Day 9... in transit

So currently, Scott and I are in transit to Valencia. We left Nice this morning and 13 1/2 hours later we are in Barcelona for the night. I'll get to the reasons behind that horrendous travel time in a minute.

NICE: We arrived in Nice, France three days ago. It was a little bit of a shock to come back into a city after being in Cinque Terra for three days, and even the parts of Milan where we were weren't too crowded. So huge shock to the senses. But we made it to our hostel, which was this cute little flat split up into nine rooms, an extra bathroom, and a kitchen/office. The owner was this cute french woman named Martine, and she had a little girl who was absolutly adorable. Se, we walk up what feels like a million flights of stairs (yes, more stairs!) and walk in and Martine just does a double take when she sees me. She them proceeds to compliment me on my hair and tell me that it is blonde, not red. Now to me, that is funny, because my hair is the fartherest thing from blonde you can get in the states, but whatever. So for that night, and the next two days, we preceed to just wander through Nice. We go up to this really cool Villa that is famous for something (I'm not sure what because everything was in french), and hang out there for a while, see some churchs, the museum of modern art, the old historic center and market, the beach, the harbor. We literally just meandered for two-ish days. It was fun, and beautiful, if a little panama beachy for me (lots of neon lights... lots).

So, this morning, we got up at 5:00am to catch our train to Barcelona. If you want to know what a french train station looks like at 5am, I've got pictures! So that is literally all we did today, was ride on trains... crowded trains. We get to barcelona, and then we end up on the metro for more time, trying to find our hostel, on some university that is too far north to even be on the map! We are here though, and are just relaxing. Tomorrow morning we leave for three nights and 2 1/2 days in Valencia where I get to hang out with Ellen! I'm so super excited!

Here is something that I learned while in France: the french language totally stresses me out. So we ate absolutly every meal out of the bakery that was close to our hostel, and at some point I just made scott start ordering for me because I can't pronounce a word in french to save my life. And of course every time i tried, there was this huge line of people behind me, and i just sounded like a stupid dumb american. What I learned from the experince: Always take someone who can speak french and read it with you when visiting france!

ITALIA!!!

Yes, that is correct. I have finally made that trip to Europe that I have been talking about for at least the last 5 or so years. So, I'm here, in Italy. And it is amazing! Scott and I flew into Milan on Friday around 3pm, and mean old Scott wouldn't let me go to sleep, because we had to adjust to the time change. Whatever. All I know is that I was cranky as hell. We just kinda went exploring the evening, and while we were taking pictures of eachother hugging a ridiculously old tree, i turned my ankle again... the same one i turned three weeks ago at mudbowl. it was a little sad, and painful. on saturday we got up, and headed to the Duomo. it is the thrid largest church in europe, and it is huge. we took lots of pictures, and then we decided to head to the top. Well, let me tell you, there are more steps to the top of the Duomo than from the lake to the cabin at pickwick... it was funny because that is actually what i thought of! from here we headed to Sforza castle, ate lunch in the park behind that, and then did the museum thing. we went back to the hostel and had dinner, explored a little more, and then went to bed.

the next morning we got up early, and headed to the train station to catch our train to cinque terra. well, we got there, and realized that we had missed our train, because time had changed overnight, and being foriegners, we did not reailze this! so, we tried to get a later train, be that train wasn't going out of the region, so we got a reservation for a train to genoa, then hopped on a train to La Spezia, then hopped on another train that brought us to our town, Riomaggiore. It is a beautiful town, the southern most town in Cinque Terra (which means five lands). we dropped our stuff off at our apartment, ate lunch at a little cafe (pesto lasagna... AMAZING!), and then explored and took some pictures. We went to bed, and then got up on Monday morning and took a train to Monterosso to start the hiking. We started, and all we did was go up. and i mean UP! there were like a thousand stairs! but it was a beautiful hike through olive groves and lemon groves and vineyards. it was totally worth it. we ended that part in Vernazza, and had lunch on the water there. Then we decided to start our next part of the hike, from Vernazza to Corniglia. That hike was also just up, with lots and lots of more stairs!!! When we came down from there we had to head straight to the train station, because we couldn't walk to Manrola, because of a land slide. We got to Manrola, started on the trail, and it was flat, and paved! it was a beautiful thing after that morning!
Today we have been just town hopping, using the train, and doing some shopping, and of course taking more pictures! (i am already over 200 of the trip, and i still have three more cities!). I did get a beautiful italian scarf for me, and a purse of course, and i have picked up a few things here and there for family and friends. it was really fun.
So tomorrow we take a train to Nice, which is supposed to be a beautiful place. For now, I am going to go and eat some dinner, and rest tonight. It has been a wonderful trip so far, and I can't wait for the rest of it!!!