Ciao, Bella!

"Ciao Bella!" Sean would say this to me like every five seconds when we took our little trip to Italy four years ago. I think he was trying to get in touch with his Italian roots, which by the way, are zero. But it made me laugh, and I think that was what made him say it all.time.time. :) Fast forward four years since then, and if someone were to ask me if I thought I'd ever get to go to Italy with all of my sisters and mom, I probably would've laughed, no, snorted in your face.

So you can imagine how long it took to sink in when I got my flight confirmation for this trip. No way is this happening. We started joking about how cool it would be to go together when my youngest sister, Liv, learned that she was accepted to the study abroad program in Siena, Italy. Here is a snippit from our conversations about Italy:



-sister:"So....I wonder since Livy's heading to Italy for study abroad, if we could put together a girl's..."

-me: "I'm IN!!"

I didn't care if the end of that sentence was suppose to be girl's... bra party, tea party, sewing party, heaven forbid, scrapbooking party, I was in. We all kind of "surrendered" to this trip in the same fashion :) We landed back in the U.S. at around 10:30 pm, after being on a plane since 4:30am, Italy time. Kelly, Jessy's husband, was nice enough to take my tired self back to my house where Sean was eagerly waiting for a trip report when all I wanted to do was make up for the lack of sleep/jet lag I was already beginning to experience. But once I started telling him the stories, they just kept coming, and I was grateful Sean listened with a smile.


I cringe at the thought of having to try and post so many pictures, but I will do my best to share some of my favorites from the trip. Some of these might be completely random to you, but for whatever reason, they make me smile, or laugh, or wet-my-pants laugh.

Hanging out in the Philadelphia airport, waiting to meet up with Veronica, who had already survived a 5 hours plane ride from Seattle, WA.

You can see we took ourselves very seriously during the flights. Don't worry, this kind of behavior didn't last longer than a few minutes, seeing that all of us conked out for quite a few hours.



Sunset over the Atlantic

Next stop, Munich, Germany.

We then boarded this ridiculously small propeller plane, and flew over the Swiss Alps, which did a number on such a small plane, as well as a number on our tired bodies. Bleh. Worst. turbulence. ever.

Getting closer, we started seeing the great vineyards of Tuscany!

We landed in Florence, and almost immediately we hopped on a train bound for Pisa. We only wanted to spend an hour or so there, so we dropped off our luggage at a secure place and hoofed it to the tower! (Can I just brag for a second about how awesome we packed? We just won't talk about how many bags we came home with!!)

What big muscles you have, Liv!

Yes, I'm pretty sure this couple is making out.

My view from the bottom of the Pisa baptistry

Their view looking down

The church is absolutely beautiful in Pisa. No matter which angle you are standing at, the attention to detail is astounding!

Jessy and V taking in the beautiful interior of the cathedral with views like...

this...

...and this

on our way up to the Cinque Terre region, we passed by the marble quarries in Carrara. Little known fact: Michelangelo's favorite marble to use for his sculptures was carrara marble that came from this region!

We ended up connecting onto the wrong train somewhere in between Pisa and Riomaggiore, but once we FINALLY made it to the small coastal town, this is what we saw. It was beyond lovely.

Our rooms at Locanda del Sol were awesome, and we woke up to a view of the Sea the following morning

Because the Cinque Terre region is a costal region, the best way to get from town to town is by boat. The next morning we hopped on the boat bright and early and made our way up to the most northern town, Monterrosso.

before we knew it, we were taking in the gorgeous scenery. It was seriously breathtaking!



About 25 minutes after boarding, we reached the most developed of the five towns, Monterosso.
We immediately began exploring this little town. It was so incredibly beautiful with narrow streets and colorful buildings everywhere.
We even found a "church" if you can call it that, for the dead. It was pretty spooky with skeletons everywhere in sight.
This was one of the highlights for me from our trip. Swimming on my back, looking up at the sky and taking it all in!
Next stop, Vernazza. Soccer is evident everywhere in Italy!

We climbed the steepest set of stairs all the way to the top of a lookout tower. It was well worth it in the end, because this was our view

Upon returning to Riomaggiore, we were "greeted" by this sunbather, who I would like to think is hopefully wearing a small euro speedo! Most likely not.

After we said our goodbyes to Enrico (the wonderful owner at our hotel) we hopped on another train and headed back south to Florence. We got in around 8 or 9pm, and headed straight to our hotel. We had no idea how nice our view was going to be right outside our bedroom windows.

Veronica and my bro-in-law Jon have a favorite restaurant in Florence that we went to that night, called Il Latini. It's on a random little street away from the noise of the pallazo, and it DID NOT DISAPPOINT. I mean, look at this first course!! Followed by fresh pasta of all sorts.

The following morning, we were up bright and early (notice a trend with "bright and early") and headed to the Accademia to see the many works of Michelangelo. I. was. floored. with. emotion. The David statue is just not possible. It is perfection to a T, and it is sooo humungous you wonder how it was possible he constructed it in the first place, let along find a block of marble that size. No pictures were allowed :((((( After the Accademia, Jessy and Mom left to do some shopping while the rest of us headed to the Uffizi Museum, the most visited museum in Italy. I'd like to point out in the picture below how SWEATY we all are, especially me:) It was soooo hot.

I know I sound crazy, and I think Sean thinks I'm crazy whenever I've said that I think Livy has the face of an ancient Roman. Case in point!

After the Uffizi, we met up with Jessy and Mom who were wearing their new scarves.

Mom quickly pointed us in the direction of all of the shops and we headed out like a pack of wild wolves.

Oh wait, somewhere along there, we stopped for lunch. Note to anyone thinking of traveling to Italy in the future: lunch in Italy=not good. Italians don't eat out for lunch, instead they save their appetite for dinner...which is totally worth it.

Back to shopping, this little girl's mom got swarmed by all of us who bought scarves from her. This sweet girl held up the mirror for everyone, and when I asked her to look my way, she gave me the most adorable smile. Unfortunately, random pregnant belly lady behind her kinda ruined the picture :/

After stopping at the vendor, we walked over to the Ponte Vecchio, the glamourous shops along the canal bridge. It's beautiful. I told Veronica I wanted to get a picture of the buildings in the reflection of her sunglasses, and this is the clown I ended up dealing with! :)

Seriously, this outdoor market was sooooo overwhelming. We kept telling each other that we'd keep our bearings by always following the right side, but that didn't help much because the right hand side went on for streets and streets!

This vendor was more than willing to put on one of the masks he was selling.

Poor Liv. This is not a staged picture. Seeing that she was going to be in Italy for four months, she didn't want to blow all of her money during her first week in Italy. I don't blame her one bit! But, for her it meant a few hours of shopping that she didn't really want to do. And let's face it, we were ALL sooooo exhausted on this trip that falling asleep on some random stairs while waiting for us was understandable. Thank you, Liv, for using the neck strap to my camera!

Now, onto the best part of the trip...gelato.

One of my favorite pictures from the trip!

During one of the days in Florence, I opted to stay downstairs while my sisters changed their shoes getting ready to climb the Florence cathedral dome, and take some pictures.

I don't think I saw a single child awake the entire time we travelled. It made me think doing a Europe trip with kids might not be all that bad after all...until I saw the 4-year old girl throw a tantrum (I think out of pure exhaustion) arms and legs moving like a mad child...in the middle of a cobblestone street. Um, no thanks.

From one of our rooms at Hotel deLanzi

The famous bronze doors!

This is where we ate dinner that night. It was so beautiful!

We all would order different pastas and share with each other. livy is a happy girl in the picture.

Somewhere along the way, Livy's poor suitcase broke. Like, broke. It had to be DRAGGED from one place to the next. Everyone rejoiced when we finally found a new suitcase for livy.

The fascade of the duomo in Florence is my favorite of all of the churches I've seen in Italy. From the colors, the details, the architecture...

Unfortunately, when you actually walk around the church, you begin to notice how diiiirrty it is.

The humungous crack in the dome was a little worrisome.

Talk about sweat dripping from every part of your body (elbows?!?!) we climbed the nearly 500 stairs to the top of the dome and got to take in an amazing panoramic view of Florence.

I love this picture, because I think you can definitely tell we're sisters in this!
Hands down, this was another one of our favorites from the trip. After going out to dinner, we were strolling down some of the side streets and we could faintly hear an organ playing crazy amazing music from a small little church along the street. The poster (seen below) clearly stated that the concert was free, and it was beyond amazing. Like, take the best organist you've ever heard, and that was what we heard. It was soooo loud it made the whole church vibrate with sound!

The next day we headed to Rome, where we stayed at a family friend's apartment. Contessa Agnese (her name) was the main reason why my grandfather was able to immigrate to America. My grandfather worked as a gardener at her villa in France (yes, she actually has CASTLES) and she helped him achieve his dream of coming to America!

Her apartment is on the top floor, and has a wrap around terrace that overlooks the Piazza del Popolo (one of the church steeples show in the distance)
and St. Peters Cathedral on the other.

From her apartment
That night, we got dressed up and headed out to dinner at the most amazing restaurant called Il Gabriello near the Spanish Steps. We didn't know ahead of time that the food was all organic, but it was seriously the best pasta and the best bruschetta I've ever had. the entrance to Il Gabriello. The following morning we had reservations (always a great idea) at the Vatican Museum, where we got to see iconic sculptures such as The Lacoon, one of my favorites. Darn tour group of 50 billion people always made it difficult to get the pictures you really wanted >:/

The School of Athens, by Rafael. Amazing stuff.

The Vatican Museum is HUGE. Like, you want to break your own feet off by the end, huge. But you really can't complain when you see murals like this: (The School of Athens, by Rafael)

After winding through several rooms, you finally get to the Sistine Chapel. It is forbidden to take pictures, but we couldn't help get one picture of part of the ceiling while we were in there. Ohhhh Michelangelo, I love you.

After being on our feet for like FOREVER, we ate at the Vatican museum cafeteria and each one of us gorged on huge watermelon slices like this one V is holding.

Livy was doing the "switching of the shoes." In other words, MY FEET ARE BURNING.

After the museum, we headed over St. Peter's to climb the dome, and also to walk around inside.

we were about to climb another 500 stairs, so we thought it best to do a little stretching beforehand ;)

The staircases were steep and naaaaarrow!

Michelangelo's Pieta. And to think he sculpted this in his late 20's.

The Swiss Guards. I want some of their pants! :)

This picture was the story of our lives throughout the entire trip in Italy. We took the train and the metro EVERYWHERE and we were always boarding the trains with literally seconds to spare before the doors would close. My mom even got her leg stuck in one of the doors because we were cutting it that close! By the way, if you go to Rome, the metro is sooooo easy to navigate, and it saves you boatloads of money. It's only 1 euro to ride as opposed to 50 euros in cab fees!! And the buses are super cheap as well!!

Trevi Fountain

The following morning, Jessy, mom, Fran and I headed to the Colosseum.

The lighting was divine, and so I took the opportunity to do a mini photo session of my mom and sisters ;)

Funny story about this picture. It was (once again) soooo hot out this day, and Franny and I went inside to the tabacchi to buy bus tickets to get us back up near the Pantheon, and when we came back outside, Mom and Jessy were standing in the shade of the lamppost to cool themselves down a bit. HILARIOUS!

Pantheon

Rafael's tomb

Since the Pantheon is still an active church, it is free to the public. Can you imagine meeting in a church like this every Sunday?!

I love this picture because I'm pretty sure Jessy is telling one of her "I'm Michael Thomas!!" stories again. :)

This picture is just creepy, because I have no clue who took this picture, and why they must have been on the ground to take it! haha

After the Pantheon we headed down one of the main little streets branching off from the Pantheon and went to Della Palma, the best gelateria in Rome (in my opinion.) They offer over 100 different flavors. That night, we searched out two of Caravaggio's most magnificent paintings in a random church up on the north side of Rome. There was a wedding going on at the time so we had to wait along the sides of the church. this guy sooooo needed a different hairstyle. :)

Fran and I finally made it up to the paintings, but the little alcove they were in was so dark you could hardly see the paintings. We, along with the other 50 tourists standing there were disappointed. And then I remembered V saying that a lot of times there is a coin box nearby where you drop a coin in, and it turns the lights on for a better picture. So, I grabbed a coin, put it in, and VOILA! You should have heard the immediate "ooooohhhh aaaaaaaaahhhhh" from everyone. (Favorite Caravaggio painting! "Conversion of Paul")

Best street performer, hands down.

Dinner at PizzaRei got a little crazy that night.

I finished all of my shopping a day ahead of schedule (oooohhh yeaaaahhh) and stayed at the Contessa's apartment to help Livy pack her suitcase. She was meeting her study abroad group in Rome that day. Mom came back with roasted chestnuts, one of my favorite things to eat!

I know, this is totally gross, but this is what happens after walking for MILES every single day.

After we dropped off Livy, we rented a car and left Rome for our amazing getaway in the mountains, about 40 minutes outside of Naples. V did an amazing job driving!!

After winding around small towns, and farm lands, we drove up a super steep gravel road to reach our destination...

we wanted to cry just a tad at the beauty and the tranquility!

Why yes, V, I will gladly pose with my bread and Nutella!

That night we opted to buy our food at a local grocery store, and mom made dinner for us! It was soooo delicious! She was so cute and made floral centerpieces!

The following morning, we had breakfast out on the patio and said goodbye to our little Heaven on Earth. We headed out to Vitulazio, the last stop on our trip to see our relatives!

This is my Great Uncle Mike. We were all a big wet mess when we saw him because he looks, acts, and talks so much like our grandfather who we miss so much!

Carmelina looking at the pictures we brought along to share with them.

Next up, lunch at the house. Can you say BUFFALO MOZZARELLA!?!?!?! (My cousins Joe, and Bart)

Sweet litle Sophia made us all miss our babies!

Maria Giovanna, our youngest cousin from the family

This is at the bar that they own. It is filled with people at night!

We then headed up to my Uncle Mike's vineyard to take a look. jessy and I were the fortunate ones who drove with Uncle Mike in this itty bitty car!

Later that night, we met up with more relatives! It was soooo neat to meet all of them.

OK, I had to include this picture because this just goes to show how late it was (1:00am) and how hard we were all trying to stay awake. Veronica NEVER drinks Coke (she hates the taste), and she was in this picture because she was desperate to stay awake!

Goodbye ITALY!!!!!!!