Advertisement
Published: April 30th 2008
Hello Everyone!
I know that is this long over due, however, better to be late than to never post at all. This message shows I am located in Sorrento, Italy. I was there this past weekend and it was amazing. I little more on that after I fill you in on the past few weeks.
Life has been going really well for me the past few weeks. I have been kept busy at work due to the fact we have a person on the team leaving this Friday. As a result, I was 'traded' from the European side of security lending to the North American side. I still do some of my daily European reports, however I have taken on some US reports as well as being in charge of the Mexican market. I basically call Mexico a lot and complain about how they aren't doing their job. It’s not a bad gig actually. It’s nice to shoulder some real responsibility here at DB.
I have been trying to see more of the city lately. It’s been hard since we have had classes on some weekends, but two weekends ago I got to go to the Museum of London, which is always cool to see. We went to St. Paul's for church that Sunday. We also went to the national Gallery where i was able to see a number of works by Monet, and the highlight was seeing Vincent's 'Sunflowers.' When I get home from work I will be sure to add some photos from the weekend.
I also have had a few chances to go out and play soccer with my roommates and some local guys from around the area. Nothing truly organized, just a pick up game here and there, but it’s been a lot of fun to play again and I'm thankful for the exercise as its hard to make time everyday to go run. I had an exciting accident playing one day. Some kid and I went up for a heading and connected head on head. I knocked the kid to the ground and he was hurting. So I leaned over to make sure he was alright, and i started dripping blood all over him. Turns out I had a large gash over my left eye. Fortunately, I don't think I needed stitches. Only time well tell if it will scar over. I have a nice picture that I will also add to an entry when I get home tonight.
I finally took my first 'out of the country' vacation. I went to visit Amanda in Italy. On Thursday I left work around 3:45 (woot for leaving work early and it not counting against your days off), and went to the airport. Amanda met me at the airport in Pisa. It was great to see her as it had been a month since her visit to London. We were scheduled to leave Pisa around midnight on a sleeper train heading to Napoli, so we decided to try and make it to the Tower of Pisa to just how much the damn thing leaned. Well, it really is leaning; almost ready to fall at any moment. I regret not having more time. I’d love to back during the daytime so I could see inside the church and basilica. It was gorgeous. By the time we got to the tower, we only had like 10 minutes before we had to turn around and Run to the train station in order to catch our train in time. We made it and found our compartment, which was hot, muggy, and full of Italians. Through the night, I only got 20 minute spurts of sleep. Our train stopped in Rome, so I technically was in Rome. We finally arrived at Napoli early Friday morning. We didn’t stay long. We quickly caught our train on the Circumvesuviana, the line that would take us to Sorrento.
We finally got to Sorrento after a 45 minute journey on the CV. One of my co-workers told me that Italy is beautiful, but every other transaction you get ripped off. Don’t ever take a taxi in Sorrento. We had no idea where our Bed and Breakfast was, so we took a cab. It was about 300 meters away from the station and it cost my almost 15 Euro. We finally got to the Villa Anna, which was amazing. Sorrento is a very interesting coastal city as it has citrus groves everywhere. The streets are lined with citrus trees that you could really just walk and pick an orange or a lemon. The Villa Anna had their own trees in their garden, as served freshly picked organs in the morning. The room was really clean and roomy. So far, Sorrento has been on e my favourite cities. After we checked into our room, we freshened up and got back on the CV train and headed to Pompei to see the ruins. It was remarkable. I always assumed the ruins were a few preserved city blocks, however, almost the entire city is in some way preserved. We saw the town’s forum, the brothel, and the temple, all of which have the active volcano Vesuvius looming in the background.
After we spent 2 hours exploring the city, we hopped a bus that took us to almost the top of Mt. Vesuvius. We hiked the rest of the way to the top. The views are beautiful. Napoli, Capri, and Sorrento can all be seen from the summit/crater. Vesuvius is still active, so we saw all kinds of vent leaking steam into the air. It was eerie, and I couldn’t help but wonder why people would build cities this close to a pending disaster. After the overnight train, walking in the Pompei ruins under the hot sun, and hiking up a mountain, we were exhausted. We went to grab dinner and gelato that night. Italians know how to eat. It was great to escape the blandness of English cuisine for awhile. See the next entry for pictures from the day.
On Saturday, we woke up and went to eat our breakfast. It was a simple breakfast with cereal, pastries, and some meats. But the highlight was the hand picked oranges. They were the best oranges I have ever eaten. They also made us some coffee fresh in front of use. I haven’t had really good coffee in such a long time. Italian coffee is some of the best I have ever had. After breakfast, we rush to get everything packed for the day. We left some of our bags at the B&B, and took a backpack around with us as while we explored the city of Sorrento. We went down to the marina and coast to hit up a beach. The Mediterranean was freezing, so we didn’t swim at all. We did a lot of walking around and enjoying the city that day. I bought myself an Italian espresso maker so I could make coffee every morning for myself before work. Then the excitement happened.
We hopped onto the CV to head back to Naples. We finally get to what we thought was our stop, but apparently it wasn’t the right Naploi station. We tried asking someone how to get there. One of the station workers said, “you come with me, I take you in my machine.” We assumed he meant the bus or train he was driving. Instead he walked us outside and told us to wait. He showed up 5 minutes later with his car and drove us to the station. It was 10:10 at that point and our overnight train to Florence was due to leave at 10:30, or so we thought. We walked into the station to find no train heading to Florence. Apparently, American Express, where Amanda got the tickets, screwed up the date of the ticket and our train was due to leave Sunday night, no Saturday. So we were stuck. The taxi drivers were dodgy, trying to convince us to let them drive us to Casserta where would could catch a train. They wanted to gives us a deal of 80 euros. After we finally convinced the taxi drivers to **** off, we decided to sneak onto a train to Solerno, where we could catch a train to Florence at 1am. We got to Solerno no problem at 11:25ish. So we had to sit there and wait in the cold for an hour and a half. We ended up buying tickets for this train in fear of getting caught and fined for not producing a valid ticket. So there went another 70 Euro for the two of us. Amanda had her computer, so we watched Friends until our train arrived. We got on the train and went to our assigned cabin, it was already full. We check every compartment and there was, like for Mary and Joseph, no room at the Inn. So we sat in between rail cars for about 20 minutes until Amanda complained to the guy checking tickets about not having room. He told us to move up to first class. Sweet, free upgrade. Went to the First class cabin and found seats. We sat down, and just as we were about to sleep, the ticket man came buy and demanded that we pay 30 euro for the upgrade. Shit, no free upgrade. So after hours of restlessness and a lighter wallet, we slept until we arrived in Florence Sunday Morning.
We arrived around 6:20am, and got to Amanda’s apartment by 7:30am. We both agreed we needed a nap, sleeping horizontally rather than sitting. I had a reservation to see the David at 10:30am, so we had time to nap. We woke up around 11:11. Oops. We finally got out of the apartment at noon, and went walking around Florence. It is really a beautiful city, with cobble stone streets that are everywhere. I could have spent a whole weekend there exploring. But I only had 7 hours before I had to leave for the Pisa airport. So we went and saw some piazzas, and grabbed a great lunch. We then went to the see Michalangelo’s ‘David.’ It really is amazing. Everyone tells you its amazing, but until you see it, you think its just another statue. Its so life like, it is like a street performer pretending to be a statue. It looks like David will turn his head at any minute. It really was and amazing thing to add to my list of great works I have seen. I also snapped so illegal pictures of it (see next entry).
We then went to the Duomo, however it was a Sunday so we couldn’t really get in. But we climbed 414 steps to the top of the bell tower and saw some breathtaking views of Florence. We then went back to pack me up and to get me to the Airport. It was hard to say goodbye to Amanda this time, because I don’t really know the next time I get to see her. I hope not too long as she has been offered an internship at the American Embassy in London She also has an interview with Delta coming up face to face. Either way, I’d get to see more a lot more often. We had a cliché movie goodbye at the train station. It was great, except for the goodbye part.
I made it to my flight and got to London safely. I had problems getting through immigration. They screwed up my Visa sticker and it said my Visa expired April 3rd 2008 instead of 2009. I was held up for and hour there until they sorted it out and let me into the country. I got home at 2am on Sunday and had a hell of a day at work on Monday.
That brings me to now. Still tired after one of the best trips I’ve had. Sure there were bumps along the way, but that is how memories are made. I will add photos of it all, and maybe some videos as well tonight. I know this is long, but I felt I would give you all a detailed account, not mention have a vivid account of the trip for my own sake. Please leave me comments. I love getting them. Katie, you are the queen of comments keep it up.
Until next time- Cheers!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.084s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 14; qc: 30; dbt: 0.0546s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
Amanda
non-member comment
our trip!
hi hunny - thought it was about time i left you a comment - seeing as how this entry is mostly about our vacation! :o) Thank you so much for coming down to see me in Italy - Even though there were a lot of mishaps - I had an amazing time sharing adventures and seeing the world with you! I can't wait to do it again - next stop .. Paris! - I love you!