Just got back from my weekend in the three beautiful cities
of Padua (Padova), Venice (Venezia), and Verona. I always wondered why we call some cities different names
from their original in America? It
makes no sense to me. Haha. We meet at seven in the morning to
depart from Florence to Padua. We
were the FIRST four people at San Marco Plaza! (The meeting spot.) This was a first! You could tell Irene was relieved we
weren’t going to be the late ones again.
We arrive in Padua a couple hours later at our hotel, Hotel Plaza
Padova. Not all of the rooms were
ready yet so a lot of the people had to wait around in the lobby with all of
their luggage, but since we were the first to arrive at the meeting spot, we
got the first hotel rooms! It pays
off to be on time! After a few
minutes of settling in, we began our guided walking tour of Padua. We walked through their markets and The
University of Padua campus. Padua
is known as a “college town”. We
learned about how the first girl in the world to ever graduate from a
university and earn a degree, Elena Lucrezia Cornaro Piscopia, graduated from
The University of Padova in 1678. So
proud to be a woman! While walking
through the town, we saw a young girl in a Tarzan like outfit, crazy hair, and
covered in confetti and flour. Our
tour guide told us that when someone graduates in Padova, their friends can
take them around town and literally make them do whatever crazy things they
want! It was so funny because this
girl just was so proud and had so much joy for graduating that she didn’t care
how “embarrassing” she looked. She
just owned it and posed for the pictures we were taking. I loved it. We were also able to see the most famous of the Paduan
churches, the Basilica di Sant’ Antonio Da Padova. St. Anthony was buried here in 1231, and was canonized a
saint only eleven months after his death.
We got to see his chin, teeth, tongue, and vocal cords! Crazy how they are still in tact after
all these years!!! I learned that
this is a sign that St. Anthony’s teachings were true words of God. During the tour, we were told about a
famous coffee house called Pedrocchi that had been around since 1831. After the tour, we went to try their
signature famous coffee, the Pedrocchi Café. It was warm Italian coffee covered in a layer of green,
minty cream and dusted with cocoa powder.
I thought it was delicious!
I also noticed that Padova did not have as many English speakers as more
of the touristy towns do. We
noticed this particularly during lunch where none of the workers around us
could speak English and the menu was entirely Italian. We just pointed at the menu and ordered
what we think we would like! It
was a good time to break out the Italian that we have learned. During our meal, we got to listen to a
little man going around and pleasantly playing the trumpet for the people in
the Piazza. (tongue twister!) Just how I always imagined enjoying my
Italian lunch. I was so proud of
myself when at the end we were trying to ask for the check, and I said,
“conto!” Conto means check or bill
in Italian and even Torri and Christin didn’t remember, but I did! Haha, most of the time they are Shannon
and I’s saviors when it comes to trying to speak in Italian. (They both have taken two semesters of
Italian at Texas A&M.) We came
back to the hotel after lunchy time for a little break. The hotel rooms in Hotel Plaza were
like a little piece of paradise.
Everyone in America would laugh because the beds were still hard as rock
and small, but they felt like sleeping on clouds compared to the ones at our
apartment. And there was a shower
with amazing water pressure and air conditioning! I am going to appreciate those things so much when I go back
to the states. Shannon and I also
did not know how to work the T.V. very well, but we happened to find all of
these American/Italian music video channels that we fell in love with. There is this new song called “Can’t
Say No” by Conor Maynard that we assume is probably already popular in the
states, but we can’t get it out of our heads! One of our new jams.
We jammed out to all fun music and jumped on our beds for a little, then
took the BEST NAP in the world on our “fluffy” beds. We accidently slept for five hours and slept right through a
tour through a castle…oops! Oh
well, at least we got some sleepy time!!
API provided us dinner at the hotel. Yay free dinner!
Then, we went out and enjoyed the “college” town with some of our API
friends. We stumbled upon this
huge elevated square where the markets were located earlier that day. Now, it
was completely covered with college students and tables for socializing. Coolest place ever! College Station needs a place like
that!
Saturday morning, we woke up bright and early to begin our
voyage to Venice. Literally the
last person on the bus. Yay I made
it again!! On the bus ride to
Venice, Shannon and I shared headphones and blabbed on and on about how blessed
we feel to be in Italy and seeing the world. There is never a moment where we don’t appreciate where we
are and what we are doing.
Sometimes I pinch myself to make sure it’s not a dream! Twenty or so minutes later, our buses
arrived to this bus station then we got to take a private boat over to
Venice. Venice is a city that
stretches across numerous small islands in the Venetian Lagoon along the
Adriatic Sea in Northeast Italy.
It is built on an archipelago of 122 islands and is world famous for its
150 canals and 400 bridges. So
this means all travel is by boat!
Ambulance, Taxi, UPS, Police, Garbage Man…all on boats. It is absolutely car free! It was slightly raining so there were
only a few people riding on the top deck of the boat. I took advantage of this time to pretend I was performing a
concert and singing/pointing to every other boat/ferry/cruise ship that we
passed by. It was empowering. I love boat rides and being surrounded
by water. When we arrived on the
main island of Venice, we were greeted by another group of tour guides. “Oh yayyyy another one.” Quote from Real Housewives of Disney
that Shannon and I quote all the time here. We walked through San Marco Plaza, by the Palazzo Ducale, squeezed
around the small streets in Venice, and learned about the famous Carnival that
takes place in Venice every year.
I could definitely walk around Venice all day long. So many things to see and appreciate! We were set free from our tour and
immediately scouted out a good lunch spot. We found the perfect little place right along the water and
under the shade. After lunch, we
did some shopping along Rialto Bridge, gushed over all of the beautiful hand
blown Murano glass, and tried on Carnival style masks and posed for pictures in
them before the shop owners chased us away.
Then, the best part of the day…Torri, Christin, Shannon, and I all went for a GONDOLA RIDE!! When somebody thinks of Venice, they think of the long, skinny, flat bottomed gondola gliding through the canals with the cute little gondola man with the black and white striped shirt and the straw skimmer hat who sings to you while you enjoy the experience. Well guess what, that’s exactly what we got! Our gondolier was named Fabio and gave us the best gondola experience you could ask for. He offered to take all of these pictures of us, did funny poses for us, sang the song that they sing in The Lizzie McGuire Movie, and gave us a smooth ride to remember for a lifetime. The ride only lasted about twenty minutes or so, but I could have rode on that gondola for hours. It was so peaceful and like I said earlier, I love being on the water so much. After the gondola ride, we had to say goodbye to Fabio and head back to Padua. Shannon and I went to our hotel room, turned on our little music video channel, and jumped around for a little. Our song came on again! Then, we got ready to go out for the night because we wanted to go back to that piazza filled with college kids and grab one of the tables that were in the center. When we showed up, there were no tables and instead the piazza was cleared with a short metal fence surrounding what looked like a dance floor with stage lights. We were so excited!!! This has always been a dream of mine! Dancing in the middle of an Italian town with lights sparkling all around me. Haha I am such a girly girl. Well, while Shannon and I waited for that to get all set up we uncovered a hole in the wall “messicana” restaurant! You couldn’t even tell it was a restaurant from the outside. It was just one door with a little flyer and menu on it. We slipped inside to find **ANGELS SINGING** the delicious smell of Mexican food. It was packed with locals and we discovered that this was the one and only Mexican place in Padua! We are just so good!! We got some margaritas and their “nachos” which was chips that came with little cups of salsa, queso, and GUACAMOLE! It had been way too long. We met some funny friends at the bar (one was cute and couldn’t speak English and one was old and helped translate) that made us almost pee in our pants laughing. I don’t remember what we talked about but I giggled so much! After some good ole Mexican food, we went back to hopefully find our dream dance floor. We come back to find a FULL ON Renaissance Medieval battle going on. Definitely not what we expected! There were horses, fire, swords, knights, suits of armor, and anything else you could imagine that you would find at a Medieval Festival. It was kinda neat! I love soaking in different sorts of entertainment. We met up with a huge group of our new friends and bonded the night away!
Then, the best part of the day…Torri, Christin, Shannon, and I all went for a GONDOLA RIDE!! When somebody thinks of Venice, they think of the long, skinny, flat bottomed gondola gliding through the canals with the cute little gondola man with the black and white striped shirt and the straw skimmer hat who sings to you while you enjoy the experience. Well guess what, that’s exactly what we got! Our gondolier was named Fabio and gave us the best gondola experience you could ask for. He offered to take all of these pictures of us, did funny poses for us, sang the song that they sing in The Lizzie McGuire Movie, and gave us a smooth ride to remember for a lifetime. The ride only lasted about twenty minutes or so, but I could have rode on that gondola for hours. It was so peaceful and like I said earlier, I love being on the water so much. After the gondola ride, we had to say goodbye to Fabio and head back to Padua. Shannon and I went to our hotel room, turned on our little music video channel, and jumped around for a little. Our song came on again! Then, we got ready to go out for the night because we wanted to go back to that piazza filled with college kids and grab one of the tables that were in the center. When we showed up, there were no tables and instead the piazza was cleared with a short metal fence surrounding what looked like a dance floor with stage lights. We were so excited!!! This has always been a dream of mine! Dancing in the middle of an Italian town with lights sparkling all around me. Haha I am such a girly girl. Well, while Shannon and I waited for that to get all set up we uncovered a hole in the wall “messicana” restaurant! You couldn’t even tell it was a restaurant from the outside. It was just one door with a little flyer and menu on it. We slipped inside to find **ANGELS SINGING** the delicious smell of Mexican food. It was packed with locals and we discovered that this was the one and only Mexican place in Padua! We are just so good!! We got some margaritas and their “nachos” which was chips that came with little cups of salsa, queso, and GUACAMOLE! It had been way too long. We met some funny friends at the bar (one was cute and couldn’t speak English and one was old and helped translate) that made us almost pee in our pants laughing. I don’t remember what we talked about but I giggled so much! After some good ole Mexican food, we went back to hopefully find our dream dance floor. We come back to find a FULL ON Renaissance Medieval battle going on. Definitely not what we expected! There were horses, fire, swords, knights, suits of armor, and anything else you could imagine that you would find at a Medieval Festival. It was kinda neat! I love soaking in different sorts of entertainment. We met up with a huge group of our new friends and bonded the night away!
On Sunday, we had the blessing of visiting Verona, The
Lover’s City. Right away I fell in
love with the romantic atmosphere, quiet and vacant streets, cheerful faces,
flowers and vines trickling from the balconies of pastel colored buildings, and
all the greenery. We started the
day off with yet another tour, but this time from our favorite tour guide EVER
– Franklin. Franklin was the
sweetest older man I had ever met, spoke in the softest voice, let us roam
around Verona at our own pace, and soak in every detail. At the end of the tour, all of us
wanted pictures with Franklin.
Verona is very well known for being the setting of the famous tale of
Romeo and Juliet. Franklin loved
telling us all the details of the dramatic love story. I could tell he was proud to be from
Verona and a hopeless romantic.
Franklin took us to “Giulietta’s House” (Juliet’s House) where we got to
see the famous balcony the Romeo climbed up onto and walls completely covered
in names and love letters and colorful locks. One of the most romantic places I’ve been. There was a statue of Juliet in the
courtyard below her balcony and legend says that if you rub Juliet’s right
boob, you will have good luck in your love life forever. Of course, all of us girls, and even a
lot of the boys, scrambled and crowded around Juliet to get our chance to rub
her boob. Haha. Franklin also
showed us Romeo’s house and all around town. It was so neat because as we were touring Verona, there was
a marathon going on through the city!
I just ran my first half marathon back in March with my dad, so this was
a special reminder of that bonding time with my dad. I can’t wait to show the pictures! This marathon race was for all sorts of people and all sorts
of ages, so I got to see lots of different characters running through the
streets. After enjoying a few
hours in Verona, I decided that I could definitely see myself spending more
time there/living there for a while.
I did not want to leave!
Definitely in my top three favorite places in Italy now (Lake Como,
Verona, and Florence).
We the city and bussed over to a beautiful winery in the hillsides of Verona by the name of Azienda Agricola Novaia. Our bus dropped us off at the bottom of this hill, so we had to follow a winding pebble path up and down, past the rolling hills and rows of grapes, and under dripping trees. There were these absolutely delicious cherry trees on the sides of the trail that we all obsessed over. I never knew that I loved cherries so much! They were so fresh and juicy and slightly sour! Mmmmmm. When we finally arrived at the top of the hill, the most gentle and luxurious landscape was presented in front of our eyes. It was exactly how I had dreamed of a winery in Italy being like and even more perfect. Azienda Agricola Novaia was a family owned winery that had four generations of winemakers. The family was so friendly and I was impressed with all of the little details they knew about wine tasting. Even though I had learned so much in my wine and food pairing class, I still learned so much more from the family. We were able to taste three of their different wines including the famous Valpolicella red wine and an olive oil. I fell in love with the taste of the wines and may or may not have made a special purchase for somebody back home! :) After we tasted the wine, the winemaker gave us a tour of the vineyard where he told us the details of all the different grapes and areas where they grew on the hills. We also took this time to take some cute pics. The day ended with a beautiful sunset across the undulating green hillside as we skipped back down to our buses. Another place that I did not want to leave. When we finally arrived back in Florence, we were happy to be home. Weird to call Florence home right!? But that is what Florence is right now and will always be in my heart, a place to call home.
We the city and bussed over to a beautiful winery in the hillsides of Verona by the name of Azienda Agricola Novaia. Our bus dropped us off at the bottom of this hill, so we had to follow a winding pebble path up and down, past the rolling hills and rows of grapes, and under dripping trees. There were these absolutely delicious cherry trees on the sides of the trail that we all obsessed over. I never knew that I loved cherries so much! They were so fresh and juicy and slightly sour! Mmmmmm. When we finally arrived at the top of the hill, the most gentle and luxurious landscape was presented in front of our eyes. It was exactly how I had dreamed of a winery in Italy being like and even more perfect. Azienda Agricola Novaia was a family owned winery that had four generations of winemakers. The family was so friendly and I was impressed with all of the little details they knew about wine tasting. Even though I had learned so much in my wine and food pairing class, I still learned so much more from the family. We were able to taste three of their different wines including the famous Valpolicella red wine and an olive oil. I fell in love with the taste of the wines and may or may not have made a special purchase for somebody back home! :) After we tasted the wine, the winemaker gave us a tour of the vineyard where he told us the details of all the different grapes and areas where they grew on the hills. We also took this time to take some cute pics. The day ended with a beautiful sunset across the undulating green hillside as we skipped back down to our buses. Another place that I did not want to leave. When we finally arrived back in Florence, we were happy to be home. Weird to call Florence home right!? But that is what Florence is right now and will always be in my heart, a place to call home.
Reflection:
I frequently think about home and the people from home here
in Italy. I think about how much I
love them and I want them to be here with me. I know I am very far away, but never doubt that you are
always on my mind. I truly desire
for everyone to have an experience like me one day. If anyone has any aspiration for traveling the world and
surrounding yourself with a culture completely different from your comfort
zone, I am begging you to take a chance and study abroad. Shannon and I blab about how much we
love it here everyday and whenever somebody asks us about it when we go back
home, we are going to talk for hours and hours and hours. This experience and journey is HANDS
DOWN the most incredible thing I have done in my life. We find ourselves often worrying that
we only have a few weeks left here in paradise and remind each other that we
need to live in the now and enjoy every moment we have left. When we were in Verona, we were able to
feast our eyes on Dante’s house. Dante
was a famous Italian philosopher and best known for his epic piece of work
called “The Divine Comedy”. I
learned a few important words from Dante this weekend. E la sua volontate è
nostra pace. In doing His will, we
find our peace.
Tanto Amore,
Diane
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