Assisi

Assisi was a very important place for me to visit for a lot of reasons.  First of all, I went to St. Francis High School and St. Francis was from Assisi.  I have been learning about St. Francis for most of my life, even before I went to high school.  Another reason, my mom was born on St. Francis' feast day.  I also did a report on St. Clare when I was younger, who was also from Assisi.  When I was planning my trip to Italy, I researched where Assisi was and how easy it would be to get to.  Turns out it was relatively easy, and thank goodness for that because I was then able to visit one of the most charming, intriguing cities in Italy.

The train station in Assisi is not actually in the city.  The city is up on a hill about 2 kilometers (1.5 miles) from the train station.  The hostel I was staying at was somewhere between the two.  I ended up getting a taxi to my hostel because I wasn't sure my directions were going to be the best, and it honestly looked like I was in the middle of nowhere. My hostel was a converted farm house, just below the city with a wonderful view of Assisi. The first night I was there, I went into town to explore a little and then went to daily mass at the Basilica of St. Francis.  The Basilica was absolutely breathtaking.

view of Assisi from my hostel

Basilica of St. Francis

Basilica at night

The next morning, I planned on taking a day trip to Sienna.  Unfortunately, that didn't work out.  I then tried to go spend the day in Perugia, but that also did not work out.  So I simply went back to Assisi, where I would stayed for the next day and a half.  However, I did get an awesome video while I was walking to the train station.  This will give you a little glimpse into what my surroundings actually were. 

Assisi didn't seem to have any sort of information center, so I bought a small 4 euro tour book at one of the many souvenir shops and took to the city on my own.  It was actually quite helpful.  The first day, I saw the center of the city, the church where St. Francis' parents' house was, where St. Francis was born, San Rufino which held the basin in which St. Francis and St. Clare where baptized, and I went back to the Basilica to go to daily mass again.  

medieval streets of Assisi

clock tower in the center of town

fountain in the center of town

church at the place where St. Francis' parents lived

pax et bonum: peace and goodness

where St. Francis was born

loved the tiles with pax et bonum everywhere

Basilica at sunset

The next morning, I went a little outside of Assisi to see San Damiano.  San Damiano is the church that St. Francis often visited.  It is said that God talked to St. Francis here, asking him to rebuild his church.  St. Clare also lived here for a large portion of her life.  It was a short walk outside of the city, but amazing to see.

courtyard in San Damiano

exterior of the church that St. Francis rebuilt and where St. Clare lived

walk to San Damiano from Assisi

path to the church

I also visited the Basilica of St. Clare this day.  And just walked around, relaxed, and took more pictures before heading back to my hostel for dinner. 

Basilica of St. Clare

only picture of me in Assisi, looking out from the city

one last picture of Basilica of St. Francis

That night, I had dinner at the hostel with 5 older French people who were on a pilgrimage to Assisi for St. Francis.  They had been walking from city to city and spending the night once they got there.  They were telling me all about their trip, it was fascinating.  I really hope when I am their age I have the energy to do something like that.  I saw them the next morning, getting ready to head to their next city.  They had about 20 kilometers to go and they thought it was going to be a tough walk.  I wished them luck and they were off!  Soon after, I was off to the train station myself.  It was a nice morning, and I had time so I walked there, capturing this last photo of Assisi.   

Ciao, Assisi

I feel very lucky to have been able to visit Assisi on this trip.  It was a lovely little city and I'm so happy with time that I spent there. 

Last stop: Rome.  

C'est la belle vie! 

Venice and Florence

I was a little hesitant about Venice for a lot of reasons.  First of all, this was my first destination on my own this trip.  While I am okay with being by myself, after hanging out with people for the previous week and a half I was a little nervous to get out there on my own.  I also was a little nervous about finding my hostel.  But once I got there, I realized that I had nothing to be nervous about.  Venice was beautiful right from the start and I was able to find the only place in the entire city to give me a free map: the Carlton on the Grand Canal.  They were probably not thrilled to see a backpacker in their lobby but whatever, I needed a map.  After that, I ended up finding my hostel no problem.  This hostel was also a very different/interesting place of lodging.  First of all, it was in a very old building that was basically a museum.  The hostel was on one floor, the rooms were decorated as they had been when the building belonged to royalty which means everything was decorated and there were naked, baby angels staring at me when I slept.  Another thing, there were only locks on the front door, not to all of the rooms.  But that didn't matter here, everyone acted like one big family.  It was refreshing, and nice for me since I was by myself.

I didn't do much that first night and got up early the next morning to go out and see the city.  Venice is very easy to get lost in.  And that didn't matter.  I had no where special to be, I was wandering around by myself and I could do wahtever I wanted.  I saw all of the main sights almost right away and by that point it was only about 1pm.  I decided to buy a 12 hour pass for the water buses so that I could get on the water, without paying 80 euro for a gandola ride for myself.  It was great, I ended up going to the island of Lido just to see what was out there.  Came back to Venice and continued walking around and taking the bus when I could find a stop (I got lost a lot).

canals everywhere

standing on the rialto, with the grand canal in the background

gondolas

ponte rialto and the grand canal

restaurants along the grand canal

i liked this older couple walking their dog

pretty view from the water bus

lido, very different from venice

san marco square

surprise! another canal

mask stores everywhere

view from our hostel balcony

video of the grand canal from the water bus

That night, I ate dinner at the hostel and sat two seats away from Kayla, who I know from U of O!  It was complete chance that we were both in Venice at the same time, at the same hostel and sat so close at dinner.  We had talked about visiting each other during this year as she was studying in Spain but unfortunately it never worked out.  Glad we at least got to meet up once!

kayla and me at our hostel in venice

And the next morning, after a quick breakfast with Kayla and some other girls I had met, I was on my way to Florence to meet back up with Margaux.  I probably spent the least amount of time in Venice than any of the other cities but it really didn't need more time than that.  As Vanessa said, "You see one canal, you see them all." Ciao Venice!

I got to Florence and Margaux was waiting for me at the hostel we were staying at.  She took me on a quick little tour of the city and then we decided to go out to dinner for our last night.  We tried a couple of different places but there were so many people out.  We ended up eating really late but the dinner was good and they didn't charge us for our dessert. The next day Margaux left for Africa, where she was going on a safari and volunteering for a month.  It was sad to say bye to her, she was one of the first assistants that I had met.  But we promised to meet back up in California when we both get back.

We had met a few people in our hostel the night before and Dustin had wanted to come to the Accademia Gallery with me the next day to see Michangelo's David statue.  Sarah and Blake, a couple from Canada decided to join us.  We only had to wait about a half hour to get into the museum but it was totally worth it.  I was in complete awe when I saw the statue.  I had seen pictures, and heard about it, but nothing was as amazing as standing in front of this giant statue.  You weren't allowed to take photos but of course, I snuck one in.

michaelangelo's david

After that we got lunch, because the Basilica wasn't open for the afternoon yet.  We got lunch (which consisted of pizza, duh) and then went inside the Basilica, walked over to the Ponte Vecchio, and to the Plazza Michaelangelo to get pictures of Florence from the famous lookout point.  We also planned to go back at night because we heard it was amazing to see the skyline at night.

basilica in florence

interior

basilica san croce

ponte vecchio

with the beautiful florence skyline

new friends: dustin, sarah, and blake

piazza vecchio

After eating an amazing dinner, we went back up to the lookout point and people were right, it was amazing to see.  We brought some wine, andof course I brought glow sticks.  We ended up having glow stick races by rolling glow bracelets down the stairs.  Then proceeded to make a giant chain of glow and take pictures on each other's shoulders.  Another fun night with new friends!

florence skyline at night

sarah and me, and our glow chain

hanging out with dustin

my attempt at an artsy photo

The next day, we all went our separate ways: Sarah and Blake back to England where Sarah was studying, Dustin to France, and I was headed to my much anticipated visit to Assisi which I will talk about in my next blog post.

Florence was amazing, just like everyone had told me.  I'm really happy with the time I was able to spend there! Grazie Florence!

C'est la belle vie! :)

Cinque Terre

Let me start this blog post by saying, there is no possible way to fully describe how completely breathtaking, beautiful, and amazing the Cinque Terre actually is.  Everyone should have this destination on their must see list.  When Margaux and I were walking around Riomaggiore the first night, I said "Oh my gosh, is this my life right now?"  It became the motto of the trip, because we were in so many places where we just could not believe what we were seeing.  Everything was beautiful.  That being said, I will share my wonderful experiences there in hopes that you might get a hint of how incredible a place this is.

Cinque Terre is italian for "5 worlds" as there are 5 cities that make up the Cinque Terre: Riomaggiore, Manarola, Corniglia, Vernazza, and Monterosso.  The cities were built in the side of a mountain for the sole purpose of developing the vineyards in the area.  It was amazing to see these vineyards growing up the side of mountains for as far as the eye could see.  All of the little cities have colorful buildings and while each of them look a lot alike, they are all very different in feel.

We started our adventure in Riomaggiore where we were staying.  Our hostel was unlike any other hostel I had ever stayed in.  Instead of the hostel being in one place, there was a reception office and then small apartments all over the city that were transformed into dorm style rooms.  I was a little worried because I had read in reviews that some of the rooms were not all that nice, but we lucked out and got a great apartment in a great location.  On the first floor, there was our room with 4 beds and a toilet.  Up the stairs, there was another room that would have been a living room, complete with 5 beds, a kitchen, toilet and shower.  Margaux and I met all of our roommates the first night and we became an instant family with all of them.  It was such a good group!

riomaggiore

watching the sun set over the water

view from our room

The next day we started our hike along the trail.  Riomaggiore is the first town of the 5 so we made our way towards Manarola.  This was by far the easiest part of the hike between cities.  It's completely paved, there are no ups and downs, in fact it's called the Via dell'Amore or "pathway of love".  It only takes 20 minutes to get from Riomaggiore to Manarola.  We got there right when the trail first opened so there were a lot of people but soon enough we were in Manarola.

beginning of the trail

coming up on manarola

main street in manarola

Unfortunately, because these trails are built into the sides of mountains, there had been a landslide between Manarola and Corniglia and the trail was closed.  But luckily, there is a wonderful train system between all of the cities so we just hopped on the train to Corniglia, instead of taking the longer, steeper path which would have taken us 2.5 hours.  So we got to Corniglia in record time and took a little time to explore the middle city.  Corniglia is the only city that is not down by the water.  There were a lot of cute little stores just like in the other cities, but this one did not require a lot of time to explore.

corniglia

houses in corniglia

surrounded by the sea

last picture with corniglia before heading to vernazza

After snapping a few pictures, we were anxious to start the next portion of the coastal trail to Vernazza.  Up until this point, the trail had been fairly easy.  This is where it got a little more difficult.  There were more ups and downs on this trail and it took us about an hour and a half to get to Vernazza.  But it was so worth it once we got there.

first view of vernazza

walking into the city from our hike

view of the buildings and the sea beneath

port area in vernazza

absolutely beautiful

Vernazza was definitely one of my favorite cities.  There was a lot going on in this little town.  More restaurants than the rest and a lot more tourists. There was also a very lovely port area, where little kids were swimming and boats were coming in and out. Besides the trains and the hikes, it is also possible to travel by boat between all of the towns.  There was a stop in Vernazza so there would be waves of people coming and going when the boat would stop.  Margaux and I stopped to eat lunch here after our hike from Corniglia.  I had pesto pizza with a fanta.  This was basically my meal the entire time I was in Italy, although the pesto was not nearly as good anywhere else but the Cinque Terre.  Pesto is a speciality of Northern italy and now I know why, it was amazing there.  After our big lunch it was neccessary to rest for a bit, before starting the big hike from Vernazza to Monterosso.

After that, we started our hike to Monterosso.  From the beginning, it was almost straight up.  For this hike I took videos to show where we were and where we were going to.  This was by far the most fun hike, probably because of the people we met along the way.  This was the hike that we met Ben and his dad from Sacramento!  Anyways, enough of this, see for yourself!

When we finally made it to Monterosso, we crashed on the beach for a couple of hours to relax.  Monterosso is really the only town of the 5 that has an actual beach.  There is a little boardwalk, as well as the best gelato I will ever have in my life.  That day was my first time going swimming in the Mediterranean and it was perfect after a long day of hiking.  That night we were so exhausted, we went to sleep early to rest up for our next big day.

We woke up the next day after making the decision that we would take the longer 2.5 hour hike from Manarola to Corniglia.  We had heard it was absolutely gorgeous and less crowded than the others trails.  So Vanessa (one of our roommates), Margaux and I made our way to Manarola first and then to Corniglia.  I am very happy that we stayed in Riomaggiore because it was perfect to start hiking, being on one end.  However, there really wasn't that much to do in our little city.  In fact, Margaux and I basically saw the whole thing the first night we walked around.

But anyways back to our morning hike.  We didn't take any time to stop in Manarola but continued on to find the trail that led to Corniglia.  There were a lot of stairs and it felt like it was straight up.  But we had water and the view was so gorgeous we couldn't complain at all.

perfect morning in the cinque terre

view of manarola from our hike in the vineyards

surrounded by vineyards and water

view of corniglia from up high

see why i think this place is beautiful?

vanessa and me on the trail

We didn't even stop in Corniglia but headed to the train station to get to Vernazza, there was no way we were hiking again.  Margaux and I had lunch again, and when we were hanging out by the harbor, Vanessa had just walked up from her hike from Corniglia.  So the three of us stayed and relaxed for awhile before taking the train to Monterosso, finding our other roommate Naomi on the beach and relaxing for the rest of the afternoon.

hanging out our last day in monterosso on the beach

I should also mention this was a 2 gelato day.  Yes, the gelato in Monterosso was so good, we had it twice in 1 day.  More like twice in 4 hours but who cares, we were on vacation. We took pictures on the beach, ran into Ben and his dad again and invited Ben out for a drink in Riomaggiore that night.
After getting back in Riomaggiore, I figured out that I didn't have any good pictures of Manarola and because it was so close, it wouldn't be a problem to just walk over at sunset.  So Margaux and I walked over, and thank goodness we did.  We didn't think it was possible to get any good pictures of the city because of the landslide but the trail wasn't closed off until the landslide so we were able to walk down the path a little to get some beautiful photos.  I was so happy!

start of our sunset walk

all of the locks on the via dell'amore

gorgeous manarola

another view

sunset in cinque terre, italy

after the sun had gone down

So Ben came and met up with us that night and we had one last drink together at the (only) bar in Riomaggiore.  So much fun with new friends!

the girls: vanessa, naomi, margaux, and me

our little family one last time

And that was it.  The next morning as I was leaving, I felt like it was my last day at Disneyland: here were all of these people so happy to be starting their days, and we had to get on a train to go to our next destination.  I was so jealous of everyone staying.  Some people think you can do the Cinque Terre in a day, I mean all the cities look alike right?  I think to really appreciate its beauty you need at least 2 full days but I could have stayed longer.  I will definitely go back to the Cinque Terre one day, and I hope through this post I have convinced you that you have to see it too!

Next up: Venice and Florence.  More great things to come, people!

C'est la belle vie! :)