since we took off from berlin a day and half earlier than we'd planned, we were able to see more of italy than we thought we'd be able to. first was venice, which was beautiful yet very touristy. and i think that the whole story of dreamy singing gondoliers is a myth--they don't sing and they all have beer bellies. we didn't get to ride on a gondola seeing that they charged 100 euro for half an hour.
since we saw venice pretty quickly we headed off for some beach time... all the way to the opposite side of italy. we slept in the port city of la spezia but spent our day on the monterosso beach, in the cinque terre coast.
next we went off to florence where we slept in tents at the 'hostelling international' hostel. there we met very friendly irish and spanish people. one of the most interesting characters was tony, a scot travelling on money he made from playing his bagpipe and wearing his kilt in piazzas all over europe. he left scotland with only 40 pounds sterling, and went on to make at least 200 euro in an hour of performing!
we stopped by siena for a day before rome (we took no pictures there though). rome was amazing though not what i expected--it was very small. again we ran into erin, sofia, fernanda, & debora--staying at the same hostel in piazza bologna!
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venetian masks.
a quick picture before the shopkeeper turned around! |
clara in venice.
all the streets look the same. it's like a labyrinth. |
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our campsite in florence.
clara, irish 1, me, irish 2, tony the scot. |
il duomo, florence.
the most beautiful church in italy, in my opinion. |
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chance encounter!
erin, sofs, fefa, debs, & me in our hostel in rome. |
the colosseum.
if you look really hard, i'm in the picture. |
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