Special Visitor

Just so everyone is at ease, in case you've heard of the large earthquake in Italy, I'm 100% ok. I was in Northern Italy at the time. I was actually unaware of it until my mom texted me about it and asking if I was ok. Thank you to everyone who called or wrote to her asking if I was ok.

I've been enjoying my spring break off of classes in beautiful 70 degree weather here in Italy, accompanied by my boyfriend Andrew. We have had a busy last week and a half but it's been a blast. Despite his flight arrival dilemmas and mishaps, we started out with a 3 day trip in Paris. I'm just going to name off the many things we saw and did over the days and expand upon them further. The Eiffel Tower, Notre Dame Cathedral, The Lourve, Luxembourg Gardens, the Paris Statue of Liberty, Jardin des Plantes, Arc de Triomphe, and spent lots of time just walking and getting a feel for the whole city. When we got to the city and were trying to find our way to the hotel, we were impressed with the friendliness of locals. As we were searching for streets signs, a woman approached us asking where we needed to go. She wasn't familiar with the street, but another woman approached us asking where we needed to go. In the meantime, the first woman had already flagged down a couple to help us. So with the help of our four locals standing around us, we were pointed in the right direction. Our small hotel staff amazed us as well with all the help they gave with directions and favors for us. Google translation came in handy for them! As for our daily adventures, we only went to one museum, which was the Lourve. It was well worth it though even though the place is huge and there's no possible way to see even half the items in it if you spent an entire day there. We ventured all across the city and had a picnic in one of the gardens one afternoon. We found that we enjoyed just walking around and exploring the city with a map in hand and in many cases stumbling across places we probably never would have otherwise made a point to see. We ended the last night in Paris by going to the top of the Eiffel Tower and seeing the city all lit up. It was actually well worth it and sure, even a little romantic :) We even saw a proposal occur at the top of the tower.
First trip down, 2 more to go. Second on the list was Venice, Italy. I had already visited Venice before this but there was sure a difference in being there this time rather than during Carnevale. We only spent one night here, but had two days. The first day was a rainy so it made sightseeing and walking around a little less enjoyable, but day 2 was sunny and warm. We had dinner sitting right next to the Grand Canal one night too.
Trip 3 I'm still recovering from. We ventured north to Cinque Terre. There are 5 small towns right on the coast that make up Cinque Terre and are located in the mountains. We arrived at noon on day one, set down our bags, changed and were out on the hiking trails for the day, returning at 6. We ended up going high up into the mountains, and these trails were not the easiest. They were steep, there were dropoffs right next to you and paths that at some points were only a mere foot wide. We were sore and tired after our hike, which included getting lost a few times and backtracking and I didn't know if I'd make it through another day of hiking. The second day though we wanted to hike through all the 5 small towns, but part of the trail was closed due a large landslide. We were somewhat glad though because once again, the trails were tough and the sun was hot. Ending in the last city of Monterosso was perfect because we were able to lay and relax on the beach for a good hour before then heading back to Milan.
It's all gone by so fast and Andrew is already leaving tomorrow. We've done our own exploring and sightseeing around Milan as well, but are hanging pretty low. I do have to say though, our diets have consistently been comprised of pizza/pasta followed by gelato...almost daily. As much as I hate to say goodbye I do need to say bye to the gelato for quite some time! Enjoy pictures and there will be more to come as my parents are arriving on Sunday! Love to all!