My tour of Italia (Milan and Venice)

Once again sorry for the delay.  This past week has been busy with Arsenal games, biology labs (they call them PRACTICALS here), and social outings.

Here is, as promised, a continuation of my last post, documenting my adventure through Italy.

After leaving Rome and arriving in Milano, the next few days were fairly laid back.  First of all, it rained for probably 36 hours straight after I arrived.  I think it was making up for all the fantastic weather I had in Rome.  Rachel had class during the day, so I hung out, did homework, ate food, and just relaxed, because I was on holiday.  When Rachel wasn't in class she showed me around Milano.  We went to Duomo, strolled through the fashion district, and ate panzerotta.  Panzerotti is a stuffed pastry, similar to a calzone but smaller and more delicious.  I could have eaten 3 or 4, but I managed with only one.  We 'saved' some money by cooking dinner every night.  Saved is in quotes because we would end up buying WAY WAY WAY too much food and probably ended up costing the same amount, but there were some good leftovers too.  On that note, trying to prepare rice when all the directions are in Italian and not knowing any italian is pretty tough.  That is one thing I am glad I don't have to deal with most of the time: LANGUAGE BARRIERS.  Sometimes in Italy it would be so hard to do simple things like order food or drinks, which is frustrating.  Towards the end of the trip I was glad to be going back to an english speaking nation, and I no longer take that fact for granted.

After Milan we headed to my final destination: VENEZIA.  The train there was uneventful, although it was 20 minutes late and we sat on the platform for another 30.  Upon arrival in Venice, I was first struck with it's unbelievable location.  It's similar to an island in the way that it is about half a mile from the mainland, but isLANDs have LAND, and Venice is just buildings built in the water.  It is an amazing sight.  Our group (Some of Rachel's friends, her flatmate Brittany, Rachel and I) decided that it couldn't be THAT hard to navigate through the city to our hostel, which google maps said was only a 15 minute walk away.  We were wrong.  The walkways are randomly placed, their names change or they aren't marked well, and there are so many of them.  After quite the adventure, we arrived and we were greeted by the owners.  The place we stayed was awesome and the owners were very nice and accommodating.  Two of them owned a nearby restaurant and gave our entire group 20% off our dinner and even made a reservation for us.

The next day was our only full day in Venice, and once again the weather was perfect, mid 50s and sunny.  We saw the sights: Rialto Bridge, Piazza San Marco, the fashion district (armani, prada, burberry any high end store you can think of and they are all in the same area.) and just enjoyed the beauty of the city.  There are no cars in Venice because there are no roads, and if you stay away from the Grand Canal and main tourist attractions, in the maze that is Venice, it is very peaceful and quiet. A polar opposite of Rome.  We ended the day with a dinner at a restaurant recommended to me by my good friend Anthony Bourdain.  You might know him from the Travel Channel or appearances on Top Chef.  The venetians are some of the nicest people I have ever met and experienced in my travels.  Claudio and Giorgio from the hostel and restaurant were so generous and the owner or host was the same way at this restaurant,  Al Mascaron.  We sample some of Venice's famous seafood and closed the restaurant down.  They even brought us more wine on the house.  The next day was somewhat stressful in that I didn't know where to catch my bus to Treviso (the airport I flew back to London out of) and Venice was still confusing.  After getting lost a couple times I figured it out and made it to the airport to fly back to London, which feels like home.

My trip to Italy was simply amazing, but it is only the beginning of my adventures abroad.  I am so thankful for this opportunity and especially thankful for those people that made it possible (that's you Mom and Dad).  This weekend I go to Wales and only have 3 full weeks of classes until I have all of April off and until my family gets here!  Yesterday I met with some friends and planned my next adventure, after wales and before my family arrives, to Brussels and Amsterdam.