More Cinque Terre

Cinque Terre

I went to the Cinque Terre (which literally means "Five Lands") on Friday with the program and stayed overnight. I had been to Cinque Terre before in 2004, but it is so amazing, I had to return. I woke up at 4:30AM on Friday to catch the train to La Spezia and then a cab to the port of La Spezia where a tour boat was waiting for us. The boat ride was fantastic...it stopped in all five towns of the Cinque Terre: Riomaggiore, Manorola, Corniglia, Vernazza, and finally Monterosso al Mare. Three other girls and I booked a hotel in Monterosso and decided to drop our stuff off after the boat ride. We saw signs for the hotel and began walking because it was only 800 meters away. Well, the sign failed to mention that the hotel was 800 meters above the village. So it was grueling, grueling walk up the steepest, narrowest road I have ever seen. All we could do was laugh about it. We showed up to the hotel lobby literally soaked through in sweat and panting. I mean, signing the hotel bill, I managed to get the bill wet with my perspiration (much to the disgust of the anti-American hotel clerk behind the counter). The three other girls, Cassie, Kim, and Angela, still wanted to go hiking after our hike to our hotel...older and wiser, I stayed behind and had a leisurely lunch in the town followed by nice lounge on the beach for a few hours, people watching and reading. I found an amazing place to have dinner at...it is perched up a bit from the village and looks directly out to the sea. When we arrived, one of the restaurant workers was fishing off of the balcony...the place is very close to the water. We had a fantastic meal and stayed out that night getting drinks and dancing. There was a 4th of July party set up on this piazza right on the sea, complete with deejay spinning American music. We were probably really obnoxious, we did get the party started. The next day was spent on the beach and laying on a raft in the water. I had some octopus salad for lunch and some granita limone (like a slushy but better) because you can't be in the Cinque Terre and not have fresh seafood and lemons (they have a lemon festival there each year). This may be my favorite place on earth.

The Library

Here is where I work Monday through Friday. I spent most of last week cleaning...two years worth of dust was on those shelves. I can always tell which kids are allergic to dust because the minute they walk through the library, they begin sneezing. The problem with the library is that there are just too many books and not enough space. There are so many good things...I wish I could stay here for years and just make my way through reading them all. They are mostly books on Italy's culture, political system, architecture, and art. And also quite a bit of literature....mainly stories that take place in Italy. I'm reading a book now called The Bay of Noon by Shirley Hazzard that is set in Naples after WWII. The library has a lot of work yet to be done. There are a lot of books to sadly get rid of, but it sounds like we will be sending them to a prison in Sicily instead of simply tossing them out.

More, more, more of the villa

More of the villa...

Because the villa is so darn beautiful, I thought it deserved some more pics. The gardens have all these fountains that have to be cleaned every week because they start to grow heaps of algae. I like the wall fountain face that gets "bearded" in the stuff by the end of the week. There are many animals wandering around the place...first and foremost, there is Blake, the dog who loves to sleep and occasionally follow me around. There are also lizards around, which Blake likes to hunt. Two roosters, cats, coy (coi?...Japanese gold fish), and let's not forget the pigeons. They are the constant "coo" morning, noon, and night.

Siena before the Palio

Siena is a lovely Medieval city south of Florence. In the middle of the city is the fan-shaped Piazza Del Campo where a horse race is held every July. The edges of the piazza are turned into a large sand-filled track for the horses and spectators watch from the middle of the piazza and the balconies above. This race is next week, so preparations were being made...track groomed, flags hung, etc. Each district in the city competes against each other in the race and each district has its own flag. I had been to Siena before, so I had been to the lovely cathedral there. I spent most of the day wandering with a couple kids....we went and saw the thumb, whip, and head of Saint Catherine of Siena at one of the churches and to the university there that is perched on a hill with amazing views of the city. We finished out the day with a trip to the Enoteca Nazionale (national wine cellar basically) where most of the wines of the country are available for purchase and consumption. We consumed only 2 bottles of about 1500 types available. Can't do it all in one day I guess. The bus ride home was interesting...although an air-conditioned bus in theory, in practice the bus driver refused to turn on the AC for reasons unknown.

Pizza n' Soccer

On a whim, I decided to join up with a couple kids who were going into Florence to get art supplies and gelato before dinner. What was supposed to be a quick jaunt turned into us missing dinner....we sat on a broken down train that was without air-conditioning for over an hour. It is on average 95 degrees here. So the train became a sauna treatment. We treated ourselves to some pizza and gelato afterwards in a square in the town where I'm staying, Sesto. The restaurant had a tv and chairs set up outside for a big crowd to watch the Spain and Russia soccer game.