Well, I am back in St. Paul- safe and sound. Our plane was delayed a little because there was some damage to one of the cargo doors and then when we got back they were having trouble getting the stairs hooked up so we waited on the plane for another half an hour but all in all it was a good flight.
Leaving Venice was fun, we took a water taxi. Our hotel was located right on the grand canal and it picked us up on the back balcony. It cruised straight to the airport. It was very cool, I swear it is the only way to travel haha!
I am glad to be back and excited to do laundry but this has definitly been an amazing experience and I am so incredibly thankful to have had the opportunity, despite the fact that I'm going to be paying this one off for quite a while haha
On that note, I have to call work and tell them to get me on the schedule ASAP haha I actually have quite a few things to do in the next couple of days to play catch up before classes begin on Monday.
I am glad to be back and I will try to post the final group of pictures on here when I get the chance, sometime this weekend.
Lots of love,
Ash
Friday, January 25, 2008
Wednesday, January 23, 2008
Day 24
Last Day!
Today was our last day in Venice and in Italy... Half of us went to Padua which is a city where Shakespeare set a couple of his plays and half of us stayed here in Venice. I stayed here, I have not have enough of the city yet. I love it here. It is still my number one.
We took off in the morning and went to an island called Murano. It is where the glass making is based. It was so cool. We went into one of the factories and we saw them make a glass vase. When he was done he got some more glass and I was watching him pull on it with some scissory things and suddenly I realized he was making a horse! It seemed like it only took him one pull and suddenly there would be a perfectly shaped head or leg... it was utterly AMAZING. Needless to say I spent a lot of money in Venice buying glass but I am so excited about it. I knew I was going to do that so I did not spent as much in Rome and Florence.
We spent the rest of our day shopping again on Rialto bridge. It was fun, very relaxing and the day was absolutly perfect. It was bright and the sun was out. It was the perfect way to end this amazing trip.
Now we are all packing up and getting ready for a group dinner. I am not sure what we will do tonight. We only know where one bar is, mostly they have wine bars where you stand outside and drink wine. It might be an early night again which would be ok with me.
Overall this trip has been amazing. I hope the trip home goes smoothly and all of the things I bought get back in one piece.
I better head out though, I cannot wait to see everyone when I get home!
Lots of love,
Ash
Today was our last day in Venice and in Italy... Half of us went to Padua which is a city where Shakespeare set a couple of his plays and half of us stayed here in Venice. I stayed here, I have not have enough of the city yet. I love it here. It is still my number one.
We took off in the morning and went to an island called Murano. It is where the glass making is based. It was so cool. We went into one of the factories and we saw them make a glass vase. When he was done he got some more glass and I was watching him pull on it with some scissory things and suddenly I realized he was making a horse! It seemed like it only took him one pull and suddenly there would be a perfectly shaped head or leg... it was utterly AMAZING. Needless to say I spent a lot of money in Venice buying glass but I am so excited about it. I knew I was going to do that so I did not spent as much in Rome and Florence.
We spent the rest of our day shopping again on Rialto bridge. It was fun, very relaxing and the day was absolutly perfect. It was bright and the sun was out. It was the perfect way to end this amazing trip.
Now we are all packing up and getting ready for a group dinner. I am not sure what we will do tonight. We only know where one bar is, mostly they have wine bars where you stand outside and drink wine. It might be an early night again which would be ok with me.
Overall this trip has been amazing. I hope the trip home goes smoothly and all of the things I bought get back in one piece.
I better head out though, I cannot wait to see everyone when I get home!
Lots of love,
Ash
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Day 23
Free day in Venice!
Our group decided to get up at a reasonable time (9ish), eat an awesome breakfast and then head out. We went to the Rialto bridge and went shopping, I got a ton of beautiful glass things. I love Venice it is so amazing. A couple of us broke off from the group and pretty much walked around the city all morning/day. We went to a ton of glass shops and then took a boat to San Marco where the basilica is.
We "fed" the pigeons- scariest moment of my life. I went to open the bag of seed and the birds were EVERYWHERE. Me, being me, screamed like a little girl, threw the bag of birdseed into the crowd of birds and RAN FOR MY LIFE. Yup.. I did. Then one of the guys we were with saved the bag of seed and we fed them. It was scary... I'm not a big fan of birds.
We basically spent the day wandering around the city. It was awesome. I love Venice. It is such a beautiful and unique city. Then we got hot chocolate and headed back. I'm really craving a crepe with nutella right now though... we might go to get some later.
I'm not sure what the plan is for tonight. We might all go out to dinner together, there isn't much of a night life here though so it'll probably be an earlier night. Which is fine by me... I'd rather get the most of my days than spend them sleeping and be out all night.
I hope everybody is well, I'll be home in 2 days! I love it here but I'm looking forward to coming home. I miss everybody and it'll be nice to not live out of a suitcase.
I love you all,
Ash
P.S. I'm not sure if I'll get more pictures on here before I go but I'll try to post them when I get back for those of you who are reading this and want to see them.
Our group decided to get up at a reasonable time (9ish), eat an awesome breakfast and then head out. We went to the Rialto bridge and went shopping, I got a ton of beautiful glass things. I love Venice it is so amazing. A couple of us broke off from the group and pretty much walked around the city all morning/day. We went to a ton of glass shops and then took a boat to San Marco where the basilica is.
We "fed" the pigeons- scariest moment of my life. I went to open the bag of seed and the birds were EVERYWHERE. Me, being me, screamed like a little girl, threw the bag of birdseed into the crowd of birds and RAN FOR MY LIFE. Yup.. I did. Then one of the guys we were with saved the bag of seed and we fed them. It was scary... I'm not a big fan of birds.
We basically spent the day wandering around the city. It was awesome. I love Venice. It is such a beautiful and unique city. Then we got hot chocolate and headed back. I'm really craving a crepe with nutella right now though... we might go to get some later.
I'm not sure what the plan is for tonight. We might all go out to dinner together, there isn't much of a night life here though so it'll probably be an earlier night. Which is fine by me... I'd rather get the most of my days than spend them sleeping and be out all night.
I hope everybody is well, I'll be home in 2 days! I love it here but I'm looking forward to coming home. I miss everybody and it'll be nice to not live out of a suitcase.
I love you all,
Ash
P.S. I'm not sure if I'll get more pictures on here before I go but I'll try to post them when I get back for those of you who are reading this and want to see them.
Day 22
We arrived in Venice this morning! We took a long train ride (almost 3 hours) and came right into the city. It was so beautiful. I love Venice. It is unlike any other city in the world. The streets are made out of water; the roads are really tiny alleys. It’s awesome. As soon as we got here we dropped our bags off at our hotel (didn’t even get into our rooms) and went to the Peggy Guggenheim museum. It was small but had works by Picasso and Jackson Pollock and many other modern artists. I’m not a big fan of modern art so I’m glad it was small but it was still interesting. After that we headed over to San Marco and toured the basilica. It wasn’t that great to be honest. Maybe I’m just getting “churched out”. It was pretty though, it’s such an old church. Apparently the bones of Mark are there under the alter but we couldn’t see them. After that we headed back to our hotel and got settled in. It’s a very nice hotel actually and I’m really excited to have breakfast at the hotel tomorrow. It has one computer and a tiny space of wireless but I’m having a hard time connecting so I might have to send this later... I’m using word right now and they don’t have word on their computers. It’s kind of a bummer. Hopefully it’ll get working otherwise I won’t get to post this until I get home.
I’m not sure what we’re doing tonight. Venice doesn’t really have a night life and you have to walk along a lot of creepy alleys to get anywhere.
Tomorrow and Wednesday are free days so they should be fun and then I head home on Thursday! As always I hope everybody is doing well. I love you tons,
Ash
I’m not sure what we’re doing tonight. Venice doesn’t really have a night life and you have to walk along a lot of creepy alleys to get anywhere.
Tomorrow and Wednesday are free days so they should be fun and then I head home on Thursday! As always I hope everybody is doing well. I love you tons,
Ash
Day 21
Today was our free day. We hung around the hotel, slept in and relaxed until about noon. Then a small group of us decided to go to Pisa! We went to the train station, got our tickets, and got something quick to eat. Then as we were sitting on the train about 10 mins before it was to leave one of the girls realized she left her purse where we were eating. She ran off the train to get it. We were trying to decide if we should get off the train or if she would make it in time when the doors suddenly shut and locked. We still don’t know what happened to her… we got back and everybody was at a pub to watch the football games, I know she’s find but I wonder if she ever did find her purse and all that.
After that we got to Pisa. There is nothing there, it’s a very run down city and as you’re walking along a deserted side street you suddenly come across the green patch of grass and you turn around a corner and there it is, the leaning tower! It was very cool… we decided to pay the 15 euro to climb to the top (way expensive but considering that’s all there is to do there it’s worth it). As you are walking up you can feel the tower tilting, you start walking slightly sideways, and then leaning forward, then sideways the other way, then backwards. It was so weird. We got to the top and you are literally on top of the tower. There is just a railing to keep you from going over the edge. It was ridiculous. It was a great view though and to be able to say that I climbed to the top of the leaning tower of Pisa is great. It’s one of the 7 wonders of the world dontcha know! (By the way, I’ve decided that I HAVE to go to each of the 7 wonders at some point in my life.)
There is also a church and duomo there but we didn’t get to go in. They closed while we were in the tower. We went back to the station and got our tickets and came back to Florence. The four of us stopped for dinner before we came back to the hotel. I had the best lasagna I’ve ever had in my life. Usually you can taste/feel that you are eating a layered pasta dish, here the layers all blend together and it just melts in your mouth. It was so good. After that we got back and everybody was already at the pub. Two of the people I was with went to Piazza de Michelangelo to see a cool view of Florence and then went to the pub to join the others. One of the girls and I decided to hang out here and pack up and stuff. I’m not a football girl and after all the walking today I wasn’t really looking forward to walking up another huge hill to see Florence since we already saw it from on top of the tower the other day.
All in all today was a good day. I’m glad to just relax a little before we have a big travel day tomorrow. We leave for Venice at 8AM and the train ride is 2-3 hours. I’m excited though, I would love to spend another day in Florence and see more of it (like the other side of the river…) but Venice is going to be wonderful. Only 3 more days until I head back home too… I can’t believe this trip has gone this fast. It really has been a blink of an eye for me. It’s just insane. I am so incredibly glad that I did this, it has been a once in a lifetime experience and you learn so much about yourself and other people. It’s amazing.
That’s it I guess, I’ll probably head to bed soon here. It’s midnight. I think the second game just started or is about to start so it’ll probably be a while before the rest of the group comes back.
As always I love everybody and miss everybody and can’t wait to come back home in a few days. I hope everybody is well and keeping warm.
Lots of love,
Ashley
After that we got to Pisa. There is nothing there, it’s a very run down city and as you’re walking along a deserted side street you suddenly come across the green patch of grass and you turn around a corner and there it is, the leaning tower! It was very cool… we decided to pay the 15 euro to climb to the top (way expensive but considering that’s all there is to do there it’s worth it). As you are walking up you can feel the tower tilting, you start walking slightly sideways, and then leaning forward, then sideways the other way, then backwards. It was so weird. We got to the top and you are literally on top of the tower. There is just a railing to keep you from going over the edge. It was ridiculous. It was a great view though and to be able to say that I climbed to the top of the leaning tower of Pisa is great. It’s one of the 7 wonders of the world dontcha know! (By the way, I’ve decided that I HAVE to go to each of the 7 wonders at some point in my life.)
There is also a church and duomo there but we didn’t get to go in. They closed while we were in the tower. We went back to the station and got our tickets and came back to Florence. The four of us stopped for dinner before we came back to the hotel. I had the best lasagna I’ve ever had in my life. Usually you can taste/feel that you are eating a layered pasta dish, here the layers all blend together and it just melts in your mouth. It was so good. After that we got back and everybody was already at the pub. Two of the people I was with went to Piazza de Michelangelo to see a cool view of Florence and then went to the pub to join the others. One of the girls and I decided to hang out here and pack up and stuff. I’m not a football girl and after all the walking today I wasn’t really looking forward to walking up another huge hill to see Florence since we already saw it from on top of the tower the other day.
All in all today was a good day. I’m glad to just relax a little before we have a big travel day tomorrow. We leave for Venice at 8AM and the train ride is 2-3 hours. I’m excited though, I would love to spend another day in Florence and see more of it (like the other side of the river…) but Venice is going to be wonderful. Only 3 more days until I head back home too… I can’t believe this trip has gone this fast. It really has been a blink of an eye for me. It’s just insane. I am so incredibly glad that I did this, it has been a once in a lifetime experience and you learn so much about yourself and other people. It’s amazing.
That’s it I guess, I’ll probably head to bed soon here. It’s midnight. I think the second game just started or is about to start so it’ll probably be a while before the rest of the group comes back.
As always I love everybody and miss everybody and can’t wait to come back home in a few days. I hope everybody is well and keeping warm.
Lots of love,
Ashley
Day 20
Today we had our final. We slept in a little and then went down the street and got waffles covered in Nutella (Read: amazing). Then we studied most of the day and worked on stuff we had to turn in this afternoon. I did take a little study break though and bought a cute top haha I had to get out of there, it was such a beautiful day. We just took our final, it went ok, very similar to our other exams. We’ll see how it goes. I’m not too worried about my grade. Now we are all getting ready to go to dinner. I think everybody is planning on going out tonight and celebrate finishing the course. We’ll see how that goes.
(later) Dinner was ok, a lot of seafood so I didn’t eat much. I had a steak and I’m pretty sure it was still bleeding a little. After that we got ready and went out. I watched some of the group take the CRAZIEST shot in my life, an orange slice half covered in coffee, half covered in sugar, you put the coffee side down on your tongue and eat it, take this weird shot with god knows what in it and then eat a piece of banana covered in poppyseed… it was nuts. Then we found the Fiddlers Elbow which is a bar we went to in Rome and there is one in Venice. After stopping in there we went to a Discotec called Space. We danced to weird techno music and got hit on my creepy Italian guys. It was fun though, different from just going to pubs and I got to dance!
That’s it for now, tomorrow is our free day and we have no clue what we’re going to do. Possibly going to the Tuscan country side, Chianti, Sienna, Pisa, or just hanging around here and experiencing Florence a little bit more. I hope everybody is doing well, I miss you all!
Lots of love,
Ashley
(later) Dinner was ok, a lot of seafood so I didn’t eat much. I had a steak and I’m pretty sure it was still bleeding a little. After that we got ready and went out. I watched some of the group take the CRAZIEST shot in my life, an orange slice half covered in coffee, half covered in sugar, you put the coffee side down on your tongue and eat it, take this weird shot with god knows what in it and then eat a piece of banana covered in poppyseed… it was nuts. Then we found the Fiddlers Elbow which is a bar we went to in Rome and there is one in Venice. After stopping in there we went to a Discotec called Space. We danced to weird techno music and got hit on my creepy Italian guys. It was fun though, different from just going to pubs and I got to dance!
That’s it for now, tomorrow is our free day and we have no clue what we’re going to do. Possibly going to the Tuscan country side, Chianti, Sienna, Pisa, or just hanging around here and experiencing Florence a little bit more. I hope everybody is doing well, I miss you all!
Lots of love,
Ashley
Day 19
Hey all,
Today we had lecture and workday all day. It was awful because it was a bright, beautiful day outside. We did however sneak out for an hour and climb to the top of the tower at the Duomo and watched the sun set over Florence. That was awesome and kind of made my day better. I have a lot of pictures J we then spent the night doing more work… nothing exciting at all. I guess we had dinner too, but it wasn’t good at all. First bad meal this week.
I better get back to studying… final tomorrow! Hopefully it goes well. I can’t believe this class is basically over with and I get to be a tourist for a couple of days! Haha I hope everybody is doing well, Love you all!
Ash
Today we had lecture and workday all day. It was awful because it was a bright, beautiful day outside. We did however sneak out for an hour and climb to the top of the tower at the Duomo and watched the sun set over Florence. That was awesome and kind of made my day better. I have a lot of pictures J we then spent the night doing more work… nothing exciting at all. I guess we had dinner too, but it wasn’t good at all. First bad meal this week.
I better get back to studying… final tomorrow! Hopefully it goes well. I can’t believe this class is basically over with and I get to be a tourist for a couple of days! Haha I hope everybody is doing well, Love you all!
Ash
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