Italy

After the Coslada game, AJ and I took a trip to Italy. We spent Easter weekend in Rome, then he went off to visit a friend abroad in India, while I headed north to Florence for 3 more nights.

Rome was amazing. One of my favorite classes at Harvard was about the Roman Games and we learned all about the munera, which were originally funeral games to celebrate that person's death but came to be the gladiatorial games. We also learned a lot about each of the Caesars, what they did, who built the Colosseum and how and why. (This website talks more about it: http://www.vroma.org/~bmcmanus/arena.html) To finally go there and see that was very cool and I had a lot of fun. We had some really nice weather there too and hung out at the Trevi Fountain for a while. We saw the Vatican - St. Peter's Basilica was just incredible - as well as the Pantheon and all of the other tourist junk. We went to a restaurant that had been recommended to us and it did not disappoint. The food there really is incredible.

We stayed in some tiny hostel, but the location was awesome, very close to everything. The first night we were packed into a room with 6 bunks with about a foot in between the beds. We were there from Thursday to Sunday, and we went to some of the popular American study-abroad bars in the Campo di Fiore. Those were fun, but it's almost like being at home. Then again, when you walk by the Colosseum on your way home, it's not just like being home. We found a bar that had the NCAA Final Four, and ended up having an awesome night watching Butler upset Michigan State. Needless to say, people at the hostel were happy to see us go. Apparently coming home at 4 in the morning is not standard procedure with some of those folk.

On Sunday, I got a rental car and headed north to Florence. As it turned out, my hostel wasn't in Florence but 15 minutes South. The easiest way to get there was to take the main highway into Firenze and then take a highway south to Siena, and get off at the right exit. Unfortunately, I didn't get on the Firenze-Siena autostrade, but another road that led to Siena. I had planned on getting a GPS with the rental (they had said one would be available) but when I arrived, the only one they had was broken, so I had to use a map of the entire country to get around, not exactly what you'd call detailed. It was raining and foggy and I made it to Firenze by 10 pm. Should have been to the hostel no later than 1030pm. At 1230am, I was driving through Tuscany, and had been for a few hours and I decided I would just stay at the next villa that I found. 5 minutes on a dirt road through olive fields and I show up at this place. Turns out I couldn't afford the 350 euro/night price, but the guy there spoke English and drew me a great map with good directions to the place. He admitted the area was nearly impossible to navigate, especially with this fog and rain at night. At 1am, I get to the hostel. Alive. Unfortunately the place closes at midnight, so without a phone or key, I was stuck. So I spent the night in my baby blue Fiat Panda - great car, surprisingly spacious.

After the miserable start, Florence ended up being quite nice. I spent the next day there and was able to hang out in the Boboli Gardens, see the Duomo, and a few museums. At the Academy Gallery though, I hit a speedbump, or perhaps a wall. In order to rent the car, I had to put a deposit down. This exceeded my daily allowance so I could not use my debit card to get cash for 24 hours. Unfortunately the Academy Gallery does not accept credit cards, and there was no way to get cashback at any local places. Matt did not get to see Michelangelo's David. However I did see a copy of the statue that stands in the original location of David, in front of the Palazzo Vecchio.

My hostel was in a small town called Tavarnelle Val di Pesa, situated right in the middle of Tuscany, and I found a little restaurant there that was probably the best meal I have ever eaten. Some red wine, spaghetti bolognaise, lambchops with potatoes, and gelato. Unreal. Back at the hostel I made some friends and we went out to a bar nearby. This place was a tiny little town and we were the only ones at the bar except for a few high school aged locals who were out messing around on a Monday night. It was a fun experience.

The next day I drove to Pisa to see the leaning tower. That thing is pretty cool. I felt kind of lame knowing that Galileo had figured out gravity there and I was just taking pictures of people pretending to hold it up, but it was a nice day so I took a nap on the grass. After that I drove north along the coast to Cinqe Terre. The place was amazing. I'll put up pictures later but here's a good one from the internet: http://www.nomaders.com/blog/index.php/recordando-un-mes-de-mayo-de-hace-unos-anos/
It's a small region of five villages built into the mountains on the coast. They are tiny little towns that have recently become a popular tourist spot because of how cool the area is and how beautiful the landscape is. You can hike back and forth between the villages or take a train that runs back and forth. It was a nice day so I hiked and the whole time I was just loving it. I'd love to go back some day and stay right there in the villages. Unfortunately my budget doesn't exactly allow for that just yet.

On Wednesday, my last day, I drove back south towards Rome, stopping at Siena for lunch. That's a cool place but I didn't stay too long there. I wanted to first go to Ostia Antico before getting back to the airport.

Ostia is a port city on the mouth of the Tiber River that goes directly into Rome. It was very important in ancient times when all global transportation was done by boat. It wasn't a huge city, but there were something like 40,000 inhabitants. In the 7th or 8th century though, a case of Malaria spread through the town and it was eventually abandoned. Everyone just picked up and left. No one ever built over it, and the ruins have since been excavated and studied and is now a park. Like the Colosseum, I really enjoyed getting to see the ancient Roman ruins. That type of stuff really interests me and it was amazing that so much of the stuff was still intact from over 1200 years ago.

That night I flew back to Spain and have been hanging out here for the last few days. The weather has been nice, and I went to my first bullfight yesterday. That was unlike anything I had ever seen before. Very interesting, especially since there was a female matador who failed to kill the bull and was eventually boo'ed out of ring when her sword got flung up into the crowd and almost impaled the beer vendor. Haha. Time to go outside.