Spring Break

I had 10 days to travel for spring break and I took advantage of it! Me, Jessie and Lauren went to Budapest, Vienna and Prague and then met up with Christina in London at the end of the trip. We had a great time and saw soooo much, I'll try to recap each city as best as I can!

Budapest
We arrived late Thursday night and went straight to our hostel. We stayed at the Mandragora Hostel and it was so cute and nice! It was yoga/hippie style and had only 3 rooms, a double, a six person and an eight person where we stayed. It didn't have any bunk beds but lofts instead, it was a lot more private that way. We also got free breakfast and all the coffee and tea we wanted. Friday morning we headed out to explore. We took the metro to the center of Pest and wandered around, a little lost for a while. We found Parliament, made it to the river and crossed the chain bridge into Buda where most of the "sights" are. We walked up a ton of stairs to the castle district and saw amazing views of the city.





We had lunch at a traditional Hungarian restaurant; I had goulash- yum! We struggled with money, their currency has large denominations (100, 500, 2,000, 5,000 etc) and it was confusing trying to convert prices in our head to see how much we were really spending. After lunch and some more walking in Buda, we took the metro back to Pest to go to the thermal baths! Their basically huge hot tubs, some outside and a bunch inside. It felt so good to relax and hang out in the baths and then we decided to get Thai massages! It was pretty cheap and felt so good. This little Asian lady was crawling/walking all over me and cracking my body in ways I didn't know were possible. It was awesome. We had dinner, strolled around a little and headed back to the hostel. We enjoyed the unlimited tea and went to bed early because we had to catch the train the next morning. We only spent a day in Budapest but one full day is all you really need to see most of the sights. Parts of Budapest area really nice and some are really sketchy and run down looking so we were ready to move on.

Vienna
We arrived in the early afternoon and only had to walk about 2 blocks to our hostel, the Wombat. The hostel was really cool, it had a lounge area with a pool table, computers with internet for 50 euro cents and a huge bed to relax on. There was also a kitchen with free food and the WomBar in the basement! The Wombat felt like living in the dorms, there were lots of young people staying there. We stayed in a 6 person dorm so we had randoms staying with us the 2 nights we were there. It wasn't as awkward as I thought it would be since we were all out and about all day and didn't really see each other. On Friday we started in the center of town where St. Stephen's Cathedral is and continued to the area where the Vienna Boy's Choir performs, the Spanish Riding School, the Butterfly House, the Opera House, Parliament and City Hall.


In front of St. Stephen's Cathedral

We found multiple Starbuck's which was very exciting. The cool thing about them in Vienna (and some other countries) is that they ask if you want to drink your coffee there and give you real Starbucks mugs! Classy. Anyway, we were cold from walking all day so we headed home for a nap before going down to the Wombar for our free welcome drink. The next day, Sunday, we went to see Shonbrunn Palace across town. We rode the metro which is awesome in Vienna, it takes you everywhere and our hostel was right across the street from one of the stops. The palace is gorgeous, and there are gardens all around it, I only wish all the flowers would have been in bloom.



We had lunch at a traditional Viennese restaurant, I had soup with dumplings. Side note- Vienna in German is Wein, we had so much fun trying to read words in German. Words have like 15 letters in them, people thought we were crazy when we would laugh at street signs. Our favorite sign read "Gute Fahrt" (say it out loud hahaha), turns our it means "enjoy your travels". I digress... That night we went to an English cinema and watched Milk, it was my second time seeing it, so good! It was really nice to do something "normal" like going to the movies, it helps to not feel like my life here is so different than at home and that I'm in a foreign country. Vienna is a beautiful city, the architecture is gorgeous, most old buildings are crisp white with no graffiti and the whole city is very clean.

Prague
Our original plan was to take the overnight train from Vienna to Prague but it ended up being a lot more expensive than we thought, so we took a bus. It was a 4 hour ride but it went by pretty fast and it was cheap. We stayed in an apartment that we rented for 3 nights, it was pretty nice and there was a washing machine! We had to pack light, only backpacks or duffel bags because the budget airlines that we took charge you to check a bag so we could only have a carry-on. We packed for 5 days and were able to wash things in Prague, which was half way through the trip. The machine didn't work that great but it was good enough. My friend Martin that I know from SD last summer lives near Prague so he was our tour guide. We had lunch at a Czech restaurant down the street from our apartment, I had Wiener Schnitzel- yum and we had a beer tasting. Prague is truly a fairy tale city, it looks just like Main St. in Disneyland. All the buildings are really clean and are different colors so they stand out.



The weather was crazy though like Budapest and Vienna, windy, cold, thunderstorms, a little snow and sunshine, so bipolar. Monday we saw Old Town Square, Wenceslas Square, the Municipal House, Powder Gate and we saw an Opera that night. On Tuesday we went to the Jewish Ghetto and walked along the river, then we crossed the Charles Bridge. We saw the Lennon Wall and had to take a million pictures. It was amazing, and detailed, you could stare at it for hours and still not see everything.



After we walked up a ton of stairs to the Castle area. Up on the hill is the Royal Palace, the Castle, and St. Vitus Cathedral. We watched the changing of the guards before walking down the Golden Lane and then back home. That night we went clubbing at FX, the club where Rhianna shot the video for "Please Don't Stop the Music' it was a lot of fun! Wednesday we had a lazy start to the day and just wandered around the city and into a few shops. We stayed in that night to pack and rest up for London the next day.

London
We left early Thursday morning to get to the airport. We arrived in London and took a quick train into the city. Christina met us at the train station and we took the tube to the Marriott! It was awesome to end the trip in a nice, comfy hotel. After freshening up we went sightseeing. We saw Big Ben, the Houses of Parliament and Westminster Abbey before lunch. We went to a typical English pub and had fish n chips, delicious. After we ate we crossed the Thames River and went on the London Eye. I was scared at first because I really don't like heights, but I had to go on it! It actually wasn't scary because you're completely enclosed and there is a bench in the middle to sit. The only time I would get a little scared was if I went right up to the glass and looked down. We went in the late afternoon, just before dusk and the sky was beautiful.



That night we attempted to go out, but for various reasons it didn't work out so we kicked it at the hotel. Friday we went to Buckingham Palace to see the changing of the guards, it was packed so I didn't see all of it but it was still cool. I was a little bummed to learn that you can't actually go up to the guards and take pictures with them like in movies. We had lunch at Pret- basically its all grab and go food, packaged but really fresh and delicious. They have them all over and other places like it, Italy needs to get on it! We also took some time to act like complete tourists and took picture with everything...



Lauren, Jessie and I went to see the Tower of London and Tower Bridge while Christina went to a few museums (she was in London a few days before us so she already saw the Tower). I was so excited to go because the Tower of London was once a palace where royalty and nobility lived but then became famous as a prison. The Tower is where King Henry VIII beheaded two of his wives and had others killed as well. They had tours of the grounds lead by the Beefeaters (retired military personnel that now work here, that's their nickname, they're actually called Yeomen Wardens). Our Beefeater was awesome, he was really funny and told us about a lot of cool stuff. At the Tower of London is also the Royal Jewels- bling bling! We were grandma's again that night and stayed in. We enjoyed the pool/steam room/gym at the hotel and watched a movie in our room. Saturday we got up early and went to the Apollo Victoria Theatre to get Wicked tickets!!!! We went on a Beatles walking tour through some quieter areas of the city and saw where some of them lived, where they filmed scenes from both of their films and saw Abbey Road and Abbey Studios.


Our attempt of The Beatles Abbey Road album cover haha
After the tour we walked around the shopping areas and then went to Wicked. The show was amazing, I'm so so SO glad we went and I really want to see it again! Sunday was our last day, Christina left in the morning for her flight, the rest of us didn't fly out until that night. We did some last minute sightseeing, St. Paul's Cathedral, the Millennium Bridge, the Globe Theatre and a stroll along the river. There were a bunch of street performers out and it was so fun to see them, especially the break dancers! The last thing we did before going to the airport was go to King's Cross train station to see Platform 9 3/4 from Harry Potter, that's right they made a little wall and trolley just for tourists lol. We had a great time in London, it was awesome to be in an English speaking country, we really didn't feel like foreigners. It mostly felt like we were in the U.S. just in a state we'd never been before, except for the cars on the other side of the road and the double decker buses haha.

Brussels and Amsterdam

I thought this weekend was going to be really stressful with all the traveling involved to get from Rome to Brussels, then to Amsterdam and then back to Rome, but it was surprisingly a very smooth weekend. Christina, Jessie and I flew to an airport outside of Brussels, hopped on a bus and was in the city in an hour. Our hostel was about a 2 minute walk from the train station and was in this really cute square- a great location to see the main areas of Brussels. We were just a few blocks from Grand Place square where they have gorgeous old buildings with lots of gold. One of the best things we saw was Mannekin Pis- basically a statue of a little boy peeing. Legend has it that a man couldn't find his son and swore that when he found him, he would create a statue of him exactly as he found him, and apparently he was peeing. I don't know if that's true, but I hope it is because that's hilarious..



We also walked to the royal palace, the cathedral, a few parks, ate the most delicious waffle, had a beer tasting, and went to a chocolate shop all within a few hours!


WAFFLE


Royal Palace

Brussels is awesome because pretty much everything you need to see is all in one little area of the city. It was very relaxing to just wander around and go in and out of little shops. Everyone is so nice there and they all speak English. Belgium had 2 official languages- Dutch and French, most of Brussels speaks French. We met this lady who worked at the chocolate shop, and we heard her speak 4 different languages with customers while we were there, turns out she can speak 10 languages! That's amazing. Another bonus was that our room had a TV and we got to watch American shows! Italy doesn't have American programming on their basic channels...

The next morning, Saturday, we took the train to Amsterdam, about a 2:30 hour ride. We love the train so it was a nice scenic ride. Again we got really lucky and were staying close to the train station, and the best part was we stayed at a Marriot! The price for a hostel was almost the same as the hotel so why wouldn't we go classy?! The hotel was gorgeous and our room was huge with really comfy beds. Unfortunately we didn't get as lucky with the weather as we did in Brussels, it drizzled most of the day but we still explored. We walked along the canals, saw the flower market, ate pancakes and bacon-yum!!!! saw the I amsterdam structure, walked past the Anne Frank House and the Van Gogh museum (the lines were too long to go inside), learned the tram line, walked through the red light district (wow, that's all I'm going to say) all by 6:00 pm.






Giant Clog!

We were so concerned we would be pressed for time in both cities, but a day in each ended up being plenty. We went back to the hotel to relax and watch MTV on our flat screen; it was a much needed update on American trash TV. We had dinner at a really cute little Indian restaurant, wandered around a little more and went to bed. The next morning we took a 2 hour bus ride to Eidenhoven where the small airport is where the budget airlines fly out of and were back in Rome by 4:30pm. It was a really chill weekend, nothing super crazy happened and we took it easy. This coming weekend starts our 10 day spring break and it's going to be BIG! I'm going to Budapest, Vienna, Prague and LONDON!!!! Can't wait!!

AS Roma

A few thoughts:

1. Sporting events in Italy are way crazy, they basically let you do whatever you want. People were sitting in the walkways, on the fences, getting into fights and security doesn't care.

2. Italians LOVE their futbol. Every time a Roma player would mess up a play, they would freak out, curse in Italian and genuinely act like their world was crashing down (including the kids, minus the cursing). It was pretty hilarious. They also have a few songs/cheers for the Roma team that are way cool and I'm determined to learn them.

3. The stadium that AS Roma plays in is the Stadio Olimpico where the 1960 Summer Olympic games where held and holds over 72,000 people. Rome is officially in the running for the Summer games in 2020, that would be so sweet to come back for it!!!!





4. We made sure to buy some Roma gear before going to the game so we would somewhat blend in and so the crazy fan's would know we're on Roma's side. We saw some other American's at the game, in Roma gear but totally stood out because they were being really loud and obnoxious. It's so annoying when people act like that and give the rest of us American's a bad name. A lot of Italians don't have any patience for American's because of people like these girls and it sucks for the rest of us...

Barcelona

I love Barcelona. End of Story.


Haha not really but I do really love it. Me, Christina, Lauren and Jessie all went and we were so excited because it was our first trip out of Italy! We flew on Ryanair and landed at a small airport about an hour outside the city (which is why the tickets were so cheap). Luckily they have a really convenient bus that takes you from the airport into Barcelona for 21 euro roundtrip. From the bus station we walked to our hostel which was in a great location, about 2 blocks from La Rambla, one of the main walking streets. It was my first hostel stay and I must say it was pretty nice for how little we paid. Nothing special, but clean and the 4 of us had our own room, lockers and bathroom so I can't complain! After we dropped off our stuff and freshened up, we walked down La Rambla to find lunch. La Rambla is such a cool street, it basically has a huge pedestrian walkway right through the middle of it and one way streets for the cars on either side. There are little kiosk type stands that to sell you things and out door tables for the restaurants that are across the street.


La Rambla

Friday was really warm and we didn't have to wear coats! We had tapas, paella and sangria outside and people watched. It was awesome. After lunch we continued walking down La Rambla all the way to the water. It was so beautiful to walk along the harbor and look at all the sail boats, it actually reminded me a lot of California, probably one of the reasons I love Barcelona so much!



The rest of the evening we wandered around, went shopping (of course) and had dinner at a falaafal shop! Barcelona is really cool because they have way more diverse people and food (and it's actually good) than Italy. They have a lot of American chain restaurants; our hostel was 2 doors down from Starbucks!!!!!!!!!!! I realize that half the fun of going abroad is to immerse yourself in that countries culture, but man was it nice to sit and drink a way overpriced tall vanilla latte in the cookie-cutter design of every Starbucks. Anyway we went home and relaxed before going out to Razzmatazz, a 5 story club. We knew people go out later in Barcelona so we headed out around 1 am thinking it would be good timing. Man were we wrong...it was empty, and didn't start getting packed until 2:30!

On Saturday it was overcast unfortunately but we still stuck it out without coats during the day. We had an early start and took the Metro to see Parc Guell designed by Guadi. It was so beautiful and really different, more of a gardens than a park actually. It also had a lot of mosiac designs including a giant 3-D lizard! They also filmed the season finale of America's Next Top Model there, the one with Carridee and Melrose in the crazy wedding dresses. So cool.



We walked around some more, saw some of the houses Guadi designed, had lunch and went to a HUGE food market off La Rambla. This market was awesome, it was basically outside, with just a cover to protect if it rains and had every kind of food: meat, seafood, cheese, fruits, veggies and tons of candy! We bought some chocolate- yum and went home to relax. Around 9 we went in search for dinner and found a spanish/mexican bar/restaurant; chips and guacomole+fajitas=heaven. We did some night time sightseeing, which works out better than you'd think because Barcelona is really well lit and there are tons of people out at night so it wasn't sketchy. Later that night, around 2am we went to Opium, an awesome club on the beach. It had a huge dance floor, lounge area and outdoor seating, if only it was warmer then we could have enjoyed the outside. I really liked this club and would definitely go back!

Sunday we didn't have time for any sightseeing, but we did get one last Starbucks before heading to the bus station and then to the airport. We arrived in Rome around 5pm to rainy weather of course and it's not supposed to stop all week! Oh well, I have 4 short papers to write and 2 midterms next week so I wouldn't be able to enjoy the nice weather much anyway. It's a good thing I'm staying in town this weekend!

Carnivale in Venice!

Last weekend Christina, Jessie, Molly, Lauren and I went to Venice and it was so awesome! Jessie decided to fly because she found a cheap flight and so she arrived a few hours before the rest of us. We took the train which is a 4:30 hour ride but it really doesn't feel that long. For some reason airplanes seem to take forever, but not the trains. I think it's because the seating is set up differently and you can see the countryside through the windows, it's beautiful. Right as we walked out of the train station, we walked into Carnivale. We saw the canal, boats, face painters, musicians and tons of people. People were dressed in the most amazing costumes and masks. Some had really elaborate renaissance era costumes and they just walked around and pose so we could take pictures of them.



Other people were dressed up in funny outfits, we saw teletubbies, clowns, school supplies and little kids dressed up, they were so cute! We got a little lost trying to find our studio apartment that we rented for the weekend, luckly we found Jessie and she took us there. For some reason none of us could open the door, we all tried a million times and even asked our neighbor. We finally had to call the lady we rented the place from so she could come back and open it. She had to grease the door, I guess it sticks? It was weird... Molly and Jessie hung back to nap while the rest of us went exploring. One of the best part about Venice is that there are no cars! Walking around in Italy, you always have to watch out for cars, they tend to not stop...We wandered around, took pictures of everything and bought masks! Later in the evening we met up with the other girls and headed to St. Marc's Square to see the drag queen competition. It was pretty entertaining but once the sun went down it got really cold so we headed home.

Saturday we took the ferry to the glass blowing island of Murano. The ferry ride was pretty short but I really enjoyed it, you know how much I love boats! Unfortunately the glass blowing factories were closed so we couldn't see any being made, but we still had a really nice time strolling along the canal and going into all the shops. They also had really cool glass sculptures around the island.



When we got back to the main island of Venice, we all got our faces painted! It was so fun to feel like a little kid again at a carnival lol.



I had been trying to get in touch with my friend Kendall from SD who was in Venice the same weekend, but we were having phone issues. I only ended up seeing her for about 5 seconds when she was in line to go into the Basillica. I was bummed I didn't get to spend more time with her, but a quick hug and a hello was better than nothing! The girls and I had a delicious dinner together and went looking for a bar/club to hang out in. Venice doesn't have much of a nightlife, even during Carnivale so we headed home and had our own dance party in our room haha.

Sunday we packed up and did some more sightseeing. We went to the Jewish Ghetto and it was so nice to be away from the crowds and just enjoy a walk. After lunch and more wandering it was time to head to the train station. There was bumper to bumper traffic of people along the main streets, which you have to take to the train station.



It was a little stressful and annoying trying to navigate through all those people with our stuff, but we managed and got to the station just in time. I unfortunately didn't have a seat on the train, although I had a ticket. So basically how that works is I just hope that someone doesn't show up so I can take the empty seat. I wasn't so lucky and I had to sit on the floor the whole ride, it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be though!

"When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that's amore"

This week hasn't been too eventful, just an average week in Rome. We've been having some interesting weather though, a lot of rain and thunderstorms. It even hailed one day even though the sun was out, weird. It's been raining so much that the Tiber river is getting really high and might flood again if this keeps up. This weekend was a much needed break of the rain and we had some sunny days but it's REALLY cold and windy; no fun for walking.

Last night a bunch of us went out and ended up walking all over the heart of Rome. Our original plan was to go on an organized pub crawl that started at the Colosseum but we were running late so we ditched that and went to Campo de Fiori for apertivo and drinks. We decided we needed to go to a club and dance so after getting a little lost and changing our plans a bit, we ended up at Gilda's, a discotecha! I had a good time but I would have had more fun if we didn't do so much wandering a before; cobblestone streets+heals=no bueno. They played really fun hip hop and techno music and there were so many JCU students there it was ridiculous. We met some interesting Italians that were really excited that we were American haha.

Today is Valentine's day! Me and some of the girls went to see Sleeping Beauty the ballet at this gorgeous Opera house in Rome. We had box seats, one just for us to sit in and we felt so classy. After the ballet we went to dinner and I decided to order something besides pasta; I got the steak and potatoes. It was a nice change, even though they gave me french fries instead of roasted potatoes (I think they did it because we're Americans lol) and even better was the chocolate cake and tiramisu for dessert!


At the ballet

I think I'm getting sick again, booo so I am being responsible and staying in to rest up. I don't want to be sick next week in Venice for Carnivale!!!! I'm so excited!!

p.s. I have yet to be serenaded "That's Amore" by an Italian, I'm workin on it hahaha

Things I love about Italy (in no particular order)

1. The tram in Rome- It takes me close to campus and various bars, there is almost always some musical entertainment and you can get away with riding without paying, although I'm bound to get a ticket sometime...oh well I like to live on the edge haha

2. Cappuccino's- They're waayyy better than home and cheaper

3. Gelato- Same as above.

4. Wine- The same price as water and socially expected to be drank at every meal.

5. The pubs/bars when they play throwback American music- they love our old school pop/rock. My favorite pub would definitely be Scholar's, always a good time.

6. The cheese ball Italian music video's, especially Italian Zac Efron and the high school musical song remake.

7. My favorite Italian word "Cinque" (pronounced cheen-kway) which means 5, It just sounds cool!

8. Copious amounts of Pasta and Pizza- 2 of my all time favorite foods.

9. Eurostar- They are way more comfortable and easier than flying (although way more time consuming if you're leaving Italy).

10. Going to the market- it's always an adventure finding new foods to try out seeing as all the labels are in Italian, and the funny guy that always rings up our food is awesome, he's so nice (and trust me customer service is not common in Italy).