Cinque Terre
After being pleasantly surprised by how much I loved Florence, we were off to what I most looked forward to on the trip: Cinque Terre! It was a 2.5 hour bus ride to the trains. The trains go through all five cities (Cinque Terre translates to “five lands”) so it’s easy to take the train or hike between the cities.
Our first stop was Manarola, where I got these photos of the iconic coast. We were only there for 20 minutes so I could take the photos, then we took the train to Vernazza for lunch. I got fried calamari at Antica Osteria Il Baretto – if you’re eating here, it’s much less expensive to eat further away from the water. You won’t have the view but it’s only a five-minute walk to the water, tops, so nothing is prohibiting you from going down there anyway.
After we ate, we took the train to Monterosso for the beach! The water was stunning – super clear and turquoise. I know my photos seem unreal but I edited it exactly as I saw it with my eyes! The beach is very rocky, but it makes the water clearer because there’s no sand. I swam for about an hour and it felt incredible, it was so beautiful and unlike anything I’d ever experienced before. We were all exhausted on the way home but it was so worth it.
Rome
The next morning, we drove to Orvieto for a few hours. We happened to be there on the day of the Corpus Christi parade – it seemed like the entire town was in the parade! I had some pizza (what else) at Il Dialogo. The Duomo there was beautiful and built in the 1300s, with really pretty mosaics decorating the outside.
After Orvieto, we drove to our hostel in Rome. The majority of the bus ride was filled with Lizzie McGuire references and songs – if you’ve seen the movie, you know haha. We stayed at the Travestere Hostel. I would NOT recommend staying here if you can help it. It was supposed to be a gentrified area, but it was the first (and only) place that I felt unsafe where we stayed and returning to it at night.
We did a short walking tour with our tour director, Kyri, and he bought us gelato for his birthday! We saw the Pantheon, the Trevi Fountain and the Spanish steps. I had my first carbonara of the trip – it was so good – then we went back to the Trevi fountain later at night in hopes of it being less crowded. No luck! It’s in a much smaller square than I had pictured previously. Rome was the first place that I had felt itchy, like I had hives, even though I knew I hadn’t eaten anything wrong. It was also the hottest place of our entire trip, which didn’t help. I took a couple of Benadryl every day I was there but I think it must have been something in the air, because the second we left, I felt fine.
The next day, we went straight to the Colosseum for a three-hour tour. It was WAY too long and they only had cakes and pastries available for breakfast at the hostel, so the majority of us hadn’t eaten. The heat was the worst part and I think everyone was starting to not feel well. We walked around the Roman forum as well, then met our tour director at the Campo di Fiori market. I wandered around the market for a little bit but really hated all the vendors yelling at me to get my attention – can you tell Rome wasn’t my favorite already? It was cool to see the variety of meats, cheeses and produce though. We then went to the pasta making class at In Rome Cooking. I don’t have any photos because it was extremely messy, but it was fun to get a look at homemade pasta! I think I’ll stick to Barilla though 🙂
We then went back to the hostel around 3 and I took a nap and bought some cereal at the market next door. This was the first time during the whole trip that I prioritized sleep and taking a rest – I definitely needed it, seeing as it was day 19! I also brought a tube of Nuun with me (tablets for electrolytes) and this was the thing that helped me the most. We then went to Buddy’s for our “Italian feast” that we signed up for. They were SO great about my allergy. I started with a great bruschetta, then I had my own personal allergy-friendly charcuterie board with apples, prosciutto, salami, cheese and a blackberry-cherry jam. The prosciutto was incredible and I could have just eaten that the entire meal! We finished with pasta – of course. I was kind of burnt out on pasta by then, but I’m pleased to report that didn’t last long 🙂 We ended the night walking around Lungo Il Tevere, a First Fridays-esque market along the river that’s only open at night.
The next day, we went back to the Pantheon. This sounds so spoiled, but it didn’t seem all that special to me. After seeing some of the gigantic tiled churches, you would probably think that too! Then we went to Antica Caffe Greco, the oldest coffee shop in Rome (founded in 1760). Hans Christian Andersen and Franz Liszt are known to have had coffee there. Then for lunch…we finally hit our breaking point and had McDonald’s. It was actually SO good though – I had an egg mcmuffin, fries and a chocolate shake. It was the fanciest McDonald’s I’d ever been in and I had no shame!
By this point, it was just my friend Lauren and I trying to explore. We waited for 45 minutes in 95-degree heat for the bus, only for a very nice English man to inform us that the public transit was on strike! We had to figure out how to get a taxi back to the hotel, then went with our group on a bus to the Vatican. It was very hot (again) and packed with tourists, but so pretty and ornate. The Sistine Chapel was much smaller than I thought and photos weren’t allowed, but several people were blatantly taking them anyway. It was hard to see the paintings because they were so small and so high up. I enjoyed Saint Peter’s Basilica a lot more and thought it was much more impressive.
After the Vatican, we went back to the hotel for a little bit then went back down to the river like the other night. I had a cheeseburger and a Coke – clearly today was my culinary breaking point! We went back to the hostel after dinner and some gelato at Otaleg (not my favorite), I showered and called it a night.
Rome was not my favorite city, but a large part of that had to do with the heat and whatever allergy thing was affecting me the whole time. I’ll link my map below and also added some things on my map that I didn’t get to, but were recommended to me in my research!
https://goo.gl/maps/RfSCv92X5LfQpXsi9
xo, Hannah