The word "finally" sounds like I couldn't wait to leave that city and move on to the next city, and that certainly isn't true. I just mean that it seems like we had been there for forever, and I was ready to see new places...But there were a lot of things about Florence that I absolutely loved and will miss:
1) The Arno River. It carved a wide expanse of "breathing room" down the middle of the city, and it was wonderful to walk across and take pictures of the Ponte Vecchio (the old bridge with all the jewelry shops.)
2) San Miniato. Besides the church in Assisi, this was my favorite church of the trip. It's the one that sits on top of a small mountain slightly outside of the city, and it is just beautiful.
3) Knowing where I was and knowing how to get to the grocery store, the laundry mat, our favorite gelato place, favorite sandwich shop, and the fruit market by heart. I felt a sense of independence and belonging for the better part of those three weeks just because I didn't have to pull out a map at every corner.
4) Cooking class adventures! Florence has a lot of options as far as cooking classes...and it was so much fun!
4) Cooking class adventures! Florence has a lot of options as far as cooking classes...and it was so much fun!
5) Seeing more sculpture and paintings than I ever thought I would. If I could make a good approximation, I would say I saw in Florence about 75% of the information I have learned in my art history classes.
6) Having Liz as my roommate! She made me laugh harder than I had in a very long time, and she is brilliant. Go stalk Liz Barfield on facebook!
But like I said, I am glad to be moving on. We left yesterday morning for the train station, and went speeding on a EuroStar train straight to Naples, and then took a bus from Naples to Sorrento. (see map!....I love maps...I secretly wanted to be a cartographer once upon a time.)
Naples is a large, busy city, and full of much louder people. We noticed the difference immediately in the personalities of the people compared to Florence, Venice, and Milan. The more south you head in Italy, the crazier people get! It took about an hour to get from Naples to the smaller, seaside town of Sorrento...and this place is beautiful. The views along the coast remind me a lot of Cinque Terre, and there are orange and lemon trees everywhere. Our hotel is really cute, and my new roomie is Anna, one of my new favorite people on this planet! We had a talking session last night with Shealy "Lil Spoon" White (our new nickname for her), and it was awesome.
After an AMAZING night's sleep, we woke up, ate breakfast, and drove to Pompeii, a place I have wanted to see for years! This place is unbelievable. Picture a whole town, complete with streets, shops, houses, and temples, and then take out the people, the paint colors, the roofs, and belongings inside the houses, and you have Pompeii. It is one of the largest archaeological sites in the world, and the quality of preservation of this city is amazing! And yes, we were able to see a couple of the "bodies" of the people who were trapped when Mount Vesuvius erupted. (Though I learned that those bodies aren't actually petrified bodies. They are merely the casts of molds. When the people died from the eruption, they were covered by layers of ash. They ash hardened around their body before their bodies decomposed, so after their bodies did finally decompose, they left an empty "shell" which archaeologist merely filled up with plaster to show the pubic what they looked like.) We spent the whole day there looking around and listening to our guide, and now I am sitting in an internet cafe with a couple people trying to get some things done online. Two little Italian twin girls just walked up to Sarah and I and tried to talk to us in Italian, but we had no idea what they were saying...I need to learn Italian...
Much love!
6) Having Liz as my roommate! She made me laugh harder than I had in a very long time, and she is brilliant. Go stalk Liz Barfield on facebook!
But like I said, I am glad to be moving on. We left yesterday morning for the train station, and went speeding on a EuroStar train straight to Naples, and then took a bus from Naples to Sorrento. (see map!....I love maps...I secretly wanted to be a cartographer once upon a time.)
Naples is a large, busy city, and full of much louder people. We noticed the difference immediately in the personalities of the people compared to Florence, Venice, and Milan. The more south you head in Italy, the crazier people get! It took about an hour to get from Naples to the smaller, seaside town of Sorrento...and this place is beautiful. The views along the coast remind me a lot of Cinque Terre, and there are orange and lemon trees everywhere. Our hotel is really cute, and my new roomie is Anna, one of my new favorite people on this planet! We had a talking session last night with Shealy "Lil Spoon" White (our new nickname for her), and it was awesome.
After an AMAZING night's sleep, we woke up, ate breakfast, and drove to Pompeii, a place I have wanted to see for years! This place is unbelievable. Picture a whole town, complete with streets, shops, houses, and temples, and then take out the people, the paint colors, the roofs, and belongings inside the houses, and you have Pompeii. It is one of the largest archaeological sites in the world, and the quality of preservation of this city is amazing! And yes, we were able to see a couple of the "bodies" of the people who were trapped when Mount Vesuvius erupted. (Though I learned that those bodies aren't actually petrified bodies. They are merely the casts of molds. When the people died from the eruption, they were covered by layers of ash. They ash hardened around their body before their bodies decomposed, so after their bodies did finally decompose, they left an empty "shell" which archaeologist merely filled up with plaster to show the pubic what they looked like.) We spent the whole day there looking around and listening to our guide, and now I am sitting in an internet cafe with a couple people trying to get some things done online. Two little Italian twin girls just walked up to Sarah and I and tried to talk to us in Italian, but we had no idea what they were saying...I need to learn Italian...
Much love!
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