pisa + portofino

so for our first weekend trip, i went with catherine, judith, kelsey (the three girls i’m rooming with), zac, and micheal (4^th year landscape guys) to pisa and portofino. we left friday afternoon and got to our hostel in pisa around dinner time.

it was cheapest for all six of us to share a room, so six beds were shoved in a little room…it was pretty cute! i don’t think the boys thought so…especially because they could barely fit in their beds!

we asked the woman at the hostel where to go for dinner and she directed us to the area around the leaning tower. it was crazy when we just came up to an opening and looked to our right and saw the tower! it was so cool! we found a pizzeria and got pizza and pasta. it was so good! we walked around a little more and found a cool bar called ‘the wall’. the whole back wall of the bar was glass and butted up against the really old wall that runs in the middle of the city of pisa. the bar was really cool with fun lights and a bartender who looked a little too much like fabio to us. after a drink we headed back to our villa to get some sleep.

saturday morning we got up and went to the tower. we bought tickets to climb to the top. it’s over 300 steps to the top, but after climbing all the hills and steps in genoa, getting to the top of the tower was a breeze! the view was gorgeous!

we walked down the street to a cute café we had seen the night before and ate delicious sandwiches and gelato while seeing the tower from our table. it was quite a view! afterwards we went back to try to take fun pictures with the tower. it was harder than we thought it’d be! but we got some pretty good ones. we took pictures with the clemson tiger rag too!

we walked around the city and found lots of cute stores and got cappuccino at a café before heading back to the cathedral next to the tower. the inside was gorgeous! we went back to our room for a little bit before dinner and enjoyed a couple bottles of wine while talking…what turned out to be a few hours later, we went downtown to get some dinner. we went to another cute restaurant and had pizza and pasta again. while walking around to find other things to do, we ended up at a tiny little mexican restaurant. we had delicious tequila flavored beers and tried to order chips and salsa, but the salsa we ended up getting was the spiciest i’ve ever tasted! the boys ended up having a contest to see who could eat more without taking a drink. it was hilarious! after that we went back to the bar from the night before. there was a soccer game on, so it was packed! it was really fun to watch the game with everyone.

the next morning we took a bus to the train station to go to a small town called portofino, which is only about a half hour from genoa. apparently portofino was a hot spot for celebs in the 1950s. we definitely visited during their off season…almost everything was closed. it was beautiful though! we are planning to go back once it warms up! we hiked up to see a castle there and a church with a pretty cemetery and a light house. it was really cool but a lot of walking, and we didn’t have anywhere to put our bags so we were tired pretty fast. we got back to the train station (with a quick stop for this coffee/chocolate/ice cream dessert) and took a train back to genoa.

we got back around the same time as everyone else and all ate dinner together. now we just have to get through our review on wednesday  and we’re off to naples, rome, and florence next week!!

my birthday celebration

we celebrated my birthday saturday night on the 16th. almost everyone went to the old city café (where a couple of us had been before) for drinks. my group was late from the day trip we had taken so i had to meet everyone else there. everyone cheered and clapped when I walked in, and the owner remembered us from before. he told everyone (in his Italian accent) that I was the one who kept ordering drinks over and over again! it was funny. he gave me my first drink (a jack and coke, in honor of mario) in a large glass, double the size of everyone else’s, for free!

everyone had a really good time and had plenty to drink. the waitresses and bartenders like us because we’re american (and americans drink a lot). they tried to get us to dance on the tables. no one would do it except for logan…it was pretty ridiculous!

five or six of us stayed until the bar closed and made the trek back to the villa. we stayed up for a while longer in the dining room of the villa. dad sent me two dozen roses, 1 for each year and he said to give the extras to sylvia for taking care of us for the next four months.

on sunday, our italian professor barbara (who is here until wednesday) decided we should go to this nice restaurant down in the port. she had called ahead so our meal would have a fixed price- 30 euro per person. this was the biggest meal I’ve ever eaten! it included red and white wine, water, bread, antipasto (foccaccia al formaggio and farinata di ceci, which was a really good bread and cheese type dish), primo (trofie al pesto and testaroli al pomodoro, two different types of pasta), secondo (the main dish: l’orata al forno con le potate, a baked fish with potatoes), dolce (semifreddo, fluffy ice cream that is made with cake), and espresso. it was delicious! i couldn’t eat it all. it was definately an amazing birthday dinner i’ll never forget!!

the top of the mountain and the sea

on friday, i went with allender, sam, and lindsay to the top of the mountain that we live on. we took a lift up to the top. it was pretty cool, like a subway on a 45 degree angle. we got off on the last stop and then hiked up the rest of the way. there were three forts up there and the views were amazing!

yesterday (the 16th) I went with allender, stephen, tyler, nate, and sam to this small coastal town. it was about a fifteen minute train ride from genoa. there was a long promenade type thing that stretched along the water. it was like a brick/stone boardwalk! the water was such a pretty blue and all of the buildings were beautiful. there were also these large parks to walk through and huge museums set back. they also had a downtown area with cute stores and restaurants.

we took the bus back, which was not as easy as the train. it dropped us off at a place in genoa we had never seen and we had to figure out how to get back to the downtown area we’re familiar with. we stopped for pizza (so good!) and wine and gelato (i’m obsessed) and finally made it back to the villa.

everyone else had already left to go to the old city café to celebrate my birthday so I got changed and tyler and i walked down the hill to meet them there…i’ll fill you in on my birthday night in the next post!

villa life

so we're finally settled in the villa. there are 21 of us here. everyone is third year with me except for the three grad guys i knew from charleston, three landscape architecture guys, and one grad girl who studied in barcelona in the fall.

 

 the villa is three floors. a kitchen and dining room and a ping pong table in the basement; our studios, a library, the faculty offices, and the lecture room are on the second floor that opens up to the courtyard. the studio professor, bernard, also has his private quarters there. the bedrooms and bathrooms are on the third floor. there are three rooms for girls and two for the guys. the guys have the big room with the large balcony and i'm in a room with three other girls my age and we have a smaller balcony.

    sylvia is the coordinator of the program and she's in charge of the villa. angela is our cook, judita is our tour guide' who takes us on day trips on tuedays, and lucia cleans the villa. they are the cutest italian women. bernard calls them the villa angels. we were told to thank them all the time and that they love receiving flowers.

   we’ve had classes and met all of our professors. they all seem great. our studio project is to work in groups of 3 and redesign a building that is downtown that really doesn’t fit in right now. it should be cool. i’m working with jamie who is my age, and max who is a graduate.

   the food that angela makes is delicious! and the faccacia bread we have every day is amazing. it’s good with honey, nutella, cinnamon, anything! two guys have to go buy it every day for us, so it’s fresh! my job at the villa is to keep the library neat and organized and to tell sylvia when we need more ink for the printer.

   i can definitely get used to this :)

the city

exploring the city

the villa

the view from our balcony

leaving for italy

one week left!