http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/lglass/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from lglass en-us Fri, 08 Jan 2010 02:45:11 +0000 Fri, 08 Jan 2010 02:45:11 +0000 I'm so sad. Everyone is leaving. Most people have already left. some are already home. and we leave on wednesday morning. our apartment is pretty much packed up and it looks so bare. But even though i'm going to miss it here i'm really excited about seeing everyone at home. i'm a little bit worried about how shelle's going to react. i just hope no one gets hurt. So. Last tuesday keri sarah http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Netherlands/North-Holland/Amsterdam/blog-31895.html Yesterday was our day for final exams. we still have a couple of projects due on mon. that i still need to do some work on. but instead i'll catch up on this thing. the exams were pretty easy but it was terrible getting ready for them. that morning was soo rainy and miserable and i got soaked. i think rome is going to float away. the tiber is flooded so much i dont think we're going to see the http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-30734.html Even though i'm pretty relieved to know that i wont have to go on any more 12 hour train rides across the continent any time soon i'm still pretty sad about the fact that i'm almost done with my semester here. I ended my 6th day of rail travel with our trip to Munich for thanksgiving weekend. Keri and Sarah and I started out trip from Rome on Wednesday night after another long wednesday and si http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Germany/Bavaria/Munich/blog-29044.html Keri Sarah and I are leaving for Munich tonight so i figured i should update before i have too much to write about. This past weekend almost everyone went out of town except for a couple of us. Keri and i went around to do some stuff we've been meaning to do but havent' yet around rome. We found the gelato place near the pantheon that's supposed to be the best in town or something. it was soo http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-28425.html Ahh got back from Venice last night. everyone else is still there but keri adn sarah and i decided to come back early because its really expensive to stay there and we saw everything in the first day anyway. Venice is so beautiful though. Gorgeous. Started out pretty rough though. Since keri sarah rachel and samantha and i all had eurail passes we didnt get the reservations for the train and http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Veneto/Venice/blog-27127.html Not too much has been going on lately just some midterms and studying and hanging out around town. But yesterday we had our day trip to Caprarola and Bagnaia which were about and hour and a half north of Rome. It was a really fun trip because we jsut looked at some villas and gardens and played around in them. It must have been really fun to have been friends with the Farnese family. their ga http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-26151.html So last sunday was the papal mass it was an amazing experience. not only was this an opportunity to go to receive mass from the pope but it was a cannonization mass where he cannonized 5 saints. how cool is that so anyway that morning we all got up super early to get ready and go. The mass itself started at like 930 or 1000 but we had to get there at about 7 in order to get into the gates http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Vatican-City/blog-24725.html So we went to Florence last weekend. I jsut havent had the energy to write all about it on here. I know taht the longer i take to update the more i'm going to have to write about when i do but that makes me feel even more overwhelmed about writing so i just don't. So i am just going to recap the main events from Florence. Train ride there. yay pretty tuscany. dropped luggage off at hotel a http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-24109.html seriously. best place on earth. ok i'm lying a little bit on this journal bc i'm not actually in switzerland anymore. but i wanted to put another country on here. so anyway last thursday night we got all our crap together and took the bus to termini from school. i had to wear my coat bc i didnt have room to pack it adn we got on such a crowded bus and i was sweating so bad and we werent very http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Switzerland/South-West/Interlaken/blog-23134.html alrighty its lunch break on my horrible wednesday. dante and italian got switched so we had italian this morning. easier to concentrate when i'm not so exhausted. but still i was ready to get out of there. plus we're not getting out of school today til 630 and i have to go to standa before they close at 8 to get the stuff for switzerland yay we're going to switzerland tomorrow i have to buy gl http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-22105.html i just booked our reservations at the hostel in interlaken switzerland i am soooooooo excited about going. its sounds ridiculous to want a vacation from rome but its going to be so nice to be able to relax and not have to take notes on teh places we go and to be out of a city and see trees and birds that arent pidgeons. ah. we're staying at balmer's herberge www.balmers.com. And i get t http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-21746.html as much as wednesdays suck tuesdays are awesome. Today we went with Emilio to the Museum of roman culture or something. It was all models and casts of sculptures. The big thing we saw there was the hall with the casts of the scenes of Trajan's Column. Apparently this is never open to the public and Emilio told us to take as many pictures as possible because it might not open again. So i did. http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-21202.html Well sort of. more or less. This morning Sarah Keri and I walked up to St. Peter's Square because we heard that the vatican museums are free on the last sunday of the month. BUT everyone else in the world has heard that too adn there were tons of people there. But we got up to the square and worked our way up as close as we could and we heard the pope talking and saw his face on the big scre http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-20924.html So yesterday we went to Ostia for class with Davide. The four of us girls had already been to Ostia but the beach we went to is a lot farther out than the ruins of the city we went to. We took the train there which was kind of gross but the city was really nice. The weather was nice for once and it had beautiful scenery there. it was a lot longer than i had anticipated though or i would hav http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-20521.html yesterday we went to pompeii. we got up very very early and left at about 7 am. keri and i were planningn on getting some coffe and croissants on the way to school but aparently nothing in rome is open before like 8 or 9 in the morning. this is crazy to me. but we got a nice bus for the ride there and the scenery on the way there was gorgeouslots of mountains and hilltop towns. pompeii was re http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-20024.html ahhhhhhh i am soooo hot right now. and sooo sunburned. my feet are falling off of my ankles and i am very tired. I've been walking around rome since 800 this morning. its 5 right now. so what is that like 9 hours walking around in the very hot sun. ouch. I dont even remember anything that davide and francesco told us. i couldnt concentrate on anything but the agonizing heat and tiredne http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-19781.html I just went to an Italian high mass at St. Andrew of the Valley with the Quinns. I was so confused. Even though I've been catholic all my life I still had a difficult time figuring out what was really going on. The priest was newly ordained and this was his very first mass. That was pretty interesting. I felt nervous for him. I bet Megan and Keri were even more confused than me since they'v http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-19336.html I think it rains every day here. but its like florida rain. it rains for a little bit then clears up and then rains and clears up. i only got stuck in the rain once walking home from school without my umbrella. now i carry it everywhere. Anyway we were supposed to go on a tour of the Colosseum but Keri and i walked over there in the rain and when we showed up Davide told us that the Colosse http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-19145.html We've been in Rome now for 5 days but it feels like we've been here a month because we've done and seen so much. I love our apartment. It's so cute and close to everything but the road that its on is still very quiet and nice. We did have a flood though our first night because aparently the air conditioner drains into this can on the floor that we didnt know to empty. so we woke up the next http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-18795.html So I have 10 days until I leave for Rome. I'm getting really nervous about it because it feels like I still have so much to get done before I leave. Hopefully everything will get done because I know I will put it all off until the very last days. One of my friends was studying in Germany this summer and hearing about all the stuff he did made me really excited about going. I'm just afraid I'm g http://www.travelblog.org/Europe/Italy/Lazio/Rome/blog-17101.html