Italia

Okay so here I am again writing about my week long tour de Italia. I don't think I will finish this all in one siting but I will try and get it all finished before I leave for Paris! I don't think I will forget about my trip because I have been journaling along the way. Our trip consisted of traveling to the cities of Verona, Venice, Florence and Rome and boy do I feel like I have seen a lot! Okay I will do a quick recap of each city at a time. Since my mom thinks I include too much details about food and everything else I will try to make it brief please contact my via email with additional questions.

Verona 

So we arrived in Milan and in the same day caught our transport to Verona. We were supposed to have some time in Milan but due to a flight delay (typical Ryan air) we were in a bit of a hurry to make our train. Coming into Milan into a bit of a sketchy airport and then a scary train station I was feeling pretty skeptical about Italy. But luckily as we neared Verona the scenery improved and as we arrived I was feeling better. At first we wandered around Verona trying to find our hostel because we were not thinking ahead enough to map out where it was. We finally made it to the hostel and there were people waiting for us on the street because it is apperently more of an apartment. It was super adorable and looked out into the road. In Verona we looked around at a lot of the Romeo and Juielt things like Juielts house, tomb and Romeos house. It was cool to see these things but funny how people were paying to see them when they are fake sights. It reminded me of the movie letters to Juieltt though. We also climbed up a hill with great views of the city and looked around at other buildings. I really liked Verona as it was small and easy to navigate and had a lot of Italian charm. It was also the least touristy of all the cities we visited.

View from the hill in Verona

Venice 

Next up on the tour de Italy was Venice. We arrived in the afternoon and did some strolling around the city and eating. The next day was pretty packed since we did a walking tour. Our tour guide was pretty useless except for that he did navigate us to all the main attractions which would have been very difficult to find otherwise due to the layout of the city and winding streets and canals. He basically took us places and said "okay this is a bridge, moving on". My favorite part of Venice was rowing lessons that we did. We got to go with a venicee and row in the canals. Our teacher wanted to cancel our lessons at first because she said it was too windy but we did not take that since we had no other day to reschedule too, so luckily the lessons went on. Anyway once we got the hang of the rowing style it was not too difficult and very peaceful and relaxing. Being there made me wish I lived in Venice so I could travel around in a boat. 

Venice

Bridge with shops

Florence 
OKay I am extremly annoyed because I just wrote all about these two places and then it didnt save. UGH. Now it will be even more brief.  Well in Florence we hit up the main sights to see including the Duomo, Bell tower, David Statue and others. I liked Florence because I liked to see where KT studied for the summer and the city that she loved. We also got to go on a day trip to Tuscany and see a castle where people still lived and opened up to tourists so that they could afford to keep it. One day we took a trip up to fiesole which was a small town overlooking Florence. It was so relaxing and we were able to soak up some sun and take in the views. 

Rome 

In Rome we also hit up all the major sights which I will not list since this is the third time writing this and I am extremely annoyed it keeps getting deleted. I liked Rome because it was so big and there is so much to see. It was also cool to see all the sights that I had seen in movies. My one disappointment was that the coliseum was not actually in the Lizzie McGuire movie at the end. I couldn't believe that this movie had lied to me like this. I also loved seeing the Vatican because it is so old and contains so much history. It was just shocking how it could be decorated so beautifully and so many detailed paintings on ceilings. I was a bit disapointed that I did not get to see papa Francesco (what some peole call him) however. 

I loved seeing Italy and it was amazing how all the cities were so different and each contained so much history. The thing I didn't like is that there were so many hecklers. It made me sad that so many people make their living off selling things illegally on the street. I am sure they do not enjoy heckling us just as much as we do no enjoy being heckled but maybe they just have not other options. Anyway the language barier was also quite challenging and it made me super grateful for the easy life that I have had in Ireland and the warm welcome that they give to people. But overall I am so glad that I got to see Italy and that I didn't have to chose just one city to see. It was sad leaving each place and thinkin that I would probably never be back.