Porsche

Geez, oh pete. It has been a long 16 days since I wrote. No, it wasn't neglect -- I was on Spring Break and free of technology for 10 of those days! Being able to disappear for awhile is great for your health. I recommend it. Perhaps, though, you're wondering how my break was and I'm afraid that the version I must tell will be seriously abbreviated. Never fear! I journaled throughout my trip and will try to sufficiently recount it all. 

I must say that leaving Arezzo in the first place was a daunting task. We missed our train to Rome; Danielle got fined in the train for not validating her ticket; and we last-minute had an issue with one of our hotels and I had to pay for 2 nights in a hotel that we didn't end up staying at. Talk about a total waste of money. It feels like a stab in the heart. Finally, we were in Rome and ready to start. 

On Friday, we picked up Danielle's friends Stephanie and Rachel from the airport. It was nice to see the route that I will end up taking when I head back to the airport because it's going to be a stressful situation, what with juggling my bags and everything. Our first three days were spent in Rome. We had found our apartment on a hostels website and after going through a labyrinth of streets, we found Stella's House, which ended up being a woman's apartment that had a few spare rooms. Stella spoke English-Italian that was borderline hilarious. For example, "Hai to close la porta, please." (You have to close the door, please) It ended up being like that episode of The Office when Dwight is talking to some Hispanics and asks, "Donde are you from?" Hopefully you can appreciate this reference. Anyway, she made us espresso and gave us breakfast each morning. She ended up brokenly telling us that she was headed to Naples on Monday to visit family. The fact that she's from Naples makes total sense -- that southern hospitality is not only typical of Oklahomans, I assure you. We saw all the normal sights: Trevi, the Colosseum, the Roman Forum, Vatican City, the Spanish Steps and Pantheon. We obviously did a lot of walking, which made us all pretty exhausted. All those backstreets are full of people selling knock-off designer bags, street art (the current fad is to use spray paint for their prints), and beggers. One man showed us his cute parakeets, which we immediately cooed over and held. He waited till we were done with our pictures before saying, "Three euro, three euro." Danielle said, "You didn't tell us that. NO." And away we went. 

In St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City, we had a lot of fun taking advantage of the lighting offered by the windows in the side aisles. It either looks eerie or angelic -- you decide:

Saturday night was St. Patrick's Day and since we'd wanted to be in Ireland that day, we were sort of sad that we weren't there. When we had picked the girls up at the airport on Friday, we had seen a lot of men in kilts and found out that Scotland was playing Italy in rugby on Saturday. It was a small consellation to see  innumerable amounts of Scotsmen throughout Rome. As luck would have it, we met a few of them while we were dining outside one night and ended up spending the evening with them. The BEST part of the night was when I got to (.... drumroll ....) WEAR A KILT. That's right. I got to try on and wear some of their family colors for a couple of hours and it was sooooo perfect. 

I must say that, while Rome is full of antiquity and everything, it's so incredibly dirty and crowded. It's comparable to New York City, I suppose. I was glad to be moving on, for sure.

Monday we left for Cinque Terre. Everyone warned us that, because of last year's flooding, it would be unenjoyable. I wouldn't say it was unenjoyable, but if you're going there to hike from town to town, that's impossible. And if you're going for entertainment, don't. We had the most relaxing couple of days. I even got some sun! The season for the beachfront towns doesn't start till after Easter so going before then just means that the cities are quiet and some of the stores and restaurants are closed. We were tired from Rome, though, and perfectly content to sit and enjoy the scenery. I've always loved the view of Manarola, with the waves crashing into the side of the hill. I was freaking out as I got to the place that displayed that view. Here's one from there:

We made sure to leave our mark... maybe someday I'll be back?

After a lot of seafood (even octopus!), we headed up north to Lake Como for our last three days! From the right location, you can even see the Swiss Alps from the lake so it's really gorgeous and relaxing. My first thought on arrival? Retirement Community. Everyone and anyone with money lives and travels there. Again, we were there before their season began so it was rather uneventful. We tried renting kayaks but they didn't trust us to not fall in and die of hypothermia. We shopped and ate. And ate. And ate. George Clooney lives in one of the surrounding towns so we kept asking, "Scusi, dove does George Clooney live?" and "George, is that you?" No, it wasn't . . . One night, we were eating in a restaurant by the ferry and a man and his friends struck up a conversation with us. He ended up buying us three rounds of lemoncellos (a gross, potent lemonade that we gritted our teeth through) and welcoming us to the wonderful (albeit quiet) town of Bellagio. The most interesting part of that evening was that I got to drive his PORSCHE. Yes, that's right. His porsche. Don't believe me? 

I only killed it twice and in my defense, I was turning while driving up the side of a mountain after a stop sign. I can cross "Drive a Porsche" off my list, though. I must say, it drives a littttle bit different than my jeep, Zorro.
The rest of the trip was lovely but I must say, I was glad to go "home" to Arezzo. Living out of a suitcase is no fun. Plus, I was missing all my friends. It's starting to feel normal here after all.