Posted October 17, 2011 at 5:30am
Pinch Me
What a day it’s been….
We had our first trip today and it was just dreamy. The morning started with a walk on a beautiful mountainside overlooking the Castelli Romani. The path is paved with stones that date back to the Roman empire and a canopy of chestnut trees drape over the way. After taking in the views of the little towns at a birds-eye view, we walked back down and began our tour of four adorably quaint towns. My favorites were Nemi, famous for its strawberries and mushrooms and Castel Gandolfo, which is the town of the Pope’s summer residence (he happened to be there today!). The places we saw were very authentically Italian and it was kind of fun being the only tourists. I just couldn’t get enough of these towns… each of them had so much charm and I kept finding myself having “I can’t believe I’m here right now!” moments. The weather has been great… lots of sunshine but no humidity and a nice breeze to beat the heat. I was expecting to find Italy to be a wonderful place, but it’s turning out to be much more than I had even hoped for!
Posted September 1, 2011 at 2:24pm
Some Fun Facts
1. The palace was designed to be painted blue by the artist Bernini to match the sky. How romantic is that?
2. The palace used to be a vacation home for royalty. To communicate with their palace in Rome, they would use pigeons. For some reason this really made an impression on me. The lecturer claims that the birds were able to get the messages to Rome in less than an hour.
3. Everyone said that all Italians speak English. They lied.
4. They use military time over here. SOS.
5 The Italian lifestyle is really relaxing. I’m really beginning to feel the benefits. For example, I don’t feel stressed at all about the fact that I can’t speak the language or tell time or understand the money very well. Honestly.
Posted August 31, 2011 at 5:50pm
