"boy, i sure feel like a mary without a peter and paul"--tobias funke

i need to get a few things off my chest:

things i will miss about abroad:
--seeing cool places/doing cool things
--the 7 people i like on my program...the rest are literally freaks and i don't care who reads this at this point
--being legitimately on my own...but that's getting old
--the food
--the wine
--the nightlife that feels more sophisticated, minus barcelona, which was definitely not sophisticated at all but was still awesome
--siena and the natives
--feeling independent
--learning things i would otherwise never know and finding out random facts about random crap everyday
--living in one of the most beautiful places and the tuscan countryside
--the dogs, especially the huge dog named lucky that sits in front of his house next to IES every day and for whom i specifically schedule an extra 7 minutes to play with before i go to class
--being able to go wherever i want in europe basically
--not being bored at any moment in time, always having something to do
--finding out what i can do by myself...which is actually a lot...

things i won't miss about abroad:
--having travel plans go awry
--having to get from siena to anywhere else
--freaks on my program
--hostels
--my smelly apartment due to my roommates
--smelly italians
--smelly italian youth
--having to do an inordinate amount of work for classes that don't even count for my major or show up on my gpa, but which require the effort nonetheless because the grades appear on my transcript
--the weather this entire semester in every single place in all of europe
--language barrier
--public restrooms in europe
--the euro (see: not getting free water at the table, being charged ridiculous cover charges at mediocre restaurants, the awful exchange rate)

things i miss about america:
--my bed, my shower, car, reliable wireless access, comfortable pillows, other tangible and material possessions of the like
--DRIVING and the feeling i get when i am doing so
--my friends
--my family
--legitimate BRUNCH food (eggs, bagel, lox, french toast, pancakes)
--iced tea and ice in general
--drying machines
--the food, specifically: sushi, tiny boxwoods, beck's, cupcakes from crave, mac and cheese from basically everywhere, grilled cheese, pei wei chicken fried rice minus bell pepper and plus extra egg, chipotle, chicken pad mun sen from thai gourmet
--hot weather
--USD, english, english-speakers
--walgreens, cvs, target, things that are open 24/7
--central standard time

that is all.

Cinque Terre...the most beautiful place I've ever seen

Cinque Terre (directly translates to "5 Lands" in Italian) is an area along the Northern Italian Riviera that is comprised of 5 really small towns that are all connected by a small train and hiking trails. I had wanted to go here more than any other place in Italy because I had heard such amazing things about how beautiful it was. I had planned virtually all of my other trips around this weekend because it needed to be warm and sunny out to fully appreciate the hiking trails, beaches, and views...needless to say, excitement for this trip had been building up for quite some time.

We stayed for one night at a hostel in the first of the towns going from south to north, called Riomaggiore, and we got a pass that gave us unlimited access to all of the trails and trains connecting the towns.

We got in at around 4:30 pm on Friday, found our hostel, which was located up the steepest and longest flight of stairs (all of the towns are build into mountains) ever. It ended up being awesome though. We were the only people staying in that part of the hostel so we basically had our very own apartment with a kitchen, living room, tv, 2-story porch with amazing views, private bathroom, and really comfortable beds. It was exactly what we needed after a semester of not-so-great hostels and pretty awful weather.First off, I have to say that Cinque Terre is definitely the most beautiful place I've ever been to and by far my favorite place in Italy. It is the Italy that everyone comes to Italy imagining. We had amazing seafood, beautiful weather, incredible landscapes, beach and mountains, beautiful flowers everywhere that made the entire place smell really good, cute shops....I felt like I was walking in a postcard. It was so incredibly stunning.

Anyway, the names of the towns are: Riogmaggiore, Manarola, Corniglia, Vernazza, and Monterosso. As I said before, they are all connected by hiking trails that are right along the sea. We hiked 3/4 of the trails...2 were pretty easy and the last was really hard, but I love hiking and I was really happy to finally be able to do outdoorsy things in Italy after so many months of cold and rain. Altogether, we hiked over 4.5 or 5 miles which took us a little over half the day. We ate a really good lunch and then took a train to the last town, Monterosso, and laid at the beach for the rest of the day until we had to go home.

There were locks and hearts like these all along the trails...allegedly people from the 5 towns weren forbidden from being together so tons of couples put locks up to symbolize enduring love..it was pretty neat:

All of the girls in front of Corniglia (I think)

My favorite town was Vernazza, pictured below.