Italy is a Dream that Keeps Returning for the Rest of Your Life

All my life I have dreamt about going to Italy and I still can not believe that I have travelled there.  The views, the architecture, the food; and what made it even better was the people that I got to share this experience with; Taylor, Ashley, Bridget, Cody, and even Nelson ;).  Although I was sad to leave this wonderful country, I know that in the future I will return. But for now I have memories and experiences that I can look back on until.


So now after that, let me dive in and tell you about how my holiday in Italy unfolded.  On Tuesday (3/31) we all raced back from our internships to catch a tube to catch our flight that was flying out to Amsterdam at 8:25 pm.  We were all a bit panicky because we were cutting it close.  After finally making it to the airport and rushing through security, we found out that our flight was delayed.  So we popped a squat and waited, we ended up waiting for more than two hours.  What a great way to start our trip.  We all got on the plane and landed in Schiphol airport around midnight.  Our flight to Venice wasn't flying out until 9:10 am, so we had a lot of time to do a lot of nothing.  A few of us tried napping, but it didn't go over to well.  I tried laying out on a bench in McDonalds, and I must of dozed of a little, because when  I woke some kid was staring at me...really weird.  We were then finally off to Italy.  Even though we were all utterly exhausted from not sleeping, we could not have been any more excited and anxious.  We landed in Venice, grabbed our travel day pass, and were off.

 

 

The view walking out of the Venice Santa Lucia train station was amazing.  Right in front of us was beautiful buildings, water, warm weather, and the sun was shining.  We stopped and took a few pictures, but the main thing on our mind was to find a place to eat.  We stumbled upon this little bar/café called Bacaro Jazz.  We were all very excited to try traditional Italian food and it definitely lived up to the hype.   I ordered lasagna.  We were than off to find were our free tour was.  We met up in Campo San Geremia and then were on our way to explore the city of Venice.  Our tour guide took us on my paths that tourists don't know about it and don't get to see.  We even got to visit the famous book store that has books in boats and a staircase made of books.  There were also cats, cats everywhere!  On this tour we also got our first taste of Italian gelato and that started our obsession for the rest of the week.  I swear we ate gelato everyday and sometimes twice a day, it was so delicious! 

 

 

Since we stored our luggage at the train station, we made our way back because we had to catch a midnight train to Rome that night.  After getting our luggage back, we found a cute little mom and pop Italian restaurant.  Since we had about four hours until our train we sat and relaxed.  I ordered spaghetti and it was of course very good.  We then went back to the train station and well lets just say we had a little bit of a problem with the train, but it all worked out in the end.  We got to Rome at about 7am and hung out in the station.

Now it was time to get to our hostel called the Prince Inn.  We dropped off our luggage and were off to our next free walking tour.  I really enjoyed this tour, because our guide took us to all of the main attractions and gave us some really interesting information about the history of the city.  The neatest thing we got to see were all of the ruins of the city.  It is amazing to think of all of the history that has happened here.  The tour ended with us seeing the Colosseum and that was absolutely amazing to see, because we have been studying this structure in school and Ashley and I even made a model of it Freshman year.  After our tour we were all starving and decided to wonder around and find some place to eat.  I got a tomato, mushroom, and prosciutto pizza and it was the best pizza I had while in Italy, or shall I say ever?.  For dessert I decided to get tiramisu and it was more a pudding consistency, but still good.  We then got back to the hostel to wait for Taylor's cousin, Cody, and his friend Nelson to get into the train station.  After we met up with them, we went and wondered around Rome to find food for them; boy was that a challenge.  After they finally decided on a place, we sat down, they ordered, ate, and then we called it a night and went back to the hostel.

The next day we decided to go venture to the Vatican.  We didn't go in anywhere, because there were so many people, but we did get to see it.  We then made a plan for the day and made our way to the Pantheon.  On the way to the Pantheon, we encountered some more ruins and without knowing it stumbled upon the Torre Argentina Cat Sanctuary which was literally in the ruins.  There were cats everywhere, it was kind of weird.  After that minor distraction, we were on our way again.  Seeing the Pantheon was pretty surreal, seeing as though this is also another structure we studied immensely.  Because we had been walking everywhere we were all starving, so we went to a restaurant where I again ordered lasagna and again it did not disappoint.  Our final destination was to go and watch the sunset on the Spanish Steps. There are a total of 135 steps and it was an great accomplishment climbing them I would say.  The view was absolutely breathtaking and it was a good end to our time in Rome.

The next morning we were off to Lucca, which is most commonly known as the walled city.  We left at about 5am to catch our train.  This day was the only day where the weather did not cooperate with us; it was very rainy.  That was alright though, because we just hung out and relaxed.  The city was very cute and quiet.  It was nice getting away from all of the commotion of London.  The place we stayed at was a little apartment that we got the opportunity of staying in due to connections Taylor's family had.  For lunch I got more pizza and for dinner I got more pasta with tiramisu of course!  We then went back to our apartment and had a scary movie night.  It was really nice just hanging out with each other.

For our last full day in Italy, we took a spontaneous trip to Pisa.  Lucca is only a 20 minute train ride from Pisa so we thought, why not?  When getting there, it was funny seeing all of the people taking their cliché photos with the Leaning Tower of Pisa and of course we had to take part in this fun.  The train rides there in back were really fun too.  All in all it was a good time.  This day was also Easter Sunday, and we were not sure if the city would be open, so we bought groceries the day before.   So for dinner the boys made us a pasta dinner and it was actually pretty good.  To end the night we went up to the terrace, ate cannolis and looked at the stars. It was really a great way to end our last night, especially when we scared Ashley close to death.  We had Nelson hide in the wardrobe in her room and when he jumped out we all though that she was going to have a heartache!  It was hilarious.  We all had to get up pretty early to catch our train back to Venice, I think we got a total of maybe three hours.  You can sleep when you're dead I guess they say.

 

 

 Monday was our last day in Italy and I could not believe how fast the week went.  We got to Venice and ate lunch at a nice restaurant.  I thought no better way to end a trip in Italy then to get pizza, and that I did.  I got a Hawaiian pizza, my favorite.  After eating, we made our way to a donut shop that Nelson and Cody said we had to go to.  After literally running through Venice, we finally made it.  We then had to Run back to the train station, because we had a plane to catch at 4pm.  Out of luck we made it back.  After getting to the airport, we all said our good byes and then we were off back to London.  After having a three hour layover in Rome, we got back home at about 1am.

I have to say that this week in Italy was probably one of the best weeks I have had and it was definitely needed.  I will definitely make it my mission to come back to Italy sometime in the future.  The memories that I have made I will have for a lifetime and it honestly felt like a second home.  One of the main reason that I wanted to visit Italy is because of my heritage.  Some times throughout the weekend, I would just take a step back, and I could not stop thinking about my grandparents and how I wished that they could have spent this time with me.  I am glad, however that I had such great friends to share this experience with.  All of the laughs and joking around really lifted my spirits and made this time so great. 

Well that was my time in Italy.  As of right now I come home in about nine days, so I hope you all are ready ;).  Until then stay safe and I love you all! Cheers -Heather