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Florence Diaries 19: Athens

We took our last trip of the semester last weekend, and it definitely didn’t disappoint - it’s hard to pick a favorite city, because each one was awesome in its own way, but let me just tell you how much I loved Athens.

Greece was probably the country I wanted to see most going into this semester, and my roommate Eliza and I had managed to get round-trip plane tickets for around fifty euros back in September, so we had been looking forward to this trip for a while. But in the days leading up to it, I admittedly wasn’t super excited - when I pictured myself going to Greece prior to planning this trip, I always imagined going to the islands rather than the city in the middle of winter, and as exciting as travelling is, doing it every weekend definitely gets exhausting after a while. But Athens was so much better than I ever imagined it would be, and it gave every other city I’ve been to some serious competition!

On Friday morning, Eliza and I got up early and caught a bus from Florence to Bologna, and then a shuttle to the Bologna airport. There, we met up with two other friends, Kitzel and Lauren, who happened to be going to Athens the same weekend. The flight was uneventful, and soon enough we were on the ground in Athens!

From the Athens airport, we took a train to Syntagma Square (the main square in Athens) and then walked to our hostel to check in. By that point it was pretty late in the afternoon, so we made plans to meet up with Kitzel and Lauren for dinner at a Greek restaurant. Greek food has been one of my favorites for years so I was excited to try the real thing. I had pastitsio, which is sort of similar to lasagna, and it definitely didn’t disappoint!

The next morning, we headed to the center of the city, and our first stop was the Olympeieon, a group of ancient temple ruins near the Acropolis. The Olympeieon itself was really cool - it’s hard to wrap my head around the fact that parts of Athens have existed for literally thousands of years - but even better was our first encounter with the stray cats of Athens. I didn’t realize this going into the weekend, but in Athens there are cats everywhere, and they’re all super friendly. We probably spent even more time petting the cats than actually looking at the ruins.

Then, we stumbled across a park with some cool walking trails, one of which led to the top of a hill from which we had a great view of the whole city. After that we headed to the central market, thinking that markets are generally good places to find cheap, local food, but once we got there, it didn’t take long to figure out that this was not that type of market. The first area we walked through was full of butchers selling meat that was still a little too recognizable, and from there we found the seafood area, which smelled about as strong as you would imagine. And there wasn’t a tourist in sight - just Greek people buying their groceries for the week. It was cool to see, but definitely not what we were expecting!

Then we managed to find actual food for lunch, and then we headed back towards the main part of the city, and wandered through Plaka (a neighborhood at the base of the Acropolis) for a while. Then we headed up to the top of a second hill nearby just in time to see the sunset!

It was a pretty cloudy day, so the sunset wasn’t super impressive, but it was still beautiful, and we took lots of pictures. Then we met up with Kitzel and Lauren for dinner again, and then we all finished the night by walking back to Syntagma Square, where we looked at the Christmas lights and then bought baklava for dessert.

The next morning we headed straight for the Acropolis (we had saved it for Sunday because admission happened to be free that day!) and hiked to the top. We spent a while exploring and taking pictures, and then headed back to the bottom of the hill to check out the Acropolis Museum, which ended up being one of my favorite museums this semester. After that, we grabbed gyros on our way to the train station, and then we started our long but uneventful trip back to Florence!

We made it back to Florence a little after nine, and went straight to the Christmas Market at Santa Croce to meet up with Erin and Grace for dinner. And the next day marked the start of our last week of classes for the semester!

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Florence Diaries 18: A Visit From My Parents

This past week was one I had been looking forward to for a long time: I finally had the chance to show my parents around Florence! They arrived last Tuesday and left this morning, and we managed to squeeze a ton of different stuff into seven days.

On Tuesday afternoon, I met my parents at their hotel, and we headed out for a walking tour of Florence. I showed them all of the highlights - the Ponte Vecchio, the Duomo and Baptistery, Piazza della Repubblica and Piazza della Signoria, the Oltrarno, and more - and then we headed back to my apartment before going out for aperitivo at a place nearby. Then we finished the night with gelato at Vivoli, so it was a great start to the week!

I had class for a couple of hours on Wednesday, so I sent my parents to explore the Uffizi, the Galleria dell’Accademia, and Santa Croce while I was gone. When my last class was over, we met back up and headed up to Piazzale Michelangelo to try to catch the sunset.

The sky was pretty cloudy that night, so the sunset wasn’t super impressive, but the view of the city definitely didn’t disappoint. Then, after taking a few more pictures, we headed to San Miniato al Monte to catch the evening Mass. For dinner, we tried a new pizza place that ended up being amazing, and then we had more gelato at Gelateria dei Neri, which is my personal favorite spot!

On Thursday morning we had cappuccini and bomboloni at a cafe near my apartment, and then wandered around town for a bit while we waited for the main museums and churches to open at 10. Our first stop after that was the Duomo (this was the first time I had actually been inside this semester!), and then we hit the Palazzo Vecchio to climb the tower and take in the views from there. Then we grabbed panini at my favorite spot near CAPA and ate our sandwiches while walking to the bus station.

We caught our bus to Greve in Chianti just in time, and we made it there in about an hour. We spent most of the afternoon doing a wine tasting at Enoteca Falorni, which was amazing, and then we explored the rest of Greve and grabbed hot chocolate before heading back to Florence in the evening.

Once we were back in Florence, we headed straight to Trattoria Za Za for dinner. Even though it wasn’t exactly a Thanksgiving dinner, the food was still amazing, so it was the best possible substitute for this year!

On Friday morning, we had more cappuccini and croissants at another favorite cafe, and then we caught a train to Rome. Once in Rome, after dropping our stuff at the hotel we were staying in that night, we did a self-guided walking tour of some of the main attractions, including the Colosseum, the Forum, the Pantheon, Piazza Navona, the Trevi Fountain, and the Spanish Steps.

The next morning, we had scheduled a guided tour of Vatican City, so we had an early start to meet up with our group. On the tour, we checked out the Vatican Museums, the Sistine Chapel, and St. Peter’s Basilica, all of which were amazing, and after the tour finished, we climbed the dome of St. Peter’s to get more awesome views.

We spent the rest of the day eating lunch and shopping for souvenirs while we made our way back to the hotel, and we killed the last bit of time before our train back to Florence by drinking a glass of wine in our hotel’s lounge. We arrived back in Florence around 9 PM, and then we tried to have a late dinner at a place that had been recommended to Dad. But before we had a chance to order, the power went out for the whole block, and by the time it finally came back on, it was a little too late for a big dinner.

So we ended up eating more gelato for dinner, and then we called it a night. The next morning, I met my parents for breakfast at their hotel, and then we took some time to watch the Florence Marathon before heading to Pitti Palace for one last museum visit. After exploring the different exhibitions there, we made a quick stop to check out Piazza Santo Spirito before spending some time shopping for souvenirs at the Mercato del Porcellino. Then we checked out Orsanmichele briefly, and headed back to the hotel to check out their bar.

The bar was on the top floor of the building and had a deck with great views of the city, and, even better, the rain that had been around all week cleared up just in time for the sunset and made the most amazing rainbow right over the Duomo. The pictures don’t even begin to do it justice!

After that, we hopped on a bus to my Ganzo family’s house to have dinner with them. They were so nice to invite us over and they gave us such great food, and it was so cool to have the opportunity to introduce everyone!

And today, for our last morning, we headed back to the cafe that my parents liked best and hung out for a while until my first class. Then they walked me back to CAPA and we said goodbye for three more weeks!

All in all, it was an amazing week - we squeezed so much in and it was so cool to have the opportunity to try some new places with my parents, and show them a few of my favorites. Now I’m down to two more weeks of classes and one week of finals, and then we’ll all be back together again for Christmas! Until then, I’m planning to do my best to enjoy one last weekend trip and everything that Florence has to offer! :))

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Florence Diaries 17: Berlin

My most recent weekend trip was to Berlin, and this one was even more special than all of the ones that came before it, because I wasn’t just going as a tourist - I was going to meet up with my friend Feli, who I’ve been writing letters to since we were first introduced as part of an assignment for my high school German class in 2013, but who I had never actually met in person! This trip was even better than I could have ever hoped it would be, and it was definitely one of my favorites so far.

At 3:30 on Thursday afternoon, I caught a train from Florence to Milan, and once I was in Milan, I hopped on the shuttle from the main train station to the Malpensa airport. Luckily I had no issues with my travel (I’m hoping I maxed out on travel issues during my trip to Lake Como!) and I made it to the airport with plenty of time before my flight to Berlin.

Once we boarded the plane, we had to wait for a while because there was some issue with people’s travel documents, but we made it out of the airport eventually, and after that, the flight was uneventful. I finally landed in Berlin around 11:30 that night, and Feli was waiting to pick me up!

We hit it off right away, and took a taxi from the airport to her family’s home just outside the city. Her mom had made soup for us so we had a late dinner, and then headed to bed since we had a busy day ahead of us!

We started the next morning with breakfast at home, and then hopped on a bus and then a train to get to the Brandenburg Gate. We took a few pictures there and then visited the Reichstag and the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, and then walked from there to Checkpoint Charlie. After that we took photos at one of Berlin’s ubiquitous Photoautomats, and then checked out the East Side Gallery (the part of the Berlin Wall that is still standing, and has been decorated with tons of different murals) before grabbing currywurst for lunch. Then we headed to a coffee shop to get out of the cold for a bit, and for the rest of the afternoon, we checked out a couple of cute shops.

Feli’s parents had made reservations at a traditional German restaurant for dinner that night, so after we finished shopping, we headed back to her house to hang out for a little while before leaving for the restaurant. Dinner was amazing (I definitely think German food is my favorite of all the different cuisines I’ve tried this semester) and it was so nice to have a chance to get to know Feli’s whole family. After dinner, we headed to a bar where we had glüwein, and that was all for Friday!

On Saturday, we slept in for a little while, and then we headed into the city again. Our first stop was the Panoramapunkt at Potsdamer Platz, where we were able to see super cool views of the whole city, and then we headed to Museum Island to check out the Alte Nationalgalerie. After spending a few hours there, we grabbed döner (a German-Turkish specialty, so good!) for lunch.

Our next stop was the Berliner Dom, which was beautiful. We happened to walk into the main sanctuary space just as an orchestra was finishing their rehearsal for the concert they were putting on that night, so that was super cool to see! Then we checked out the church’s museum space before heading up to the top of the dome, where we got more panoramic views of the city, this time just in time for the sunset.

After that, we headed back to Museum Island to check out the Pergamon Museum. Unfortunately it closed before we were able to see everything, but it was still super cool! Then we headed back to Feli’s house for dinner, and at the end of the night, we watched a movie.

We got up super early the next morning to catch a train to the airport, and then said our goodbyes for now. I didn’t have any issues getting back to Florence either (the only annoying thing was that the cheapest train trip from Milan back to Florence involved three transfers and took more than five hours!) and I was back in time for dinner with my roommates.

Berlin would have been impressive enough on its own, but it was so much better to see it with Feli. It’s crazy to think that a pen friendship that started more than five years ago would lead to friendship in real life, but I wouldn’t have it any other way! She made a great tour guide and her parents were so wonderful and generous to let me stay with them, and I can’t even begin to say how thankful I am for this trip.

Now I only have one last weekend trip - this time to Athens - and then I’m done travelling for a little while. While it’ll definitely be nice to stop spending money on flights and to have a little more free time on the weekends, I’ll definitely miss being able to jet around Europe so easily!

But for now, I’m getting ready to finally show my parents around Florence. It will be a busy few days, but I’m so excited! ❤︎

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Florence Diaries 16: Weeks Ten and Eleven

Now that I have less than a month left in Florence (!!), I’m starting to think about all of the things on my study abroad bucket list that I still haven’t done, and I’ve been pretty busy trying to squeeze everything in! Here’s another update on what I’ve been up to between weekend trips...

Last Monday, right after I got back from Lake Como, I got back into my normal routine with my Renaissance Literature class. Afterwards, I tried a new panino place that one of my friends had recommended, and then I headed back to school in time for Italian. And in the afternoon, I headed to my favorite café to get some work done before dinner with my roommates.

Tuesday’s Renaissance Art class involved a field trip to the churches of Santa Trinita and Orsanmichele, both of which were beautiful. The picture below is of Orsanmichele - unfortunately the main altar was under restoration when we were there, but you can still see how cool it is!

Italian was cancelled on Tuesday, so I spent most of the afternoon getting homework done in the library at CAPA. After that, CAPA hosted another language exchange with local high school students, and then my roommate Grace and I headed to a coffee shop close to school to get bomboloni, which are a type of donut (arguably better than any I’ve ever had in the U.S.) that are served fresh at 5 PM almost every day. Shortly after that I met up with my Ganzo family at their home for another evening of games and dinner, and that was about all for Tuesday!

On Wednesday we had another field trip, this time to the educational department at the Uffizi Gallery. We got to check out some of the resources they have to help blind visitors engage with their artwork - like relief carvings of some of their most famous paintings that allow you to feel the design with your hands - which was so cool! Then I had my history class, where I had to give a presentation, and shortly after I came home, my roommate Erin and I headed out to another cooking class.

We got super lost on the way there and ended up being twenty minutes late, but we made it eventually, and I was so glad we did, because the second cooking class was just as good as the first! This time, we made crostini topped with white beans and kale (which I would probably have never ordered if I saw it on a menu, but was so good), fresh tortellini with a meat and cheese filling, and panettone for dessert. The food was all amazing, and the experience of cooking it ourselves made it even better!

On Thursday afternoon I left for my next weekend trip, but I still had the morning to spend in Florence, and because my normal Thursday morning volunteering gig was cancelled, I was able to sleep in and then check out a new café with Erin. Then I headed to CAPA in time for Italian, and when that was done, I ran home to pack up my stuff, and then I stopped for a panino at one of my favorite places and ate it on a bench right by the Duomo. Then it was time to catch my train to Milan and start the next adventure!

Berlin probably warrants its own post, so I’ll get into that later. But to get caught up as far as possible, here’s what went down today...

In my Renaissance Literature class we had presentations, and then I headed home to make lunch before going back to CAPA for Italian. Then, as I’ve started doing most Monday afternoons, I spent a few hours at my favorite café doing homework. While I was there I realized I had left my apartment keys at home, so I waited around until I knew my roommates would be home to let me in, and then we ate dinner together. After that, Grace and I headed out for hot chocolate, and since then I’ve been back at home getting caught up on my last bit of homework before my parents arrive in Florence tomorrow! Lots of fun to come :))

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Florence Diaries 15: Lake Como

Last weekend, for the first time in a few weeks, I stayed in Italy - but instead of spending the whole weekend in Florence, I spent three days in Lake Como!

Lake Como is in the northernmost part of Italy, just a few miles from the border with Switzerland. That means it’s right by the Alps, and also that it’s easily the most beautiful place I’ve seen so far this semester, if not in my life. The mountains are some of the tallest I’ve ever seen, the villages are built into the hills, the fall foliage was at its peak, and the water is perfectly clear and blue. The weather wasn’t great while I was there, but it was still amazing.

That is, it was amazing once I finally got there - I made up for the fact that I hadn’t really experienced any travel issues during any of my other trips by having a ton in the process of getting to Como.

The cheapest trip involved taking a train and transferring three different times, in Bologna, then Piacenza, and then Milan, before finally arriving in Como. My first two trains were uneventful, but on the way from Piacenza to Milan, the train stopped on the tracks for a while with no explanation, and shortly after it started moving again, it pulled into a random station and everyone got off and changed to a different train on the next platform over. But again, there was no explanation, and I wasn’t confident enough in my Italian skills to ask someone what was happening, so I just followed the crowd.

Luckily, on the new train there was a map right by my seat, so I was able to see where I was and figure out that I was still heading towards Milan. So I hung out on that train for a while, assuming that it would take me to the same station I was originally supposed to go to. Buuuut before long I ended up in the Milan subway system, and rather than stay on the train when I didn’t know where it was headed, I decided it would be better to just get off at a subway station and regroup from there.

So I looked at a subway map and figured out which line I needed to take to get to the main station in Milan, assuming that I’d be able to get to Como easily from there, but as I was following the signs to the right platform, I came across a board listing upcoming train departures, and saw that a train was leaving for Como from the station I was already in almost immediately. So I hustled to that platform only to see the train drive away without me, and then spent the next hour waiting in the station for the next train to Como.

The other exciting element of this day was that my Italian phone company had cut off my data unexpectedly right before I left for Como, so I could only use my phone to get directions and to text the people I was travelling with (they had all gone to Como on Thursday night and were planning to meet me there on Friday, which is why I was travelling by myself in the first place) when I had wifi. Luckily the train station I was waiting in in Milan had wifi, so I was good to go for a little while, but I lost my connection once I finally caught the next train to Como, and when I finally did get to Como, that train station didn’t have wifi either. But I knew the address of our Airbnb and was able to ask at an information desk how to get the bus there. When the bus arrived, I just had to get on and hope for the best.

The bus ride to the right town took about an hour, and I managed to find my stop by looking at the street signs as I went along. From there, I walked along the main road until I found a free wifi signal, and then I was able to text my friends and meet up with them for lunch. So ultimately I survived my trip to Como, but it was definitely one of those situations that makes you think about all of the what-ifs that could have made the situation so much worse!

Anyway, like I said, Como was perfect after I finally got there. On the first day, we took a bus to Menaggio and explored for a bit, and at the end of the evening, we stopped at a little grocery store to buy ingredients for dinner so we could cook dinner back at the Airbnb. That was actually one of the highlights of the trip: most of my other trips this semester have been with my roommates, but the trip to Lake Como was with five other girls I hadn’t travelled with before, so it ended up being a great chance to get to know a few of the people in the program a little better!

On our second day, we had to wait around for a while to catch a ferry to Bellagio, one of the biggest towns around Lake Como. Once we were in Bellagio, we spent most of the day shopping. We also had lunch at a really cool restaurant, and it was another one of the best meals I’ve eaten this semester: I had pizza with pear and walnuts, which sounds like a strange combination, but was so good.

On the second evening, we cooked at the Airbnb again, and spent the rest of the night hanging out and playing games. And the next morning, when a couple of the others crossed the border into Switzerland, me and one of my friends, Leanne, spent some extra time exploring the waterfront at Como and then headed to Milan. I would have loved to have gone to Switzerland, but I wasn’t completely sure I would have time before my train back to Florence, so I stuck with Milan. Even though we only ended up being there for about two hours, it was fun and definitely worth seeing!

My train back to Florence left Milan around 5 PM, and I was back at my apartment by 11. It was another busy weekend, but so worth it to see Lake Como and to hang out with a new group of people!

The next week was also busy - I had a long list of things I needed to get done before my trip to Berlin this past weekend, and also a bunch of CAPA-sponsored events to look forward to - but it was another great week! More on all of that later :))

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Florence Diaries 13: Budapest & Vienna

Things have been crazy around here and I’m almost two weeks behind on updates now: so here’s the rundown on my trip to Budapest and Vienna two weekends ago! Stay tuned for many more updates to come...

I had actually tried to plan a trip to Budapest and Vienna earlier in the semester through a local tour company, but the trip was cancelled when not enough people signed up, so I had to postpone to the weekend right after Halloween. The timing worked out really well because November 1st, All Saints Day, is a national holiday in Italy, so school was cancelled and I had an extra day to travel!

I traveled and stayed in a hostel with my roommate Eliza and another friend Kitzel, but for the most part, we explored the cities by ourselves each day. At first I was a little hesitant about being by myself in a totally unfamiliar city, but in the end, I was really glad it worked out that way!

We took a bus from Florence to Vienna overnight from Wednesday to Thursday, and as soon as we got to Vienna, we hopped on a second bus to Budapest. We arrived in the city around 8 AM on Thursday, took a subway and a tram to get to the area our hostel was in, and then killed some time by eating breakfast and trying to find a bank where we could get our hands on some Hungarian currency. We were finally able to check in around 10, and from there we all split up and started exploring the city.

Honestly, after my first day in Budapest, I didn’t really get what all the hype was about: Budapest is a popular destination for students studying abroad in Europe, but I went into the trip with almost no plan for what to do and ended up spending my whole first day on the Pest side of the Danube (the city wasn’t always “Budapest,” but was actually two separate cities called “Buda” and “Pest” on two different sides of the river until 1873). But little did I know at first, all of the interesting stuff to do is on the Buda side. So even though I wasn’t necessarily impressed at first, I definitely came around after exploring Buda on my second day!

But that’s not to say that my first day in Budapest wasn’t cool: I visited the Hungarian Parliament Building, which is probably one of the most recognizable buildings in the city, I spent some time exploring Margaret Island, and I also stumbled across a cat cafe (where, unsurprisingly, you drink coffee and pet cats) and spent some time there in the late afternoon. After that, I met back up with Eliza for dinner, and then we visited a few of the famous ruin bars briefly before heading back to our hostel for the night.

And like I said, my second day in Budapest was even better than the first! After learning the hard way that it’s definitely better to go into a new city with a plan for what to see and do, I made a list of the top attractions in Budapest, and managed to see most of them by the end of the day.

My first stop was the Shoes on the Danube Bank memorial, which commemorates the thousands of Jews who were killed by fascist militiamen during World War II. From there, I headed for the Chain Bridge, which connects Buda and Pest, and finally made my way to the other side of the Danube, where I saw Buda Castle, Fisherman’s Bastion, St. Stephen’s Basilica, and more. The weather was beautiful that day, so I also stopped for a little while in a little park to read my book, and then shopped for souvenirs and bought hot chocolate at a cafe before heading back across the river.

My next stop was the Central Market Hall, and to get there, I took a walk along the Danube. Like I said, the weather was amazing, and all of the leaves on the trees along the river had changed, so it was a great day for it!

At the Central Market Hall, I tried two different types of lángos, which is a fried bread (kind of like pizza dough) that can be eaten with tons of different toppings. As I kept walking through the city, I came across a couple of really cool street performers, and, maybe more importantly, a Christmas tree being decorated in one of the squares! I love Thanksgiving and I’m so sad to be missing it this year, but if not celebrating means I can skip from Halloween straight to Christmas without judgement, I’m all for it.

Shortly after that, Eliza texted me to say that she had found a cheap place to buy kürtőskalács (or chimney cake, another Hungarian specialty!), so I headed there and grabbed one for my walk to Heroes Square. There really wasn’t much to see there at night, but it was still pretty cool: I recognized a lot of the figures represented from also being commemorated in the Hungarian Nationality Room back at Pitt. :))

And after that, I headed back to the hostel and went to bed early, because we had a 4:30 wake-up call the next day to catch our bus to Vienna!

Our first stop in Vienna was the Stephansplatz, where we were able to hook up with a free walking tour of the city. That allowed us to hit all the highlights in a short period of time, so it was a great way to start the day!

The walking tour finished around lunchtime, so we stopped at a street food stand and bought weisswurst. Then we spent some time shopping, and in the afternoon, we stopped for apple strudel (this trip was allll about making the most of the food in each city). We made a quick stop at Domkirche St. Stephan, one of the most famous churches in Vienna, and then spend the rest of the time before dinner wandering around the city.

For dinner we found a place with cheap Wiener schnitzel and Sachertorte, and then we had to make our way back to the bus station to catch our bus back to Florence. And thirteen hours later, we were back in Florence!

Even though I wasn’t crazy about Budapest at first, I think it’s safe to say that it ended up being one of my favorite cities so far, and I loved Vienna too. I’m also really glad that I had the opportunity to travel by myself, because even though it was a little overwhelming at first, I got to make the whole trip my own.

Because we got home early Sunday morning, we still had all day on Sunday to enjoy Florence, and we definitely made the most of it - but there will be more on that to come soon! Stay tuned...

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Florence Diaries 12: Amsterdam

Even though it’s followed very closely by Brussels, I think Amsterdam was my favorite of the cities we visited during fall break. We only had one day there, so I’m definitely anxious to go back someday, but what I saw of the city during this trip was awesome!

Getting there was tricky, though: we had bought bus tickets from Brussels for around 7 AM on Thursday morning, but we waited for almost two hours at the meeting point, and the bus just never showed up. So we had to come up with a Plan B, and we ended up buying new tickets with another bus company, but then had to take the subway back to the other side of town to get to their meeting point. So we ended up getting to Amsterdam later than expected, but eventually we made it in one piece!

We actually spent three days in Amsterdam, but we only actually went downtown for one of them, because taking public transportation between Wormerveer, the town our Airbnb was in, and the main train station was pretty expensive. When we finally got to the Netherlands on Thursday, we immediately went to Wormerveer to check in, and ended up spending a few hours in a coffee shop there. I had my first chai latte in months (in Italy, it’s pretty difficult to come by anything except coffee and tea), and I also managed to find a bakery where I could get cheap banana bread, so I was happy.

After hanging out at the coffee shop, we still had some time to kill before we could officially check into our Airbnb, so we wandered in and out of a couple of different stores. At one clothing shop, the owner must have overheard us speaking with American accents, so he came over and started chatting with us and telling us how excited he was to see that tourists were coming to the area, which has apparently grown a lot in the past few years. He asked us where we were from, and when we said the East Coast, he said “oh, San Francisco?” and we were like, no, the opposite. :)) The closest city to Pittsburgh he had heard of was New York, so when we left, he asked to take a picture of the “tourists from New York” to show the local government to prove that tourism is growing in Wormerveer. So that was kind of cool!

Anyway, when we finally made it to the Airbnb, our host let us in and showed us around a little, and then we all crashed for a while. Then, we decided to have dinner at the Chinese restaurant on the floor below the apartment, and then we headed to bed early so we could get up the next day in plenty of time to spend a full day in Amsterdam.

This time of year, the sun doesn’t rise in Amsterdam until close to 8 AM. Plus, it was a pretty cold and rainy day, so when we first got downtown, we found another coffee shop to hang out and eat breakfast in for a while. Then, we started walking along the canals in the direction of the main museums, and soon we made it to the Rijksmuseum.

My roommates all wanted to go to the Van Gogh Museum, but I’d been wanting to see the Rijksmuseum for a while, so we went our separate ways for a little while in the afternoon. I saw tons of cool stuff, like Rembrandt’s The Night Watch (unfortunately, the other most famous painting at the Rijksmuseum - Vermeer’s The Milkmaid - is on loan at a museum in Japan right now, so I didn’t get to see that one). When I was done, I hooked back up with my roommate Eliza, and we spent the rest of the afternoon shopping.

While we were checking out the Bloemenmarkt, we saw this cheese shop that we had heard good things about, so we decided to check it out. They had tons of free samples, so of course we ate them until we started to get nervous that the staff would kick us out for taking too many, and they were all amazing. When we finally left the store, we walked another block, and to our excitement stumbled across a second branch of the exact same cheese store! So naturally we acted like we hadn’t just tried all the samples at the first store, and tried all of this store’s samples too. And then we went for round three at a third location. It was arguably the highlight of the day.

Soon after, we met up with our other two roommates, and made our way to a bar we had seen earlier in the day, which we were excited to try because they advertised cheap glühwein (hot, spiced wine) on a sign outside the entrance. We ended up sitting on the steps inside the bar while we waited for a table to open up, and then we ordered meatball sandwiches and hung out for a while. It was so nice to be able to warm up after a long day spent mostly outside.

On our way back to the train station at the end of the night, we took a detour through the Red Light District, and then we headed back to our Airbnb. The next day, we slept in and then spent a few more hours at the same coffee shop as on Thursday, and then we headed to the airport!

We made it back to Florence a little after midnight last night. It was definitely an exhausting week, but completely worth it! Almost all of my remaining weekends are booked with travel, so it’ll be a busy few weeks, but I’ve loved the travelling I’ve done so far and I’m excited to see what is to come!

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Florence Diaries 11: Brussels

Monday was pretty cold and dreary, so it was a good day to spend on a bus travelling between Paris and Brussels. Like I mentioned before, our bus left from Charles de Gaulle airport early in the afternoon. After a short transfer in Lille, we got to Brussels around 7, and had a little bit of time to explore downtown before making our way to our next Airbnb!

We were hungry after a day of mostly travelling, so when we arrived downtown, we found a shop where we could buy frites. We ate while standing in Brussels’ main square, and then wandered in and out of a few stores. Soon after, we caught a bus to our apartment a little ways outside the city center, and we called it a night!

The next morning, we had a little more trouble getting into town than we had had before: we couldn’t find anywhere to buy bus tickets, so we tried to take the subway instead, but accidentally bought train tickets instead and then couldn’t find the right platform. But luckily we made it eventually, and our first day in Brussels was great!

We started off by finding a place to get waffles (the best part of being in Belgium was arguably the fact that we ate frites, waffles, chocolate, and beer for almost every meal), and then we spent most of the rest of the day checking out different shops around the city. We found a couple of really cool secondhand clothing stores, including one where you paid for your clothes by the kilogram, and one called Episode that was a little more expensive but had tons of really cool stuff. We also found stores for tea, soaps, chocolate, random gifts, and tons of other things, and even though we didn’t buy much, it was fun to spend the day window shopping.

We ended the first day by getting more frites for dinner, and then we headed home again. We spent the next day doing pretty much the exact same thing as the first - eating waffles, browsing for secondhand clothes, and checking out different stores. We also did the Magritte Museum, which was very cool, and visited the Manneken Pis statue (which I think is a little creepy, but given how beloved he apparently is, who am I to judge?). Then we bought more chocolate, went to a bar and got flights of beer, and stopped at a meatball restaurant for dinner. And then we said goodbye to Brussels!

Our bus ride to Amsterdam presented probably the biggest headache of all of our travels, but it was definitely worth it in the end. But I’ll get into all of that later!

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Florence Diaries 10: Paris

It’s been a little longer than usual since I’ve written an update, but for good reason - my roommates and I just got back from our fall break trip! We’ve spent the last week travelling between Paris, Brussels, and Amsterdam. Since Tumblr doesn’t always let me upload more than a few pictures at a time, I’ll make a separate post for each city. So here’s Paris!

We learned pretty early on in the semester that it’s a lot cheaper to fly from the other airports around Florence than to fly out of the Florence airport itself, so we booked our flight to Paris from Pisa for early Friday morning. Our flight didn’t leave until around 6 on Friday, but because it was international we had to be at the airport closer to 4, and on top of that, the only train that would get us to Pisa in enough time left Florence a little after midnight. So we left our apartment around 11 PM on Thursday night, and prepared to pull an all-nighter of travelling!

It was still too early to catch the airport shuttle from the Pisa train station when we got there, so we took a taxi instead. At the time, we didn’t think much of the fact that the taxi driver gave us a weird look when we asked him to take us to the airport at 2:30 AM - but when we got there and found out that the airport didn’t open until 4, we understood. Soooo we ended up hanging out on benches outside the airport for an hour and a half. Luckily, the wait passed pretty quickly, and soon enough we were into the airport and through security.

The airport we ended up at in Paris was Beauvais, which is pretty far outside the center of the city. So we hopped on a shuttle that dropped us off on the outskirts, and then took the Metro to close to the Louvre. And from there, the adventure officially began!

We hadn’t eaten much all day, so we started off by finding a bakery, where we bought croissants, and then a second bakery, where we bought more pastries. Then, we decided to take ourselves on a self-guided walking tour I had found online, so we set off for the Arc de Triomphe on the other side of town.

On the way there, we spotted the Eiffel Tower, so we took a detour to see it and take pictures. From there, we finally made it to the Arc de Triomphe, and then we doubled back down the Champs-Élysées. When we made it back to the Louvre, we were all pretty tired, so we decided to head to our Airbnb.

Our Airbnb was in a neighborhood pretty far outside the center of Paris, so we had to take the Metro again to get there. On our way, we stopped at a grocery store, where we managed to find Skippy peanut butter (!!) - it doesn’t sound like much, but trust me, after having nothing but Italian peanut butter for months, which is not at all the same as the American version, it was a very exciting discovery.

Before long we made it to the apartment, and the host was there to let us in. He gave us a quick orientation, and then we headed out to find dinner.

Our host had recommended a couple of pizza and sushi places, but we wanted French food, so we struck out on our own. We ended up at a place nearby that was a little expensive, but that proved to be SO worth it. I had tortellini and honestly, I think it was one of those meals I’ll remember for the rest of my life.

The next morning, we had reservations at the Louvre for 10 AM, so we set out pretty early. We took some pictures and then headed inside and separated, and I spent the next five-ish hours wandering around the Louvre on my own.

It’s hard to wrap your head around how colossal the building is: even with my map in hand, I got lost at least three times, and I’m sure I only managed to see half of the collection at best. But, of course, it was so worth the time and money! I got to see a ton of famous works of art that I knew would be there - like the Mona Lisa, Delacroix’s Liberty Leading the People, the Venus de Milo, and so much more - but I also stumbled across so many things that I had heard of, but didn’t realize were at the Louvre. So that was way cool.

In the afternoon, we all met up again, and from the Louvre we walked towards Notre Dame. On the way, we bought crepes and macaroons and wandered around in the Latin Quarter for a bit, and then we jumped in the huge line at the cathedral. We got there close to closing time, and were afraid that we wouldn’t make it in, but we didn’t have any problems. And that was a good thing, because Notre Dame was absolutely incredible.

After seeing Notre Dame, we took a few more pictures and walked around for a while longer. Then, as we were getting ready to head to the Airbnb, we walked back past Notre Dame just as a light show on the facade was beginning, so that was perfect timing!

The next morning we didn’t have any big plans, so we hung around the apartment until around 11. Once we got back into the center of the city, we spent most of the day just wandering around. The high point of the day was definitely seeing Sainte-Chapelle, a Gothic chapel built in the thirteenth century to house relics from the Crucifixion. Every wall is covered in stained glass, and I thought it put even Notre Dame to shame.

From there, we walked to the other side of town to find a shop the others were interested in seeing, and then we hiked all the way back to the Eiffel Tower to see it lit up at night. We took a bunch more pictures, waited around to see the Tower glitter (which it does every hour), and then called it a night!

Our bus to Brussels didn’t leave until around 1 the next afternoon, but before that we had to make it all the way to the Charles de Gaulle airport, so we decided to just hang out in the neighborhood our Airbnb was in instead of going back into Paris. We didn’t have any trouble finding the bus terminals once at the airport, and then the bus ride itself was uneventful. And then, we started the second leg of our trip in Brussels!

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Florence Diaries 9: Siena & San Gimignano

When I went to write an overview of last week, I realized that I took zero pictures the entire week, which I guess means nothing super noteworthy happened! Obviously every day in Florence is awesome, but given the lack of special events or anything else out of the ordinary last week, I’ll keep this summary focused on Friday’s field trip to Siena and San Gimignano.

In hindsight, I’m actually really glad my planned trip to Hungary and Austria didn’t pan out, because that gave me the chance to go on the CAPA-sponsored field trip to Siena and San Gimignano instead - and they were so cool. Both towns are more rural and medieval, and it was nice to get away from the craziness of Florence and experience the countryside for a day.

For at least the third time so far this semester, I started the morning by hustling from my apartment to the train station on the other side of town (you would think I’d learn eventually, but so far I’ve never given myself enough time to get all the way over there!). At the train station, I met up with the rest of the group from CAPA, and once everyone had arrived, we all hopped on the tram to get to the area where our bus was set to pick us up.

The bus ride to Siena took about an hour, and once we got there, we set out on a guided tour of the city. Our first stop was the Basilica San Domenico just outside the town. The church itself is beautiful, but the even more interesting thing about it is that it contains two relics from St. Catherine of Siena: her mummified severed head as well as her right thumb. Both are displayed in ornate reliquaries inside the church, so you can see them easily, which is wild but also so cool. It blows my mind that the relics even still exist in the first place after hundreds of years, and that I actually saw them myself.

After seeing the Basilica San Domenico, we walked through some of the medieval streets of Siena, learned about the seventeen different districts of Siena and how they all compete against each other in the Palio, the horse race the city holds twice every year, and ultimately ended up at the main cathedral in Siena. It was probably my favorite church I’ve seen so far: the interior is beautiful, and even better, it has a library space with tons of authentic medieval music manuscripts on display. So cool.

The final stop on our walking tour was Siena’s main square, where the Palio is held. From there, we all split off to find lunch. My roommates and I went to a pasta restaurant behind the square, which was a little expensive but totally worth it for the food we had.

Then we had some free time to explore Siena, so we wandered around the streets for a little while. Before long, it was time to meet back up with the group to head to San Gimignano!

We didn’t have much time in San Gimignano, but what we did see was amazing, and in my opinion, even better than Siena. We started by climbing one of the medieval towers (San Gimignano was famous in the Middle Ages for its many towers, many of which still survive today) and seeing the views of the Tuscan countryside from the top, and then we grabbed gelato and explored a bit more. San Gimignano is also famous for a particular type of white wine produced there, Vernaccia, so we tried some of that too and took in more views before getting back on the bus to Florence.

I probably wouldn’t have taken the time to go to Siena and San Gimignano if I hadn’t gone on this field trip, so I’m so glad I had the chance to go after all, because San Gimignano in particular might be my favorite place I’ve been in Italy so far!

This week probably won’t be too exciting either, because with midterms all week, we don’t have time to do much except studying. But as soon as I survive this week, I’m off to Paris to start Fall Break - so there will be many more updates to come next week!

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Florence Diaries 8: Munich

Last weekend, after a month spent travelling around Italy, I finally had the chance to explore a new country: Germany! Even though we only spent about fourteen hours total there, it was super cool, especially after taking all those years of German in middle and high school. Here’s what went down!

Getting a spot on this trip to Munich was actually kind of last-minute, after our original trip to both Prague and Munich was cancelled. We struggled for a few days trying to decide whether to spend all weekend in Munich or just a day, and to find a tour company whose trip was still scheduled to run, but luckily, this one worked out. Going with the day trip made for a pretty exhausting weekend, but it was definitely worth it!

My roommate Eliza and I left our apartment to catch the bus around 10:30 on Friday night, and the bus departed from Santa Maria Novella station at 11. The drive between Florence and Munich is about seven hours, so we slept on the bus all of Friday night, and woke up around 6:30 when we were about an hour outside Munich. We stopped at a McDonald’s for a quick break and then got back on the road, and we were in downtown Munich by 8.

First, the tour leaders took us to the Oktoberfest gates to show us the meeting point for later that night, and then they took those of us who were interested to a nearby store selling lederhosen and dirndls to the festival attendees. I tried on a dirndl, but it was way too expensive to justify wearing for one day, so I decided to just become part of the 5-ish percent of people who don’t dress up for Oktoberfest.

After checking out the store, Eliza and I headed into downtown Munich to explore for a bit - we had heard from the tour leaders that the masses of people waiting at the Oktoberfest gates effectively stampede in when the festival starts in the morning, so we decided to let things calm down a little before braving the craziness.

Munich was so nice - up until then, Cinque Terre had been the undisputed favorite of all my weekend trips, but Munich definitely gave it some competition! We wandered in and out of some of the shops and churches, stopped at one point for mid-morning pastries, checked out the Marienplatz (the main square) for a bit, and eventually stumbled across a farmer’s market with tons of fresh produce, prepared food, flowers, souvenirs, and more. It was such a nice day to explore the market, and the food was so great - over the course of the day, we tried weisswurst, pretzels, and much more, so it was an awesome way to spend part of the day.

And by mid-afternoon, we were ready to check out Oktoberfest (which is held a few blocks away from the center of the city). Oktoberfest is definitely not an event for the faint of heart - there are literally thousands of people and so much going on that it’s almost hard to process it all - but I’m still so glad I took advantage of the opportunity to go.

When we first got to the festival grounds, we wandered into one of the big beer tents to see what was going on inside, but ended up just doing a lap around the perimeter because we weren’t ready to sit down and eat yet. So we spent a while just exploring the fairgrounds, checking out the stands and some of the rides, and taking occasional breaks on a grassy hill overlooking the whole thing.

After a while we decided that we wanted to try to get into one of the beer tents, but we found out the hard way that people usually reserve tables far in advance, which we obviously hadn’t done. It’s still possible to get into the tents without a reservation, but seats are first come, first served and the tents close as soon as their tables fill up, so by evening, it was impossible to get into any of them. So in that sense, we didn’t have the “traditional” Oktoberfest experience, but it was still cool to see. (And it gives me a good reason to try to go back someday!)

Anyway, we needed to find food somewhere, so we walked all the way back to the farmer’s market we had visited earlier, only to find out that it had closed. So we stopped at a coffee shop nearby to kill some time, and then headed back to Oktoberfest to spend the remaining hour or so before we had to hook back up with our tour group. Oktoberfest by night was crazy - easily 50%, if not more, of the population there was well past drunk by then - but it was still cool (and sometimes comical) to see.

And soon enough, it was time to meet up with our tour group and get back on the bus. We were on the road shortly before 11, and we arrived back in Florence around 5:45 the next morning. Sleeping on a bus for two nights in a row made for a pretty exhausting few days, but in the end, seeing Munich and Oktoberfest was worth it for sure!

With midterms next week and fall break the week after that, we’re taking some time off from travelling this weekend and staying in and around Florence. And then we’re off to Paris next Saturday - so the adventures continue!

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Florence Diaries 7: Week Four

Between studying for midterms next week, working to meet an upcoming research proposal deadline, settling into the volunteer opportunities I’ve taken on, and finally catching the cold that’s been going around CAPA, it’s been a busy week and a half for sure. But as usual, things are great in Florence - here’s what I’ve been up to lately!

October 1st

Most of the day on Monday was pretty standard, but on Monday evening was an event I had been looking forward to for a while - I finally got to meet my Ganzo family!

The “Ganzo” program is an opportunity offered by CAPA that places students with local families, so that we can still experience what it’s like to be part of a host family even though we all live in apartments. Through the program, we’re able to get to know a local family through weekly dinners and other outings throughout the semester.

My Ganzo family - parents Claudia and Matteo, and their children Pietro, Tommaso, and Maddalena - are wonderful. On Monday night, I spent about an hour playing with the kids, and then we all had dinner together. At the end of the night, Matteo gave me a ride home on his Vespa, so that was pretty cool too! Even though I’ve only met with them once so far, I’m excited to spend more time with them over the next few months.

October 2nd

Tuesday was another day of classes, and the field trip of the day for my Renaissance Art class was to Santa Maria Novella, one of Florence’s major cathedrals. Walking all the way across town in the rain to get there wasn’t fun, but it was definitely worth it to see the church, especially because one of my favorite artworks - Masaccio’s Holy Trinity - is there!

On Tuesday evening was another exciting program: a pasta-making class! A group of about fifteen of us worked together to make fresh pasta and two different types of sauces, as well as potato souffles and individual lava cakes. It all turned out great, and at the end the chef gave us copies of the recipes to bring home, so it was well worth the €25 we spent to take part!

October 3rd

Wednesday was pretty uneventful. I spent most of the day in class, but for dinner my roommate Erin and I decided to try out the ramen restaurant on our street, which was great! Afterwards, we grabbed gelato from our favorite spot, and then we came home and worked on homework for the rest of the night. And that was about it for Wednesday!

October 4th

On Thursday mornings I usually don’t start classes until around noon, so I have time to shop at the local market and grab a cappuccino from the café on our corner - but this past Thursday was the last week for that, because the following week I was set to start volunteering in an English class at a local elementary school (but more on that later!). So I took advantage and got some work done, and soon enough it was time for my Italian class.

Later in the evening, my roommates and I went out for another round of aperitivo at our favorite bar. There was a ton of food and it was even better than the last time, so it was definitely €7 well spent!

And on the way home we stopped for more gelato, and then we crashed for the rest of the night.

October 5th

There’s not much to be said for Friday - I didn’t have any classes, so I stayed home most of the day to get work done. In the evening, my roommates and I all cooked dinner together and shared a bottle of wine from the bulk wine shop down the street, and then we spent some time planning more weekend trips. And before long, Eliza and I had to head out to catch an overnight bus to Munich, where we spent all day Saturday - but more on that later, too!

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Florence Diaries 6: Week Three

I’m super late catching up with this (sorry!), but we’ve had another great week and a half since we went to Venice. Here’s the rundown!

September 23rd

Since we were busy in Venice for most of my birthday, my roommates and I went out for dinner the next day to celebrate. We tried Trattoria Zà Zà near the Central Market on Grace’s recommendation, and it definitely didn’t disappoint! We all split wine and prosciutto with melon (my new favorite appetizer!), and then I had tagliatelle with pesto for dinner. All of the food we had was incredible, and after dinner we headed to Perché No for gelato, so it was definitely a birthday dinner to remember!

September 25th

On Tuesday morning my roommate Eliza and I made our first trip to the market at Sant’Ambrogio (and wondered why it had taken us almost three weeks to get there!). We picked up some cheap produce and also stopped by a nearby café for croissants, and then I headed to class.

The field trip of the day was to Santa Croce, which is probably my favorite church I’ve seen so far! It’s so beautiful, and I still can’t get over the fact that it’s just a street over from my apartment. After class I had time to grab a quick panino, and then I headed to Italian. Then the rest of the day was spent doing homework, and that was about it!

September 26th

For my Museum Studies class on Wednesday, we met at Pitti Palace across the Arno, and toured the Galleria Palatina for about two hours. The rooms are so ornate and beautiful, so I think it was my favorite museum so far!

Class let out a little early so I had time for a quick lunch, and then I headed to my history class. When class let out I went home for a while, but soon enough I had to head back to CAPA to meet for a boat trip down the Arno.

There were only three of us from the CAPA Florence Program on the boat ride, but it was still really cool. The boat trips are guided by the Renaioli, who stand at the back of the boats and direct them down the river with huge sticks, and also give a little background on all the sites as they go along. We sailed past the Uffizi, under the Ponte Vecchio, and down to the Ponte alla Carraia before turning back. It was definitely cool to see the city from a different perspective!

September 27th

On Thursdays I don’t have class until the afternoon, so in the morning, my roommates and I all ran back to the Sant’Ambrogio Market for more fresh fruit, and then grabbed cappuccinos at a café near our apartment. Before long, it was time for Italian, and then after class Eliza and I stopped to chat with Valentina, one of the CAPA staff members, about possible weekend plans.

While we were chatting, Eliza got an email that the Prague and Munich trip we had planned for the next weekend had been cancelled by the tour company - so we headed to their office to get refunded, assuming it wouldn’t be too hard to get there on our own instead. Turns out Oktoberfest makes getting to Munich SUPER tricky and expensive, so it wasn’t as easy as we hoped it would be! Luckily, we’ve since been able to reschedule the Munich part of the trip with another tour group, so that worked out well. Between that situation and the planning for Fall Break we did later that night, we realized that weekend travel can definitely be a little stressful. But in my experience, it’s SO worth the hassle!

For Fall Break we ended up booking a trip to Paris, Brussels, and Amsterdam for pretty cheap, so that’s also something to look forward to! Our other weekends are still up in the air for now, but hopefully they won’t be for long...

September 28th

On Friday, we had no classes and no other plans, so Eliza and I decided to spend a few hours at the Boboli Gardens. It was one of the last hot days we’ve had, so afterwards we grabbed gelato at Piazza Santo Spirito. We had also planned to go to the Latin Mass at San Miniato al Monte, but I forgot about the dress code and accidentally wore a tank top, so we headed home early instead. Luckily the Mass happens every day, so it shouldn’t be too hard to reschedule!

My roommates and I cooked dinner at home, and then we made an important discovery - our Italian professor had told us that it’s possible to take empty bottles of wine to certain stores to have them refilled for two or three euros, and we confirmed that she was right! So we spent the rest of the night at home, and it was great. I definitely got placed with the best roommates I could have had on this trip! (There’s your shoutout, Erin, OK?)

September 29th

I also didn’t have formal plans for Saturday, so when I woke up, I decided to book a train ticket to Pisa, because I wasn’t sure when else I would have a chance to see the Leaning Tower. It was my first solo trip outside of Florence, and it was a success!

I got off the train at Pisa Centrale, which is in the southern part of the city, and then walked north to the Field of Miracles, where the Leaning Tower is. I saw the Keith Haring mural, walked down the main drag of shops, stopped for gelato, and checked out some of the main sites. There’s not much to see in Pisa except for the Leaning Tower, though, so once I had walked to the opposite end of the city and seen it, I headed home again. But I’m still glad I got to see it, and especially glad that I survived travelling outside Florence by myself!

September 30th

In comparison to the other two days of the weekend, Sunday was definitely busy - CAPA participated in Corri la Vita, a charity marathon that takes place all over Florence, and then Erin, Eliza and I headed to Impruneta for the annual grape-harvesting festival!

Corri la Vita was so much fun, and it was a beautiful day for it. And it was so cool to see the city overrun with people dressed in the purple event t-shirt! Erin and I ended up bowing out a little early because we wanted to catch an early bus to Impruneta, and we managed to hook up with Eliza and get to Impruneta without a hitch.

I’m not really sure what I was expecting from the grape-harvesting festival, but it was SO much cooler than I could have ever imagined. When we first got there, we checked out some of the food vendors’ tents (and I found out that despite sounding a little wild, fried zucchini flowers are actually really good), and then we found seats for the parade on the bleachers that had been set up all around the main square. When the parade started, tons of people dressed up in elaborate costumes came into the square with three huge floats that were arranged to make a stage, and performed a show about the grape harvest. It was so creative, and I can’t begin to imagine how much time they put into it.

So the first part of the parade finished, and we all agreed that it was super cool, but what we didn’t know yet was that the show we had just seen was only the one by the first of Impruneta’s four neighborhoods - and there were still three neighborhoods that had to go! We could only stay for the second because we had to catch one of the last buses back to Florence, but the second show was just as impressive as the first. So it turned out that making the impromptu decision to go to Impruneta for the afternoon was definitely worth it!

And that was it for the third week - busy as usual, but so much fun! I’m loving being here, and even though I’ve been in Italy for almost a month now, I don’t feel like the semester is flying by as fast as it normally does. So life is good, and I’m looking forward to everything that is still to come!

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Florence Diaries 5: Venice

My birthday this year was unlike any I’ve had before - I traded in birthday cake for birthday tiramisu and spent the day in Venice! 

After hearing that Venice can be tricky to tackle on your own (not to mention the fact that I got a birthday discount!), we decided to book a day trip with a local tour group that caters to study abroad students. We got to see all the highlights in a short period of time, so it was definitely the right decision!

We met the tour group early in the morning at a hotel across town, and then hopped on a bus for the three-hour ride to the outskirts of the city. And then, because Venice is isolated by its canals and you can’t drive to into it, we took a train for the last bit into the city center. When we stepped out of the train station, the first thing we saw was a giant canal full of gondolas, so my first impression of Venice definitely met all my expectations!

To get to Piazza San Marco, the main part of the city, we had to take a water taxi through the canals, which was so cool! From there, we had a few minutes to take in the Doge’s Palace, St. Mark’s Basilica, and the other famous sites, and then our tour guide took us to a Murano glass-blowing demonstration. After that, we had a little time to explore the glass showroom, but all of the pieces there were WAY out of our price range, so we didn’t stay long!

Then we stopped to get pasta to go, and we ate it on one of the bridges overlooking the canals. Two of my roommates tried the squid ink pasta, which sounded kind of wild but was actually pretty good!

And then, because we had decided not to pay extra for a gondola ride, we had a little extra free time to explore the city. The main parts were absolutely packed with tourists, but we were able to get away into the more residential areas, which was really nice. We also went on a (successful!) quest for tiramisu, because it originally came from Venice.

By mid-afternoon we had to meet back up with our tour guide, because the tour group had planned a walking tour around the city for the rest of the day. That allowed us to see some of the other famous sights - like the Bridge of Sighs and the Rialto Bridge - and soon enough we were back at the train station!

Even thought we were so busy that it barely felt like my birthday, our day in Venice was amazing. And if it’s true that Venice will disappear within my lifetime, I’m really glad I got to see it!

So far we’re two for two with weekend travel, and I can’t wait to see what else is in store! (Hint: Pisa this weekend and then Prague and Munich after that!)

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Florence Diaries 4: Week Two

The second week was just as busy as the first, but as usual it was full of amazing experiences! Here’s a quick summary of what I’ve been up to...

September 17th

On Monday we didn’t have any big plans, so my roommate and I decided to take another aimless walk around the city after class. We tried a new coffee shop and discovered a really cute little souvenir shop, which I’m sure we’ll be back to again soon!

September 18th

In my Renaissance Art class on Tuesday, we took a field trip to San Miniato al Monte, a thousand-year-old basilica at the top of one of the hills overlooking Florence. The church is dedicated to Saint Minias, an Armenian martyr who was beheaded in Florence and is said to have carried his own decapitated head up the hill to where San Miniato al Monte now stands!

Anyway, the church is beautiful, and it never ceases to amaze me how old everything in Florence is. You would never find anything half as historical as some of the sites here in the United States. And the best part of taking Renaissance history classes is that I get to visit all of the sites for free!

Then on Tuesday afternoon a group of us went on a “Secret Florence” tour, where a local guide took us all around the city and told us tons of things you wouldn’t necessarily hear on a normal tour. It was super interesting buuuut we didn’t realize when we signed up that it was scheduled to last for three hours. So we got a little more than we bargained for!

But the evening definitely turned around when we went out for our first aperitivo, which is an Italian custom where you buy a drink for around €8 and then get access to an unlimited bar of appetizers and snacks. It’s a great deal, and it was super fun too, so I’m sure it was the first aperitivo of many!

September 19th

Wednesdays are busy class days for me, but luckily this time we had the chance to go on another field trip, this time to the Palazzo Vecchio! Most of the building looks as it did when it was inhabited by the Medici family, and it is unreal. Every single surface is covered in artwork. I can’t even begin to imagine how much work must have gone into making it look the way it does!

And on Wednesday evening, the CAPA staff took us on a hike in the hills surrounding Fiesole, a town on the outskirts of Florence. The hike was tough, but it was worth it for the views from the top, and for the pizza we ate at the end!

September 20th

On Thursday we had our Italian class at the local market so we could practice buying our fruits and vegetables in Italian, and then another one of my roommates and I ran a couple of errands around the city, including registering for absentee ballots for the November midterms!

The most exciting part of the day (and honestly the whole week!) came in the evening, when a group of us made an impromptu decision to get tickets to an Art Battle happening across town.

The Art Battle was a competition between twelve professional artists, where the artists had twenty minutes to produce paintings which were then voted on by the spectators. And it was so cool. I had a lot of work I was supposed to be doing so at first I wasn’t sure if I even wanted to go, but I’m so glad I did!

September 21st

I spent most of Friday getting caught up on homework so I could enjoy the weekend, and when my roommate got done with work at 5, we met up at one of our favorite coffee shops for a cappuccino and then headed to the French Market that has been set up in Florence for the past few days. After buying some stuff for dinner, we came home and cooked, and then headed out to the local library to do some more homework. And then we finished the night by getting gelato at our favorite spot!

And then we were off to Venice for my birthday on Saturday - but more on that later!

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Florence Diaries 3: Cinque Terre

Travelling through Italy by train is pretty cheap, so this weekend we took advantage of the good prices and made our way to Cinque Terre for the day!

Cinque Terre (the “Five Lands” in Italian) is northwest of Florence, on the coast of the Mediterranean, and takes about three hours by train to reach. The five towns that make it up - Monterosso, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola, and Riomaggiore - are so colorful, and almost everything is built into the hills so it’s pretty easy to hike between the towns!

We took the train to Vernazza, where we had a quick breakfast at a café and walked down to the water to take some pictures. Then we headed onto the trail to hike to Monterosso!

The hike took a little more than two hours, and covered about three and a half miles. The climbing was definitely rough, and the heat definitely added to the challenge, but the views from the top were so worth it.

When we got to Monterosso, we found a public beach and headed for the water. The waves were super calm and the water was so blue, and it was an amazing way to spend the afternoon after hiking all morning!

At the end of the afternoon, we took the train from Monterosso back to La Spezia (which is the train station that all the trains going to and coming from the five towns of Cinque Terre end up) and found dinner there.

Then we headed down to the waterfront for a while, and soon enough we were back on the train!

By 10:30 we were back in Florence after surviving our first trip outside Florence. Hopefully Cinque Terre was the first of many to come!

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Florence Diaries 2: The First Week

I’m officially one week in, and Florence still never ceases to amaze me! Between starting classes, exploring the city, and travelling a little bit, it has been a busy few days. Here’s what we’ve been up to!

September 10th

Monday was our first day of classes, and I started the day with Renaissance Literature. After class, one of my friends and I grabbed panini for lunch at the same place we had gone during the walking tour on Saturday - the shop is run by an older couple, Stefano and Stefania, who are so sweet and always down to help us practice our Italian!

My second class of the day was Italian, and at the end of class, our teacher took us to a coffee bar around the corner from CAPA to practice ordering in Italian. My first Italian cappuccino definitely did not disappoint and I have a feeling I’ll end up developing a habit by the time I leave!

After Italian, my roommate Erin and I went for a walk around the city and discovered a bunch of cute shops and alleyways. And of course we took lots of pictures of the Duomo, as usual :))

Monday was also Erin’s birthday, so after classes, we all went out for dinner and gelato. We walked across the river to the restaurant at sunset, and got some pretty cool pictures there too!

September 11th

Tuesday was another day of classes (Renaissance Art and Italian), and in the evening we all went over to one of the other apartments to plan a couple of weekend trips during the semester. Right now it looks like we’ll make it to Germany, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Austria, Portugal, and France in the next few weeks, and I’m so excited to see how things turn out!

September 12th

On Wednesday I had two classes in a row (Museology and European History). During the second one, our teacher took us on a field trip to Cafè Giubbe Rosse in Piazza della Repubblica, which meant more coffee! 

We had a little extra time after class, but soon enough we had to head out to the CAPA-sponsored Welcome Dinner! The staff gave a little speech at the beginning about using this experience to try new things and step out of our comfort zones, so I had a feeling they would be giving us some strange foods to taste - but everything was so good. It was a three-course meal, so they gave us a sampling of different types of appetizers, pastas, and dessert. I got to taste prosciutto with melon, pecorino with pear sauce, caprese salad, stuffed tomatoes, and so much more, and I’m definitely going to try to apply the attitude of willingness to try anything as much as possible during the next few months!

September 13th

I only had Italian on Thursday, so the only exciting thing that happened was that afterwards my roommates and I decided to celebrate surviving the first week of classes (and Italian grocery shopping!) by going out to a local bakery to try schiacciata all’uva, a type of bread made with local grapes. It was amazing, just like all the other food I’ve had here!

September 14th

No one at CAPA has classes on Friday, but we still had to go in for a little while this week to sign up for some of the local volunteer opportunities offered here. We haven’t heard back yet about what we’ll be doing, but I’m hoping to be placed with an Italian host family for occasional dinners and excursions - so hopefully it works out!

After that, a few of us went out to grab lunchtime panini (more food pictures, oops) and then headed home to work on homework for a while.

On Friday evening, we went to the Gelato Festival All Stars at Piazzale Michelangelo, a worldwide competition for gelato makers that was making a stop here in Florence. For €10, we were able to try 17 different flavors and then vote on our favorite!

We were still at Piazzale Michelangelo for the sunset, which made for a pretty cool end to the night and the whole first week - and then on Saturday, we were off on our first trip outside of Florence!