So the journey begins with ... my computer dying. Legit, wake up the morning before a 16 day vacation with 1000 things to do on a computer (select classes, record an IRHC speech, apply for summer jobs, reserve summer housing, and, let's be real, watch Lost), and my computer is dead. And then my phone runs out of credit on the tech hotline. And then it pours down rain on my way to the computer store. Yes, spring break definitely started a bit rough, but hey, it made everything else seem even greater by comparison. Luckily, I managed to get my stuff wrapped up on Morgan's computer, and I couldn't really sleep that night, which was fine because we had to be up at 2am to head to Dublin. We were a bit delirious in the cab ride to the EasyBus (Morgan, Hannah, Athena and I), but once on the way to Luton we all passed out - soooo tired. Our flight to Dublin was painless (if you call landing - yes, that's right, ARRIVING at a place at 7:30am painless), and one friendly cab ride later (so, THAT's where U2 went to school), we were at our friend Joe's apartment. His amazing, two story, well-lit, 4 bedroom, 2 bathroom, apartment with washer/dryer combo. Dear Joe: all of us in Nido HATE YOU. We immediately passed out from lack of sleep.
After our nap, a shower, and a quick lunch, we decided to begin the vacation the right way: touring the Guinness factory! This is how you do a museum people: make the central lobby shaped like a pint glass, have large fonts that tell interesting facts about cool things like beer, and end the tour with a free pint of said beer overlooking the city and Irish countryside. Hannah had a little spill because she's classy like that, but we enjoyed our first real Guinness (there IS a difference) and headed back out to find more adventure!
Bai.
Pint glass shaped lobby what upppp
The happy Guinness fans
Hannah's tiny bladder hindered us only slightly as we wandered aimlessly past baby parades, streetlights (Morgan: "Guys .... someone died here!") and stone walls with no end. We crossed over the river to a nice park, enjoyed some sun, and could not FIND a public bathroom (sorry Hannah's tiny bladder). We walked back to Joe's and, on the way, found ... Scooter Island.
*Shutter Island spoiler alerts ahead*
So basically, Scooter Island is the exciting sequel to the hit Scorsese-Dicaprio film Shutter Island. Post SI-1, Leo D has had his lobotomy, and in the follow-up (SI-2), we follow his adventures as he scooters around the island, solving crimes in a wacky, episodic fashion! "The records say there are 66 scooters on the island, but I believe, you have a 67th scooter." Of course, this is all in a strong Boston accent, and every other word is "MAH-SHAL." Scooter Island, coming out May 2011. Starring Alex Heald and Hannah Novick, featuring Mark Ruffalo, directed by Morgan Collins.
That night, we hung out with Joe and saw some of his music videos (and also heard the worst potential music video song ever - "Bus stop I'll drank my coffeeeee!" Eww.) and then grabbed dinner. The night ALMOST ended - Morgan's passed out on the couch (per usual), we're all fading, and then Hannah said the magic words: "Guys, let's just get silly." An hour later we're out with the group, having a blast, dancing to some old-school Destiny's Child, enjoying delicious Irish cocktails, and buying the WORST 8 euro chicken doner imaginable. Damn you, tempting cab driver... and sorry, again, world, for tying my jacket around my waist at the one club. Coat check was expensive, and fashion choices were ignored. It was a mistake, I apologize.
The following day (Saturday), we enjoyed traditional Irish breakfast (bangers and mash) and did some sight-seeing around Dublin. We saw Dublin Castle, Trinity College (gosh, a real campus! And a rugby game - hello Hannah's boyfriends), and walked down Grafton Street (the main shopping street with a hilarious street performer) to St. Stephen's Green, a park with REAL LIVE LARPERS! That's right - Live Action Role Players, people who dress like X-Men and video game characters in public and throw "spells" at each other for the amusement of the rest of the world. We maybe took pictures. Definitely took pictures. Sorry, "Storm", but it had to happen. (I personally didn't take them, but once they're up, I will share them, no worries).
THEN we saw the Spire of Dublin which is basically a large needle in Dublin, pretty self-explanatory. We had a nice dinner at an Indian place, and headed to The George, a gay club near Joe's where I witnessed the GREATEST moment of my life. Morgan did a little karaoke ("Livin' On a Prayer", natch) hosted by our fabulous Irish drag queen. Morgan, a few drinks in, forgot his microphone-cradling etiquette, and the drag queen, worried about the safety of the microphone, went up on stage to reconfigure it WHILE Morgan sang. Picture it: Morgan, a drag gueen, four hands, one microphone, and an intense battle for supremacy at the EXACT moment the chorus hits. I die.
Trinity College in Dublin - yay for real campuses!
This haircut happened
St. Stephen's Green (minus the LARPers)
The River Liffey
The Spire of London (so spire-y)
On Sunday, we awoke and headed to Kilmainham Gaol, an Irish prison where we found the PERFECT setting for Scooter Island. Fun little tour here, with some dank decrepit hallways, abandoned cells, and stories of torture and firing squads. Quite the light-hearted afternoon, laugh out loud.
Every episode of Are You Afraid of the Dark was shot in this hallway
Welcome to Scooter Island
Hannah practicing for her role in Scooter Island
Where the firing squad did their thang
That night we took it pretty easy, had a nice dinner at a restaurant with great wings (and the HUNGRIEST couple I've ever seen, it was like the food was going to grow legs and run away from them). With a last pint of Guinness, we caught a few hours of sleep at Joe's, said goodbye to Joe, Hannah, and the Dublin crew, and Morgan and I were off to Venice - at 4am!
FINAL THOUGHTS ON DUBLIN: great city, WAY expensive, Guinness is double delicious there, short buildings, bipolar weather, expensive drunk food, LARPing -- really??!?, and why doesn't the Hard Rock take American Express?
On to Italia! We flew over the Alps and landed just around sunrise, caught a bus to the beautiful city(?) of Venice. Venice is kind of like a city from Star Wars - it's not actually a real place. Actually no, it's a maze from the kids menu at Chili's - lots of right angles, dead-ends, and we used crayons. It's amazing to walk through a city with no cars, only canals, sidewalks, bridges, and TONS of tourists. So many non-Italians there, and it wasn't even high season yet. So crazy, but so beautiful. However, unlike many other European cities, there's not really that much to do in Venice. Morgan and I made our way through the kids menu maze to our hostel, which was kind of at a dead-end near a canal. We thought it WAS the canal for a hot second. We dropped our stuff off, had a nice meal in the sun, and went about the rest of the maze. The architecture is astounding, and we spent most of the day just walking. We of course took a romantic gondola ride through the canals, which was awesome and truly worth the price of admission. We also saw the Plaza de San Marco and the Rialto Bridge, two of the biggest destinations in the city. We got gelato. We had dinner and wine around 7. By about 8:30, it was bedtime - no joke. We were too tired and had no motivation to go out and find the miniscule amount of nightlife in Venice, so ... we went to bed. Cool, yeah? I'll answer for you: DAMN COOL.
Not where our hostel was
ALTERNATE CAPTION: no, stupid child, this is NOT the end of the Chili's kids menu maze, please use a pencil with an eraser next time and have fun repeating kindergarten, you idiot
The Rialto Bridge
Just the typical Venetian canal ride
The gondola workers were legit. I would crash into every wall/boat in existence, they make it look easy
Venice at sunrise - so amazing
FINAL THOUGHTS ON VENICE: Romantic, amazing, a place to see and not to do, tons of tourists, a severe lack of creative shot glasses, tons of churches and canals, and hotel lobbies - where ARE your bathrooms??
After eleven (YES: ELEVEN. Repeat: DAMN COOL.) hours of sleep we were up and back to the Venice train station to head to Florence and then Cinque Terre. This proved to be quite the adventure. Our train into Flo Flo was late, so we had to catch a later one (giving us time to run into our friend Adrian at the train station), yet the later one gave us 4 minutes to make our connection in Pisa (so we ran, hardcore, like Amazing Race style). We then connected again in La Spezia to get to Monterosso, so, in total, FOUR TRAINS to get from Venice to our (semi) destination.
So Cinque Terre is the "Five Lands", literally - five towns sprinkled along the Italian coast in the mountains, connected by trains, hiking paths, and not much else. They are truly beautiful - if there's anything that can be said about Italian towns (so far), the more inhospitable the environment (a sinking city of canals, the rugged coastal cliffs), the more beautiful the city built there. Morgan and I felt the first truly warm sun we've felt in months, and we began the hike from the first town (Monterosso) to the second (Vernazza). This was the toughest by far: steep, tons of stairs and skinny paths along the cliffs, and we have our 30 pound traveler's backpacks with us. Pretty intense, but we made it. As we got near the end of our hike, the wind picked up like something out of Day After Tomorrow, and we hurried into Vernazza just before the skies opened up. Our gelato break let us sit out the rain, and the sun was out in another half hour to allow us to hike to Town #3, Corniglia, where we stayed for the night. Another pretty serious hike, but we made it (hope the same can be said for the baby this couple was carrying. Seriously? You took a baby on a mountain climb? Poor baby probably has road rash from the leaves and twigs hitting it in the face). In Corniglia, we had a nice night at the hostel - made friends with some Iowans, Canadians, and Australians, drank some wine whilst enjoying the amazing sunset, and enjoyed Cinque Terre's famed pesto. Paige (our Australian friend from Perth) humored us with tales of her wine meniscus and Lianna-esque cries of "I couldn't PAY someone to rape me!", and confirmed our theory that every hostel pays an Australian money to stand around, have a cool accent, and be the resident Aussie. Good night all around.
Not a ton to say here - just let the images speak for themselves
The next day we woke up, bid our new friends farewell, and finished our hike from Corniglia to Manarola and then Manarola to Riomaggiore (via the infamous Via de Amore - Lover's Walk). MUCH easier hikes, thank goodness, we were both sore and not ready for another Everest climb. We saw some fantastic views, enjoyed the sound of waves against the rocks (much closer to the beach this time), and saw some seagulls ... doing it. Rough image, I won't share with you. We made it to the last town by around lunchtime, at which point we grabbed a quick lunch and decided to head in to Florence to start yet another chapter of our adventures.
Descending into Vernazza
Yup, you're jealous
The Via de Amore
FINAL THOUGHTS ON CINQUE TERRE: Unforgettable, worth doing for anyone who loves hiking, the outdoors, good views, good food, good sunsets, or seagulls copulating
We took a train back to Florence and met the amazing and lovely Liz David (who you may remember from our Barcelona shitshow), who hosted us for the two nights and provided us with splendid food. We also met up with Laura (previously seen in Barcelona, Stockholm, and Naughty Nurses 9), Kaila (yay for my first trip with the wonderfully effervescent Kaila!), and many many more. We chilled in the plaza by the Duomo waiting to meet everyone, and watched the winds of karma totally own a gypsy. I'm not being rude here - gypsies are the worst, they are pushy and violent and scheming, and when God decides to blow their gypsy cups across the plaza at approximately 100mph, I laugh. Plain and simple.
Florence was the first European city I've revisited, having been there in January of 2008, and it was weird to be back in a place so foreign and yet somewhat familiar. I really just wanted to see people, and luckily that's mostly what we did. After joining up with everyone, we dropped our bags at Liz's, and then she took us to an amazing aperitivo at a local community center called Ganzo. Here, we had cheap wine and all the free appetizers we could eat. It's supposed to be pre-dinner. We just made it dinner. Post-Ganzo, we enjoyed some 2.50 euro a bottle wine (2.50 euro a bottle?!? And it's GOOD wine? It must be my birthday) and a good Skype session with the bestie, Taylor. With that accomplished, we headed out to take over Florence, and boy did we. At The Fish Pub we took some shots with inappropriate names (which I won't repeat here, because, duh, this is a family friendly blog ... except for the seagull sex), then headed to The Red Garter, where, truth be told, I met a magician in the bathroom who lives in Nido. Nobody remembers this, but it's an IMPORTANT DETAIL OF THE NIGHT. Following an awkward encounter that resulted in much jumping (ask me about that one later), we were at Twice (my third time there ... dammit, there goes my only funny joke), a club that allowed for maximum Liz-and-Alex-Tango-Time. This is an amazing dance that, well, needs to be seen to be understood. But it was steamy. Good times all around. I also spooned Liz at bedtime, which allowed us to talk about love, politics, and Obama, apparently.
The next day (gosh - Thursday already?), we woke up and met up with the crew again (all of us matching in red), and had some DELURSHOUS paninis for lunch before walking up yet another mountain to see the NYU campus in Florence. By the by, Italy is the land of serendipitous run-ins. I saw my good friend from high school Katie Dunn on a random street, just out of the blue - it was crazy, unexpected, and awesome. This wouldn't be the first run in - so many NYU peeps in Florence! It was awesome to see them - and the campus is so pretty, a villa in the foothills near Florence. It was Morgan's first time there, so we walked around and caught up with friends while Laura had class. We headed back down (following yet ANOTHER bizarre rainstorm) and went to see the David, which is one of the coolest (if not THE coolest) statues I've ever seen. Then it was back to Liz's to prepare for her 21st birthday! We waited for Tay at the train station, realized he was late, headed to aperitivo at Rex, headed BACK to get Tay, headed BACK to go to Ganzo for dinner (grouper ceviche, oxtail consomme, rabbit roulade, and passionfruit eclaire for FREE! Soooooo delicious), then BACK to Liz's for our favorite (tequila and loud music), then out to the bars and clubs to celebrate. We had an amazing night out, glad to spend it with Liz and the rest of the crew, and it was a great ending to a great stay in Florence.
FINAL THOUGHTS ON FLORENCE: gypsies getting owned is the BEST, random rainstorms not so much, the land of serendipitous run-ins, gelato and panini heaven, and everything revolves around the Duomo (and there are no pictures because I had already been, and was saving room for Rome and Greece - sorry kids! it's pretty, I promise!)
Friday we caught a train with Kaila to Rome, slept the entire way - we were pooped (I had to sleep in a CHAIR, for crap's sake!) and had a lot of sight-seeing to do in two days. Arriving in Rome, we found our hostel near the train station, dropped our stuff, got a map, and immediately left to find ... the Internet! (We had to check facebook!) But we also had to print our tickets for ... wait for it... THE VATICAN! Yes, because Rome on Easter weekend was a good idea. Tickets in hand, we were off to the Vatican, which had a MONSTER line outside - thank god we got the Roman equivalent of the Disney FastPass. The museums were awesome - so much history and art, but the Sistine Chapel was NOT what I expected. We all know that Michaelangelo painted the ceiling, but I always expected it to be one MASSIVE painting. Instead, it's a collection of lots of smaller paintings - still incredible, just not what you expected. Plus, the guards actually shush you ... renaming it the Shhhhstine Chapel. The weather was gorgeous though, so we took a break from intense museum-ing to lay in the sun and work on some sunbathing.
The lawns of the Vatican Museum
Lots of things on the ceiling!
The view of St. Peter's from the museum
We walked over the to Piazza de San Pietro, the massive circle in front of St. Peter's Basilica, which is where the Pope ... popes around, I guess, and also the largest domed structure in the world. It was gorgeous out, and we just stood and enjoyed the sun and the view. People were lined up for Good Friday mass and the line stretched around the circle. Pretty awesome. After this, we headed past the Castel de San Angelo, up Via del Corso to Piazza del Popolo (oh hey MJ impersonator - too soon? Apparently not), and then down to the infamous Spanish Steps, another famous tourist stop. So much to see, so little time - and we were exhausted, but we took some pics to remember it so our tired brains didn't have to.
The Piazza de San Pietro
St. Peter's Basilica! Ahhhhh!
Castel de San Angelo (these are all locations from Angels & Demons, so, you know ... read that or something)
Piazza del Popolo
Spanish Steps!!
We made a new friend at the hostel (Aalok from Texas), and the four of us went to a nice dinner (if you ignore the accordion player) before heading down to the Coliseum. Now, to be fair, we didn't MEAN to pregame the Pope. We had some wine with dinner, and split another bottle later on before we made it to the Coliseum. All of a sudden - BAM! Good Friday service outside the Coliseum, with the Pope doing the Stations of the Cross sermon. It was amazing, and we stood there for the entire service before heading home and getting some rest.
Saturday we woke up, feeling like the Pope, brushed our teeth with a bottle of Communion wine, and hit the city of Rome. We met up with the fabulous Tay and Liz at the Coliseum (those two again?! CRAZY!), and tried to see as much as we could in no time at all. We walked past the Forum to the Pantheon, then to Piazza Navona and across the Tiber River back to St. Peter's, which we actually got to go inside this time. So amazing - it's incredible that they managed to do this kind of architecture before modern technology was around.
The Coliseum! So amazing
Piazza Venezia
The Pantheon! (Keep your panthies on)
A fountain in Piazza Navona
The interior of St. Peter's Basilica
Then we continued our whirlwind tour by heading BACK to the Coliseum (well, post-gelato, duh) and actually going in this time (and of course meeting up with our friends Kelly and Alissa). This was SO COOL - probably the must-see thing in Rome, it's much bigger than you expect, and despite years of ruin, still quite an impressive structure. The final stop - the Fountain of Trevi at nighttime, where we all threw our coins in to guarantee another visit to Rome. We had dinner right by here, where we watched the grossest American pre-teen double dates buy each other horribly tacky Italian souvenirs and narrated their adventures. We tried to head out to some bars, but couldn't really find anything that suited our mood, and we headed back early to get some sleep and get ready for Greece!
The interior of the Coliseum!!
The Fountain of Trevi at nighttime
Love this kid. This one goes on the wedding invites.
FINAL THOUGHTS ON ROME: lots of amazing monuments, not my favorite city but still pretty cool, a great place to go find famous things and sit on them, great group to be with, amazing sun, gelato and wine, and the only city where the cops are actually aggressive against the hustlers selling watches, sunglasses, and knock-off bags ... legit, we saw chase sequences.
When we woke up Easter Sunday, Rome was soggy and rainy - a great day to head to a new, hopefully sunnier place! We literally RAN to catch the train to the airport, and soon enough Kaila, Morgan and I were in sunny, warm Athens - amazing! We caught a bus to Syntagma Square, found our amazing hostel, and went out in search of gyros! No joke - in the next week I ate a total of 8 chicken gyros. IN FIVE DAYS. This is probably an issue. Our hostel was right by the Acropolis, and the three of us climbed through some beautiful neighborhoods on our way there. Since it was Easter a great deal of the monuments were closed, but we got our first peeks of them and planned to head back soon enough. That night we grabbed dinner (a gourmet, dinner-sized gyro - hells yes) and got a drink out, then sat on the roof of our hostel (that we kind of snuck up to) with a water bottle of wine (their packaging choice, not ours) and looked at the Acropolis and the stars. Pretty fantastic, if you ask me.
Day Two in Athens found us up early and ready to do it all - we booked our ferry tickets to Santorini, enjoyed our free internet (such wonderful free internet - no 30 minute crap like in Rome), and then went out to see the Agora, the Acropolis, the Temple of Zeus, and the old Olympic Stadium (from 1904). They were all absolutely incredible - we all really loved Athens, the city had a great feel, great weather, and great sights to see. Also, the serendipitous run-ins had yet to stop - I met a girl THAT I WENT TO KINDERGARTEN with in the internet room in our hostel, and we met some NYU in London kids on top of the Acropolis. Plus, we met our AMAZING Canadians, Arlan and Emily on that day. We kept running into them in Athens, then found out we had similar travel plans to Santorini the next day. We ended up drinking beer on the roof that afternoon, getting to know each other, then grabbed dinner together as well. They were so much, great travel partners. More chicken gyros, more sun, more hustlers selling RIDICULOUS wares that nobody wants - sounds like Europe to me.
A Greek temple
Old-school Greek amphitheater
On top of the Acrop!
The Temple of Zeus
The 1904 Olympic Stadium
(Sorry no pics of the Agora. I couldn't even make it there, I'm exTREMEly agoraphobic.)
FINAL THOUGHTS ON ATHENS: beautiful city, amazing hostel, good food, good people, wine on the rooftop with the Acropolis in sight is pretty epic, the splattery tomatoes are NOT good souvenirs
Ahh... our last few days of break were spent in paradise. Santorini. The name just sounds exotic and spicy. And it was. We took an early ferry from Athens to Santorini, getting there right after noon (that ferry was BOOKING it - like whoa). Our hostel was amazing - the guy (George - love him) came and got us at the port, took us to the hostel, showed us all around, booked our ATVs, and even gave us free orange juice, cake, and beer. GOOD START! We found a place with 2-euro gyros (that's a tongue twister), and after lunch, took our ATVs to the south side of the island. Santorini is one of many Greek islands and one of the most famous, with its amazing cliffs and sunsets. It's small but big, if that makes sense - from the highest point, you can see all of it, but it still takes a full hour and a half from one point of the crescent to the other. I won't go into too much detail over the last few days, since they emphasized laziness, beach time, and eating. The ATVs were great - lots of fun, and Kaila and I were totally boyfriend/girlfriend since we shared one and I like picked her up for hot dates and stuff. The food was great too - lots of gyros, and several amazing dinners on the cliffs watching the sunset. One night we even had an amazingly nice man buy us dinner, for no reason other than we were nice to his wife who just wanted to talk since she was from America too. It was pretty much the 5 of us all week - myself, Morgan, Kaila, and Arlan and Emily, our wonderful Canadians. We watched some amazing sunsets together (and coined the term sunset pornography), we laid out on the beaches together (and braved the frozen waters of the Aegean), and we basically lived life as a little family. It was a great end to the week, and the news that I had been elected IRHC president was just icing on the cake. Sadly, our trip had to end sometime, and Kaila and braved an overnight ferry and a 14 hour stay in the Athens airport before we got back to London. Long travels home, and we were so exhausted, but as with each new trip, my eyes are continuously being opened to new amazing parts of this fantastic continent.
Two months ago I remember being a bit homesick - I thought this semester was going to drag on, and even though I enjoyed Europe, I was worried about missing out on life back home. Now, we're near the end. Three weeks of class, a few finals left, and then three weeks with Tay and Lizzy (Amsterdam, Antwerp, Brussels, Munich, Vienna, Montenegro, Athens, and Cairo - sounds great to me). I'm ALSO doing a weekend in Ireland with my sister (holla Meggles) and then a weekend in Scotland, so the rest of my time is pretty much travels, work, or finishing my time here in London. Weird to put it all in perspective - I can't even imagine leaving here now, but I know I have a lot waiting for me when I get back. Love you all, thanks for reading - not sure when a new post may show up, but keep your eyes peeled. MUCH LOVE!
"When life gives you lemons, squeeze them in your hair"
