Sunday, June 3, 2012
Our day of food, and nothing else
Nicole
Danish, banana, apple, mini muffin, half mini croissant, mini pizza, Capresse pizza, coconut mango gelato, bacio and crema gelato, brownie, dark chocolate white chocolate cone, pesto pasta, three bread rolls, Dark chocolate and hazelnut gelato,
Riley
Sausage, potatoes, yogurt and granola, juice, half of a calzone, strawberry and coconut gelato, bacio and crema de grom gelato, carrot cake, dark chocolate and coffee gelato, spinach and cheese cannolis and 3 bread rolls, lemon, mango and strawberry gelato
Avery
Danish, banana, apple, mini muffin, half mini croissant, mini pizza, slice of margarita pizza, mango and strawberry gelato, crema de grom and statechella gelato, chocolate cookie, mint chocolate and almond gelato, pesto pasta and 3 bread rolls, raspberry, mango and lemon gelato
Kendall
Sausage, yogurt and granola, potatoes, cantalope, bacon, half of a ham and cheese calzone, pistachio and mango gelato, crema de grom and bacio gelato, bacio and pistachio gelato, turimisu cupcake, mint chocolate and sage raspberry gelato, egg pasta with bacon, turimisu, bacio milkshake, pistachio, coffee and dark chocolate gelato
Sent from my iPhone
When in Rome, do as the Romans do!
When in Rome! By Kendall
Well...Avery and I thought that last night was bad! We were sitting awake in our own sweat baking to death in our oven of a room! At 3 am, we finally decided that it wasn't worth it and that bug bites would be better than wiping our brows and staring at the ceiling so we opened a window and were able to get a couple hours of sleep before we got on the train to go to Rome! Our train pulled into Rome at 12:30 and we were going to start figuring out how to get to the hotel and how to meet up with the girls when suddenly I see a red hat bobbing behind an Asian lady...oh that's a cute girl! It was Nicole!! Tan faced and smiling! Reunited at last!! It felt like ages! The pesto girls were so tan and their hair was lighter and we loved looking at all of the pictures!
We made our way to the courtyard Marriott and set our stuff down. After a quick wardrobe change, Riley, Nicole, and I went to go see the Vatican while Avery (who has already seen it just last year) wasn't feeling so great so stayed at the hotel and got herself better. We made our way to the Vatican, stopping for pizza and then spotting a huge line for a gelato place! Our thought was that it must be famous so we got in line too! We talked to these super nice people who advised us on what flavors to get. I ended up getting coconut, strawberry, and pistachio! Riley and Nicole got strawberry, coconut, pineapple, and lemon! The place is called the old bridge gelateria and all the flavors are made with fresh fruit or pistachio or whatever the flavor might be!! It was really reasonably priced and HUGE and sooooo good!!! We were obsessed! I didn't even want to try the chocolate though because I know how good Grom's was! Anyways! We ate our gelato as we walked to the Vatican but it had closed just an hour earlier!!! We were so bummed, but of course we made the best of the situation and went and saw the colosseum instead and are going to see the Vatican tomorrow morning!
The colosseum was so cool! We reenacted what gladiators might have done and thought of what it would be like to witness thousands of people in there chanting men onto their deaths! It was so cool! After that, we walked around a lot and saw Rome and got some vibes for it! We even saw the Mouth of Truth that's in Roman Holiday and that was fun. It's just amazing that Rome is a city that is built around history and ancient ruins! It is amazing here! I love it!
We walked around doing what we do best: wandering around and soaking in the vibes. Then we made our merry way back to the hotel, watches a bit of the Little Rascals, and called it a night. We only have one full day left! It's nuts how time flies!
Well...Avery and I thought that last night was bad! We were sitting awake in our own sweat baking to death in our oven of a room! At 3 am, we finally decided that it wasn't worth it and that bug bites would be better than wiping our brows and staring at the ceiling so we opened a window and were able to get a couple hours of sleep before we got on the train to go to Rome! Our train pulled into Rome at 12:30 and we were going to start figuring out how to get to the hotel and how to meet up with the girls when suddenly I see a red hat bobbing behind an Asian lady...oh that's a cute girl! It was Nicole!! Tan faced and smiling! Reunited at last!! It felt like ages! The pesto girls were so tan and their hair was lighter and we loved looking at all of the pictures!
We made our way to the courtyard Marriott and set our stuff down. After a quick wardrobe change, Riley, Nicole, and I went to go see the Vatican while Avery (who has already seen it just last year) wasn't feeling so great so stayed at the hotel and got herself better. We made our way to the Vatican, stopping for pizza and then spotting a huge line for a gelato place! Our thought was that it must be famous so we got in line too! We talked to these super nice people who advised us on what flavors to get. I ended up getting coconut, strawberry, and pistachio! Riley and Nicole got strawberry, coconut, pineapple, and lemon! The place is called the old bridge gelateria and all the flavors are made with fresh fruit or pistachio or whatever the flavor might be!! It was really reasonably priced and HUGE and sooooo good!!! We were obsessed! I didn't even want to try the chocolate though because I know how good Grom's was! Anyways! We ate our gelato as we walked to the Vatican but it had closed just an hour earlier!!! We were so bummed, but of course we made the best of the situation and went and saw the colosseum instead and are going to see the Vatican tomorrow morning!
The colosseum was so cool! We reenacted what gladiators might have done and thought of what it would be like to witness thousands of people in there chanting men onto their deaths! It was so cool! After that, we walked around a lot and saw Rome and got some vibes for it! We even saw the Mouth of Truth that's in Roman Holiday and that was fun. It's just amazing that Rome is a city that is built around history and ancient ruins! It is amazing here! I love it!
We walked around doing what we do best: wandering around and soaking in the vibes. Then we made our merry way back to the hotel, watches a bit of the Little Rascals, and called it a night. We only have one full day left! It's nuts how time flies!
Friday, June 1, 2012
another day of checking things off the bucket list!
Blog for the first By Avery
Today's memories begun when the clock struck midnight. We were laying in our "hotel "beds, so ready for a good nights sleep, when we realized we were trying to go to sleep in a sauna. We had two options, melt or get attacked my Mosquitos. We chose to melt. We wore out long sleeve and long pants pajamas to help keep the insects off our bodies but curled under the sheet as merely a shield as well. We were actually perspiring under the sheet and long pajamas, like the kind of hot where the heat feels like its coming from the inside out. Our organs had to be over heated! We were breathing in hot, thick sips of "oxygen." we were hot and uncomfortable so we ended up reading our latest blog posts and having (what felt like) hours an hours of pillow talk. Then we looked at the clock and it had only been 7 minutes. Hades must feel like our room in hotel iris. Luckily after many attempts, we finally fell asleep.
When we woke up we packed and were heckled by the hotel worker to stay another night for a cheaper price then the other hotel we booked. We were confused and just agreed. So we kept our bags at the hotel iris and set foot to another perfect day!
Our first destination was murano! An island off Venice that is know for its glass blowing! We got off the water bus and walked right into a glass blowing show room. Some worker lady made us pay 5 euro to be in the production zone while others watched for free. It was so weird haha we were just standing there, in the work space, while many others stood behind us and watched...for free! Haha talk about rip off! But we laughed about it and felt some what special to get a VIP view of the glass blowing. It was really awesome to see the "master" himself blow and create these beautiful art pieces. The temperature was cookin! The furnace thingy they were sticking the glass in was a whopping 1200 degrees! Holy hades if you ask me! Not to mention the "master" glass man was smoking a cigarette while on the job. Nothing seemed worse then standing next to the that furnace while inhaling hot smoke into your lungs! And we thought we were gonna die last night at the hotel iris! Silly us! We think we got ripped off some more when we bought a glass frame and earring from the "master" himself but we don't really care, what we bought will always remind us of the rad glass blowing workshop that we were VIPs at! After we walked around the island, looking into shops. I ended up caving and purchasing the cutest watch ever! It's this bright red leather band with awesome little blow glass flowers around the face of the watch. I just had to buy it! It was so authentic! Right? Well I'll tell myself so!
Then we hopped back onto another water bus headed towards Burano. Another island off Venice famous for their lace making. We got off the bus thingy and begun exploring the town. On our little wander we stumbled upon the coolest little square of brightly colored homes! It was real and amazing and not a movie set! Bright colored houses lined the town and you know I live for the colors! I was just loving it! And before we found this place we purchased the most delicious ripe little basket of fresh strawberries from a market. So Kendall and I were nibbling on strawberries in a square of colorful houses full of beautiful flowers! It literally was heaven on earth! Fruit, colors and flowers! Ah! We went looking for the lace making factory cause all we were seeing were shops upon shops of lace items being sold. And I was wanting to see these Italian grandmothers in a sweat shop sewing away! (not really but sorta!) We found the lace museum and were soon blown out of your minds at the detail and precision lace making demands. Now I can fully appreciate Lady Gaga's billion dollar hand made black lace gown she wore at some stupid awards night! Then we grabbed a large full on margarita pizza to go (3 euros each! Heck ya!) and enjoyed it on a bench over looking the ocean (I think it was its considered an ocean? Maybe a sea?). The view was priceless and the pizza was practically priceless too! We wandered some more and headed back to the boat station, conversing in the best conversation as always! As we headed back to Venice, the exhausted settled in an we were in dyer need of a nap! So we some how found our way back to the hotel to crash in our sauna mosquito infested room.
After a quick rejuvenation nap we were off again on a quest to find the best Italian dinner...and to return to our favorite gelato place of course! We ate at this super modern suave restaurant. Kendall got her fav-lamb and polenta and I got some yummy chicken and potatoes! It was so good! We ate very slowly and european like, engaging in the best of conversation! Then off we were to Grom, the worlds best gelato place! We ordered our fav creams de grom and bacio! The cute italian man working at the gelato stand gave kenny a funny look when she ordered a large cone. He remember us from yeaterday! Yikes! We found a place by a canal to eat it and write in our journals. Soon after we were both wanting a second Grom gelato...whoops! Went back for round two! The cute Italian worker begun to laugh at us again, we thought he was laughing at us because we were coming back for more ice cream but later we realized maybe he thought we were coming back for him hahaha! We got our second cones of the day and found ourselves at some street party! There were people everywhere and a band playing and a large boat with tons of food ( a full on pig) and wine and fun Italians (creepy old men engaging in conversation with is)! It was a total blast! We were in the "local" part of town and just felt such a cool vibes of the culture on a Friday night in Venice. Then, the dessert queen wanted another cone, round 3 of the creama de grom but was too embarrassed to go back to the cute worker so I marched up there and ordered our third cone in literally an hour. When I came back to give it to Kendall she suddenly got some guts and decided this would be a perfect time to check "kiss a boy in Europe" off the bucket list! So after a few minutes of a solid pep talk, she marched up to that cute Italian gelato worker and kissed him right on the mouth! One thing led to another and before we knew it he was taking off this apron and walking out of the shop to go around the corner and kiss her some more! Some how "I have to go back to my hotel" was lost in translation as "let's go back to my hotel!" it was hilarious!! She quickly said "ciao!" and we were out of there! Laughing and squealing hysterically! I was so proud her! I will never forget that delicious creama de grom but most importantly I will never forget watching that hilarious moment in time! Kendall did it! Ah! That's my girl! I'm so proud! We had an adaquite jumped for joy time and were off to check our last thing off the bucket list...send a message in a bottle! So we chugged a water bottle and wrote letters to our future husbands. It was such a precious moment. Together we threw the bottle into the Venetian waters and pondered about our future husbands! What a memorable night we had! I'll never forget today and this moments that will always bring a smile to my face! We are now back at our sauna mosquito "hotel" and still can't stop dying of laughter! We love Venice! And creama de Grom! And each other! We meet up with the girlies tomorrow morning and we can not wait to swamp stores! HORRAY for kissing and messages in bottles!
Today's memories begun when the clock struck midnight. We were laying in our "hotel "beds, so ready for a good nights sleep, when we realized we were trying to go to sleep in a sauna. We had two options, melt or get attacked my Mosquitos. We chose to melt. We wore out long sleeve and long pants pajamas to help keep the insects off our bodies but curled under the sheet as merely a shield as well. We were actually perspiring under the sheet and long pajamas, like the kind of hot where the heat feels like its coming from the inside out. Our organs had to be over heated! We were breathing in hot, thick sips of "oxygen." we were hot and uncomfortable so we ended up reading our latest blog posts and having (what felt like) hours an hours of pillow talk. Then we looked at the clock and it had only been 7 minutes. Hades must feel like our room in hotel iris. Luckily after many attempts, we finally fell asleep.
When we woke up we packed and were heckled by the hotel worker to stay another night for a cheaper price then the other hotel we booked. We were confused and just agreed. So we kept our bags at the hotel iris and set foot to another perfect day!
Our first destination was murano! An island off Venice that is know for its glass blowing! We got off the water bus and walked right into a glass blowing show room. Some worker lady made us pay 5 euro to be in the production zone while others watched for free. It was so weird haha we were just standing there, in the work space, while many others stood behind us and watched...for free! Haha talk about rip off! But we laughed about it and felt some what special to get a VIP view of the glass blowing. It was really awesome to see the "master" himself blow and create these beautiful art pieces. The temperature was cookin! The furnace thingy they were sticking the glass in was a whopping 1200 degrees! Holy hades if you ask me! Not to mention the "master" glass man was smoking a cigarette while on the job. Nothing seemed worse then standing next to the that furnace while inhaling hot smoke into your lungs! And we thought we were gonna die last night at the hotel iris! Silly us! We think we got ripped off some more when we bought a glass frame and earring from the "master" himself but we don't really care, what we bought will always remind us of the rad glass blowing workshop that we were VIPs at! After we walked around the island, looking into shops. I ended up caving and purchasing the cutest watch ever! It's this bright red leather band with awesome little blow glass flowers around the face of the watch. I just had to buy it! It was so authentic! Right? Well I'll tell myself so!
Then we hopped back onto another water bus headed towards Burano. Another island off Venice famous for their lace making. We got off the bus thingy and begun exploring the town. On our little wander we stumbled upon the coolest little square of brightly colored homes! It was real and amazing and not a movie set! Bright colored houses lined the town and you know I live for the colors! I was just loving it! And before we found this place we purchased the most delicious ripe little basket of fresh strawberries from a market. So Kendall and I were nibbling on strawberries in a square of colorful houses full of beautiful flowers! It literally was heaven on earth! Fruit, colors and flowers! Ah! We went looking for the lace making factory cause all we were seeing were shops upon shops of lace items being sold. And I was wanting to see these Italian grandmothers in a sweat shop sewing away! (not really but sorta!) We found the lace museum and were soon blown out of your minds at the detail and precision lace making demands. Now I can fully appreciate Lady Gaga's billion dollar hand made black lace gown she wore at some stupid awards night! Then we grabbed a large full on margarita pizza to go (3 euros each! Heck ya!) and enjoyed it on a bench over looking the ocean (I think it was its considered an ocean? Maybe a sea?). The view was priceless and the pizza was practically priceless too! We wandered some more and headed back to the boat station, conversing in the best conversation as always! As we headed back to Venice, the exhausted settled in an we were in dyer need of a nap! So we some how found our way back to the hotel to crash in our sauna mosquito infested room.
After a quick rejuvenation nap we were off again on a quest to find the best Italian dinner...and to return to our favorite gelato place of course! We ate at this super modern suave restaurant. Kendall got her fav-lamb and polenta and I got some yummy chicken and potatoes! It was so good! We ate very slowly and european like, engaging in the best of conversation! Then off we were to Grom, the worlds best gelato place! We ordered our fav creams de grom and bacio! The cute italian man working at the gelato stand gave kenny a funny look when she ordered a large cone. He remember us from yeaterday! Yikes! We found a place by a canal to eat it and write in our journals. Soon after we were both wanting a second Grom gelato...whoops! Went back for round two! The cute Italian worker begun to laugh at us again, we thought he was laughing at us because we were coming back for more ice cream but later we realized maybe he thought we were coming back for him hahaha! We got our second cones of the day and found ourselves at some street party! There were people everywhere and a band playing and a large boat with tons of food ( a full on pig) and wine and fun Italians (creepy old men engaging in conversation with is)! It was a total blast! We were in the "local" part of town and just felt such a cool vibes of the culture on a Friday night in Venice. Then, the dessert queen wanted another cone, round 3 of the creama de grom but was too embarrassed to go back to the cute worker so I marched up there and ordered our third cone in literally an hour. When I came back to give it to Kendall she suddenly got some guts and decided this would be a perfect time to check "kiss a boy in Europe" off the bucket list! So after a few minutes of a solid pep talk, she marched up to that cute Italian gelato worker and kissed him right on the mouth! One thing led to another and before we knew it he was taking off this apron and walking out of the shop to go around the corner and kiss her some more! Some how "I have to go back to my hotel" was lost in translation as "let's go back to my hotel!" it was hilarious!! She quickly said "ciao!" and we were out of there! Laughing and squealing hysterically! I was so proud her! I will never forget that delicious creama de grom but most importantly I will never forget watching that hilarious moment in time! Kendall did it! Ah! That's my girl! I'm so proud! We had an adaquite jumped for joy time and were off to check our last thing off the bucket list...send a message in a bottle! So we chugged a water bottle and wrote letters to our future husbands. It was such a precious moment. Together we threw the bottle into the Venetian waters and pondered about our future husbands! What a memorable night we had! I'll never forget today and this moments that will always bring a smile to my face! We are now back at our sauna mosquito "hotel" and still can't stop dying of laughter! We love Venice! And creama de Grom! And each other! We meet up with the girlies tomorrow morning and we can not wait to swamp stores! HORRAY for kissing and messages in bottles!
Thursday, May 31, 2012
"We found [gelato] in a hopeless place" -Rihanna
"We found [gelato] in a hopeless place" -Rihanna... By Kendall
Well Avery and I separated ways with the pesto girls today! So sad, but we know they're going to have a great time and get tan in the beautiful Amalfi Coast! In the meantime, Avery and I left the hostel just a few minutes after the girls but as we were leaving, the guy at the front desk stopped us and told us that he put breakfast out early for us (because we had mentioned how we had an early train the night before). It was so nice and really thoughtful! So Avery and I enjoyed our complimentary breakfast of coco crispies and croissants and nutella and still made it to our train on time!
To Venice we went! Our train crossed over lots of water and we ended up in the sinking city! We had our backpacks on and were ready to get lost. Believe it or not, we actually found our hostel pretty quickly after leaving the train station! We wandered through little narrow streets and over canals and on bridges and through plazas...it really is so cool! I'm so glad we came here! It just looks like you're in a movie set every which way you turn! We set our stuff down in our rooms and then we set out on the town to get lost and hopefully stumble upon some cool things...let the wind blow us where it may! And boy did the wind blow straight and true...right into the most delicious pizza place ever! We actually each got 2 pieces there! It was so delicious! Thin crust, fresh cheese, good tomato sauce, and yummy meat and mushrooms on top! We nibbled on those as we crossed over the main bridge of the Grand Canal. It was really neat! Tons of boats and gondolas floating on by.
We continued our wanderings and found ourselves in San Marco's square. It was really awesome! But what wasn't so awesome was the gelato we got there! EW! Who would've thought that bad gelato could even be made in Venice, but we were proven wrong! I got a straight up MILKshake and Avery got caramel gelato that made her want to barf! We made a few guidelines after that of what had to be present in the gelateria for us to buy any: it has to be under the counter with silver tops covering it and can't have flavor indicators that are mass produced by Nestlé!
We wandered some more of course and passed many a churches and piazzas which were all quite lovely! We sat in the shade in front of Ponte dell' Umilta and rested our feet and sat by the canal. We passed Peggy Guggenheim's gallery and found a cool garden hidden behind brick walls! But the gate was locked... :/ we walked though lots of shops and little galleries and even passed one where everything was made out of wood! It was so cool! There were wood shirts and shorts and swimsuits and hats and umbrellas and even tablecloths! It all looked real, but it was actually made out of wood!
As we walked back to the hostel to take a quick nap before dinner, we found a gelato place called GROM in the San Barnaba square...it was heavenly!!! And the gelato was kept under the silver tops that I was talking about! Of course we had to get some! An boy were we glad!!! As we ate our gelato on the way back, we made sure to remember every step we took so we could return to that place!
After taking a nap and addressing some post cards, Avery and I were back on the town, out in our usual quest for good food! We found this place with red and white checkered table cloths and thought that it couldn't get much more Italian than that! So in honor of Nicole and Riley, we got pesto spaghetti, which was good! We took our time eating as the Europeans do and talked and laughed and people watched! It was wonderful! Afterwards, we traced our steps from a few hours earlier and went back to Grom! We were in heaven once again! It is 100% the best gelato we've had so far! Ahhh!! The crema di grom was amazing!! We walked around and wandered in the sunset lighting through the empty streets and bridges of Venice enjoying the gelato and one another's company. It was so much fun. We just had a relaxing journal and sketch session and it was just perfect! The wonderful day was wrapped up by a quick blog session in the lobby where we actually met some really awesome funny people that are staying in our hostel! I just love people. Something that I feel like I have formed an opinion about on this trip is this: everyone has good in them! It's just wether or not they choose to act on that that makes the difference. We have met such kind helpful people on this trip and I am constantly blown away a by how innately kind human beings can be. There have been some grouches and creepers here and there, but I really do feel like there is good in everyone! We are all connected in an effort to help and receive love and give love! I know this sounds cheesy, but I really do think that this effort that I'm talking about links us as humans and makes the world not just a big place after all!
Well Avery and I separated ways with the pesto girls today! So sad, but we know they're going to have a great time and get tan in the beautiful Amalfi Coast! In the meantime, Avery and I left the hostel just a few minutes after the girls but as we were leaving, the guy at the front desk stopped us and told us that he put breakfast out early for us (because we had mentioned how we had an early train the night before). It was so nice and really thoughtful! So Avery and I enjoyed our complimentary breakfast of coco crispies and croissants and nutella and still made it to our train on time!
To Venice we went! Our train crossed over lots of water and we ended up in the sinking city! We had our backpacks on and were ready to get lost. Believe it or not, we actually found our hostel pretty quickly after leaving the train station! We wandered through little narrow streets and over canals and on bridges and through plazas...it really is so cool! I'm so glad we came here! It just looks like you're in a movie set every which way you turn! We set our stuff down in our rooms and then we set out on the town to get lost and hopefully stumble upon some cool things...let the wind blow us where it may! And boy did the wind blow straight and true...right into the most delicious pizza place ever! We actually each got 2 pieces there! It was so delicious! Thin crust, fresh cheese, good tomato sauce, and yummy meat and mushrooms on top! We nibbled on those as we crossed over the main bridge of the Grand Canal. It was really neat! Tons of boats and gondolas floating on by.
We continued our wanderings and found ourselves in San Marco's square. It was really awesome! But what wasn't so awesome was the gelato we got there! EW! Who would've thought that bad gelato could even be made in Venice, but we were proven wrong! I got a straight up MILKshake and Avery got caramel gelato that made her want to barf! We made a few guidelines after that of what had to be present in the gelateria for us to buy any: it has to be under the counter with silver tops covering it and can't have flavor indicators that are mass produced by Nestlé!
We wandered some more of course and passed many a churches and piazzas which were all quite lovely! We sat in the shade in front of Ponte dell' Umilta and rested our feet and sat by the canal. We passed Peggy Guggenheim's gallery and found a cool garden hidden behind brick walls! But the gate was locked... :/ we walked though lots of shops and little galleries and even passed one where everything was made out of wood! It was so cool! There were wood shirts and shorts and swimsuits and hats and umbrellas and even tablecloths! It all looked real, but it was actually made out of wood!
As we walked back to the hostel to take a quick nap before dinner, we found a gelato place called GROM in the San Barnaba square...it was heavenly!!! And the gelato was kept under the silver tops that I was talking about! Of course we had to get some! An boy were we glad!!! As we ate our gelato on the way back, we made sure to remember every step we took so we could return to that place!
After taking a nap and addressing some post cards, Avery and I were back on the town, out in our usual quest for good food! We found this place with red and white checkered table cloths and thought that it couldn't get much more Italian than that! So in honor of Nicole and Riley, we got pesto spaghetti, which was good! We took our time eating as the Europeans do and talked and laughed and people watched! It was wonderful! Afterwards, we traced our steps from a few hours earlier and went back to Grom! We were in heaven once again! It is 100% the best gelato we've had so far! Ahhh!! The crema di grom was amazing!! We walked around and wandered in the sunset lighting through the empty streets and bridges of Venice enjoying the gelato and one another's company. It was so much fun. We just had a relaxing journal and sketch session and it was just perfect! The wonderful day was wrapped up by a quick blog session in the lobby where we actually met some really awesome funny people that are staying in our hostel! I just love people. Something that I feel like I have formed an opinion about on this trip is this: everyone has good in them! It's just wether or not they choose to act on that that makes the difference. We have met such kind helpful people on this trip and I am constantly blown away a by how innately kind human beings can be. There have been some grouches and creepers here and there, but I really do feel like there is good in everyone! We are all connected in an effort to help and receive love and give love! I know this sounds cheesy, but I really do think that this effort that I'm talking about links us as humans and makes the world not just a big place after all!
Under the Tuscan Sun
Blog for the 30th by Avery
Finally we were able to sleep in! All of us looked like zombies and needed some serious shut eye. We rolled out of bed around 9ish and feasted at the hotel's breakfast. Free rolls, yogurt, cereal, and chocolate has never tasted so good. The boss man of the hotel wasnt too thrilled four Americans were eating all his food...oh well!! After we ate, packed up and checked into the hotel colorado for tonights stay, we headed to the train station to go into Tuscany for the day. The timetable at the station said we had 30 minutes until the train left!
Perfect! We thought we could have enough time to run to our favorite panini place across town! Riley needed to go back to the leather market and Nicole, Kendall and I wanted those heavenly paninis. So we split up and made a meeting point in the station. Now we had 25 minutes! We took off literally sprinting, no time for even a jog! We were weaving in and out of people and construction areas, sprinting past the duomo and reaching the famous bridge we were on a mission for these sandwiches! We bust into the shop, cherry faced and actually dripping sweat from all parts of out bodies, and order our delectable pesto, tomato and motzerella panini. It seemed like the workers were ages to make our sandwiches! We had no other choice but to leave without Riley's sandwich, we really didn't have a second to spare. So we grab our sack sandwiches, shove them in our bags and take off, channeling our inner dash incredible! It was a ten minute all out sprint to the station! When we were leaving the shop we heard the bell tower ring noon...our train was leaving in 15 minutes and Riley would probably hate out guts if we missed the train so there was no stopping us! The Italian gravel, tourist crowds and sun beating down on us couldn't get in out way! We were in an all out sprint for a good 10 minutes to the station! We make it to the station, see Riley, she points to the platform we need to be at and we don't stop until we are sitting in our seats on the train! Once we make it, a flood of sweat come pouring out of us and our faces are so hot they almost exploded! We sprinted as fast as we could for 10 minutes there 10 minutes back and nearly missed our train...all for a sandwich! But a dang good sandwich that I will never forget. I wish you could have seen us, we looked like complete psychos. But all in all, we had those panini sandwiches and that's all that matters!
It took us the entire 2 hours train ride to regain a stable body temperature! You think I'm kidding haha anyways we arrived in siena and walked to the bus stop outside the station and just jumped onto the first bus with out a ticket or a clue where it would take us. Some lady told us which stop was the city center, and she ended up giving us the wrong stop but we didn't care because that stop lead us to our other favorite gelato place! They had gelato sandwiches! Ice cream sandwiches don't even compare to this masterpiece! We ate our treats and begun to wander around the city of Siena! Our favorite thing is getting "lost" in the cities we visit. It really allows you to get a feel for the beauty and culture of the place. We loved the steep streets and old architecture! Siena was so cool and so different from the other bustling cities we've visited. The vibes were a slower pace, calm and peaceful. After some wandering we made our way back to the gelato place, where we couldnt resist but to get another gelato sandwich! This trip actually revolves around food and it's hysterical! We sat outside the gelato shop and conversed in great conversation. You really get to know some one so well when you're with them 24/7 for over a month. We have all grown to love each other so much and can't wait to annoy our future families with stories upon stories of our expedition in Europe when we were young!
After that we jumped on a train headed to San gimianano-the true countryside of tuscany. We all crashed on the ride over there. Nicole snapped some of the most unflattering pictures of us totally passed out, head back, mouth open, and a double chin raging. After the train we had to jump onto a bus to take us out to San gimianano. The view was everything and more that we were longing to find! There were rolling green hills of vineyards and the sun was setting so the lighting was perfectly picturesque. We hiked up to this castle looking structure above the town and stood there in amazement, absolutely blown away by the breath taking views. And a photo shoot at the top goes with out saying!
We ate dinner at the top of the town at this authentic Italian restaurant. Nicole found her perfect basil and we were all so satisfied by our Tuscan dinner. We had to rush out of the restaurant and act like typical go go go Americans but we had to make our train back to Florence. Of course we missed the bus to take us to the station and missed the train, so we had no other choice but to sneak on a bus back to Florence. It totally worked and we were back in no time. And what did we do when we got back? Go to our favorite gelato place of course! Kendall was a champ! She was given the name dessert queen. Ordering a waffle with gelato and nutella, a tiramisu and a large cream puff, she blew us all away with her true talent for eating. "We're in Italy for less than a week, sue me, I'm gonna indulge," was an exact quote from miss dessert! That's my girl!
We headed back to our home for the night, hotel Colorado. At this point, my eyes are gonners from my alergies and I'm a blind puppy being led by Kendall and riley and nicole had discovered over 20 big bites each on them and are having an itch attack! We looked ridiculous but I guess you can't expect too much more from us.
We took quick showers to wash our bodies coated in sweat and dirt and Nicole covered herself in cortazone! Anticipating another early morning, we had our nightly scripture/prayer time and hit the hay! We had yet another glorious adventurous day and can't wait for our travels in the morning. Nicole and riley are off to the Amalfi Coast and Kendall and I will go to Venice for two nights and we will meet up in Rome! We are in love with Italy and are so excited we still have four more nights here! Ciao!
Sent from my iPhone
Finally we were able to sleep in! All of us looked like zombies and needed some serious shut eye. We rolled out of bed around 9ish and feasted at the hotel's breakfast. Free rolls, yogurt, cereal, and chocolate has never tasted so good. The boss man of the hotel wasnt too thrilled four Americans were eating all his food...oh well!! After we ate, packed up and checked into the hotel colorado for tonights stay, we headed to the train station to go into Tuscany for the day. The timetable at the station said we had 30 minutes until the train left!
Perfect! We thought we could have enough time to run to our favorite panini place across town! Riley needed to go back to the leather market and Nicole, Kendall and I wanted those heavenly paninis. So we split up and made a meeting point in the station. Now we had 25 minutes! We took off literally sprinting, no time for even a jog! We were weaving in and out of people and construction areas, sprinting past the duomo and reaching the famous bridge we were on a mission for these sandwiches! We bust into the shop, cherry faced and actually dripping sweat from all parts of out bodies, and order our delectable pesto, tomato and motzerella panini. It seemed like the workers were ages to make our sandwiches! We had no other choice but to leave without Riley's sandwich, we really didn't have a second to spare. So we grab our sack sandwiches, shove them in our bags and take off, channeling our inner dash incredible! It was a ten minute all out sprint to the station! When we were leaving the shop we heard the bell tower ring noon...our train was leaving in 15 minutes and Riley would probably hate out guts if we missed the train so there was no stopping us! The Italian gravel, tourist crowds and sun beating down on us couldn't get in out way! We were in an all out sprint for a good 10 minutes to the station! We make it to the station, see Riley, she points to the platform we need to be at and we don't stop until we are sitting in our seats on the train! Once we make it, a flood of sweat come pouring out of us and our faces are so hot they almost exploded! We sprinted as fast as we could for 10 minutes there 10 minutes back and nearly missed our train...all for a sandwich! But a dang good sandwich that I will never forget. I wish you could have seen us, we looked like complete psychos. But all in all, we had those panini sandwiches and that's all that matters!
It took us the entire 2 hours train ride to regain a stable body temperature! You think I'm kidding haha anyways we arrived in siena and walked to the bus stop outside the station and just jumped onto the first bus with out a ticket or a clue where it would take us. Some lady told us which stop was the city center, and she ended up giving us the wrong stop but we didn't care because that stop lead us to our other favorite gelato place! They had gelato sandwiches! Ice cream sandwiches don't even compare to this masterpiece! We ate our treats and begun to wander around the city of Siena! Our favorite thing is getting "lost" in the cities we visit. It really allows you to get a feel for the beauty and culture of the place. We loved the steep streets and old architecture! Siena was so cool and so different from the other bustling cities we've visited. The vibes were a slower pace, calm and peaceful. After some wandering we made our way back to the gelato place, where we couldnt resist but to get another gelato sandwich! This trip actually revolves around food and it's hysterical! We sat outside the gelato shop and conversed in great conversation. You really get to know some one so well when you're with them 24/7 for over a month. We have all grown to love each other so much and can't wait to annoy our future families with stories upon stories of our expedition in Europe when we were young!
After that we jumped on a train headed to San gimianano-the true countryside of tuscany. We all crashed on the ride over there. Nicole snapped some of the most unflattering pictures of us totally passed out, head back, mouth open, and a double chin raging. After the train we had to jump onto a bus to take us out to San gimianano. The view was everything and more that we were longing to find! There were rolling green hills of vineyards and the sun was setting so the lighting was perfectly picturesque. We hiked up to this castle looking structure above the town and stood there in amazement, absolutely blown away by the breath taking views. And a photo shoot at the top goes with out saying!
We ate dinner at the top of the town at this authentic Italian restaurant. Nicole found her perfect basil and we were all so satisfied by our Tuscan dinner. We had to rush out of the restaurant and act like typical go go go Americans but we had to make our train back to Florence. Of course we missed the bus to take us to the station and missed the train, so we had no other choice but to sneak on a bus back to Florence. It totally worked and we were back in no time. And what did we do when we got back? Go to our favorite gelato place of course! Kendall was a champ! She was given the name dessert queen. Ordering a waffle with gelato and nutella, a tiramisu and a large cream puff, she blew us all away with her true talent for eating. "We're in Italy for less than a week, sue me, I'm gonna indulge," was an exact quote from miss dessert! That's my girl!
We headed back to our home for the night, hotel Colorado. At this point, my eyes are gonners from my alergies and I'm a blind puppy being led by Kendall and riley and nicole had discovered over 20 big bites each on them and are having an itch attack! We looked ridiculous but I guess you can't expect too much more from us.
We took quick showers to wash our bodies coated in sweat and dirt and Nicole covered herself in cortazone! Anticipating another early morning, we had our nightly scripture/prayer time and hit the hay! We had yet another glorious adventurous day and can't wait for our travels in the morning. Nicole and riley are off to the Amalfi Coast and Kendall and I will go to Venice for two nights and we will meet up in Rome! We are in love with Italy and are so excited we still have four more nights here! Ciao!
Sent from my iPhone
Wednesday, May 30, 2012
Day 29: FIRENZE by Nicole
This morning, we woke up in BEAUTIFUL Riomaggiore about 20minutes before our train left. We are so excited for the rest of our trip, butat the same time, we did not want to leave our apartment and this town!Especially after the traumatizing events of two nights before, we felt likethis place was a getaway, a safe haven, and a home. It was absolutely magical.But, we didn’t have too much time to wallow, so we packed up as fast as wecould and sprinted, literally sprinted, to the train station. There we were,booking it through the tunnel, panting, backpacks slamming the backs of ourheads and sweat starting to break. And STILL, the Italian guys were makingkissy faces at us and saying “ciao, bella” to us. WHAT? The tivas and thegreasy hair must really get them here. We took a train to La Spezia and thenran, yet again, to the train to Florence. It was a local train, so there are noseat reservations. It is first come, first serve. We barely made it on thetrain and walked in to find hundreds of school children swarming everywhere.There was not a seat in the house! We squeezed by a bunch of the carts butended up standing in the middle of the isles with all of our stuff. Eventually,the other three girls got a seat, but I just plopped my bag down, willy-nillyand sat on that thing and wrote in my journal. It ended up being a hilarioustrain ride. Kendall looked up to see Riley sitting by this very portly Italianman, eating greasy bread with plain marinara sauce on it. She began to eye it,thinking, and I quote, “what in the world?” But apparently, he mistook thatglance as “me licking my chops with lost and wayward puppy eyes, dreaming ofhow good a delicious slice of pizza would taste.” Being the jolly, kind manthat he was, he extended the pizza over the Asian girl’s head and insisted thatshe take it, even though “I insisted that he keep it!” But finally, realizingwhat a nice gesture it was, “I took it, closed my eyes, and took a bite intothe bread and tomato sauce. It actually wasn’t half bad. I just had to gratifyhim by eating the pizza, followed a smile and thumbs up.” This is just a sillystory to explain how kind everyone is here! We seriously have been so touchedby the fact that besides a few (who happened to be extremely rude or scary),everyone here is so loving and genuinely kind-hearted. There is just such anamazing air to the people here.
When we got to Florence, we were actually stranded with ourbackpacks. A couple days before, when we had WiFi, we found a hotel, right indowntown Florence, for just 4 Euro a night! It was too good to be true! Webooked it, and…it was too good to be true. They emailed us the next day, sayingthey made a mistake and that the room is actually 70 Euro/person/night. Whoops.Well, considering our lack of WiFi for the next couple of nights, we decided tocross that bridge when it came. Whoops again. It came. And here we were, inFlorence, with nowhere to go. We decided to take a gamble and walk to the Hotelafter all and at least use their phone to book another hostel. When we gotthere, we explained the situation, and they ended up letting us stay here foronly 20 euro each! What a miracle! We dropped our bags off, booked a differenthostel for tomorrow night, and went on our merry way to romp around Florence.
First things first: food. We had heard of this Panini shopthat was organic and fresh, and supposedly, amazing. We walked through Florencein awe at the architecture, and of course, the vibes. We were already in love.Little did we know what was in store for us. I am literally salivating justthinking about it. THAT SANDWICH! We found the place, ‘Ino. It was just alittle tiny shop and all of the items on the menu were in Italian. The man atthe cashier was so welcoming and nice, you would never guess that he was anaward winning, New York Times-honored chef! There were awards and articles allover the walls. Unable to read anything on the menu, besides Pesto (buthonestly, that is the only thing I need to know), we asked him what he wouldrecommend. Avery, Riley, and I got the daily special. Kendall asked him tochoose something for her with ham. We watched them slice the fresh cheese andtomatoes and LATHER on the pesto, and I honestly cried when I got that Paniniin my hands. We were overwhelmed. It was the best, most savory sandwich I haveever had. In fact, it was the best thing I have ever tasted. I cannot evendescribe the joy I felt as I ate that sandwich on the bridge by the river. RealTears.
We sat by the river for a long while, before continuing toexplore the city. We were all in awe as we admired the statues in the plaza andthe Duomo and all of the architecture and history that fills the city. I couldhave looked at those statues all day. Eventually, we decided it was time forsome gelato. We walked to another place that Kendall read about. I got thecoconut almond flavor and the dark chocolate hazelnut. It was, yet again, mouth-watering.After continuing to explore, the other girls got more gelato (probably a good20 minutes later). Then, we walked to the leather market, where we boughtjournals and whatnot. Kendall also got a great bag and Riley bought thegreatest red leather backpack that was ever made. After the market, and lotsand lots of walking around, we went back to the river to relax for the besttime of day (about an hour before sunset, when everything glows). It wasbeautiful. I walked like an Egyptian on the bridge (in honor of Zoe Hart) andwe laughed as we tried to wave at the row team. After the sun began to set, wewalked to a restaurant overlooking the square and got some more food. Kendalland I kept trying to imitate the short, evil chef from Ratatouille… “LINGUINI!!!!!!” It is still stuck in my head, Ican’t stop saying it. I got ravioli with creamy nut sauce…it was delicious!Then we went back to the first gelato place and got more! Don’t judge us! Gobig or go home. We’ve got on more week to live like this. We’ll all behospitalized by the time we get to Dusseldorf. Then we got lost on our wayhome, but got some more good walking in, so that’s always a plus! Bottom line:Italy is good to us. We love it here. Pesto is the best thing that has happenedto me...The end.
the 28th. Cinque Terre. the most perfect day!
Today was a perfect day! We woke up in our apartment and opened the windowsand swung open the green shutters to the coastal Italian air. We grabbedpeaches, bananas and nectarines on our way to the path that links the 5cities together. We walked along the ocean following the path, enjoying thewarm sun and the ocean breeze as we went. We walked through Manarola andcontinued on the path to the next city, but the path had been ruined because ofthe huge storm that really affected Cinque Terre last October. So we had totake a short 2 minute train to the next city (Corniglia) to continue the hikefrom there. We walked up a thousand stairs and walked through the town where weheard little Italian kids singing in their elementary school for a performancefor their parents! It was precious!
We found the trail that would take us to Vernazza (the fourth city) andwalked about 50 feet when we saw some cement maker blocking the path! Butinstead of turn around, we decided that we thought we'd be fine if we just wentaround it and stepped over some construction tools and kept trekking. This partof the path was all through the hills that reminded us of Hawaii and Peru! Itwas so pretty! It was so nice to hike also! It wasn't an impossible hike orsuper super hard, but it got our heart and lungs working and it felt nice toget some exercise and to sweat (as gross as that might seem). By the time wemade it to Vernazza we were really hungry! Vernazza seemed like it was hit thehardest by the storm. There was construction and repair work all through thelittle town, but we were glad that we stopped there to eat because our moneycould be going in the town that needed income from tourists the most. We ateoutside this restaurant by the town's cove, and it was very tasty! Riley andNicole got pesto pasta of course and I got penne pasta with tomato sauce and itwas delicious! Avery got a delicious margarita pizza!!
By the time we were done with lunch, it had started to rain. I guess we werelucky though because it was supposed to rain all day...and the rain wasn't coldat all. So we started our hike to the last of the cities of Cinque Terre calledMonterosso. We began walking on the path and it was completely packed withtourists. It felt like we were in line to something at Disneyland. Even thoughon the way to Vernazza we had to walk over some repair work areas, we were doglad that we took the closed path because we were pretty much the only oneswalking on it and had the whole path to ourselves! This one was a bitdifferent, but half way though the hike we got ahead of a lot of people and hadit to ourselves for a little bit. When we emerged from the rainforest-like pathand made our way through some buildings and around a corner, we saw thegorgeous ocean shimmering in the sun! We could hardly wait to jump in it! Weran down to the pebbly beach (briefly encountering an LDS couple eating lunchthere) and jumped into the water! It was initially pretty chilly, but as soonas we got used to it, it was warm as can be! We started swimming out for arelaxing star floating session in the water when what do I see floating besideme?! A jellyfish!! We frantically swam closer to the shore in fear of a colonyof them! I just kept picturing Makena Madsen's jellyfish stings that she gotwhile she was traveling and picturing myself with some crazy rash where it hurtto much to carry my backpack!! But once we got back close to the shore, werealized that we were being silly and although we'd look out for jelly fish,that would not ruin our Italian ocean experience! So we kept swimming aroundand climbed over some rocks to put out things in a safe hidden place while weswam. Nicole and I climbed over some more rocks and found a ledge to jump offof into the water! It was so fun! It was a little smaller than the bungee jumpwe did a couple of days ago but was so perfect for our Cinque Terre beachparadise day. Being here relaxing by the ocean, laying on rocks like lizards,soaking in the sun was pure heaven! It almost felt like a vacation from ourvacation...like a blissful break of our hobo backpacking lives (which is alsoblissful in its own way...but not exactly relaxing sometimes haha).
We finished off our Monterossa couple hours by grabbing some gelato! It wasso good that we got some more as we walked to the train station haha Sue us!We're in Italy! The land of gelato! We took the train back to Riomaggiore anddropped our stuff off at the apartment and then set off to find boats to rentto take out for sunset, but there was no one at the stand! So even though thatwould've been the cherry on top of the most perfect day, we still sat of therocks by the ocean watching the sun fall behind the watery horizon. Nicole eventook a dip in the water!
By the time the sun was gone, we were getting hungry, so we went to the samerestaurant that Avery and I went to last night. The pesto girls obviously gotpasta with pesto on it, avery got caprese salad and I got seafood spaghetti. Wefinished off desert with the same delicious homemade tiramisu we had last nightand it was divine!!!
We went to bed for the the last night in our apartment after we tookshowers, read scriptures, said a group prayer, and even listened to a generalconference talk. We figure that we need as much help, protection, and guidancethat we can get on this trip!
It is so weird that we have been traveling for almost a month now! We onlyhave 7 nights left! It is just so bizarre! Sometimes it feel like we were inEngland a year ago but at the same time, it feels like yesterday that I waspacking for this trip! We have been doing so much every single day that it'salmost the same as college where so much happens in a week that one week feelslike a month, but because everything is so fast paced, one month feels like acouple of days...if that makes any sense at all.. Haha I am so grateful that wejust decided to backpack through Europe like we each have always wanted anddidn't procrastinate it! We knew that it'd be expensive, but when is travelingthrough Europe not expensive? Life is only going to get busier! So if you arereading this and are thinking that this would be fun and that you want to do itsomeday, try to just do it! No time is going to be completely convenient. Wemade time and saves money and took breaks from babysitting jobs and school andmissed weddings and birthdays, but it was so worth it. I wouldn't trade theexperiences we've had or lessons we've learned for anything! I hope that I canremember these lessons and and live by them when I get home!!!
Sunday the 27th. To Italy we go!
This is Riley. Sunday was quite theadventure, to say the least, but that's the way we like it. At this pointwe all have agreed that we are true backpackers. After sleeping on Toby'sbalcony, we felt like we could conquer anything. So we started off brightand early and caught the first train out of interlaken, Nicole and I wereheaded for Venice and the other Kendall and Avery were going straight to cinqueterra, because at the end of the week we are splitting up! So we rodewith the girls to Milan and then we split up. We had about anotherthree hours until we arrived. But Nicole and I had a heart to heart sothat passed the time quite nicely. When we arrived in Venice we had threehours until our train left to go meet the girls in cinque terra. So asadvised by a fellow traveler, we took a water taxi from the train stationaround to saint Marco square. This is the most famous square with thehuge church in it and all the tourists. Honestly it kinda felt likeDisneyland. We got some pizza and ate it by the famous bridge and watchedthe little men in boats rowing around. But that didn't last long becauseof the masses of people, it was crazy. So then we wandered some more, butin the direction of the train station. Before we knew it we were back atthe train station and an hour early, idiots. But then we laid by thecanal, soaked up the sun and the vibes of the city. We were both gladthat we saw Venice, but I am also glad we weren't there for days and days. So then we started our journey to cinque terra. We had the trainsfigured out, besides the last one which was a super local train and we weregoing to have to look at the times once we were closer. Everything workedout pretty well, we ended up having to wait an hour for the last train to ourcity. We learned that we probably should not travel so late at nightseeing as there were a couple scares. We encountered a few creepy guys,got stuck on the train, and had to have two girls from Japan help is to getback to the city we were staying at! We were very excited to say theleast when we finally met up with Avery and Kendall! All in all wedecided that we aren't traveling at night any more and we know that ourHeavenly Father is always watching out for us.
Kendall and Avery’s day:
After we split up, Kendall and I bothdecided we were was to exhausted to romp around Milan with our backpacks on. Wehad about and hour and a half before our train to la Spezia left so we ended upjust sitting in the station having a heart to heart are the ground. We sat downin one location and this scary bearded man moved from his seat right next tous. He was actually a foot away from Kendall and was just staring at us. So weloudly said "let's go get some gelato" and got out of there fast! Sowe found a spot in the corner on the ground and had a great conversation. Ilove Kenny so much! Anyways, after a little while of chatting and repacking andorganizing my bag, a police officer asked us to get off the floor and we tookit as our cue to get some gelato! It was SO good! Italian gelato in Milan wassuch a treat! Then it was time to get on our train. We found ourselves sittingnext to the sweetest old Italian lady who didn't speak English but wegrew friends right away. The language barrier was unfortunate but we figured outhow to communicate. She taught us some Italian and would tell us words and wewere to repeat what she said. When we got up, she watched our stuff and whenshe got up, we watched her stuff. Our first experience with an Italian was sopleasant! We arrived in la Spezia and needed to get on a train to get to cinqueterre. At the information desk we were told that train was going to leave in 2minutes! Ah! We sprinted to the platform and in a nick of time we jumped on andwere on our way to Riomaggiore! The train ride was all along the coast and itwas such a sight! When we got off we were amazing by the beautiful ocean view,the colorful narrow streets and of course the fruit outside the market! Thedirections to the apartment we booked to rented out for two night was given tous in picture form. We Kendall and I were walking aimlessly trying to find thearch to get to the apartment! There were arches everywhere! A kind Italianwoman at a bar pointed us in the right directions and we found it! From upabove we heard a sweet voice yell "Kendall!" and there ourhostess, Martina, was up there stinging up laundry to dry! She buzzed us in andshowed us the way to our apartment. The small of the place oddly reminded meexactly of the smell of my families time share place in Mexico, it was sobizarre! We walked in and were completely shocked about how much we LOVED it!It was the cutest apartment ever! We felt right at home! The orange kitchen,cute bed spread and the towels perfectly laid out for the, made us actuallyfeel like this was our apartment! We jumped for joy and laughter and Kendallalmost cried we were so thrilled at the place we randomly booked. We truly feltlike Heavenly Father helped us find this perfect place because he knew weneeded a comfortable safe place to rest for these two days and especially asafe haven for nicole and riley to come home to after the night they had. Storyto come! Anyways, we whipped on our suites and headed to the beach! We exploredthe city and got some extremely average gelato and made our way to theextremely rocky beach. The beach was a beach but the sand was definitely notthe sand we have at home. We laud on the huge heavy boulders and chatted andhad journal time. The serenity was glorious and we were so so happy. Until allthe serenity was demolished by a group of obnoxious, drunk Americans. All theItalians on the beach just stared in disgust and I was embarrassed for them!They were breaking their wine and beer bottles on the rocks, jumping in thewater fully dressed, And just making the biggest ruckus of all time... This iswhy Americans have such a bad name!! Everyone around them were moving orleaving (including us!!).
After that, we searched for a place to eat and found one almost right on theocean an got pesto pasta and pumpkin ravioli! Yum! We also shared a tiramisu!So delicious! We went back to our apartment and to straighten it up for thegirls. We seriously loved that apartment so much! We took a nap and anxiouslyawaited the arrival of our other halves! Our alarm clocks went off an it wastime to head to the train station! We were so excited for them to come!!...andwhen the train they were supposed to be on came and left we began to panic.Frantically trying to find wifi, and then getting yelled at by the bar trenderwhen we asked him for a code, we were so confused to where they would be. Afterover an hour of prayers and trying to think positive, there they were!! Thereback packs and all! We ran to reach other, screaming and nearly crying withjoy! They were safe and with us again! It was quite a traumatic night. Nicoleand Riley experienced something potentially terrible but we're in tune withspirit and could be guided to safety... I'm so thankful for our Heavenly Father'shand in our life on this trip. I'm grateful for the Holy Ghost and thepromptings we feel all day long. Thank you for your prayers, we feel the powerof prayer daily! We are safe and happier then ever! Until next time!
After that, we searched for a place to eat and found one almost right on theocean an got pesto pasta and pumpkin ravioli! Yum! We also shared a tiramisu!So delicious! We went back to our apartment and to straighten it up for thegirls. We seriously loved that apartment so much! We took a nap and anxiouslyawaited the arrival of our other halves! Our alarm clocks went off an it wastime to head to the train station! We were so excited for them to come!!...andwhen the train they were supposed to be on came and left we began to panic.Frantically trying to find wifi, and then getting yelled at by the bar trenderwhen we asked him for a code, we were so confused to where they would be. Afterover an hour of prayers and trying to think positive, there they were!! Thereback packs and all! We ran to reach other, screaming and nearly crying withjoy! They were safe and with us again! It was quite a traumatic night. Nicoleand Riley experienced something potentially terrible but we're in tune withspirit and could be guided to safety... I'm so thankful for our Heavenly Father'shand in our life on this trip. I'm grateful for the Holy Ghost and thepromptings we feel all day long. Thank you for your prayers, we feel the powerof prayer daily! We are safe and happier then ever! Until next time!
May 26th...the homeless princesses. WORTH READING!..by avery
All of today could honestly be made into a Hollywood blockbuster. Okay maybe not entirely, but for the four of us, today could be our most favorite day of the trip.
We woke up in our "tent" with what felt like baby spiders in our throats and ants in our eye boogies. That tent village was quite an experience to say the least! We ran into a problem early in the day; what were we suppose to do with ourselves/our backpacks all day and night. All the hostels in interlaken were booked! Like honestly a true "no room in the inn" experience where we figured we might be sleeping in a park that night. Our train to Italy in the morning left at 6am and paying for a spendy hotel (our only sane option) was not in our budgets. We took everything one step at a time, and once again, "we'll cross that bridge when we get to it" mentality worked out perfectly.
We knew we wanted to do this hike/walk along a river that lets out to a beautiful lake but we sure as heck did not want to lug our backpacks the whole 4 hour hike. I was positive I could convince the bungee jumping man, henna, to keep our bags in the office for the day. Sure enough, he kindly obliged...after he called us "princesses." We didnt know whether or not to be offended or flattered that he is comfortable with us? Either way, our bags were stored away and off we went...to the grocery store for the second time today! We all got fruit, big bags of granola and Swiss ice cream to take and eat at the lake!
Off we were on our walk! This time together was really special. We find that the times we grow together the most are on our long walks. It forces great conversation and there is just something about being in the beautiful nature that makes a great time. We talked about what we've learned from each other and about our future (careers, husbands, families, the usual!). The walk along the river was so beautiful but when we made it to the lake it was truly spectacular. The kind of views you see in movies or national geographic and don't believe places like that really exist. Well, I'm here to tell you they do. In interlaken, Switzerland, they do exist. We sat on a dock and ate our big bags of granola and chatted some more and wrote post cards and had journal time. We all felt so at peace with nature and each other and ourselves...how cheesy and pathetic that sounds, that's the best way I can word the feeling we all felt.
After the glorious hike, we made our third stop at the grocery store for dinner food to take with us for later. Here we got more fruit and more granola and more ice cream. Not kidding. We walk back to the bungee jumping office to retrieve our bags and ask Henna what field/park near the train station would be the safest. Secretly hoping he or his associates could offer us a couch or floor to crash on. Now he is calling us homeless princesses. Great! So we thought he must hate us and would never want to house us for the night. He never offered, but he did say that some of the guys who were taking us bungee jumping later could possibly give us a place to say.
Toby, a hairy man in his late 30s from Arizona, came and picked us up in the "Alpine Raft" bus. We now have out huge backpacks with us and when we pulls up and says something along the lines of "what the Fword are you doing with those?!" yes! Perfect Segway to ask for a place to stay. But before we even had to ask, he assured us we would have someone to stay between the bungee worker guys and that he wouldn't let us, the four homeless princesses, sleep in grass next to the station. And before we knew it we were on our way up to Stockhorn to take the biggest leap of faith!
With all the craziness trying to figure out living arrangements out, our brains were distracted what we were about to do. We were gonna strap a chord to our feet and spring off a platform on a gondola, 450ft in the air!! Emotions were flying! First psyched, then scared out of our minds, then butterflies galore, then a realization that we would be plummeting head first down to a frozen lake and so on. Everything emotion you can think of, what felt. Prayers were a constant! Especially after we found out we were the first jump of the 2012 season and that we would be the first girls to go! We signed our lives away, suited up, and headed up in the gondola to jump! Unfortunately Riley had to go in the second gondola to go up. But it worked out cause we were able to video each other on Nicole's camera from the bottom! Kendall, Nicole, and I said a prayer at the top and gave each other a pep talk. This pep talk is one I'll never forget! The overall outcome was to channel Pocahontas when she leaps off so gracefully off the cliff. We all share the same dream of doing exactly that in the after life but for now, this was as close as we were gonna get! So Pocahontas it was who eased all our fears! Kendall was first! The entire gondola yelled 5...4...3..2...1!!!! And there Kenny went, In the most perfect form! Her arms were spread, legs so long and her back was arched just as Pocahontas! All the workers raved about how beautiful her jump was! And beautiful it was! Then I was next! I've sky dived twice but this was an entirely different thing. Before I could even think, the gondola was counting down and BAM! I'm soaring through the Swiss air! You're in a complete free fall, not feeling a pull of resistance from the bungee for a good 6 seconds. Which doesn't seem like that much but in those 6 seconds you feel a sense of liberation indescribable. I was lowered into the boat at the bottom and Kendall was there to greet me! We screamed and laughed and looked up to see Nicole jump. When she jumped she had a beautiful dismount then quickly went into her hilarious flail and repeatedly opened up then closed then opened and closed while screaming a terrified scream. It was awesome to watch from below! We rowed back to the shore to let us off and we were on top of the world! What we just did was the most invigorating feeling! We screamed some more and quick ran back to the main place to meet up with Riley! Ah! It was so cool! I wish I could describe it better but you'll just have to experience it for yourself! We had our freak out reunion with Riley, telling her all about our pocohantas theory and she was so ready! Riley suited up and headed up. The first man jumped and we were expecting Riley to go next. Except the bungee was not being brought back up...it was just hanging there and we knew something was wrong. Minutes and minutes passed and the chord was still hanging and no jumpers had have gone. My allergies were raging so I stayed in doors, but Nicole and Kendall were right outside waiting for Riley. After a good 20 minutes of nothing happening, the girls said a prayer that whatever is happening up there will be fixed and Riley will be able to jump. Immediately when they said amen, the bungee began to raise up and the machine was fixed! Heavenly Father answering our prayers yet again!! It truly is incredible. Riley was up and she jumped off and screamed a screamed that won her best scream ever heard!! She was so funny! The entire country knew when Riley Jane made the biggest leap of her life! We all ran down to greet here at the bottom. We jumped for joy and screamed some more and had a total freak out! We were seriously so happy!! Bungee jumping was the highlight of our trip for sure!! Here are all the girls personal experience bungee jumping:
Kendall- I love bungee jumping!!! It was the most fun thing in the whole entire world!! But I'll start from the beginning. Ever since we booked the bungee jumping, I had tried to not think about it. I didn't want to freak myself out and get second thoughts. All I knew is that I was going to do it! I wasn't going to think about what it would be like or what would happen if something went wrong...i didn't want to not want to do it...if that makes sense. so when we got in the gondola to head up to the place where we were going to jump...I was still sort of in that mode. We were planning on Avery going first, Nicole going second, and me going third. But as soon as we solidified that, Toby (one of the guys) grabbed my arm and strapped me up!!! I was going to go first! First of the entire season! First of the year! As we dangled 450 feet above a lake, Toby opened the door of the gondola...it was beautiful but I could not look down or I wouldn't have the guts to go! So I just stared out into the sun shining on the beautiful mountains! I grabbed into the sides of the gondola, hooked up and ready to go. The whole gondola started counting down. "5, 4, 3..." I knew if I didn't go when they said one I'd psych myself out and I'd look like an absolute idiot! "...2, 1!!" I launched myself out of the thing and when my mind caught up with my body, I had a few split seconds of freak out and hyperventilating but a few instants later realized that I was flying! It felt almost peaceful and freeing with the wind blowing on my face as I did a Pocahontas dive towards the beautiful blue shimmering lake! I was in the most beautiful place in the world! All of these peaceful thoughts were very quickly interrupted with the jolt and pulls and tugs of the bungee cord! The things around my ankles kinda hurt my bare feet, but it was fine! I kept boing-ing for a while after the initial one and it was so fun!!! Then they pulled me into a little row boat and I watched Avery and Nicole jump!! It was amazing!!
Nicole-so bungee jumping was number one on my list. I was going to find a way to jump no matter what, so by the time the day came when I actually got to go, I wasn't even afraid at all, I just couldn't wait! In the gondola on the way up, naturally I started getting a little nervous about the fact that I was actually going to make my body fling out of this thing without standing there for ages and causing a scene. I started dancing in the gondola to get rid o my nerves, but still thought I might pee my pants. Then I decided to not think of it as falling, but to imagine myself as Pocahontas swan diving into the Swiss alps. A dream come true! I shared this thought with the other girls and we all pumped eachother up. All the workers were calling us the Pocahontas girls the whole day, which of course we loved. Kendall and Avery jumped so gracefully, that I wasn't even afraid as I stood on the ledge. I didn't look down, and as the gondola counted down, I dove out into the open like a bird. A couple seconds into it, my body realized it was falling through the air and I went from a graceful swan to a flopping, flailing spaz, screaming and laughing. And then back to a swan, and then a hysterical laughing spaz again. It was the craziest, best feeling in the entire world. Completely unreal. I think I might become an adrenaline junkie. Maybe I'll move to Switzerland and work for alpin raft? They said they need a new receptionist. Yep. I think that's what I'll do. See you never, America! For Switzerland!
We were on a high as we rowed into shore and walked back up I the lodge slash look out point an started raving to Riley about how muH we Lovved it!!! Then we snacked for the next 2 hours on granola and apples that we bought at the grocery store earlier.
We talked to the photo lady and got a little bit of a deal on the pictures. We found out later when we looked at them on the computer that only 5 of them were cool of us and the others were unfocused or taken 10 years earlier of the scenery... Talk about rip off! But they forced us to buy them. While Avery and I negotiated that, Riley made her way up in the gondola! The first guy went and then from the lookout point we could see that the bungee jump cord was not being reeled up. We waited probably 20 minutes and the sun was starting to set! So Kendall and Nicole said a prayer and the second thy said "amen", the rope generator started working again and we could see the rope being reeled up!! After one more guy jumped, it was Riley's turn!!! Here's her take:
Riley-Bungee jumping was by far the craziest/scariest/most exhilarating thing I have ever done in my whole life, and quite possibly will ever do. So I'm pretty sure I was the most scared of us three girls, so naturally once we got up to the gondola they separated is into two groups and I was all by myself! My group was second and a couple of these German au pairs who we were talking to in the van on the way up were with me so we were watching the other girls go. I was feeling so sick to my stomach, I actually didn't think I was going to be able to do it. So when the other three girls came running back up I was freaking out more than ever, they we all talking so fast saying it was the most amazing thing ever and thy kept saying 1. DO NOT LOOK DOWN and 2. JUST PRETEND THAT YOU ARE POCAHAUNTUS AND IT IS NOT SCARY, in fact it is liberating. So naturally I'm freaking out even more and start singing all of the pocahauntus songs in my head. So there I go up with eight strangers, the hippie photographer, and the two jump masters and I am scared out of my mind. So we get up there, the first guy jumps, and then we hear a huge chuehdhx shahid bang bang bang from the top of the gondola...uhhh...that's not good? The generator that pulls the rope back up stopped working. So now my mind is racing figuring out just how mad I would be if I got myself all the way up here and couldn't jump, while simultaneously freaking out more than ever. Then within an instant I decided that I should just forgert about every thought going on in my head and just start signing the pocahauntus songs, but this time OUT LOUD, HIIIIIII. The German girls who were with me had heard what Nicole was saying about pocahauntus so they got it and they started encouraging me and massaging my shoulders. When I think about that five minutes of my life I do not believe they actually happened, it was one of the most hysterical moments of my life. Meanwhile unbenonced to me Nicole and Kendall were saying a prayer for me that the problem would be fixed and everything would be safe for me, within the instant they said amen the rope started going up. Amazing. However then I realized that it was real now and I was going to jump out of that gondola and boing all around that lake or die trying. One other guy went before me, and then as I'm literally shaking the jump master has to tell me four times that in order to get to the door I have to go under the rope as opposed to walking straight through it, what a moron. And then there I was, standing on the edge, holding onto the sides, they count down from five, and then ladies and gentlemen, I jumped. It was not as..err...graceful as some, the arms were good but my feet were a little Off. But it still worked I boinged and boinged all over the place all the while screaming my brains off and once I was just dangling there I started to laugh, and laugh and laugh and laugh. They lower you into a little row boat, so it was me two bungee jump guys, and the guy who went before me, just hanging out in the boat and I cannot stop laughing and shaking and I just kept saying "I cannot believe I did, that. Who am I?!" Luckily they all though I was hilarious, but I pretty much just felt like a bafoon. One of the guys even said I was the loudest screamer he has ever heard in his ten years of being a jump master, hiiiii. It was a total adrenalin rush, and I loved it. I'm not so sure of I'd do it again, but I am definitely glad that I did it!!!
Once she came back to the lodge slash lookout, the piled us in the gondola and took us back down I the vans. One of the guys stuck his heads in and asked where we were being dropped off...so we told our little sob story once again. He offered us Toby's house as a joke, but Toby overheard and said that that would be fine and that he takes in couch surfers all the time! So we accepted the offer thinking that it would be better than the floor outside of the train station.
We were taken back to the reception area to get our bags and were told that our pictures would be ready in an hour or so and then Toby rushed us back in the car to drop us off at his apartment. What the rush was, I dont know...but anyways... We pull up to this place next door to a Thai restaurant where the door o the apartment complex is unlocked and we walk up stairs to his apartment that has the door wide open and has all sorts of stickers (one saying "bulls**t") on it! There's a bad in the open area next to the kitchen and he says 2 of you can sleep here and then walks outside onto the patio (which I'm pretty sure was the roof of a different building) and gets a dirty mat from out of a corner and says "and 2 of you get to sleep under the stars". Then he quickly changed in his room and left (not in the creepy way im describing...he was probably just in a rush to see his pals...he even invited us To join him if we wanted). After he left we died laughing! In the gross bathroom that was in the hallway technically outside the apartment next to a MOUNTAIN of empty beer cans, there was a poster of two girls in bikinis holding paintball guns! And on the wall, the only decoration besides some notebook paper that had spray painted letters spelling "Happy B-day" was a single thing wrapped in plastic that was a fur "willy warmer"!!! Hhaaha
We decided to get the heck outta there and went and found wifi at that gross joint Goergie's...which we still felt bad for the owner and even worse that we were stealing his wifi without even buying anything. So there we sat by the dumpster outside his place with the cats...literally.
Well we went and got our photos from the hotel, went back to Toby's and attempted to fall asleep with no blankets and feeling a little scared and skeptical of actually falling completely asleep. Nicole and Riley chose to sleep outside while Avery and I (this has been Kendall typed for the past few paragraphs) slept on the bed with the door to the "patio" open. And then sometime scary happened to Avery. Here are her words describing it: "I was laying in bed and heard drunk people coming through the door and my heart started racing! I see the shadow of a man behind me and I hear a drunk man say: "F-ing ridiculous!" I don't know if I was going to feel a gun on my back or a noose around my neck or witness him take all of our stuff and hurt us! We were debating leaving a book of mormon or not on the kitchen table and i thought that we did and that he was saying that us being mormon was "f-ing ridiculous"! I was prepared to die a martyr in this guy Toby's apartment! He tripped over our bags and fell into the gravel of the patio right by Riley and Nicole! I peer over and see him crouching over them and shake his head and say "f-ing ridiculous couch surfers!"
She ended up making friends with them despite her being scared to the bone so we wouldn't get killed or taken! She also saw Toby later that night walk out of his room in nothing but black underwear!! Needless to say, it was a night and day that we will NEVER forget!!!
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
May 25th...Balmer's Tent Village... 'nough said. By kendall
Sorry you have to hear from me twice, but it's Kendall again haha. So today was bit of a crazy day! When I woke up this morning, I was a little confused on where I was haha I forgot that i was in a hostel in a mountain village in a giant bunk bed with Riley deeply breathing in my ear and flies in my face... Haha but when we fully woke up, we asked our good friend Petra to called our other good friend Henna and ask him about the bungee jumping situation. We crossed our fingers as she flirted in German with him on the phone and she told us that we could not bungee jump today and only could tomorrow. Problem! We were supposed to leave tomorrow to go to Venice for a day and a half! We really talked about it and thought of every option we could. After about 20 minutes of trying to figure out what would make everyone happy, we decided that Nicole and Riley would stay in Switzerland an extra day and bungee jump and meet us in Venice when Avery and I went to Venice as planned and didn't bungee jump...even though we were a little bummed that we couldn't bungee jump in Switzerland.
Then we started on our way down back to Interlaken. We had to take the gondola down in order to get to the bus that would take us to the train to get there. We had a little bit of trouble purchasing our tickets from this lady at the top of the gondola place. She was getting thugs a little confused and things were definitely getting lost in translation! She thought we were trying to use our tickets from to day before to pay to get back down today, when really we were trying to make sure that we could pay the same price as yesterday! Haha but we made it back to Interlaken and then needed to make our train reservations to Venice...each of us on different days. Low and behold, it ended up that avery and i's train wouldnt leave till that afternoon anyways, so after a lot of refiguring, here is the new plan: before we go to our last destination (Rome) Avery and I are going to go to Venice while Nicole and Riley go to the Amalfi coast...meaning that we both can go bungee jumping! But because the girls want to go to Venice too, they are going to go there the day after bungee jumping while Avery and I go straight to Cinque Terre to wait for them there.
So back to the events of the day: we sorted all the train stuff out and then trekked to Henna's place (Alpin Raft) yet again!!! We moved our bungee jumping day to tomorrow. Then we walked some more to our hostel for tonight: Balmer's Tent Village... Need I say more?! Words cannot describe this place. But I'll try. In a circle around a bar slash reception area are dozens of yellow and white striped tents. Outside the tents (still in the tent circle) is not only a hot tub, but a pool as well. But we'll get to that later.
We hopped on a city bus and took it to one of the lakes by Interlaken! We sat and soaked in the sun and hopped in the freezing water and sat on the raft for a bit. It was so fun and nice. Then we got some food at this place where we met a girl who initially seemed really cool and was a lone traveler! But then when we got to Balmer's tent village and she sat and watches us on the wifi trying to figure out trains and hostels and stuff, I felt like I was supposed to be entertaining her for some reason but was being as boring as can be! But balmers tent village was definitely not as boring as can be! Nicole took a dip in the pool infested with who knows what as children had cannon ball wars! She was stuck in there because she didn't have a towel! People were partying and socializing and it was just very twilight zone-esque. Especially when we saw a humongous (not fat but straight up large) man with 7-11 sunglasses on and long bleach blonde hair flirting with the girl with tatoos on her legs! We ended the night in the lukewarm hot tub and took showers...come to find out, aparently one of Avery's friends randomly stayed there a couple years ago and got planters warts in his feet from the same exact showers!! Ahhhh! We all climbed into out rickety bunk beds and are going to sleep, heads facing cobwebs in the corners and all.
May 24th...first day in Interlaken...my dreamland! By Kendall
May 24th
Where do I even begin? As you may have noticed, we are running a little behind on our blog posts, but none the less, we still have to keep writing them because we're printing these off to keep for ourselves...anyways..Today we left the wonderful Hirsch home and left for Interlaken! Our trains all arrived on time and we enjoyed a beautiful train ride through the mountains and lakes of Switzerland! Seeing that Interlaken must mean "inter-lakes" in German, that's exactly what it is! It's a little backpackers' town situated right in between two beautiful bright blue lakes! This area has the tallest, steepest mountains I have ever seen and where we were in the valley of all these mountains in Interlaken was quite warm, but it was crazy to think that at the tops of the mountains, it very well could be snowing! There are lakes for water skiing, rivers for river rafting, and mountains for hiking, biking, and skiing in the winter!! Pretty much it is New Hampshire and Park City combined so of course I LOVED it!!!! I think it is my favorite place in the world!
Anyways! We got to Interlaken and made our way to "the Happy Inn"! We dropped off our bags there and went to go talk to the Bungee jumping place... Oh yes...we are indeed going bungee jumping!!! We went to the place and talked to a very friendly guy named Henna who seemed to know anything and everything about Interlaken! It turns out that the "big bungee" that we were signed up and paid for to do might not be possible because of the ice that's still on the lake that we're jumping over! We were planning on going tomorrow (Friday), but he said that we have a 50/50 chance that we won't be able to tomorrow! So we just prayed and prayed out guts out that it would work out that we could do the bi bungee over a beautiful lake rather than a little bungee in a grey canyon that we may or may not even want to do! Pretty much, at this point in time, everything is a little up in the air!! So we're hoping for the best! One good thing that did come out of the visit was that he told us about this town we wanted to go to called Gimmelwald. Apparently, it is so beautiful and cars can't drive up there cause you can only get there by hiking or by gondola! So he led us in the right direction and told us about his lady friend Petra who owns the place. He described the town as "Hiedi-land" and said that the hostel was very "kyut" ("cute" with an accent) haha. So we decided to give it a whirl! But first, we needed to head out on our seemingly never ending quest for wifi. We discovered a hotspot in Georgie's grill and we were starving so we decided it was the best option. Georgie was in there alone, bored out of his mind...poor guy! He's British and you can just tell that he spent all his life savings to come to Interlaken to open up a hip happening teen-attracting restaurant and defied all advice he got to not do it...but it was heartbreaking because the place is sort of a flop..the food is gross and it was completely empty and far too expensive despite the deals he was creating to advertise his place a little more! We felt awful! But we needed the wifi so we could book Petra's hostel in Gimmelwald and book something for the next night too! After we finished at Georgie's, we grabbed our bags from the happy in and said adios to that place, and on our way we went to Gimmelwald!
A lot of this day was spent on busses, but it's actually a really awesome way to see a ton of Switzerland! We took a train to a little town about 20 minutes away called Lauterbrunnen or something like that (we are really wishing that Cami was here to help us with pronunciation and communicating! Haha) and then got on a bus that took us another 8 minutes away that took us deeper in between the mountains and then got on a gondola that took us to the side of a mountain which is a town called Gimmelwald. Literally the tiny town is on the steeply sloping mountain sides of this mountain! And I dont even know if you can call it a town...it was more of like 18 houses at the whole place and grazing areas for goats and cows and 1 hostel slash restaurant which was Petra's! It is pretty awesome to think that this isn't set up to be this way for tourists...people actually live here! We were 4 of probably 25 people in the whole area!
So we checked into the Mountain Hostel and threw our stuff down so we could go on a little mountain hike slash walk through the mountains! One thing that I love about this place is that there are such steep mountains, but instead of it being covered by pine and aspen trees, there are big square patches with little wooden houses on it and little white and purple flowers and dandelions covering the ground! It's amazing!! We hiked and just enjoyed one another's company and breathed in the unpolluted fresh Swiss air! It was absolutely amazing! We could find a word to describe it! It was so majestic and fairytale-like!
After our nice walk and heart to hearts and even a rain scare (only considered a scare because of the expensive cameras we had with us), we went back to the mountain hostel and were forced to get food there because it is the only place that we could go haha. We ate Petra's homemade broccoli and cheese soup which was actually quite good! We ate it overlooking a deep valley and looking straight at the tallest mountains ever where the bottoms were completely green and the tops were snow covered and in the clouds! It was quite a sight! and then had some chocolate fondue for dessert (which apparently is an American invention and only cheese fondue is actually Swiss haha). Afterwards, we were so dog tired from the day that we all went to sleep at 8 at night!
Where do I even begin? As you may have noticed, we are running a little behind on our blog posts, but none the less, we still have to keep writing them because we're printing these off to keep for ourselves...anyways..Today we left the wonderful Hirsch home and left for Interlaken! Our trains all arrived on time and we enjoyed a beautiful train ride through the mountains and lakes of Switzerland! Seeing that Interlaken must mean "inter-lakes" in German, that's exactly what it is! It's a little backpackers' town situated right in between two beautiful bright blue lakes! This area has the tallest, steepest mountains I have ever seen and where we were in the valley of all these mountains in Interlaken was quite warm, but it was crazy to think that at the tops of the mountains, it very well could be snowing! There are lakes for water skiing, rivers for river rafting, and mountains for hiking, biking, and skiing in the winter!! Pretty much it is New Hampshire and Park City combined so of course I LOVED it!!!! I think it is my favorite place in the world!
Anyways! We got to Interlaken and made our way to "the Happy Inn"! We dropped off our bags there and went to go talk to the Bungee jumping place... Oh yes...we are indeed going bungee jumping!!! We went to the place and talked to a very friendly guy named Henna who seemed to know anything and everything about Interlaken! It turns out that the "big bungee" that we were signed up and paid for to do might not be possible because of the ice that's still on the lake that we're jumping over! We were planning on going tomorrow (Friday), but he said that we have a 50/50 chance that we won't be able to tomorrow! So we just prayed and prayed out guts out that it would work out that we could do the bi bungee over a beautiful lake rather than a little bungee in a grey canyon that we may or may not even want to do! Pretty much, at this point in time, everything is a little up in the air!! So we're hoping for the best! One good thing that did come out of the visit was that he told us about this town we wanted to go to called Gimmelwald. Apparently, it is so beautiful and cars can't drive up there cause you can only get there by hiking or by gondola! So he led us in the right direction and told us about his lady friend Petra who owns the place. He described the town as "Hiedi-land" and said that the hostel was very "kyut" ("cute" with an accent) haha. So we decided to give it a whirl! But first, we needed to head out on our seemingly never ending quest for wifi. We discovered a hotspot in Georgie's grill and we were starving so we decided it was the best option. Georgie was in there alone, bored out of his mind...poor guy! He's British and you can just tell that he spent all his life savings to come to Interlaken to open up a hip happening teen-attracting restaurant and defied all advice he got to not do it...but it was heartbreaking because the place is sort of a flop..the food is gross and it was completely empty and far too expensive despite the deals he was creating to advertise his place a little more! We felt awful! But we needed the wifi so we could book Petra's hostel in Gimmelwald and book something for the next night too! After we finished at Georgie's, we grabbed our bags from the happy in and said adios to that place, and on our way we went to Gimmelwald!
A lot of this day was spent on busses, but it's actually a really awesome way to see a ton of Switzerland! We took a train to a little town about 20 minutes away called Lauterbrunnen or something like that (we are really wishing that Cami was here to help us with pronunciation and communicating! Haha) and then got on a bus that took us another 8 minutes away that took us deeper in between the mountains and then got on a gondola that took us to the side of a mountain which is a town called Gimmelwald. Literally the tiny town is on the steeply sloping mountain sides of this mountain! And I dont even know if you can call it a town...it was more of like 18 houses at the whole place and grazing areas for goats and cows and 1 hostel slash restaurant which was Petra's! It is pretty awesome to think that this isn't set up to be this way for tourists...people actually live here! We were 4 of probably 25 people in the whole area!
So we checked into the Mountain Hostel and threw our stuff down so we could go on a little mountain hike slash walk through the mountains! One thing that I love about this place is that there are such steep mountains, but instead of it being covered by pine and aspen trees, there are big square patches with little wooden houses on it and little white and purple flowers and dandelions covering the ground! It's amazing!! We hiked and just enjoyed one another's company and breathed in the unpolluted fresh Swiss air! It was absolutely amazing! We could find a word to describe it! It was so majestic and fairytale-like!
After our nice walk and heart to hearts and even a rain scare (only considered a scare because of the expensive cameras we had with us), we went back to the mountain hostel and were forced to get food there because it is the only place that we could go haha. We ate Petra's homemade broccoli and cheese soup which was actually quite good! We ate it overlooking a deep valley and looking straight at the tallest mountains ever where the bottoms were completely green and the tops were snow covered and in the clouds! It was quite a sight! and then had some chocolate fondue for dessert (which apparently is an American invention and only cheese fondue is actually Swiss haha). Afterwards, we were so dog tired from the day that we all went to sleep at 8 at night!
We love the Switzerland
Riley here, we had a very interesting past couple of days. On tuesday we were planning on getting on an early train to travel from Paris to Geneva, however to our great dismay what we had to have reservations for that train and the only other free option was to take a train that left at one in the after noon and was going to take 10 hours traveling time as opposed to 3...what?! When you are a poor college student, you do what is free, so there we were at 8 am at the Gare de Lyon with five hours until our ten hour train journey on the exceptionally slow train with a couple hour layover in Lyon. I guess this is where we started feeling like real backpackers. With the extra time we decided, why not romp the city and find a Paul's to indulge on one last hot chocolate. Sounds simple, but it ended up taking us two hours of walking around the city to find the right Paul's, not the hotel or the restaurant or the fruit stand, but the patisserie. The rest of the day went pretty smoothly, Kendall was not a fan of Lyon, however I told her that she cannot judge a city by the view from the train station, but we were all a bit on edge so she can't be blamed, I'm sure Lyon has a lot to offer. We finally made it to Geneva where one of Karen's friends from get childhood, named Kim, picked us up. She was so sweet, took us to her apartment where she fed us delicious fruit and chocolate cake, talked to us about her days of living in Paris, and showing us her sons room (Quinton, 15), which we proceeded to take over. One of us slept in his bed and the other three were on the floor on twin mattresses, it was sleepover heaven. This morning we slept in a little bit. Once we it going Kim's daughter, Juliet (13), showed us around the old city, the cathedral, and cute park. After a little exploring we met up with Kim and her other daughter Madeline (10) for lunch at this yummy burger place. After lunch Kim dropped us off at a place that rents out bikes for free for four hours, so we rode them by the lake in a park. Of corse we layers in the grass with the wild flowers and took cat naps, it was a lovely afternoon. And to top it off on our way back we decided to stick our feet in the lake. Kendall and i were siting up on this stone wall watching our stuff when nicole took her turn to feel the water, she's standing on these rocks and mere seconds after she says "wow the moss on these rocks is really slippery", she is flat on her back in the lake. I could not stop laughing it was just too classic, and then she had to ride back home all wet it was hilarious. Once we figured out the bus system we headed back to Kim's apartment, where we met up with Avery who had gone home with Kim because she wasn't feeling well. Once reunited we got ready I go out to dinner with Kim and her husband, Lauraunt, and their kids. Just to clarify when I say get ready I mean brush our teeth and possible a t shirt change, we have become pretty grungy by this point, We take the Island of Misfit toys to a whole new level. Anyways then we went out to dinner, they wanted to show us a good Swiss cheese fondue experience so we went to their favorite place, which was quaint and delicious. We had the best time at dinner, Kim and her husband were inspiring to me. They met in college, got married after he graduated, then they moved to Paris where he is from, lived there for about 15 years until they moved to Geneva. They are just still so in love with each other and have a cute family, but thy still seemed like real every day people. I really enjoyed the time we spent with their family. They were so gracious to let us stay on their apartment, feed us, and show us the city. We are very grateful for their family! Tomorrow we are off to Interlaken to do some hiking and ever bungee jumping!
We came, we ate, we conquered
After packed days of living the Parisian life, our last day was a rather more slow paced. It was out last morning waking up in our individual comfy Marriot beds so we decided it would be smart to catch up on some much needed shut eye and sleep in. Rolling out of bed around 10am, we were so ready for a relaxing last day in the city. We took the metro to our favorite food square and begun our day of eating by sipping Paul's famous hot chocolate and chocolate croissants. We sat at the cafe for an hour or so, writing in our journals and taking in all the Parisian vibes. After Paul's, we were off to our favorite crepe stand. We all got our differing favs- nutella and
Banana, butter and sugar, and salted caramel. The man now knew us and made sure to load on the goods! We ate those up quickly and then made our way to our favorite chocolate shop. This place was dang good! Like out of this world, can't even put in words kind of good! The chocolate covered hazelnuts and almonds and the coconut macaroons were our top picks! Ah my mouth is watering just thinking about it. However, we didn't save them in our bags for later so don't be too disgusted...yet. What did we do next? (cue the gags and stomach aches) We went back to our favorite crepe place and got another crepe. We found ourselves eating such bad food because it was way cheaper then a salad from a restaurant per say. Yet we probably come out about the same from numerous servings of cheap food rather than one serving of a more spendy healthier choice. Whatever! You can loose the weight but not the memories and boy of boy I'll never forget that crepe stand or chocolate shop or the pure joy that came from their offerings. After eating our weight in sugar carbs, we stopped and the coolest bookstore in Paris. We sat at the upstairs nook next to the children's books and read books, found new favorite quotes, and wrote in our journals some more. We all grew quite fond of the this nook. It was comfy and surrounded by children's book, but our most favorite part was the one wall full of years of notes people who loved that nook posted up. Layers and layers of notes and photos covered the wall. We all decided we want a reading nook with a wall covered in nice notes that accumulate over years. After a few more hours in the Shakespeare and company book store, we wanted to go to Riley's favorite vintage thrift store. On the way we found a post office, where we all needed to send some post cards. Soon after we left and headed to a hipster paradise. This store was so awesome! Racks and racks of the most unique stuff everywhere. We all got excited and started scavenging through everything. After some fun dress up we went to check out and panic struck Nicole. Her money belt with her passport in it was gone. No where to be found. It had to have fallen out of her pocket or bag while she was throwing around hats and dresses. So we began to rip the store apart even more. The frantic was intense to be quite honest. Trying to get all the negative thoughts of what could happen out of my head, we were on our hands and knees searching everywhere. Riley and Kendall left to go check the post office where we knew Nicole just bought her stamps. Nicole and I continued to search and we were causing a scene haha the sweet worker man was so concerned and kept asking what he could do to help. We prayed an prayed some more. How tragic it would be if Nicole got her money and passport stolen. We'd have to postpone the duration of our trip and spend a few days in the US embassy trying to get Nicole out of the country. Feeling like ages later, Riley and Kendall come waltzing back in holding Nicole's life. The money bag was sitting on the table where Nicole sent her post cards, just sitting there, untouched, over an hour later!! We truly believe heavenly father was protecting that money belt. We looked at all the possible ways we could learn from this and we decided it was meant for us to be more cautious. We aren't invincible and that's that. Thank the heavens the money belt was found and we were safe and being watched over. After that almost tragic hour, we relieved our anxiety with some chicken and cheese croissant thingys from the near by patisserie. We then found ourselves window shopping at cute little boutiques. We found a "Lush" shop, it's an all natural body and skin shop. The lady working there was a saint and helped us for a good hour, trying all the different soaps and scrubs. We all smells so delicious and our skin was glowing by the time we left the store empty handed. Sorry Lush, we just can't fit any of your product in our backpacks! We wanted to finish our day off with the eiffel tower so we hopped on the metro and headed over. The rain began to pour and we really did get the full Paris experience. The Eiffel tower was surrounded by rain clouds and everyone around up whipped out their umbrellas. We sipped some hot chocolate and had a little photo shoot to wrap up our time in the city of love! Besides the money belt scare, today was such a glorious day. As we sat in the cafe and in the reading nook and as we walked around Paris in the rain, we were all so thankful and humbled to be here. We had the best of times in Paris and wouldn't have done anything different. Thank goodness for Riley and her inside scoop of the city! I really don't know what we would have done with out her. We headed back to the hotel and took luxurious baths, packed our stuff away and had group scripture/prayer time. Staying at the courtyard Marriot was so nice! We loved getting cozy in the bath robes and spreading our limbs out in our individual beds. We were sure gonna miss the hotel but we decided we would miss the beautiful French man working at the front desk. We all gawked over him and his circular glasses and French accent. We'll never know his name but we sure won't ever forget that face! Paris was good to us, maybe not good to our figures but so so good to us. Memories were made that will forever make me laugh, even Nicole's scare can now we laughed about. Silly silly Nicole! And off to switzerland we go! Until next time!
-Avery
Sent from my iPhone
Banana, butter and sugar, and salted caramel. The man now knew us and made sure to load on the goods! We ate those up quickly and then made our way to our favorite chocolate shop. This place was dang good! Like out of this world, can't even put in words kind of good! The chocolate covered hazelnuts and almonds and the coconut macaroons were our top picks! Ah my mouth is watering just thinking about it. However, we didn't save them in our bags for later so don't be too disgusted...yet. What did we do next? (cue the gags and stomach aches) We went back to our favorite crepe place and got another crepe. We found ourselves eating such bad food because it was way cheaper then a salad from a restaurant per say. Yet we probably come out about the same from numerous servings of cheap food rather than one serving of a more spendy healthier choice. Whatever! You can loose the weight but not the memories and boy of boy I'll never forget that crepe stand or chocolate shop or the pure joy that came from their offerings. After eating our weight in sugar carbs, we stopped and the coolest bookstore in Paris. We sat at the upstairs nook next to the children's books and read books, found new favorite quotes, and wrote in our journals some more. We all grew quite fond of the this nook. It was comfy and surrounded by children's book, but our most favorite part was the one wall full of years of notes people who loved that nook posted up. Layers and layers of notes and photos covered the wall. We all decided we want a reading nook with a wall covered in nice notes that accumulate over years. After a few more hours in the Shakespeare and company book store, we wanted to go to Riley's favorite vintage thrift store. On the way we found a post office, where we all needed to send some post cards. Soon after we left and headed to a hipster paradise. This store was so awesome! Racks and racks of the most unique stuff everywhere. We all got excited and started scavenging through everything. After some fun dress up we went to check out and panic struck Nicole. Her money belt with her passport in it was gone. No where to be found. It had to have fallen out of her pocket or bag while she was throwing around hats and dresses. So we began to rip the store apart even more. The frantic was intense to be quite honest. Trying to get all the negative thoughts of what could happen out of my head, we were on our hands and knees searching everywhere. Riley and Kendall left to go check the post office where we knew Nicole just bought her stamps. Nicole and I continued to search and we were causing a scene haha the sweet worker man was so concerned and kept asking what he could do to help. We prayed an prayed some more. How tragic it would be if Nicole got her money and passport stolen. We'd have to postpone the duration of our trip and spend a few days in the US embassy trying to get Nicole out of the country. Feeling like ages later, Riley and Kendall come waltzing back in holding Nicole's life. The money bag was sitting on the table where Nicole sent her post cards, just sitting there, untouched, over an hour later!! We truly believe heavenly father was protecting that money belt. We looked at all the possible ways we could learn from this and we decided it was meant for us to be more cautious. We aren't invincible and that's that. Thank the heavens the money belt was found and we were safe and being watched over. After that almost tragic hour, we relieved our anxiety with some chicken and cheese croissant thingys from the near by patisserie. We then found ourselves window shopping at cute little boutiques. We found a "Lush" shop, it's an all natural body and skin shop. The lady working there was a saint and helped us for a good hour, trying all the different soaps and scrubs. We all smells so delicious and our skin was glowing by the time we left the store empty handed. Sorry Lush, we just can't fit any of your product in our backpacks! We wanted to finish our day off with the eiffel tower so we hopped on the metro and headed over. The rain began to pour and we really did get the full Paris experience. The Eiffel tower was surrounded by rain clouds and everyone around up whipped out their umbrellas. We sipped some hot chocolate and had a little photo shoot to wrap up our time in the city of love! Besides the money belt scare, today was such a glorious day. As we sat in the cafe and in the reading nook and as we walked around Paris in the rain, we were all so thankful and humbled to be here. We had the best of times in Paris and wouldn't have done anything different. Thank goodness for Riley and her inside scoop of the city! I really don't know what we would have done with out her. We headed back to the hotel and took luxurious baths, packed our stuff away and had group scripture/prayer time. Staying at the courtyard Marriot was so nice! We loved getting cozy in the bath robes and spreading our limbs out in our individual beds. We were sure gonna miss the hotel but we decided we would miss the beautiful French man working at the front desk. We all gawked over him and his circular glasses and French accent. We'll never know his name but we sure won't ever forget that face! Paris was good to us, maybe not good to our figures but so so good to us. Memories were made that will forever make me laugh, even Nicole's scare can now we laughed about. Silly silly Nicole! And off to switzerland we go! Until next time!
-Avery
Sent from my iPhone
Monday, May 21, 2012
Milly the Lemonhead Strikes Again
This is Nicole, fyi. To explain the title of the post...Avery got her nickname Milly the Lemonhead because, like the crazy dog Milly at Uncle Max's, Avery eats anything and everything in her sight. Also, she eats lemons like candy. No sugar added. So, if you read this post, you will see why we repeated this phrase at least 10 times today. This morning, we woke up and got ready for church.
We stopped at our Patisserie and got a bite to eat for breakfast on our way to
the metro. The ward here in Paris is extremely diverse. They have translators
for English and Chinese and two separate rooms to participate in sacrament
meeting. The first speaker was a convert from Africa and her talk/testimony was
so powerful. But then, I am hoping that the translator got lost in translation,
because one moment she was talking about a dream she had about demons and the
next day she was on the metro and started having pain and was sweating and she
didn’t know what was wrong with her. Then it was translated, “I had a baby that
day. I put it in the baby carriage thing” and that was the end of the
story….what? It was so confusing. And it went about 40 minutes overtime. But
other than that she shared so many insightful and sincere feelings about the
gospel and it was truly touching. Also a homeless man at church looked at me
and said “you’re from California aren’t you. You from Laguna Beach?” Which was
pretty crazy. Intuition I suppose.
After church, we waltzed over to the metro to head up to
Montmarte. We walked up to the Sacre Cour. The church was in the middle of a
service so we walked through and listened to the hymns. Then we walked through
the artist district and I got the coconut gelato that I LOVE-despite
hesitation…it was just as good as I remembered. So shout out to Erica-it is
still the best gelato I’ve ever had…but we still have Italy to hit up so I’m
sure that will change in the next 2 weeks. We continued to walk and really
wanted to get delicious crepes (we have a problem). Everyone stopped to get
them at this little place that was really giving me the bad vibes. I could just
tell by the font they used on their menu and their color scheme that this was
not going to be a good decision. I started off saying I didn’t want to eat here
and felt like we should keep walking, but then I felt too snobby and was
blinded by the “chicken” option on the menu. I have eaten too much ham here and
really wanted some chicken. Finally, I caved. Riley and I both ordered the
chicken, cheese, and tomato crepe, despite the high prices. Hey, we’re going to
treat ourselves. The second I placed my order, I had a terrible vision of them
not using the fresh tomatoes on the counter, but instead some gross ketchup or
something. Fears confirmed. After caking the crepe in shredded figments that
did not look like chicken at all---SHLAP--- They plopped a runny red substance
that looked like a cheap wannabe salsa on it. It was honestly disgusting. We
felt bad enough spending the money on so many crepes but really wanted to
splurge today! We were on a street swarming with creperies and we honestly
chose the armpit of all armpits. Call us dramatic, but we were pretty bitter.
Then, to make Kendall and Riley feel better, we went to a patisserie to get
some giant macarons (clearly the only way we function here is with good food).
How could one go wrong with a macaron in Paris? Even the macarons at McCafe
were delicious (yes, we went there). But NO. These giant merengue and cream
beauties tasted like dirt. This was our only bad food day in Paris. In fact, I
think this was our only bad food day the whole trip. And at this stage of our
dessert/crepe addiction, it was dangerous. We were pretty upset and even
decided to rename this part of town, which I usually really like, (sorry for
our immaturity) MontFart. Well, we needed to redeem our palettes. We fervently
marched down to the metro stop by Moulin Rouge. We took the metro to the
Bastille, where they supposedly sold crepes with Speculoos. But, to our
delight, instead of a crepe stand, there was a giant outdoor market. It was
swarming with food, fruit, hand woven sandals, Peruvian sweaters, Indian
shawls, you name it. We loved walking around and watching the Parisians carry
their bouquets of flowers and their baguettes. We bought a baguette to split
and, after soaking up the vibes (we’ve been into vibes these days), head on our
merry way.
After the market, we took the metro to Riley’s stomping
grounds. She showed us the apartment she used to live in and then we walked to
the park down the street. It was supposed to be thunder storming all week, but
since we prayed for good weather again that day, it got so sunny, we thought
there was a hole in the ozone small enough to set this park to flames. It was a
magical park and everyone was out on this lovely Sunday afternoon. After
watching the kids on the carousel, Avery and Riley got some cotton candy, and
we found the longest grass to bask in. Apparently, it was off limits because we
had to step over a small fence to get to it, but it was worth the risk. We got
a solid 8 minutes in before the park rangers told us to move. We found a new
spot in the short grass that was PRIME for people watching. We watched a group
of rambunctious preteen pipsqueaks and pests make mischief with their water
fights. We watched the world’s best looking couple have the cutest/most
picturesque picnic that we have ever seen. And finally, we saw a middle aged
woman climb a tree in rollerblades. And that’s real.
We then had a great time getting lost and cracking ourselves
up with silly jokes. Then we decided to go on the metro back to MontFart to let
it redeem itself to get some dinner (apparently there was a good restaurant on
the other side of the area). On the way, a creepy man with a hoop earing tried
to impress us by flexing his pectorals. Yikes. Our dinner was AMAZING! What a
relief. Kendall got a leg of lamb, as per usual, and the rest of us got a GIANT
bowl of salad with avocado, chicken, delicious French cheese, tomatoes, and
thinly sliced garlic potatoes. It was sublime. Then we went to the Arc de
Triumph at sunset and walked down Champs Elysees all lit up at night in the
rain. The girls got macarons at Laderre (I couldn’t. I actually thought my
stomach was going to burst) and then we headed back to the hotel. We all felt
miserable! We have eaten nothing but garbage, and there is no way we can stop
these habits in Europe, it is just too hard.
So, we decided our only option is to try and exercise. We put on our
workout clothes and had a dance party/ab workout/zumba fiesta in the hotel room
and had the best time. All in all, a hilarious day that was filled with
wandering, laughing, and eating, eating, eating. Hopefully you guys will
recognize us when we get off the plane! It’s bad.
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