins

Magnificent Trevi Fountain

Roommates, best friends and travel buddies

Bruge Day Trip

[February 25-27]

Everyone stayed in Brussels the last weekend of February because we had a scheduled day trip on Friday to Bruge.  After five straight weekends of traveling Thursday to Sunday it was nice to have a break.  In addition everyone had been traveling to different places on the weekends so we were all excited to actually spend a weekend together!

We all met at nine o'clock on Friday morning and took a one hour train to Bruge. It is another city in Belgium that is absolutely adorable.  There are cute little houses everywhere and it has a ton of shops and restaurants.  A tour guide walked us around for a little more than an hour pointing out historical sites and giving us the history of the city.  We then had the second half of the day to wander ourselves.  Laura, Tricia and I enjoyed a nice lunch and then explored the shops.  We purchased some Belgian chocolates that looked too scrumptious to pass up – and Belgian chocolates really are the best.  Unfortunately the weather was slightly gloomy outside so I am definitely looking forward to going back in April when my family comes to visit!! There were several places where our tour guide mentioned that flowers fill the fields in the spring and I am anxious to see them all =)

In addition to being a break from our travels it was convenient to stay in Brussels because it was the weekend before our finals. I was taking three classes the first two month session and had my accounting, marketing, and economics final the following week. None of us wanted to believe that our semester was already at its halfway point. Following our finals week however was our weeklong spring break so we were all super excited about that!  In addition the second two month session I only have one class that meets Monday and Wednesdays for two and a half hours and then my online class, much easier than the first session to say the least.

I definitely enjoyed relaxing in Brussels for the weekend and got a chance to spend time with the other students in our program as well as explore more of the country we live in. In addition my roommates and I were able to organize and prepare ourselves for our spring break extravaganza in Italy J

Canal

Main square of city

Roomies