Friday morning a group of 6 of us (including Dave) left the Villa for the train station that would take us to Venice. Now it's been pretty rainy this past week and Venice being the city on water is bound to be much more full of water in rainy weather. However we didn't let that stop us from having an amazing time. We arrived in Venice at 3ish, we dropped our stuff off at the hotel and went out to explore. The streets were absolutely gorgeous with all the water running through them (I've been told Venice smells bad but since we came in the colder weather we didn't smell too much grossness, score for us). I loved not seeing any cars driving around smauging up the air. It rained most of the day but it was a wicked cool experience, as we had the pleasure of being there during the highest tides of the week so the water came up and over the streets and flooded most of the walkways (aside from the wet shoes and water you know isn't sanitary touching you, this was actually pretty cool and we didn't mind much). The best part of Friday night was the light painting we did in the San Marco square. Light painting is basically leaving your camera shutter open to capture as much light as it can (a tripod is necessary for this) and using flashlights or glow sticks you can draw things in the air and the camera catches it as something seeable. We did this for a good hour and a half in the wet, just playing around with different words to write and the composition and what not, it was super fun. People gave us the weirdest looks as we all waved our flashlights around (and the fact that I was making weird noises because why not) to make the words.
Saturday we just walked around the city taking pictures of the people and the wetness and enjoying the scenery. There comes a point when your shoes are so soaked that you no longer care about walking through massive puddles, breaking this point actually makes life a bit easier (until you realize you only have one pair of shoes and they're never going to dry before the next day). Around 11 we hopped on the train and headed to Verona. I wish I had stayed awake for the train ride but with it being rainy out I just get so sleepy and can't help but slowly nod off to the beautiful scenery. For those of you that don't know, Verona is where Romeo and Juliet are from (so of course there are little Romeos and Juliets everywhere). Juliet's house is located here and we just had to see it, and located at this house is a statue of Juliet. There is a tradition that if you rub Juliet's boob then you will have true love, three people in our group did this not to name names but Bailey, Ana, and Dave (unfortunately I am doomed to never have true love). We walked around the city enjoyed the scenery and then went to the train station at 6ish to make it to our resting stop for the night in Milan. Once we got to Milan we weren't much in the mood to do much touristy stuff so we stopped off at the hotel and then went out for gelato and nutella.
Sunday us girls slept in a bit (if you count 8 as sleeping in) and then went off to meet Dave (he just had to go see the Last Supper, like geez what's so important about that, pshh) at the castle in the park. This castle was pretty huge, it even had a moat (come on how cool is that). Then we were off to see the Duomo of Milan. This cathedral was super cool, none of the churches I have seen yet have compared to it. Unfortunately on Sundays they don't allow people inside but just looking at the outside was enough. After admiring this for a while we wandered over to one of the oldest malls in the world. Of course this being Milan the stores in this mall were that of Louis Vitton and Prada so we never actually went in a store just admired from the outside. There was a divot in the floor that you are supposed to stick your heel in and spin around three times for luck, I did participate in this tradition and I think I did it quite fabulously if I do say so myself. We scattered to get lunch after that, my group going to McDonalds (yes we went to McDonalds in a foreign country because when you've been eating nothing but pasta and pizza for two months you really start craving meat and greasy foods and you'll settle for even McDonalds, and you know what it does actually taste better in different countries aside from the fact they charge for ketchup) then waiting for the train.
We left Milan at 2 with our train headed to Florence for a connecting train to take us to Perugia. The first train was awesome because we got to sit in business class (so fancy), apparently they gave out snacks and wine for that but I must've been asleep for that part of the trip (bummer I know). The last leg of our long weekend was spent sleeping on the packed train of people. It felt so good to finally reach Perugia and know that I won't be on a train for another week. I said goodbye to Rebekah, as she was to stay at the train station to catch the next train to Rome so she could head home (er, to my house) on Monday. I almost didn't travel this weekend as Venice is quite expensive to go to but I am very happy I spent the money and had one last fantastic week in Italy before I make my leave this Saturday (how did that go by so quick, holy crap). Before I dwell on my departure too much here are some pictures from the weekend.
Now that is ocean side property.
Ana and Bailey looking adorable.
The water streets are super cool.
Gondola! Unfortunately we did not ride in one (they're kind of expensive).
San Marco square.
Water streets at night, so super awesome. I can't even tell you the awesomeness.
Night San Marco square, their were people here I just had a long exposure so they all disappeared.
The light painting, we also spelt out RMC, Italy, and RMC Italy. This was a lot of fun.
Ah wave!
Whoa, bigger wave! Oh yeah and gondolas.
These are boots you can buy to cover your shoes which is actually a really good idea but we thought we were above these ugly boots. I wish I had bought some.
Adorable father and son, I may or may not have stalked them a bunch for more pictures.
Adorable little girl in the water, I did not stalk her only two photos exist in my files. I swear.
These are platforms to walk on so people who didn't wear water boots (like us) can walk.
Clearly a local Venetian, trudging through the water on the way to work.
The wall people put love letters on by Juliet's house.
I wonder how often they clean this up.
A cool fountain.
Pretty flower.
The castle! The grass is where the moat used to be.
This guy and his dog were super cute, the dog was so happy to play fetch, this picture does not show how excited he was.
The Arch of Peace, of course when you are trying to take a picture of it without people and this one couple stands in the middle of it for 10 minutes peace is not on your mind.
The Duomo at Milan! So gorgeous! I love this church.
Look at how cool it is! Ugh.
Apparently I have a thing for creeping on strangers children. But he was super adorable waving to the pigeons.
A section of the door on the church, people touch Mary and Jesus' hands so much the bronze has not tarnished like the rest of it. I really liked the look of this.
Ah, amazing church!
