Italia!

Well, I just got back from Italy, and it was incredible! I can’t believe how much Amy and I were able to pack into one week. We flew out of Seville to Rome last Saturday morning. Once we got to the airport in Rome, we had to take a train into the city. We then found our hostel right away. It was actually pretty nice. I was surprised for it being a hostel how nice it actually was. Amy and I had our own room, and we had to share a bathroom, which was fine, except the bathroom was kind of dirty. The hostel also provided breakfast every morning which was nice. So here is what we did in Rome: Trevi fountain, which was beautiful, and much bigger than I had expected, the Spanish steps- Amy and I climbed them several times, St. Peter’s Basilica, which since we were there on a Sunday, we were able to watch mass which was outside, and the archbishop of Spain was there speaking, the Vatican- contains the Sistene Chapel, the Pantheon, and finally the Ancient City which contains Palatine Hill and the Colloseum. Everything that we were able to do was incredible, but I think what I loved the most was the Ancient City… walking around all of the ancient roman ruins was really incredible, and we went inside the Colloseum, which was very different inside than I was expecting, but still really cool to be able to see. Here are some pictures of Rome...

Trevi Fountain


This is an ancient castle and the bridge is the oldest in Rome


Me in front of St. Peter's Basilica


The Colloseum


The inside of the Colloseum


The Roman ruins at Palatine Hill




Amy and I were able to be girls and go shopping also, and there were so many vendors and markets in the streets. Also, Amy and I both love McDonald’s Mcflurries… in the states there are only a few flavors… well in Spain, they have three different ones- kit kat, m&m, and some chocolate one… there is McDonald’s right by the school, so we tend to frequent it…. Well, when we got to Rome, we wanted some mcflurries… (yeah, I know… I was in Italy… gelato right? Well we got gelato too, but got mcflurries most of the time!)… so anyways, we headed over to the McDonald’s in Rome, and found out they had Nutella flavored mcflurries… If anyone has never tasted nutella (Ryan), you probably should, because it’s incredible, and even better with ice cream! Needless to say, Amy and I went to McDonald’s quite a few times…. We realized this would be the only time in our lives when we would be able to order it, so we took advantage of it! It was amazing! We were in Rome for two and a half days, and then took a train to Florence. Florence was a much more peaceful city than Rome, and it was good to be more relaxed after being in Rome, which wore us out. When we were in Florence we went to the Accademia, which is the museum that has Michelangelo’s David- I loved it… Amy and I both had imagined a statue that was true to life size… you know, a guy 6 feet tall or something like that… but it was huge… I had no idea how big it was… also, the hands on David are obviously too big for the rest of the body. I had never noticed in pictures before, but it was really obvious… apparently Michelangelo had been criticized a lot for this mistake, but regardless, it was still really amazing to see. Amy and I also went to the Duomo in Florence, which is this a Cathedral… and is the world’s third largest cathedral of its type, and it was huge… we were able to climb almost 500 steps to get to the top, where there was a little balcony area, and we could see the whole city. It was incredible. There also is a leather school in Florence, and we were able to go in, and watch people making things from leather… purses, wallets, bracelets, etc. It was pretty cool. We also went to this Basilica which had the tombs/crypts inside of people like Michelangelo, Da Vinci, Galileo, and Dante. Finally, we went to the Boboli Gardens which were beautiful. There were all these trails, and fountains, and look out points where you could see the whole city. From the gardens we were able to see the actual city of Florence, and the countryside of it. It was beautiful. Here are some pictures of Florence.

The view from the top of the Duomo

Me in the Boboli Gardens, in front of the countryside view of Florence

We were in Florence for two and a half days, and then took a train to Pisa, where we were only there for an afternoon. While there, we of course, saw the tower, which was pretty cool to be at. Around the tower there were several things to do, so we went into this church type thing (I’m still not entirely sure what it was), we went to some crypt thing, which I found rather creepy, and then we went to a small museum.

The Leaning Tower of Pisa

After we were done in the city, we headed back over to the train station, and rode the train to the airport in Pisa. This was on Friday night, and we were flying out at 6:15 this morning (Saturday)… It just happened to occur this way, that there were about 10 other students from our school who were all taking the same flight back with us… we knew this before hand, and we all decided we would just sleep in the airport overnight because it would be easier than having to check out of a hostel at 4am, not to mention cheaper… Well, not too longer after we were there, did we find out that this airport closed between 1-4am…. Great…. Well, Amy and I decided to ask some people who worked there what we could do… if there were any hostels nearby or anything… which there weren’t…. this one pilot was helping us out, and told us he would open up the airport’s outdoor café for us to sit in… it was just a covered area, and not exactly inside… anyways so about 15 of us were huddled inside this covered outdoor café for 3 hours, in the middle of the night…. It was so cold…. It seriously felt like we were out there forever, but eventually we were let back into the airport, and we flew back to Seville without any problems. So that is my trip. I hope you guys enjoyed reading about it, and seeing the pictures. I have 6 more weeks until I come back home. I definitely am looking forward to coming home, but there is definitely a part of me that will miss this little world of mine over here in Spain. I will see you all soon!