I cannot believe so little has time has passed since my last post because so so so much has happened since then! (I’m sorry if anyone follows me on snapchat or Instagram and has already heard some of the things we have done, those spoilers may make this blog post feel repetitive and a little boring for you.) For everyone else though, i am going to write out some of the events that have happened since Saturday – **hint: look to the title of the post to see the locations we have visited**.
Okay so I’m going to start with Saturday:
I had to get up at 5.45 to ensure I had some sort of breakfast before leaving for my train from Treviglio. Saying goodbye to my host little sister and dad the night before made it seem less like a goodbye and, because I’m so stupidly emotional and terrible at goodbyes, this was supposed to be helpful with actually getting myself on to the train the next morning. In the morning though, things didn’t exactly go to plan when my host sister woke to say goodbye and I broke into tears before even getting in the car… And again at the train station… And again on the trains… But I guess being attached is all apart of having a fabulous host family and I would not change any of it for the world.
Once I was on the train and done crying, my next worry was my change in a city that I had never been in before; as it turned out though, I worried for nothing (surprise surprise) as most of the stations in Italy in comparison to England are tiny and so so easy to navigate. Because of this, I managed to get to Venice on time; just before 10.45 in the morning. Sam was due to join me around 10.45 after landing at 10.00 and his flight had no delays the airport told me (after I rang them because of the events later added to the fact I’m a major stress-head). Sam arrived 2 hours later, due to delays in his bus, however I spent those 2 hours crying like a fool in the street showing his picture to every poor soul that got off an airport bus within those 2 hours – like I said, I am a Class A stress-head. To be fair though, Sam had forgot to ring the phone company and enable his roaming so he had no data or signal when he landed and he also didn’t think to use the WiFi in the airport (as he didn’t realise about the data thing until he was on the bus) so I didn’t even know he was on his way and therefore being 2 hours late meant I hadn’t heard from him in nearly 7 hours so my stress was somewhat validated – I do however fully take responsibility and wholeheartedly apologise to every person at talk mobile to whom I cried, shouted, swore at or hung up on, I had had a very emotional 24 hours and, in that moment, because I’m a total stress-head I thought I would never see Sam again. **cue everyone taking a moments pause from reading to sigh at how utterly rediculous I sound and how awfully I jump to conclusions… It’s okay, I also think I’m a prat!**
So when Sam finally arrived, we spent the first half of the day, before travelling back to the hotel to drop off our bags, eating the leftovers I had brought from the night before and exploring the north side of the Venice island we were on.
The rest of the day, after getting rid of our very heavy bags and figuring out how we get to and from our hotel, we spent exploring the south and east side of the island. By ‘exploring’ I mean shopping, seeing and doing touristy stuff, and getting really REALLY lost. Top tip for anyone going to Venice for the first time: don’t use Google maps. It’ll confuse you, it’ll confuse itself, then you’ll lose signal and end up walking to multiple rivers with no way of getting across them. Also, Google maps include water taxis in Venice even when you click the ‘walking only’ route so it will send you to dead ends and expect you to pay like a hundred euros to get around. Basically, just follow the sketchy-looking signs that are mostly eroded or even spray-painted on the walls; they are 50,000 times more trustworthy than they look.
The next day, Sunday, we spent most of the time catching up on sleep, before getting drenched in a storm later on trying to find a Chinese restaurant in (surprise surprise) the south east side of the island.
Yesterday, Monday, was probably the busiest time of the trip, involving:
Getting up really early to check out, grab a little breakfast before catching our early train. We arrived around 9.30 in Verona and spent the whole day exploring. Highlights of Verona included a really, really nice cafe where we enjoyed great coffee and Spritz (for anyone who has never been to this part of Italy, spritz is a bright orange drink made of rhubarb and orange liqueur, prosecco and soda water, stay tuned for pictures of this beauty within a blog post on a later date); seeing the houses of Romeo and Juliet (tourist alert!); along with watching Sam have his first experience of a proper, Italian Tiramisu.
We left Verona about 4pm and arrived in Milan around 6.30 last night. Finding our air bnb was tricky, due to the fact talk mobiles connection has been on and off for the last 2 days and by the time we got to the red arrow on Google maps, it turned out the air bnb website had the wrong house matched to the link of the location on the listing. Anyhow, we arrived safe and sound before 7pm and even managed to get the energy to pop to Pams (a supermarket chain in Italy not like a woman called Pam) to do our shopping for our next few days in Milan, just to save us money; after all, we are students still!
Today, Sam and I have had an absolute blast exploring Milan in such beautiful weather. I have officially turned from paper white to a very pale beige, a tan I have to admit may seem rubbish to others, but really is an achievement I am proud of.
As I said earlier, I will put up some pictures of all the beautiful places I have visited since I came to Italy last month, however I did not bring my computer nor the lead to connect my camera to a computer, with me to Italy, so that post will have to come at a later date (maybe this Sunday after returning to Leeds???). As usual, I’d like to thank everyone who supports me or sends me wishes/love no matter where I am in the world. You mean so much to me and I know that you finish every single one of these updates I post on here, so thanks for staying awake to finish these as well.
Until next time folks… Cya soon!
-Alice xxxx