Okay, so it's not all trains. The other half is good old fashioned walking!
Sorry for the extreme lack of updates the past couple of days, but I haven't really been home. I haven't even had time to write in my journal since last Thursday! So let me try to think about what's been going on since then...
Friday, me and three other girls from the program went to Cinque Terre for a nice, relaxing, fun-in-the-sun beach weekend. And let me tell you, we absolutely were able to make up for 5 weeks of gray skies in 3 days! There was not a cloud in the sky the entire time that we were there. It was a five hour journey to get there by train, transfering 3 different times. By the time we got there, it was early afternoon. We took a bus up the mountain to our hostel and then after getting changed and settled, decided to hike down to the closest town. Our legs were shaking the whole time (visibly shaking!!) but the views were incredible! We went swimming for a little while in a lagoon, then hiked from Manarola over to Corneglia which took about an hour and a half. We took the train back over to Manarola (because we were exhausted!), then the bus back up to our hostel, grabbed dinner at the town's one restraunt, then went to bed early. Good day one.
Saturday was beach day in Montenegro. Despite our total care in using sunscreen, we still got burned, but not too badly. A couple other girls from the program met up with us on the beach in the afternoon, and that was fun for the most part (for the exception of one girl who was beligerntly drunk all day, but then again, she has been like that for the past 5 weeks. Her loss, though I will not miss the baby-sitting once I'm home). We had dinner that night in Vernazza at a little pirate restraunt owned by two of the funniest Italian brothers. As we were getting ready to pay, the three of the other girls I was staying with and I realized that we HAD to make the train leaving in 5 minutes to get back to the town by us to make the last bus up the mountain, otherwise we'd be hiking up the side of the road in the dark (a non-option in our minds). We paid, then bolted to the train station only to find out our train was 45 mintues late. When it finally did come and we got off, we had less than a minute until our bus was scheduled to leave. I ran like I had everything to lose from the train station to the bus stop and we made it just in time. It was intense, but wow. WOW haha
Sunday was pretty mellow and dominated by traveling. We took a boat out along the coast which was cool, did some shopping, but then spent most of the day getting back to Verona. All in all, a pretty fun weekend.
Today was all about Art History. Andrea gave us the most incredible Italian Art books that we get to keep and bring home with us in the morning, plus we looked at some slides and went over what our test will be like. After lunch, we went over to the Church of San Fermo and these really pretty gardens whose name I will have to look up. It was hot as heck, but beautiful. I'm going to miss that class because in our walks from site to site, Andrea teaches us so much about just Italian life in general that really add to the whole cultural experience of being here. Then this afternoon, I went to a Mexican restraunt with Megan, Krista, and Olga because as much as we love pasta, we were dying for a different flavor in our mouths and it really hit the spot. We hung out in Piazza Erbe for a little while, and now I'm back here at my apartment getting stuff together for Florence. I should probably hit the hay soon because it's already past midnight and we have a 7:15 train tomorrow.
I love you all, miss you tons, and hope to have emails from you when I get back Wednesday night! Only a few more days of this Italian life and then I'm back to the states!
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