Featured image is Siena

In November 2022 I traveled to Italy starting in Milan then going to Venice, Florence, Vernazza in Cinque Terre, a quick stop in Pisa, Siena, and finally Rome. I left California on November 8th, got to Milan on the 9th, and left Rome on the 22nd. The following is a daily diary from my time in each city accompanied by the photos I took.

Milan

November 9th

I got into the Milan airport. I had forgotten that it was further out from that main part of the city so it was still about an hour’s train ride and then a tram ride to the area I needed to reach. I also had to take more time deciphering what it was I was seeing on the signs and directions. It was particularly difficult figuring out which train I was supposed to take, for both the long distance train and the metro. I got out at the metro stop S. Ambrogio and walked my way over to the hostel. When I got out of the station it was dark and rainy, not the setting that I was hoping to find myself in an unfamiliar city. It was just my paranoia speaking though because walking to the hostel was fine and the city was actually pretty quiet at that point. I forgot to mention that my phone was at about 2% when I left the metro stop and I was desperately trying to conserve battery while getting to the hostel. I had used the battery pack I brought with me, but it didn’t seem to actually charge my phone at all. Finally, I reached the hostel and could relax. The hostel was quite busy and popular; the city was quiet, but when I turned down the alleyway to the hostel it got loud from all the people at the hostel bar. I walked in not sure if the entrance was to the bar or to the hostel itself, apparently, it was both. This was my first real interaction with an Italian person outside of a travel setting. They greeted me and quickly switched to English when I said “hello”. They showed me to my room, 8 bed C, and gave me some instructions on how to come and go.

I put my stuff down on my bed and introduced myself to the people in the room at the time, there was one man from India who I could not understand what his name was and another man from Boston named Trace. Trace and I spoke for some time about his travels throughout Italy and greater Europe. He was spending 8 weeks in Europe overall and his trip would take him away from Milan to Paris on 11/10. It felt great to have a space to lay my things and take a breath in a safe environment even if it was a shared bed space. I got my phone to start charging while I made my bed and got some items out of my pack. Then I went downstairs to get some food.

I fumbled around downstairs in the bar/restaurant and ordered a margherita pizza and a rum and coke. I found a spot to sit by myself even though I wanted to find some other people to talk to. It was intimidating trying to determine where I should sit, if it is rude that I only speak English in their Italian native country, would it be rude to sit and start talking to people in only English? Also, many people seemed to be sitting in groups speaking Italian so which made it all the more intimidating. So, I sat by myself. After some time a woman walked over and asked if she could join me, I gladly welcomed her. Her name was Kris and she was visiting from Australia, but she was originally from Brazil, so her accent was a little mixed. For some of their words, I could hear an Australian accent, but for the most part I heard the Brazilian accent. She was kind and talked about her travels throughout Italy and Europe. She said she started her trip in the United States and was predominately staying at friends’ places across the globe. Of course, her being in this hostel meant that she was also staying at places with beds to rent, she said that was only a few instances because it was too expensive. She was traveling because her job allows her a 3-month paid vacation and she decided to extend the 3 months by working remotely as well. She worked in parole enforcement on the admin side of things, so she was able to still work remote. We talked a little about our travels and touched lightly on F1. She said she remembered watching a lot prior to Senna’s passing. We finished our food and I was getting pretty tired at that point so we said our goodbyes and I headed upstairs to get to bed.

I took a shower, which was pretty nice, really comforting to have the warm water after that long day. I brushed my teeth and went through my usual routine. I thought fondly of how much of my normal life and routine I could have while traveling like this. After showering and brushing my teeth I went off to bed. I didn’t sleep very well since I was still getting over a cold, but I think I got in a good 6 or so hours, enough to keep me going.

November 10th

I woke up first, before everyone else in the room and got dressed, brushed my teeth, and got a bag ready for the day traveling in the city. I went downstairs to see what breakfast was like and ended up getting yogurt, some cereal, orange juice, and a chocolate croissant. The food was all quite good and just enough for my day. I also looked through a handout map that the hostel provided to see what they recommended for sightseeing and compared it to Rick Steeves book. I made a list of things I wanted to see; the Duomo, Vittorio Emanuele, piazza degli affari, castello sforzesco, and the fashion district. I didn’t want to waste any more time so I headed out for the day and tried to make my way to the Duomo. I was going to try and take the tram, but that seemed too challenging without speaking Italian or there being a ticket machine. So I walked over on foot, about a 15-minute walk from the hostel to the Duomo. The city was bustling with people walking all throughout, but also bikes, scooters, tiny cars, and small-scale delivery trucks. Everything is so much more compact in these European cities so that they can fit down the narrow alleyways and into the small garages. Just because they are small though doesn’t mean they’re slow, the bikes and scooters were quickly zipping around and maneuvering past parked trucks sometimes in areas where pedestrians shared the road. So important to pay attention while you’re walking.

I walked into the square that had the Duomo and was bewildered at the scale of this cathedral. The intricacy of the carvings on the outside of the facade was stunning. The square also connected to the Vittorio Emanuele which was a massive structure with a glass dome. In the square there was a statue on a horse, I didn’t get the name of the depicted figure at the time, but looking it up on the internet it was a monument to King Victor Emanuele II.

I got a ticket to go inside the Duomo and continued to be in awe of the detailed artwork of the carvings, stained glass, and scale of the work. The inside of the building was so large and spacious, the roof being so high made the interior feel endless. Looking around and reading some of the history I wondered why not many buildings like this exist in the United States and why even fewer are being built today. Not just this cathedral which is of religious importance, but the massive structures like the Vittorio Emanuele, with spacious headroom to capture the grandness of human engineering and construction. Back to the Duomo though, I sat in the pews and wished that I could hear an organ play through the halls. I am not a religious person, but there is a feeling that I get when I visit a place like the Duomo, a sense of something greater, something bigger than just myself or the humanity that creates the world that we live in. So much has to come together and a strong sense of purpose is required for the building of a structure so grand. I only wish an organ was playing to fill up the space with beautiful music.

After I left the Duomo, it was already 10:45 and I needed to check out for the hostel by 11:30, so I took some time to walk through the Vittorio Emanuele. That place was expensive. Lined with shops from Versace, Dior, Gucci, and other names I don’t even know what they sell, but I know it’s too expensive for me. It was fun to walk around and see the culture of fashion on display in the fashion capital of the world as some people say. I don’t think this was even the fashion district, but the fashion icons were definitely present. There was also a woman walking through the promenade and a man following with a production camera, for some photo or video shoot I assumed. Cool to see it live like that and on such a small production scale. The camera was very nice, but it seemed to just be the woman and the cameraman.

I walked back to my hostel to check out, I wandered back the way I came, surprisingly remembering the path I took fairly well. I find my memory of the locations based on sight landmarks is pretty good. Still, I have Google maps open just in case. I grabbed my things and checked out at 11:30 just in time. Then I walked over to Castello Sforzesco, about a 15-minute walk. It was a fine walk, but I was carrying my pack so it wasn’t as enjoyable to wander around as it was in the morning. I got to the castle and took some quick pictures of the front, but that was all that I was really able to handle with all my stuff so I started to find my way to the metro in order to get to the train station. This time the metro was a little more straightforward since I used it the night before. I realized that the ticket I bought the night prior and the ticket I just bought were for the three zones within Milan, luckily the three zones cover most of the city and all of the locations that I was headed. So, the metro got me to the Milano Centrale station with some time to kill and since I was a little hungry I decided to find some food. Looking on Google maps I found a reasonably priced and decently reviewed spot called Cafe Pascucci. I got a burger (I know, not really in the spirit of Italian cuisine), but it was pretty good! After I finished that up I went to the train station to figure out another ticketing machine in order to buy my train ticket. This machine was a little more helpful than the metro ticketing machines, but it was still pretty pricey at 49 euros, but I didn’t have time to hunt for something cheaper. Once I had my ticket I walked to the platform, accidentally walking up a  closed escalator like a dumb lost tourist. Regardless of my rule breaking I made it to the platform and found a sea of people coming and going from the station platform. It was busier than the Milan airport when I flew in! I had to wait for a little to see what platform my train was on, but it was quick to get on and then not soon after we left the station.

On the train ride, I was seated next to a kind man named Luka, who was an Italian native but spoke English very well. He was a hospice nurse and lived in Belluno. He said he had to travel to people’s homes sometimes for his job, but he also worked at a hospital that had 10 beds. Luka was visiting in Milan for the day to see some of his friends and go to see a basketball game, his first basketball game, which he said was fun! We talked a little bit more about traveling, where I’m going, what he has done in Europe, and where else he wants to go. He shared that he recently went to Iceland and he showed some pictures that he took throughout the island. It looked as spectacular as you might assume. He shared that he initially wanted to travel to the United States, but the travel package he was looking into was about 4k euros; so, pricey. We had a lovely conversation about the differences in culture and lifestyle between Italy, Europe, and the US. He also talked about a language test that he was taking and studying for, two different levels, but basically on the path to being fluent. He was pretty good talking with me, but he did have some trouble thinking of words which is why he said he wasn’t fully there yet. He said that he watches shows and movies in English or with English subtitles so that he can practice. We exchanged our Instagram’s so that we can keep in touch and if he makes his way to San Francisco he can reach out so I can give him a little tour.

Venice

November 10th

After the train ride, I made it to Venice, luckily it was still somewhat light out so I was able to take in some of the scenery illuminated. The island is really a world isolated on its own, but it is also filled with tourists, likely even more tourists than there are locals. Walking out of the train station I walked to the Grand Canal waterfront and saw bustling watercraft and multiple stations for the water taxis called Vaporetti. I didn’t really want to figure out how to get tickets, what boat to take, or what stop to take so I decided to walk to my hostel. Luckily it was only about a 15-minute walk. The walk was packed with people on the narrow streets with suitcases, backpacks, strollers, very clear tourist accouterments. Still, there was plenty of room for me to walk comfortably through the crowd and also enjoy the scenery along the way. I got to the hostel, which was in a shared space with a student housing in a seemingly old building. The hostel itself seemed quiet and not very busy so I asked if it was full for the night and the desk attendant claimed it was, still tamer compared to the hostel the night before. She showed me to my room and there I met Ozeil.

Ozeil was a traveler from Dublin, but he was originally from Brazil, Sao Paulo. He was just in Berlin and quickly decided to come to Venice as well. I put my things in the locker and we both took to the town for a nice stroll. We didn’t have any destination in particular, but we wanted to see the city and enjoy the atmosphere. We meandered through the narrow alleyways and found some alleys not as packed with tourists as others, but no matter the number of people it was all still so charming and pleasant. We stopped at a pizza joint called Farini which offered some delicious-looking pizza and the appearance did not disappoint. After grabbing our slices we sat outside and people watched as hordes of crowds passed us by. I shared that I like to try and guess people’s nationalities just based on appearance. It’s challenging enough to discern nationality based on language so I look at their dress, expressions, and how they compose themselves to try and make a guess. I’ll never know the answer, buts it’s still fun. Ozeil talked more about Dublin and how expensive it is to live there, he said that he shares a room and still pays €500 a month. He also talked about how he likes to write, horror-type novels, and that he actually has a book that he is going to publish this December in Portuguese. We also compared the differences between Ireland, Brazil, and the US. After eating we walked some more through the streets and we reached the Rialto bridge. I can understand why it was so coveted compared to the rest of the bridges in Venice, the scale of this bridge is truly grand, befitting for the grand canal. There were three pathways, two on the outside, by the banisters, and then a pathway up the center. Along the center pathway of the bridge, there are little stands, merchants, selling nick-nacks and typical tourist items from Venice, like masks. We took some pictures and then started to walk back to our hostel. There was not much more that occurred on our walk back. I wanted to find a bar with younger people, locals, or tourists, but nothing really presented itself.

When we got back to our hostel room we found two new roommates, brothers from the United States. We first met Ezra who was from Berkeley and still lives in Berkeley. He said that he and his brother just came from Florence and they started in Rome. After Venice, they were going to head to Berlin and maybe Amsterdam. The other brother Levi came back to the room since he was showering. Levi grew up in Berkeley but now lives in New York. Ezra and Levi shared some of their travel stories from Rome and Florence and made some suggestions to definitely see the Vatican and the Sistine Chapel and also to see David. I was already planning on seeing both of those but still reassures me that they are good sights to see. The brothers were hungry though so they went to the hostel kitchen to make some pasta. I thought it was a good idea to take a shower since there was only one shower for 10 or so beds! The shower was fine, but a little cramped and the bathroom had few amenities; no hooks for hanging my bag, no towel hangers, not any ledges in the shower to place items like soap, just very minimal. The floor was also quite gross because the water from the shower sprayed onto the tile and mixed with all the dirt, I was glad to have my sandals.

After my shower, I went to the common room to hopefully find some more travelers. I saw Ezra and Levi cooking and just one other woman speaking on the phone. I sat and mapped out what I wanted to do the following day in Venice. Some time passed and another woman knocked on the door asking to be let in. I was hesitant to let her in, I assumed that’s not very safe in a hostel setting, but Ezra let her in and it was fine. She said that she was supposed to have been greeted by a front desk representative after the typical check-in time, but no one was there to greet her. She was a little panicked, but Ezra and this other woman tried to help her. Ultimately the late arrival went over to the student housing that shared this facility and was able to get in touch with someone there. It turns out that the students living there also work part-time at the hostel to raise money for the student housing. They helped the woman get into her room and then it was back to Ezra, the woman, and me. We chatted some about our travels and where each of us was from, she was from the Netherlands. But for the most part, we kept to ourselves and then dissipated as the night progressed. I got my things and went back to my room to hopefully fall asleep quickly.

November 11th

I slept well enough, I think I got about 7 hours, refreshed enough. But I woke up, brushed my teeth, and got dressed quickly so that I could get out and see Venice. I also wanted to see if I could get some quick breakfast items. Ozeil was going to join me so we both left the hostel and started walking on the main promenade. Again it was full of people, tourists mainly, but also workers. People pulling carts with goods in boxes stopping at shops and talking to shop owners. Interesting to see the different ways that humans adapt to their living situations, there aren’t any cars so there are dedicated delivery carts and the people who pull the carts. More compact and challenging with the bridges, but they adapted to how their environment is structured. Anyways, we were walking on the hunt for food. We saw a small bakery called Pastocceria Nobile where I got a chocolate croissant. We also saw a small grocery store where I was able to get some yogurt, but they didn’t have any spoons so I would have to try and find some other spot that had disposable spoons I could use. While we were walking I saw a stand that had disposable spoons and the girls were kind enough to give me one free of charge. The chocolate croissant was not as good as I would have expected, it was rather cold and not as flaky as the one I had in Milan, the chocolate was fine, but still, I was a little surprised by the quality. We walked to a Vaporetto stop but it seemed that they were not running from that current location until about 10:20 so we would have had to wait a while. We decided to walk to San Marco’s Square instead, about 20 minutes to get there. We walked much of the same path that we took the night before, but now of course with the sun up.

We followed an indirect path along narrow alleyways to emerge on the corner of the square closest to the San Marco Basilica facing the square and looking up at the campanile. It was a stunning sight to behold. As I was walking through the alleyways and entering the square I imagined what it must have been like for the residents of Venice back in the 1500s or 1600s. What a marvelous city this must have been to live in, a luxury beyond anything else imaginable. How life must have ebbed through this square and changed the lives of so many people, and how it still does. We looked for the line to enter the basilica, but decided to look online for instant tickets, it saved us quite a bit of time. We got through the entrance and walked into the basilica under a sky of gold. The mosaics above us on the ceiling were covered in gold artistry. Depicting new testament biblical events. It was an awesome sight for sure, but I still didn’t think that it was as stunning and breathtaking as the Milan Duomo. We walked through the ground floor and even saw that there was a mass being held with local parishioners. The tickets we got permitted us access to the basilica museum which was still inside the basilica on the upper levels. We rose above through some narrow stairs and emerged just below the ceiling mosaics. There were more tapestries, mosaic pieces, and carvings on this upper level, not as religious and more related to the history of the city. After we made our way through the museum we came to an overlook point that was on a balcony outside the front of the basilica where we could view the entire square. The balcony also turned a corner to give us a view of the waterfront and the Doge’s Palace. After some pictures and taking in the view, we left the basilica. We turned to the Doge’s Palace next, but found the line and the price to be a bit too steep for our liking, €30 for access and waiting at least 30 minutes. So, instead, we went to the Vaporetti station to try our luck again and go to Murano, the glass-making island.

There was a long line at the station so we had to wait about 45 minutes for our ride, but it was worth it because we were basically first in line and got to sit in the outdoor seating and see the views of the Venice coastline as we traveled to Murano. As we rode on the Vaporetto I saw a part of Venice that had trees and it made me realize that I hadn’t seen trees at all on the island until that point, I thought of how depressing that could become to be deprived of nature unless someone went out of their way to find it. We also passed a more modern-looking building, the only one that stood out the whole trip, which was the hospital. They even had ambulance boats, which I found to be comical for how on theme it was, despite how necessary it was.

After about 30 minutes we arrived in Murano. The island was following the same style that Venice had, but the sprawl was limited to mostly one street, there was more housing further into the island, but it seemed that most of what was for tourists was on that one stretch. It was the island for glassmaking so there were numerous shops selling glassware of all sorts; jewelry, plate ware, figurines, cutlery, etc. We stopped in at a few of the shops to see what might catch our eyes, but nothing really jumped out at us. At the end of the street, we stopped at a small deli of sorts called Il Bocconcino which sold focaccia pizza, Nutella cookies, and risotto fried balls. They were all delicious. The pizza bread was particularly good, the focaccia base was so well done; crispy, but soft in the center. The Nutella cookie wasn’t as good as I thought it would be but still enjoyable. We sat and ate on the steps of a bride while pigeons pressed their luck at our feet trying to get crumbs. After we finished eating we continued to stroll down the other side of the canal looking briefly at the glass shops until something did eventually catch my eye. It was a bracelet with black matte-finished glass pearls and three glossy blue pearls. It was something that I could see myself wearing so I bought it. Unfortunately, after I walked away from the store and tried it on the bracelet was too small for my wrists. So I kept it as a gift for someone else because it was still pleasant. We continued to walk back to the Vaporetti station and boarded the boat back to the Venice mainland to go back to our hostel. We had been walking all day long at that point and we needed to give our feet a rest.

After some respite, I grew anxious sitting in the hostel. There was still so much I could see I couldn’t let my tired body hold me back. I decided to go to the Galleria Accademia. I took another Vaporetto to the Accademia bridge because I read that it was the second-best bridge in all of Venice. It was massive that’s for sure, but not nearly as fascinating as the Rialto bridge. I crossed the bridge to get into the Galleria Accademia. I toured inside for an hour or so seeing a multitude of paintings from the 1500s through the 1800s. There was a lot that was related to religion, and Christian significance, but also sections for perspective, nature, and architecture. There was one painting that stood out to me called Descent From The Cross by Luca Giordano. It was to my eye the most impressive, not as large as some of the others in the gallery, but the shadows really made the pale and seemingly cold body of Christ pop in comparison with the rest of the painting. I had not really been all that interested in paintings; so, I wasn’t expecting anything incredible visiting the gallery, but this painting did make me understand and appreciate the artistic medium more. I am still more excited to see sculptures in Florence, such as David.

I was feeling really exhausted after walking through the gallery, my feet were hurting and my back was aching, but I was also getting hungry. I went to take another Vaporetto back to the hostel so I could change into something a little warmer and put on some nicer shoes for dinner. I also wanted to see if any of my roommates were around and wanted to join me. I sat around for the Vaporetto, missing one because of a gaggle of people standing in the entryway and me not being able to voice what my intentions were in Italian. It was fine though since that first boat was packed and I got to sit a little longer, resting my body. I rode the Vaporetto back to my station and got back to the hostel where it was empty, with no one in my room and no one in the common area. I was a little bummed because I was hoping to meet more travelers and this hostel did not seem to be the best setting, a shame. So, I changed and then decided to go and get food for myself, I wanted gnocchi so I searched Google for places that offered gnocchi which was abundant. I found one place called Trattoria al Gazzettino in the San Marco district.

I got to Trattoria al Gazzettino and was able to sit outside as I had hoped so I could do some people-watching. It was not on a main thoroughfare like other parts of the city, but there were plenty of people to keep my eyes occupied. I looked over the menu, but I knew what I wanted already, some delicious gnocchi, I also decided to order a house salad. That would end up being a mistake though since I didn’t know what comprised a house salad. I found out it would be too many food items that I just did not like so I hardly ate anything. Throughout the rest of my meal he brought me dishes to taste; one a risotto dish, another of fried risotto balls with some paste that I couldn’t make out, and then finally my main dish the gnocchi. The gnocchi was not as I was expecting, it was the four kinds of cheese, but the pillowed pasta was tough and chewy. It was not light, fluffy, and soft like I was expecting. I am comparing my gnocchi to Cafe Giostra in Petaluma and this gnocchi was not better than that. It seemed as though the gnocchi was the frozen food you can find at a grocery store. I also had a house red wine with my meal which was fine enough, I am no experienced wine drinker so I couldn’t accurately judge if it was good or not, but it seemed fine for my meal. In conclusion of the meal the waiter brought me some Tiramisu as another dish “to taste”. I didn’t know if this was something I would be charged for and the two other dishes to taste, but they were all very good and enjoyable, something different than what was common in the United States. There was nothing spectacular about the people watching, a sea of people passing by in the narrow alley made even narrower by the outside seating and people waiting to be seated. There were two women seated at a table nearby who said that they were from Slovenia, as they told the waiter. I didn’t speak their language but based on their body language there seemed to be some disagreement between them. Finally, I paid my check and wandered my stuffed belly back to the hostel, walking as slowly as I could to help digest the big meal I had.

When I got back the two brothers were back in the room so we caught up on our day’s sights. We all went to the Galleria Accademia so we talked about the paintings that we saw and liked. But we didn’t talk for that long and we went to bed as it was late and we were tired.

November 12th

I woke up earlier, around 7am so that I could head out early and see a few sights before I left Venice. I wanted to go and see a bookstore that the hostel recommended called Liberia Acqua Alta but they didn’t open until 9. So, I wandered some and stopped in at a cafe for a croissant and some fresh orange juice. The shop I visited was called Rosa Salva. The chocolate croissant I got was quite good and the orange juice was fresh, it seems that fresh squeezed orange juice on the spot is commonplace and it tastes so much better than the orange juice that is from concentrate which I usually get in the US. I sat and watched people walk by and people come into the cafe to get coffee and pastries. It was interesting to watch people approach the bar, order their food or drinks and quickly drink and eat while standing and then paying. A different ritual than we have in the US and not many people took the option to sit at the tables. It was a to-go option, but still while enjoying the ambiance of the cafe. These small shops with standing areas or limited seating is a design that I think could be enjoyable in a downtown setting like Petaluma, especially after covid when the streetside seating became permanent. There is a possibility that this style of a restaurant could be transferred to the US with great success, but it is definitely more successful in Venice since there are no cars to impose on the experience. After enjoying my breakfast I walked out into a small plaza that contained the church of San Salvador. I briefly went inside to see the beauty of another religious monument and it was lovely. Not as grand as the Milano Duomo, but still a grand display of devotion to god. I took some pictures, without flash, and then took off for the bookstore.

When I got to the bookstore it was a little past 9, just after they opened, but it was already filling up with people. I’m glad I did get there so early because I could only imagine how impacted it could be during the day. It was a very small and cramped store with books piled high on top of each other and crammed into odd shelving; such as a boat, a bathtub, or just stacked on a table. There were platforms made out of old books, maybe encyclopedias, so that you could see above the wall for a view of the canal behind the store. I took some pictures trying to capture the quaintness of the store, but I don’t feel the pictures do it justice. There was also a lovely calm black cat sitting by the register watching and waiting for the storekeeper, I assume for some attention and pets.

I left to go back to the hostel, trying to not use Google maps to guide me. I recognized the way back through the narrow and winding streets like it felt natural. It was fun to just wander and wade back through people now that it was a little later and more full of tourists. When I got back to the hostel I saw the two brothers and Ozeil who were just heading out. They had checked out and dropped their bags at the drop-off, but I was leaving Venice shortly; so, we said our goodbyes and exchanged information to keep in touch.

I packed up the rest of my belongings and began walking to the train station. The walk to the station was very busy with people coming to Venice for the weekend. I was happy to be there during the week and the off-season, I can only imagine how crowded it would be during a weekend in the summer. The locals are living a dream and a curse in Venice, kept alive by the thing that likely makes their lives hell, tourism. I got to the station and bought my ticket, but I wanted to get some gelato before I left since I hadn’t had a chance to get some yet. I waded back through the sea of people and came to a gelateria called Gelateria San Leonardo. It was another small shop with little seating, but that was okay since I didn’t want to take my pack off just yet. I got a chocolate chip gelato in a cup so that I could walk and eat on my way back to the train station. Back through the masses. I got back with time to spare and comfortably boarded my train bound for Florence.

Florence

November 12th

On the train I sat next to a couple who were studying in Florence, but were originally from California, they were students of San Luis Obispo. Ross and Sophia; Ross studied finance and Sophia studied plant science. They were just in Venice as well and were heading towards Rome for a night’s stay and sightseeing. They were kind enough to give me a lot of recommendations for things to see and places to eat in Florence. We talked a little about where I was going and where I had already been and they shared what else they had seen in Europe too; lots in Italy, but also Portugal and Sweden. Sophia and I talked a little more about her time at SLO and I mentioned that Zane went there and studied forestry and that he was on the logging team. She also said she was getting poached by the logging team to be the plant identifier which is what Zane was as well. Sophia and I also talked about how she knew Sophia Marquez, Zane’s ex-girlfriend. Sophia volunteered at the same place that Sophia Marquez worked, Swanton Ranch I believe it was called. Small world it can be sometimes, running into people. We exchanged numbers so that when they were back in Florence we could go out together and grab a drink then said our goodbyes.

After I got off the train I walked to my hostel, Florence compared to Venice is a very stark contrast in the atmosphere. The cars on the road and the amount of space devoted to auto infrastructure completely dominated my view. It made me a little sad to be back in a world so dependent on cars, it honestly made me feel that Florence was dirtier than Venice, but I think that was just a quick assumption because of the change. I walked to my hostel down narrow alleyways again, similar to Milan, dodging cars and squeezing by people on the little sidewalk space. The alley the hostel was on is not very impacted by cars though and there were restaurants with seating outside. I arrived at my hostel happy to be back at a familiar chain that I knew would allow me the opportunity to meet many people. The host greeted me warmly and there were 10 or so people sitting in the common area already which was a good sign. I got checked in and headed up to my room on the second floor. The hostel was very nice with an open indoor patio area below the stairs and a common room with ample seating and tables. The rooms though were the best part because they were spectacular, much nicer in comparison to the previous hostel and nearly the same price if not cheaper. I had my bed on the bottom bunk with 3 other beds, 4 total including mine. There was a bathroom in the suite. I wish that I could describe all the components that made it wonderful, but you really just had to be there to understand and to have seen the comparison with the other hostel to see why it really was so much better. After I got into the room I started to unpack and get settled, then the first roommate arrived. His name was Gabriel and it sounded like he was from the British Isles, I assumed England based on his accent. We didn’t talk much since I was just about to head out and do some laundry that they had at the machines they had at the hostel.

I put my clothes in the wash and was pretty hungry so I decided to go to the central market, which Ross and Sophia recommended. On my way over I walked through the leather stands where they were selling handbags, wallets, belts, and more. I couldn’t tell if it was gimmicky or genuine because it seemed almost too easy to be genuine quality leather, maybe I was just being cynical. I walked into the market and found an array of shops with small stands, it was a lovely indoor open-air market. I walked around a little to see what sounded appetizing and then remembered that Ross and Sophia recommended a pasta shop that let you build your own dish. So I walked in the direction they mentioned and luckily found it! It was called F.N. Pastafresca, the line wasn’t too bad when I got there, so I jumped in line and got my order in. Gnocchi with parmesan. It took about 5-10 minutes and it was much better than the gnocchi that I got in Venice. Fresh, warm, and delicious. The gnocchi was still harder than the gnocchi from Cafe Giostra, but it was still very good. I let the plate cool a little so I could hold it while I walked back to the hostel. I wanted to hang out in the common area to see if I could meet some fellow travelers. I got back and sat at a table, but it was still a little too early for people to be back in the hostel from sightseeing for the day. So after I ate I decided to go and see the Duomo at least.

I walked to the Duomo, which was about a 10-minute walk, and was greeted first by a sea of people. Venice was packed because the walkways were narrow, but on the square surrounding the Duomo where there was plenty of space, people we everywhere! I don’t think that I have seen so many people crowding a place like that before, outside of a concert. The cathedral was huge, I think even larger than the Milano Duomo, especially when considering the campanile. I tried to get a good picture of the entire front, but it was too large so I resorted to cutting off corners or getting it from an angle. When standing in front of the cathedral, the dome is not all that visible, you have to view it from the side or further back in order to see the dome. So I walked around to the rear of the cathedral to try and get a better view. There weren’t as many people on this side luckily. I got a few more pictures, but there wasn’t much to see other than the dome from this side. It was a magnificent cathedral, but there was only so much I could do from the outside other than enjoy being in its company. So, I walked back around to the front and made my way back to the hostel. When I got there I got a drink and sat in the common area again, but still not that many people were there. I was texting my parents now that it was early in the morning for them back in California and we decided to have a quick call and catch up on my adventures. I shared some of the differences that I noticed between American and European customs, what I had seen, my thoughts on Venice, and how I was feeling since I was sick when I left for the trip. They were also still a little sick so we took turns coughing on the call.

After I talked with them I went back into the hostel common room and there were a few more people around at this point. We all sat somewhat separated from each other, not knowing one another yet; but I couldn’t take the awkwardness after a few minutes and I introduced myself to the girl sitting next to me. Her name was Sophie and she was originally from Australia but was currently an Au Pair for a family close to Venice. We talked a little about each of our travels and some of the joys of Venice until eventually the man sitting at another table near us also joined our conversation. His name was Joel, pronounced joe-el. He was from the United States, San Antonio currently, but had been traveling in Europe for a few weeks and still had a few to go I believe he said. He was a very charismatic person and tended to dominate the conversation, but that was okay because he was an interesting conversationalist. He talked about how he loathed so many aspects of the United States and felt more at home in Europe and he also talked a little about the politics of the US, disliking the current trend of Republican social negativity. A particular dislike of the US he had was the architectural style in the US, being very boxy, stale, and uniform, but also sometimes not having any uniformity so that it contrasts with other buildings. I agreed with much of what he said and shared that Rohnert Park, where I currently live, was the perfect example of a distasteful suburban city. He said that he was a designer on a contract basis mostly. He worked as a remodel designer, but most recently he had been completing work for smaller-scale booths or events. Designing how an event should be built or set up, which was a pretty interesting line of work that I didn’t know existed. After some more time passed a girl from another table wanted to join our conversation so she pulled up a chair and joined in. Her name was Lydia and not shortly after she pulled up a chair, her friend Erika joined as well. Lastly, there was a woman sitting at the table with us who we sort of pulled into our conversation since she was in the near vicinity, her name was Ninon. Lydia and Erika were from Wisconsin and Ninon was from France, Corsica in particular. Lydia and Erika were traveling Italy and other parts of Europe sometimes together and sometimes separately. Ninon was visiting Florence briefly since Corsica was not too far from Italy so she could make a relatively quick trip over to Italy. Ninon spoke English well enough, but still had some trouble following our conversation or expressing her thoughts well. We tried to piece it together with her and it was all in good fun. Lydia and Erika had just graduated from college; I can’t fully remember what Lydia had studied, but I remember that Erika studied environmental science because she was going to take the LSAT in the hopes of becoming an environmental lawyer. We all talked about our travels, what cities we had been to, what cities we were going to, where else in the world we’d been, where else we want to go, and why we chose Italy this time. It was great to have a fun group going and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. Lydia and Erika went to get some food and I should have jumped to go with them since I was getting hungry too, but I didn’t want to impose. After they left I decided I should get some food too, Sophie said she was getting hungry also and decided to go on the hunt with me.

First, we walked over to the central market again to see what restaurants were still open. When we got there though the first story was closed, I didn’t know there were two stories, but we ascended to the second and found a huge food court! It was also very busy like the rest of Florence, so we shuffled through people to see what restaurants might be appetizing. We both had a hankering for pizza. We looked at all the restaurants and they seemed fine, but not so much in the spirit of being in Italy. Instead, we decided to leave for a little hole in the wall and hopefully something more authentic. I looked on Google maps and found a shop called LiVio Pizzeria. It was fairly close to the hostel so we walked over and put our order in. We each got a pizza to go and walked back to the hostel. It was a good little shop, I got a five-cheese pizza that was fine, I wouldn’t say spectacular, but definitely good. Sophie and I talked a little about the differences between Australia and the US and she dispelled some of the beliefs that I had about the country. She said that the middle of the country is not really a desolate wasteland like the impression I had. We also talked about how much the US influences Australia, she said that there are not many Australian movies or TV shows and that many of the shows that Australians watch are just shows from the US. We got back to the hostel and ate our pizza. She thought that she would make some more friends and share her pizza with some other people in the common room and I didn’t finish all of mine so went up to the kitchen to wrap it up for later. After storing my pizza I went back to my dorm room where another roommate had arrived, Sunny. Sunny was from California as well, she recently graduated from USC after getting her master’s in Entrepreneurship and she had previously gone to Stanford. At Stanford, she played beach volleyball which is what gave her the opportunity to study at Stanford. Since she graduated she thought she would travel the world a little before jumping into the corporate world working. She lauded her parents for being supportive of her desire to explore before going to work. Then we talked a little about entrepreneurship since I had also been an entrepreneurship major, even though I didn’t get my masters in it. I talked about Virtual Frontier and my current job at PG&E, and how it was somewhat related to entrepreneurship. We also talked about how we would still like to start our own businesses at some point, but it not being the right time for either of us. Sunny said that she wanted to try and work for a start-up and if possible work internationally because she wants different business exposure. It was a fun conversation with someone who had a similar mind like me and she was a really kind person so I was glad she was my roommate. She was going to take a shower and then she might join me downstairs.

I headed back down to the common room to see if I could find some of my previous companions. I didn’t see anyone at first, but then I saw Ninon and she was sitting with a new person named Vanessa. Vanessa was from Colorado and she was touring Europe for many months, about being halfway through her trip at this point. She was from Colorado and had been staying at Airbnb’s for most of her trip. She also said that she had only spoken to 5 Americans for about 3 weeks and was happy to meet me and speak fluent English! We also talked about our travels, the common questions when meeting fellow travelers. Then the live music started to play and not shortly thereafter Joel returned. He had to find another place to stay for the night because the hostel had been double booked by a booking service and he got the short end of the stick, but he wanted to come back for the live music and hang out some more. Then we had some more friends join, Erika and Lydia. Vanessa shared that she had tried micro-dosing mushrooms and that she missed doing that and wanted to again. I was curious to hear what her experience of micro-dosing mushrooms was like; she said it was a very small amount that she would usually take so it would not impact her daily life all that much but would change her perception of the material world. She said that if you were to take more it would impact your life more, but she didn’t take enough for that to occur. She said the amount she took even allowed her to work and drive, although I didn’t really trust that she was being very responsible when she said she was driving. Anyways an interesting recounting of her experience. It was getting late at this point and I decided to call it for the night, so I said my goodbyes and headed up to bed. I saw Sunny back in the room and she shared that she had been followed back to the hostel which was crushing to hear. I felt bad for her, but I couldn’t understand that experience because typically guys just don’t have that risk. She brushed it off, but I felt bad so I offered to hang out tomorrow with her if she wanted.

November 13th

I was woken up by our final roommate early in the morning because his alarm was going off while he was in the bathroom, not advised if hosteling. Sunny climbed out of bed and turned off the alarm. Then while the other roommate was still getting ready he sprayed body spray all over his body which then permeated throughout the rest of the room. Again, not advised if hosteling. Some pretty inconsiderate actions when sharing a space with other people. So I didn’t go back to sleep after that and just slowly woke up in bed. I checked my phone and found out that it had not been charging the whole night, another unfortunate addition to my morning. So I then started getting out of bed and found my wall charger instead of the USB charger that they provided so that I could quickly charge my phone. While it was charging I got dressed. After I got dressed I look to see what I was going to do for the day because I didn’t plan the night before. I looked at the Uffizi to see what tickets were available and found they were all sold out. The final unfortunate discovery of my morning. In a worried state I got my things together so that I could go have a quick breakfast downstairs, Sunny wasn’t up yet so I didn’t think she would be joining me. I went downstairs and got a great breakfast that they had available, buffet style. I continued to charge my phone while I ate and when I was done I took off for the Uffizi gallery in the hopes that there wouldn’t be that many people up early and in line for at-the-door tickets.

I walked over and it was pretty quiet when I arrived, a good sign. Then Sophie spotted me, she had the same morning of sold-out ticket discovery and hope that no one would be in line early. So we joined forces and went to the ticket booth. Our assumptions were right, there were only two people ahead of us. So we got our tickets and got in line to get into the gallery. This line to get in was more impacted since it included those who had pre-booked their tickets online. The line was consistent and long but moved fairly well to the start of the tour. Then we arrived in the first main hall to see a multitude of busts, statues of various persons throughout history. The carvings were predominately Roman and Greek, if not all Roman and Greek. I was particularly interested in marble carvings, I found that artistic medium to be a really impressive feat of artwork. I have never tried to carve marble, but I can only imagine that working with a chisel and a hammer is not something that would be easy. I mean being a successful and skilled painter wouldn’t be easy either, but even starting to paint would be an easier level of entry than it would marble sculpting. So I would think. The sculptures were definitely captivating, some more than others. Some that stood out to me were Julius Caesar for being, well, Julius Caesar. Emperor Vespasian because the description of his profile shared that he wished his bust to be an accurate and realistic style. He had a furrowed brow, a balding head, a square head, and small eyes. It was different than the other carvings, I don’t necessarily remember seeing a sculpture that captured a balding person so maybe that’s what initially drew me into the sculpture. There was also a carving of Marcus Aurelius so I had to read more about that since I was currently reading his meditations, but there was nothing that stood out as spectacular to me when looking at his bust. Nothing strikingly different than all the others.

The rest of the museum was paintings. I am not as into paintings as I mentioned before when I went to the Accademia in Venice, but I was open to seeing what might catch my eye. The first thing that I liked was the way that the halos for saints were painted by Bartolomeo. The halo is so faint that it really looks like the halo is hovering above the head of these religious icons. But it is still clearly visible and blends with the painting to seem opaque. That skill in painting amazes me that someone would be able to overlay the image in such a way so that it still displays the background while also presenting the halo so clearly. The painting showed this clearly to me, and there were likely others, but it was The Vision of St. Bernard that caught my eye. There was a painting by Hans Memling called Our Lady of Sorrows that was of Mother Mary crying. the painting was of incredible detail and definition it appeared as if it were a picture. The folds in her clothes and the shadows that they created invoked such a lifelike quality to the painting. The last picture that interested me was called Portrait of a Girl with a Book, it was also incredibly realistic. The gold chain and headband that the girl in the painting was wearing seemed like I could reach into the painting and pull the gold jewelry into the world. Some really stunning pieces of work. There was a lot in the Uffizi and I only came out with a handful that made me truly fascinated by the level of quality and artistic ability, but there were plenty of others that were interesting either for their depictions of history or other qualities. I could have probably spent more time there and I did miss a section since I went a little out of order, but it is a really large museum and it’s almost impossible to see it all in one visit.

After finishing at the Uffizi, I wanted to go and grab some lunch. Ross and Sophia suggested going to the other side of the river for some more inexpensive and good-quality food, so I thought I would take a walk over the Ponte Vecchio as well. The bridge was interesting in that it had shops lining the walkway, but I wouldn’t say it was all that fascinating. Cool to see yes, but not something to go out of my way to see. I crossed the bridge, after taking some pictures of the Arno river of course, and looked around for some food. I found a place called Amici Do Ponte Vecchio which served sandwiches. It was a tiny shop with little seating and one man working the counter and kitchen. I got a Purgatorio sandwich which was bacon pecorino cheese, onion, and something called rocket salad. It was quite good and not expensive at all, Ross and Sophia have hit two on the mark at this point.

After lunch, I wanted to see if there was much of a line at the Pitti Palace since it was on this side of the river. I walked over there and got some gelato along the way, but when I saw the line I thought that today wouldn’t be the time to go in. Instead, I went over to the Piazzale Michelangelo which was back the way I came, unfortunately. The walk was about 30 minutes to the top of the lookout point and it was a little steep at times, but still overall not very challenging so, manageable. The hike up had some good views of Florence, but the top of the hill definitely had the best-unobstructed view of the city and all its landmarks. There was also a wonderful view of the Arno river lined by grass shoulders. I also saw a classic sight of the Italian Tuscan countryside. There were still plenty of houses for the density, but it was much more typical for the countryside than Florence was, at least based on what I saw in movies, shows, or pictures. I finished up with the sightseeing there and moved on to the other side of town, back to the main side. I took my time since my feet were pretty tired at that point and wandered down through a pathway that reminded me a little of the filbert steps in San Francisco, not steps, but a nature pathway that was reminiscent of the steps. I also walked past a bridge that had some growth or natural rock formation called Fontes Rampe di Pogi. It was really unique and cool to see in the middle of the city. I made it back to the hostel and finally took my shoes off and relaxed for a bit. I had some downtime before I was due for a walking tour so my feet needed to rest.

When 4:30 started to roll around I headed over to the Basilica of San Lorenzo where we were scheduled to meet Deborah, my tour guide. I was a little early so I went to find something to snack on and I found Caffe Agora where they had some cream-filled donuts. It was good, just what I needed for a quick snack. I rejoined the group which was up to about 12 or 15 people at this point. There were people from Canada, Italy, Spain, the United States like me, and Australia. The tour was of course in English. The tour was focused mainly on the Renaissance and the Medici family, so Deborah started by explaining that the church we were standing in front of was a beneficiary of the Medici family. It was worked on by Fillipo Brunelleschi and paid for by the Medici family and it contains all the Medici family members’ burial sites. Then Deborah took us down to the Medici bank called the Palazzo Medici Riccardi. This was the largest building built in the city at its construction, but it was not an impressive building, a very plain facade. The Medici at this time had enough money and power to build bigger, but they were not royalty or town leaders yet, they were still patrons of the city of Florence so they respected their status as one of the people and only demonstrated their power with the size of what they could build. A component of the building that she pointed out was the bench seating on the outside of the building on the perimeter. This was so that patrons of the bank could sit while waiting for their turn to do business. It was unique and considerate of the common people, goodwill for the Medici family. At this point, the head of the family was a very young man named Lorenzo Medici and he managed the bank and de facto ruled the city with his brother Giuliano. The Medici were the bank for the papacy as well at this point and the pope had asked the Medici bank to finance a new conquest of a city in Tuscany. However, this city in Tuscany was owned by the Florentine republic, so the Medici would be financing the conquest of a city owned by the republic in which they live. They turned down the pope, which upset him of course, and this presented an opportunity for the second most powerful bank in Florence called the Pazzi. As tensions grew between the Pazzi/the Pope and the Medici a conspiracy began to culminate. The Pazzi’s intended to kill Lorenzo and Giuliano in the cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore. A sin to be sure, but because the Pope was on the side of the Pazzi they were offered pardons to dispose of the Medici rulers. The Pazzis attempted to kill both of the brothers, but they failed to kill Lorenzo and only killed Giuliano. After this, Lorenzo went on a revenge killing of the entire Pazzi family and even some of those related to the pope. After Lorenzo killed a relative of the Pope a war erupted between Florence and the papacy, which also included other Italian regional nations. We then continued on down to the Duomo and Deborah told us more about the Renaissance work that was related to the Duomo. She first covered the baptistery and in particular the doors of the baptistery. These doors were gold-plated and depicted religious iconography. The only iconography that I can remember is for the western doors that face the cathedral. The western doors depict 10 scenes from the Old Testament. These doors were termed the gates of paradise. Two sets of doors were completed by Lorenzo Ghiberti, his first set of doors took him 21 years to complete and the second set, the gates of paradise, took him 27 years to complete. We then continued on to the Duomo construction. Deborah informed us that the construction was completed by Fillipo Brunelleschi and this was his first construction project. He had bid for another project previously but embarrassingly did not receive the award. Florence had attempted to have builders bid for the construction of the dome, but all the prior bids were not feasible. Not until Brunelleschi did a feasible plan come together and Florence decided to take a chance on him to build the dome. Brunelleschi would go on to complete the dome and develop new construction techniques for its development. The most interesting being that he created two domes so that he could reduce the square footage requirement of the dome directly above the opening. Brunelleschi would come to be considered the father of the Renaissance. There was much more information Deborah provided, but that was some of the key points on that topic. We continued on to the Palazzo Vecchio. Deborah jumped forward to the Medici now having taken control of Florence and becoming the royal family and rulers of Tuscany. The first ruler, Cosimo decided to take up residence at the former administration offices for the region at the Palazzo Vecchio. His wife was not pleased to be living in a castle and wished to live in a palace instead. Cosimo attempted to appease her by building additions to the Palazzo, but this did not quell her desires. Instead, she bought the Pitti Palace on the other side of the Arno river. This created a problem because there was no way for Cosimo to visit his wife safely at her new place. So, Cosimo built a secret pathway above the walkways and through the building in the Uffizi and over the Ponte Vecchio so that he and his wife could traverse back and forth to visit each other safely. We had reached the end of our tour and Deborah was great, I gave her a tip and then headed back to the hostel, I was tired. It had been a long day already and it was only 6:30!

On the way back I was hungry but I didn’t want to get anything big or go sit anywhere so I decided to go to the central market again and see what they had which was quick. I ended up getting a burger and ate there and then walked back to my hostel. It still wasn’t very late at this point so I went back up to my room to put my feet up some more and relax. After some time I went back downstairs because there was going to be karaoke in the hostel common room and I thought that would be fun to watch. When I got down there Erika and Lydia were already sitting so I joined them. The karaoke started not too long after that and Shawn, who was a volunteer resident at the hostel, kicked it off. He sang some and then more of the crowd started to sign as well. It was fun to watch them do pop, country, hip-hop, and foreign songs from Mexico, Mozambique, and Germany. After some convincing from Erika, Lydia went up to sing and she blew the competition away. She had really great control of her tone and pitch, much better than any of the other singers, really impressive. Near the end of this group a person named Sean got up to sing a Michael Bubble song, Feeling Good, and he killed it! His voice was really on point and the pitch was great. A treat to hear him sing, and he seemed apprehensive at first. There was a bit of a lul of people wanting to get up to sing so Shawn paused it and we went to hanging out again. Erika continued to try and convince Lydia to sing more and I considered singing a Frank Sinatra song or a country song. After a while, some other girls got up to sing a repeat song and then Erika went back up again and sang a Sara Bareilles song that was a lot of fun. I finally got up the courage to sing as well and I chose Blue Moon by Frank Sinatra. I was pretty nervous but I went into singing nonetheless. I did fairly well, but not as well as I thought I could, I sang in an octave a little bit higher than the song was sung by Frank Sinatra and I didn’t think my voice was all that full. I think the next time I will have some more confidence so I will try to focus on singing in a lower octave like I do when at home or in the car! Still, it was a lot of fun and I will definitely feel more comfortable singing again in the future, I’ll have to try with friends back home. After I sang I was tired though, so I went up to bed, tomorrow was going to be a busy long day again so I should get some good rest.

November 14th

I woke up slowly again since the first thing I was going to see, the Duomo, was not scheduled until 9:30. I got a good breakfast downstairs again in the hostel common room and then headed out to the Duomo. I had a set time, but there was still a bit of a line to get in with reserved tickets. I waited maybe 10 or 15 minutes until I was inside the Duomo. I had heard that the inside of the cathedral was not all that impressive, but it looked interesting enough inside. I could see how people would say it is empty though. The Milan duomo was more impressive on its interior. I started to climb the stairs and it was varying degrees of steepness and narrowness. We came out onto a ledge at the top of the interior of the cathedral, just before the dome portion and I could see the painted ceiling of the dome much more clearly now. Then, back to the climb. The stairs started to ascend the dome portion of the building now, I could see the curvature of the interior some and of course the exterior dome on the other side of me as well. The stairs were a little steeper at this point, but there was not much climbing left. Finally, I emerged out of the dome and onto the balcony at the peak. A stunning view of Florence in all directions. I took some pictures and enjoyed the sights, but then I made my way back down. There’s not much to do up there honestly, but the views are definitely enjoyable. After I made my way down the dome I took a break because I could feel my knee hurting a little from all the stairs. After I had sat for some time I went into the Duomo museum which was right behind the domed portion of the building. Most of the statues and exterior facade components were removed and kept in the museum to protect them from the elements. The ones currently on the dome are replicas, so I wanted to see what the museum had in a more accessible view.

The museum had three levels. On the first, I saw many of the statues and carvings from the front facade of the cathedral. There were also the doors from the baptistery, two pairs of doors from Lorenzo Ghiberti and one pair of doors from Andrea Pisano. The most impressive of the doors were the cathedral-facing ones, titled the gates of paradise. They were intricate carvings covered in gold of scenes from the old testament and I felt lucky to be able to see them up close. Something that stood out to me was the polished portions of the door in which the gold covering had been removed. People throughout history had touched the doors so many times that the gold had been removed. It felt like I could visibly see a connection to those who had lived centuries ago when the real doors were still on the baptistery. I wondered what people thought of the doors when it was part of their everyday use at the cathedral. Did they take the works of art for granted and just use them as doors or did they use them with care and caution because of their artistic value? No matter how people previously viewed them, I was enjoying a personal viewing of them.

The first floor also had a room that housed some examples of tools and machinery invented and utilized by Brunelleschi during the construction of the dome. It was interesting to see all that was used and how seemingly modern the tools were. There was also safety equipment for workers which I found interesting because I thought to the construction of the Golden Gate bridge had limited worker safety that was utilized. Was there a period when worker safety got worse? Or was the worker safety also still very limited during the construction of the duomo. After touring the first floor I went up to the second level which had more carvings and statues from the campanile. There were carvings of important religious figures, personifications of the planets known at the time, virtues of the Christian faith, and skills of humanity. It was interesting to see what value was placed on different art forms, skills, and knowledge at the time of the carvings. There was not much else on the second level that interested me so I made my way to the top level which was a terrace looking out to the dome of the Duomo. It was a pleasant view, but not much else to see so I left after not too long. I enjoyed this museum more than I thought I would and am glad that I went in to see, thanks to Deborah from the walking tour recommending the museum.

After the museum it was lunchtime and I was getting somewhat hungry so I made my way over to Al Antico Vinaio which was suggested to me by Bryce Williams since he studied abroad in Florence. I saw the line yesterday and it was incredibly long, but that was during the weekend and in the afternoon. I hoped that on a Monday and just before noon the line would be short. I was right and I only had to wait for about 15/20 minutes for my food, I got the sandwich called Beatrice which had raw thin slices of beef, stracchino cheese, cream of truffle sauce, and rocket leaves. It was really good, the beef was an incredibly good-tasting spiced meat and the cheese was really good too. The truffle sauce was okay, I didn’t notice all that much taste with it for some reason and the rocket leaves seemed to be a little overpowering in the middle of the sandwich, probably could have been a little more evenly spread. Either way, it was good, but if the line was longer than it was it might not be worth it.

After I ate I wandered over to the museum in Palazzo Vecchio, another suggestion from Deborah. She specifically suggested the town because it would have the best view of the Duomo. I got there and there was no line, but I was not able to reserve a spot for the tower until 3:15 in the afternoon. So I got my ticket for the museum and then would go up in the tower later. The museum was interesting, the art was more integrated into the palace since it was meant to be on display for a normal setting if a king was to have guests and present his palace and works of art. It was just organized in a different manner and stood out to me. The ceilings in particular were the main focus of the art. Depicting success of the rulers, religious scenes, and family members. It made me wonder why they chose the ceilings for all these pieces of art and had them directly integrated into the ceiling rather than standalone pieces of work. it was also interesting to see the palace because it was in small individual rooms called apartments. There seemed to be some rooms grouped together for people such as the queen, she had 6 or so apartments, and then there were other patrons of the courts that as part of their service they were provided apartments, maybe one room maybe more. It was interesting to learn that the palace had to provide lodging for people working in the court. People living and working for the royal family in the same place, the epicenter of power. There was also a really interesting map room that had maps drawn of the various parts of the world that had been discovered at that time. Some are more detailed than others, but very interesting to see, I hadn’t seen any maps on display in a museum before. Speaks to the uniqueness of this museum displaying the palace and how it was utilized for work. Near the end of the tour, it was a little confusing where to go next so this girl close by and I tried to figure out where to go next. Luckily there was a museum attendant nearby and they informed us that the next section was actually closed. After we got that information we stopped and talked for a little since we were both touring the museum alone. Her name was Emma and she was from Boston visiting some friends who were studying in Florence. She was only visiting Florence and she was leaving Tuesday as well. She wasn’t staying at a hostel like I was and was just in a hotel instead. We exchanged information so that we could hang out that evening or the next day if we wanted and went our separate ways.

I still had some energy and time to kill before climbing the tower of the Palazzo Vecchio so I decided to walk over to the Church of Santa Croce and see what that was like. It had been suggested by a couple of other people as well so hopefully, it was interesting. There was no line to get in when I arrived, but there were plenty of people inside. I looked through some of the religious iconographies, but not much stood out in particular. Something that was interesting was how the burial sites were directly on the floor of the church, there must have been more than 50 people buried within the actual footprint of the church.

I was about halfway through when I discovered I had lost my keys! I figured I left them at the bag lockers of the Palazzo Vecchio, but I wanted to hurry back in the chance that the attendant didn’t grab them. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to continue the touring of the church, but getting my keys was more important. I walked back to the palace and in the bag room, the attendant recognized me and was able to provide me with my keys. Thank God. It was fairly close to my tower climbing appointment so I hung around in the plaza people-watching until my reservation came around.

3:15 rolled around and I joined the group waiting to climb the tower. There weren’t nearly as many people as there were for the Duomo climb, maybe 20 or so people. We climbed to the top of the building first and got to look out over the city and then I climbed up the tower itself. It was narrow, but not as claustrophobic or steep as the Duomo. There was a little tower room before reaching the top and then a small set of stairs to reach the open top of the tower.

Finally, I was at the top and could see the city in all directions. Unfortunately, they didn’t let us get close to the edge, but I was still able to take some photos. There was a little riser balcony that faced the Duomo and I was able to take some incredible photos of the cathedral. Little did I know that the time of day would be perfect for shadows and setting sunlight pouring over the red-roofed building. They might be some of the best photos I’ve ever taken, just such a spectacular view. It was another great suggestion from Deborah to see the sights from the tower because you could see the main feature of Florence, the Duomo, in all its greatness.

After I took some photos I went back down and made it back to my hostel. I was exhausted from walking and touring all day so I laid in my bed for an hour or so. Sunny got back and we chilled and caught up with each other on our experiences for the day. She went for a wine-tasting and pasta-making experience that she found on Airbnb. While we were sitting in the room another person showed up, a new roommate. Her name was Liz and she was from New York, she worked as an admin in the finance world or she used to because she had just quit her job and was taking a year off to relax, she called it her Liz-battical. Liz was only in Florence for the night before she went to Rome and meet up with her family. Sunny and I shared about our travels some and then another person walked in, Mimi. Mimi was from San Diego and she was sightseeing in Florence for just the night because she was going back to Nice where she was an Au Pair. Mimi had originally been a teacher with a master’s degree in San Diego before getting burnt out from all the stress that job brought. So, now she works as a consultant for teachers’ retirement planning and as an Au Pair. They were both fun new people to have as roommates even if it was only for one night. They already ate and were thinking of going to a bar, but I was still hungry so I decided that I would go and get food before joining them. I was also checking in with Lydia and Erika to see what they were up to and hopefully I would be able to do something with Emma. I looked around for some restaurants that served gnocchi because I wanted to find a gnocchi dish that beat Cafe Giostra. I found Braciere Malatesta which had gnocchi that looked good and they opened at 7. The three girls left and then I went to the restaurant.

I walked into Braciere Malatesta and was the only and likely first person in the restaurant, I still hadn’t gotten used to Italians eating so late. I was seated and then waited on rather quickly since I was the only person there. I got a house chianti and then ordered the gnocchi. I only had to wait 5/10 minutes for my food to arrive and it looked incredible. Just as it looked, it tasted incredible, it had some truffle specks in the gorgonzola sauce. The potato dumplings were pillowed and soft to the touch. Finally, a gnocchi dish that could beat Cafe Giostra. There was plenty to fill me up, but I felt I could have had another serving because it was so good. I gathered up the rest of the sauce with the bread and polished my bowl. After the main course, I was offered dessert, and I chose the chocolate cake. The cake was warmed up and served with strawberries and some cream sauce. The cake had a spongey base and a dense chocolate top. It was also quite delicious. For not being a foody, I was really enjoying all the food that I was having in Italy and especially this place. I paid my check and then headed out to meet up with my roommates who were at a rooftop bar called View on Art.

It was a cool little place and had a great view of the Duomo at night, but it was also quite dead when I got there with maybe 10 people including the three girls. I joined them mid-conversation in a deep topic related to the cultural differences between the US and Europe, in particular, wealth and social inequality. We continued traversing equality issues, a sense of entitlement, and another big one was the impact of social media on our lives. We also talked about some lighter topics such as enneagrams which are similar to the Myers-Briggs test, but their own thing. I wasn’t sure what number I matched with but 2 and then 1 seemed closest. The girls talked a little about horror scopes and what signs each of us was, but I’m not that interested in signs so I just listened along.

After a couple drinks, they were hungry and wanted to go get some food, they had an interest in Asian cuisine since they hadn’t had it for a while when in Italy. I wasn’t going to eat anything, but I wandered along with them to enjoy the company. When we got to the restaurant we continued the deep conversations, mostly about family this time and the relationships we have with our family members. We also talked about the cities we live in and how they impact our lives, a big topic was how safety is in each of the cities. After they finished eating we decided to head back to the hostel and have a drink or two there. When we got back we went to the common room to play some board games. Lydia and Erika were in there with some other friends and I offered them to join us, but they were having fun so decided not to. The four of us got some drinks and then played cards against humanity. It was a lot of fun and a little confusing at times because it was the UK version so there were some cards that didn’t exactly make sense to us Americans. It was fun though and in the end, I wound up winning! The night was late at that point and the three of them headed upstairs to go to bed and I stayed a little longer hanging out with Lydia and Erika. There were a few other people there, one from the US and two from Australia, then a little later another person from the US joined us. I hung out with them for a little bit I was also tired so I went up to bed. Unfortunately, Emma was out all night with her friends and was tired too so we didn’t get to spend time together. I was drunker than I thought and I stayed up much later than I should have since I was due to wake up and head to the Accademia early the next morning. I think I had about 4 different types of alcohol and 5 drinks overall, it was too much and I was spinning in bed trying to fall asleep.

November 15th

I paid for my foolishness in the morning because I woke up early feeling unwell, my stomach. I really did not want to throw up in a hostel and inconvenience my roommates. So, I tried to hold it together, but a few moments felt too great to not lean over the toilet. Luckily I didn’t throw up and felt I might just need some food. I garnered enough energy to go downstairs and grab some food. As I was walking away with food I felt like I might vomit and used as much strength as I possibly could to hold it in and make it back upstairs. Thankfully I didn’t throw up and had some of the food and orange juice before curling up in my bed. It was already past my Accademia appointment for the morning so I was afraid that I might not be able to see David. I slept for maybe an hour and then felt much better. I finished my food and orange juice, got my things together, and then walked out to the Accademia. Hopefully, I would still be able to get in because I had enough time before my train to Vernazza. I walked over and there was not much of a line, but they still let me use my reservation booking which was very kind of them. I toured some of the Accademia, but I wasn’t all that interested in the paintings. There was a small section on musical instruments which was interesting, I saw some really old clarinets. I hurried through and got to David, the main attraction. David was incredible, everything I was expecting. He had such detail in his hand, arms, neck, and feet. I don’t know how Michelangelo was able to craft something so intricate from marble using a chisel. It really inspired me and I felt like I could have stood there inspecting David for hours. Deborah shared on the tour that the sculpture was much different than other sculptures of the time because it was to represent a person who was accurate and an honest representation of David. Other sculptures gave the heroes hero qualities, massive muscles, abs that didn’t really exist, and not fair representations of humans. Michelangelo decided to give David realistic qualities to show the people of the time the strength that an average person could strive to achieve. David also had subtle details such as the veins in his hands and arm clutching the stones and his neck stressed and tense. He had a furrowed brow and clenched jaw to show his anxiety and determination in anticipation of facing Goliath. It was all incredible and it inspired me. I felt like sculpting was something I might want to attempt and to channel Michelangelo in creating something accurate and honest.

I also saw another sculpture in the Accademia called View of the Innocent by Lorenzo Bartolini which depicted a young woman taking her vow of chastity, for some reason the sculpture drew my attention and it was also quite beautiful. It was much smaller and I think only a mold or some practice sculpting, but it was still captivating.

I left the Accademia not too shortly thereafter because I needed to get back to the hostel and pack up my things and catch my train. I walked back and thought I should get some food too, so I stopped briefly in the central market to get some quick pizza. It didn’t take long and I was back on my way to the hostel, where I packed up my things, said goodbye to Sunny, and checked out. I was already late so I had a feeling I would miss my train. I was in no hurry so I got the next train ticket and waited for my ride to arrive.

Florence was an incredible experience, I grew socially, artistically, in courage, and in confidence. I loved the few nights I spent there and was sad to be leaving, but with so many others leaving as well it seemed to be destiny for me to move on. The hostel traveling experience is strange in that bonds are created so quickly and can be so strong, but because they are brief trips we have to say goodbye and be on our way. I enjoy the quick relationships but hope that I can stay in touch with some of the amazing people I met. Lydia, Erika, Sean, Sunny, Joel, Sophie, Emma, Liz, and Mimi were really wonderful people to have spent a few days in Florence with.

Vernazza – Cinque Terre

November 15th

I arrived in Vernazza and wandered from the small train stop through the one road that the small hamlet had. I was instructed to meet Viola in front of the Farmacia so that she could guide me to the VRBO where I was staying at. It wasn’t a very far walk because the town was so small and it seemed sparsely populated in the off-season. Viola was kind and showed me the apartment and some of the amenities, it was really quite basic, but nice to have my own space. She said goodbye and left me to unpack. I got all my things out and it was particularly nice to be able to take my bathroom items out of the travel bag instead of fishing for each item like I had been the nights prior. Once I got settled I went out to explore the village a little. I walked down to the sea to see what the view was like, it was still light out, just getting to the evening so it was a nice time for pictures. Unfortunately, it was raining a little so I was switching between my raincoat, on and off. The sea was also quite choppy due to the turbulent weather, but it made for some nice photographs. The village was beautiful, the colored buildings with a backdrop of terraced vineyards were something out of a fairytale. The sea was also a bright blue color making for all the colors to pop out and create stunning visuals.

I wandered more through the village, trying to get a little higher and I found my way toward the hiking trail that led to Monterosso Al Mare. I wasn’t going to do that hike because it was a little longer than I wanted, but the entrance to the hike gave me some beautiful views of the village and the coastline. The narrow passageways reminded me of Venice a little, but instead of bridges, it was all stairs. As I roamed around I saw that many of the shops and restaurants were closed, and only a few remained open in the off-season. I knew this going in, but I didn’t expect the town to be as deserted as it was. After I roamed for a couple hours I went back to my apartment to see what I might want to do for dinner and also just rest.

I relaxed for a little and then decided to go and get some dinner at one of the open restaurants near the marina, a place called Masa e Masa I believe. I tried to look it up on Google maps while writing this and it didn’t even show up. That was another issue with visiting, since so many things were only closed for the off-season many restaurants still showed open on Google maps even though they were closed. Anyways, I walked into the restaurant and sat inside since it was a little rainy. There was a small backroom with indoor seating that had a handful of tourists enjoying meals. I ordered a limoncello spritz and a pizza with spicy salami. The pizza was good but drenched in sauce, not pizza sauce but something else, almost like it was grease and spice. It was good but made for a messy eating experience. I don’t normally get something other than cheese pizza, but I had gotten that so much lately that I needed to try something else. While eating there was a group of people from Spain I assume because it sounded like they were speaking Spanish. They were incredibly loud and obnoxious, but also they were vaping in the restaurant, the first time I had seen that. It didn’t seem like any of the other patrons or staff were bothered, but it seemed uncommon. After dinner, I got a chocolate cake which was quite good, but not as good as Malatesta in Florence. I finished my meal and left the restaurant to head back to my apartment. I was thinking about stopping in at a bar, but there didn’t seem to be any open. So, I went back to my apartment and hung out there for the rest of the night. Enjoyed a nice shower and got to bed early since I hadn’t gotten much sleep the night before.

November 16th

I woke up later than I thought I would, but I guess since I was so tired I needed to catch up on sleep. I quickly got together and headed out for the day. I stopped at the same restaurant where I got dinner for a quick breakfast where I got a chocolate croissant and an orange juice. Then I found my way to the top of town to begin the hike to Corniglia. The hike was supposed to take about an hour or so to complete. I got a lot of really great views and pictures of Vernazza when I was first heading out and I could still see Monterosso Al Mare in the background.

I continued my way up the stairs, it was a little more humid than I was expecting since it had just rained so it was a more challenging hike than I was anticipating and I was paying for wearing pants. There were olive farms scattered along the pathway and not many vineyards at the start of the hike. The views all along the coast were stunning and I frequently stopped, one to catch my breath, but also just to take in the views. I reached about halfway and came across a tiny little village nestled in the mountainside, there was a restaurant, bar, hotel, and that was about it other than maybe a few houses. They all seemed closed since it was the off-season, but I could imagine the special treat it would have been to visit there in such a romantic setting.

At this point my knee was hurting me a little, I had hurt it at home playing soccer a while ago, and going down the stairs so much was making it ache. I slowed down and tried to be more careful, but I was afraid for the rest of the day because I was supposed to explore the remaining four towns and they would surely be filled with stairs. The second half of the hike gave me great views of Corniglia and the coast as well. There were a few spots where a rock slide occurred from the recent rains, but it was fairly minimal so I was able to walk around them. I also came across a few additional people coming the other direction from Corniglia, said ciao and continued on.

Then I finally reached Corniglia. I wandered into the town and down the main road, there was only one main road where cars could drive. Vernazza didn’t let cars past at the top of the town’s entrance, but it seemed like Corniglia allowed cars all the way into town. Then it got too narrow and just became footpaths through the city center. I walked through the main path and found my way to an overlook, there was not much else to see in Corniglia as it was pretty small and this town didn’t have access to the sea. I waded a little more through the streets but I quickly ran out of differentiation of my views. So I decided to head to the train station so I could grab a train ride to the next town Manarola. The train station was down at the bottom of the hill which was near the ocean. I was pretty tight on time to make my train so I had to hurry down the steps which hurt my knee some. I made it in time thankfully and got on my train.

The train ride was very quick to Manarola, about 3 minutes. Manarola had a tunnel that lead to the main part of the town. When I got out of the tunnel it was raining slightly so I covered up with a rain jacket and tried to protect my camera. I walked down towards the marina and there was an elevated plaza along the way with stairs for pedestrians and also a small little car driveway. I don’t think even the tiny European trucks would fit through there, maybe only a small Fiat. I walked down to the marina, passing some shops and there was actually a decent amount of people touring this town, more so than people were in Vernazza it seemed. The marina had a pathway that led up to an overlook point, most people seemed to be taking the lower path so I decided to take the upper path and see where that led. It was a little steep, but not for too long and when I reached the top there was a little open gate that I could walk down which led into a park. I assumed the park would be packed with kids during the busy season but when I visited it was deserted. The park had some stairs that led down to the section where the lower path took people so I emerged at the same place anyway. It was a beautiful overlook point and seemed to be the town most catered towards tourists so far.

I wandered slowly back down that lower path to the marina mouth, although the mouth of the marina seemed to only allow suspended access to the sea. There was one boat ramp, but it was pretty windy and narrow so it seemed like most boats would use the suspended load crane to gain access to the sea. I headed back through the elevated plaza and walked to the top of the town to see what the view was like. The town road curved so much that it wasn’t really possible to get a straight view down to the marina so I took some pictures and walked back down. I was a little hungry at this point so I stopped in at a focaccia pizza place called Il Discovolo La Spezia which only took cash. I got some pizza and sat for a little while eating. Then I wanted to get some gelato so I did at a gelateria and bar place called Bar Enrica. The gelato was quite good, probably the best I had at this point, just a small cup of it. Something interesting about the gelaterias in Italy is they don’t ask for the size or number of scoops you want, you just get what they give you. I sat and ate my gelato looking out over the water and enjoyed the view some more. Then I wandered back to the train station so I could board a train to Riomaggiore.  I think Manarola was my favorite town so far. While I was buying my ticket, a couple from South Africa was trying to decipher the ticket machine. They watched what I did and then asked if I would help them, they were very kind and I obliged especially since we all spoke English so it was easy to help. After some patience, we got their tickets as well and we parted ways.

Again this train ride was quite short, maybe even less than three minutes. Riomaggiore had another underpass that led to the main part of the town. Once I came out from the underpass I could go to the marina or up to the top of the town. I decided to walk up first and see the view, if there was one, of the whole town. I followed the main road and then I turned around to head to the castle overlook point. On my way to the castle, I stumbled upon a cat hunting some pigeons or attempting to. It stopped for a moment to approach me for some pets and then went back to work. I also then went back to work hiking through the town.

I came to the castle and was able to get a wonderful overlook of the sea, but it was not really all that different than the other towns and there was some construction going on so I couldn’t get to as many overlook points as I might have normally been able to. I turned around to head back down, but I found a very narrow and winding path to take instead which would terminate at the marina. There were some workers carrying wooden planks up these narrow stairs as I passed by them, must be some very challenging work to try and traverse the steps which are steep and narrow with heavy equipment and materials like that. The walkways I took were so narrow they seemed like walkways to someone’s home and I didn’t know if I was supposed to be there.

Ultimately, I did arrive at the marina and got to see the front of the town which was quaint. I could go up and around the other side of the mouth of the marina to a beach on the side of the town, so I did. As I approached the beach the water was a little too choppy for me to continue and make it to the beach so I got some pictures and walked back. I could imagine during the busy season it would be challenging to compete with the crowds through the narrow streets. I walked back up to the underpass and then to the train station. I was pretty exhausted at this point, but I had one more town to visit, Monterosso Al Mare which was at the northernmost part of Cinque Terre, past Vernazza.

This train ride was a little longer but more direct. I got off the train to a grand view of the sea and an actual beach. There were not really any people on the beach since it had been a pretty crummy weather day, but one person was putting their feet in the sea and I thought that was a good idea. So, I walked down to the beach and took my shoes off, rolled up my pant legs, and walked into the water. I thought it was going to be warm, but it was not nearly as warm as I thought it would be. I don’t think it was as cold as the water in California, but not something that I would go out and jump into either. I let my feet dry and then put my shoes back on so I could walk into the town. Monterosso was the largest of the towns so I was expecting to see some more crowds but still it was sparsely populated. There was a tunnel that people were walking down which I could have taken, but there was also a footpath that went around the side of the mountain. I decided to take that. There was another path along there that had stairs leading up to a church overlooking the bay, I thought that I would hit that on my way back since my knee was really hurting at this point. I continued on to the town and found hardly any people at all, it might have been fewer people than even Vernazza, I couldn’t believe how dead it was. It was a little depressing to see it so empty, I was hoping to meet some more people, travelers or locals, but it was not panning out to be something likely. I walked through the town a little and then headed back to that main path into the city so I could climb to the church that I saw on the top of the hill. It was a little winding and not all that well-guided so I wasn’t sure if I was really heading up to the top. I followed some stairs and steps that seemed to go to the top and found the entrance to the church. It didn’t seem like there was an overlook available because the church was closed and there was no side pathway. I saw another walkway leading further up the mountain so I thought I would follow that and see where it lead. It ended up leading me to a cemetery, fairly small and a little closed off, but also no overlook point. It might have been closed since it was the off-season to actually go and see out over the sea, but I had seen enough of the sea that it wasn’t a huge deal. I walked back down the steps and followed the main path out of the town and to the train station. I got my ticket and waited to board the train back to Vernazza.

When I got back to Vernazza the town was even quieter than the night before. I went back to my room to put my feet up for a little. I had some leftover pizza from the night before and it would probably be wise to save a little money rather than eat out again. I stuck around in the apartment for a while and then I thought I would try to go and find a bar to hang out in and see if I could at least meet some locals even if there weren’t any tourists around. I found this one spot on Google maps, but when I walked around to try and find it, I couldn’t seem to spot it. I followed to where it was supposed to be, but nothing. It must have been closed because everything on the side street that it was located on was closed. I looked up another bar and walked over there, but the same situation, closed for the off-season. I decided it wasn’t meant to be so I went back to my apartment and decided to stay in for the night. Just isn’t the right place to travel solo in the off-season I guess.

November 17th

I woke up early, packed up my things, did a little cleaning, and then set off for the train station. I wanted to get some food before I left, but the one place that seemed to have a semblance of breakfast was closed. Luckily I had some yogurt that I bought from the night before so that would have to be enough to hold me over. I bought my ticket just as the train was arriving under a little pressure so I wasn’t really sure if it was the right train or if I even had my ticket stamped correctly. Luckily, the train I got on was the correct one and I went over to La Spezia, my connection before going to Pisa.

Pisa

November 17th

I took the train from LA Spezia to Pisa, not a very long train ride, but my connecting train wasn’t very clear so it was a little confusing what platform and train I was supposed to be on. An info person helped me figure it out barely, but I got on the train and head out for Pisa. When I got to Pisa it was raining fairly heavily so I was worried that my pack was going to get too wet and the walk was fairly long so there was a good chance for it to get drenched. First, I stopped in at a small coffee bar to get some food since I still really hadn’t had any breakfast. I got a croissant and some orange juice which were both unimpressive. I guess that is the one downside of always getting fresh orange juice is that sometimes the OJ will be tart. I ate and drank quickly and continued to walk to the tower of Pisa, it was a bit of a walk, about 20 minutes and in the rain… so, along the way, I stopped to get an umbrella since my raincoat wouldn’t be able to cover my pack. Luckily it wasn’t price gouging since it was raining at only about 5 euros. I finally got to the tower and it was a sight to behold for sure, different than the other monuments that I had seen in Italy so far. The other towers were at least in relation to a castle, church, or palace. This tower seemed to be just on its own for show, I didn’t have a chance to learn about it since I had my pack with me and I wasn’t going to climb or tour with all that weight on my back. I walked the fence line to see where I could get a good picture/selfie. I was stopped by a family from the Philippines asking me to take a picture for them and in return, they would take my picture. They were kind people, some living in Italy and some visiting from the Philippines. They took my picture as I asked and then we said our goodbyes. I honestly wasn’t all that satisfied by the photo so I ended up taking a selfie anyways which turned out better in the end, joking that I was carrying the tower on my back. After that, I had gotten all that I wanted so I set back out to the train station, another 20-minute walk back, at least it wasn’t raining very much at this point. I got to the station and boarded my train to Empoli which was my connecting stop on the way to Siena.

Siena

November 17th

I arrived in Siena in the afternoon, a little later than I hoped I would have, but I was there nonetheless. I got out of the platform and onto the main station, but it was a little confusing because there were a few exits. There was one main exit that most people seemed to be taking up an escalator. I decided that was probably my best bet so I took that up as well. It went up a good way and took me into a shopping mall of sorts, the first that I had seen in Italy. I got some food there, some focaccia pizza since I was starving from traveling and not really stopping all day. I wandered around the mall a little to try and find the exit, I wasn’t sure if I should take the other escalator or not again. After looking around a little bit it seemed like that was the best option so I took it. It went on forever, up and up and up. Thank God I took that instead of some other pathway up, I could only imagine how exhausted I would have been otherwise. I finally emerged at the top and onto a major street of Siena, but it still didn’t seem as large or busy as the streets of Milan or Florence. It was actually quite beautiful and reminded me a little of San Francisco for some reason, just the trees lining the avenue and cars bustling by made me think more of an American city than the other Italian cities have made me feel. Maybe it was just because of the trees since the other major Italian cities had so little greenery. My walk to the hostel at this point was still a little way, I think about 20/25 minutes, given the escalator already I was a little worried about the hills that I might encounter. The walk was actually quite pleasant, there were few cars once I got past the old town walls which reminded me some of Venice, but it still had the same aesthetic as Florence in terms of the building design. The streets were winding and narrow at points, but also some of them were very steep! Like steeper than San Francisco! Thankfully the street I was following was pretty flat, for the time being. I rounded a corner and was shown an incredible view of the Siena old town center. It was one of the most beautiful sights I had ever seen. The view was fairly unobstructed and the hill that the city sat on made the buildings terrace themselves to display a depth and stacking of the city. I took a picture and took in the sight for a little before heading to my hotel, which was just around the corner.

Down a small set of stairs and into a narrow doorway I walked into the hotel. After briefly checking in I went down to my room which was pretty nice, with different amenities than the apartment I was in, but nicer in other ways too. I was still happy to have my own space to spread out a little more. I was tired at this point, but I still wanted to go out and see more of Siena, at least the square because it was allegedly the best town square in all of Italy. I also needed to do some laundry since it had been a few days. So I organized my things and then went out for a little sightseeing.

I walked through the narrow pathway out of the hotel room and up a fairly steep street, it was a little confusing walking through the town because some streets were overlapping on top of each other, usually perpendicular, but at first, it was hard to see on Google maps which street would take me where I wanted to go. I finally found my way and emerged on the city square and it was incredible, I can see why it was called the best square in all of Italy, even though it was more of a semi-circle. It seemed as though the square was designed from the start to feature a dedicated open space or over time that open space was left untouched as buildings were added around the square. All the buildings were connected to each other creating a seamless wall perimeter around the square. It really was an incredible view and such a unique space, not like anything I had seen in Italy, and nothing in the US would look like this, especially with the density surrounding the square. I wondered what the restrictions must have been like back when the square was being built, how did builders get instructed on where and how they could build, was it by a municipal government, or was it a collective decision by the community without expressed regulation? Was this something created out of collective work or from the vision of a government? However it came about, we are the gracious beneficiaries of the square now. I spent a while just looking around in bewilderment and taking pictures, the tower also stood out quite prominently which drew my attention and lens.

After I walked around for a little bit in the square I decided to go over to the Siena Duomo to see what that area was like. It was not a very far walk, but it was up a hill so there was a bit of a steep climb, it’s so interesting how the city is layered in itself. The Duomo was very beautiful from the outside and it didn’t seem like it was nearly as packed as the Milan or Florence ones, Siena overall seemed to be less populated than the other major cities. This was something I knew for the most part coming in, but luckily it wasn’t as sparsely populated as Cinque Terre. I didn’t stay long at the cathedral square because I knew I would be coming back the next day to see the inside and try to go to the top. I still had to do laundry so I went back to my hotel to get my dirty clothes and find a laundromat.

I gathered my things and walked over to a laundromat about 10 minutes away. Surprising that there were so few despite the little space that Italians have in their homes; I would have thought that more people would be forced to use laundromats since they might not have in-house laundry. I found the laundromat, tried to figure out how to wash my clothes, which took a little time, and then started the load of laundry. I had about 25 minutes until it finished so I went to find a bar where I could get a drink, it was a little early, but it didn’t seem like Italians followed any real timing for drinks and I was on vacation so why not! I found a place that was pretty popular so I walked up to the bar for a drink. The bartender didn’t really speak English so it was hard to understand what I needed to do to get my drink and what drink I was actually getting so I went with the flow and got something a little different and paid later. The drink was pretty strong so when I was walking back to the laundromat I was a little tipsy since I hadn’t had food yet either. I got in and my clothes still hadn’t finished and a few other people were washing their clothes now too. I sat and waited with the rest of them. I asked one of the people in there how they use the dryer so that it would hopefully be a little easier than it was washing. He was kind enough to help me and spoke English too. My clothes finished spinning and I put them in the dryer. It only ran in 6-minute intervals for some reason so I had to keep starting the dryer again. After three spins my clothes were fairly dry, they were damn hot, but some items still seemed damp which was weird. I thought it was fine and gave my remaining tokens to some girls who were in there as well since I was never going to use the tokens again. I went back to my hotel and started folding them. However, when I got in I found two girls sitting on the neighboring room’s balcony. They were speaking English so I opened my window to see who they were. One girl was Lydia from Colorado and another girl was Natalie from Colombia, but Natalie was currently living about an hour outside of Naples. They met in school in Colorado and Lydia was visiting Natalie and traveling through Italy. We talked a little about our travels and I offered them to hang out later in the evening if they wanted. Then I let them get back to hanging with each other since they were traveling together.

I was getting a little hungry at this point so I finished folding my laundry and looked up some places to eat. I found someplace a little off the square that seemed interesting and walked over to it. On my way, I looked at some other restaurants on the square directly to see what their menus were. One sounded interesting called Bar Manganelli; so, I took a seat on the outside tables facing the square so I could people-watch. I ordered the lasagna and a chianti. The food took some time to get there, but it was delicious. The lasagna was slightly crispy on the edges and had a delicious meat sauce. After I ate I waited a while until they came back out to see what I might want for dessert. I ended up getting a chocolate lava cake which was also very good. Again, I had to wait quite some time for them to remember to come back out and provide me with the check. The food was very good, but the service was awful, it wasn’t even that busy so I wasn’t sure how it could be so bad. I paid and went on my way. I thought about finding another bar to go into and meet some people, but while walking around I didn’t see any bars, in particular, that seemed to have a socially open setting, mostly tables. It doesn’t seem like Italy is set up for the social group bar scene, maybe that was just more in these tourist towns where it wasn’t common. I walked around a little more and then went back to my hotel room where I stayed for the rest of the night. In the end, Lydia and Natalie wanted to just hang with each other so we didn’t get together which was fine. I lounged in my room and then went to bed a little earlier.

November 18th

I woke up fairly early and went for breakfast at the hotel. It was fine, nothing special, but it was a buffet so I could get as much as I’d like. Once I finished, I gathered my things and left for the Fortezza Medicea which was a fortress built by the Medici, I believe Cosimo the 1st. It was pretty early in the morning still, but there were actually people out and about, more so than I had seen in other cities in the early mornings, or maybe I just hadn’t gotten up that early before… I walked to the fortress and tried to find the entrance, but I was hopelessly lost trying to get in. I knew I could get in because I could see people running and walking on the top so it must have been some sort of park. Just my luck it turns out that I went the opposite direction from the entrance and walked all the way around the fortress and finally found the way in. It was a lovely space that had been converted into a park and I joined the other morning walkers for a stroll through it. The top gave some nice views of Siena and the newer part of the city, but nothing that was spectacular, the space itself was the gem. It reminded me a little of Golden Gate Park and some of the more secluded areas there. After I walked around the top I walked to the exit and began a walk to the main part of Siena.

As I was walking back I passed a little farmers market, but there were only about 10 stands so it was pretty small. There were plenty of people shopping for food and other goods there though, it was all very quaint. It made the town feel much smaller and close-knit than I had seen before, something more that the locals do and not just the tourist areas. As I was walking back it started to rain a little more and I found myself walking closely along the buildings. As it was raining I was given a beautiful sight of the rain and sun sharing my view to create a springlike shower in November. The picture and video would do it more justice than my typing could, but it was some beautiful nature that I got to witness.

I made my way to the Siena square, I didn’t get tickets online for the museum and tower so I was just going to hope that there wouldn’t be a line early. However, when I got there I found out that the ticket office wouldn’t even be opening until 10am, these Italians seem to like starting the day late… I waited around a little until the ticket office opened and people watched on the square. There seemed to be some sort of school group taking photos of the surrounding area, it didn’t seem like there was anything in particular that they were focusing on. Just sort of funny to watch them look around and take pictures of random things, sometimes the buildings, sometimes a dog, sometimes each other. The ticket office opened and I was able to get tickets for the museum right away, unfortunately, since it had been raining the tower was closed and I was not able to get a ticket for that. I was bummed because I figured that would be the best attraction for the square. Despite that disappointment, I went into the museum at the Palazzo Publico and looked through the paintings and ornamental objects that they had there. It was actually really short and only one level so I spent maybe 30 minutes in there. I was also bummed how short that museum was. There wasn’t anything in particular that stood out in the museum.

After I finished there I went over to the Duomo which was also a big attraction in Siena. I bought tickets there and luckily the line was also not very long. I was able to get an appointment for the dome in the following 15 minutes. So, I went over to the meeting area, but since I had a few minutes before the tour of the dome I was able to walk around the inside of the cathedral a little bit. It was very beautiful, more filled out than the Florence Duomo, but it wasn’t as large. I still don’t think it was as impressive as the Milan Duomo. They were also playing choral music and at times organ which really helped to bring the ambiance of the visit to a more holistic experience. I had wished there was something like that in the prior churches/cathedrals I visited and I was glad I was able to hear the sound inside one of those massive structures. There was nothing in particular that stood out as special with this cathedral compared to the other ones, but it was still beautiful like all the other cathedrals.

My time was up and I walked back over to the meeting area for the dome tour. It was a pretty small group, maybe 15 people. They led us up a narrow winding staircase into a room above the cathedral’s main room, in between that ceiling and the roof of the building. There were some windows that we could look out over into the main room, which did provide some great pictures.

After waiting there for pictures for a few minutes we continued to climb, this time into a narrow hallway with stairs that led us to an overlook point where we could see the main part of Siena with the tower. We could also see the surrounding scenery of the Siena countryside that draped the background with rolling green hills. It was a stunning view with the old Siena buildings and the olive and vineyard-lined hills. This was probably as high up as I was going to go in Siena since I couldn’t get into the clock tower near the plaza. We were led back and went to the other side so we could see the more modern side of Siena which had more contemporary buildings and apartments. Still, it looked pretty even if it wasn’t the old buildings, we could also see a really good view of the Basilica of San Domenico. We actually weren’t led to the top of the dome, just the top of the building so it was a bummer that I wasn’t able to get higher. I was still able to see some great views and take some incredible pictures.

They took the group back down and I went back into the main room of the cathedral to look a little more and take some additional time looking at the artifacts. There was an interesting room that had choir books and was lined with paintings which were really impressive. I had my fill and left the duomo. My ticket allowed me access to a few other sites around the Duomo such as the museum, the Facciatone, the crypts, and the Baptistery. I decided to go into the museum and explore there before getting food.

The museum was interesting, but it had a lot of older religious paintings and iconography which doesn’t interest me as much. These paintings were very flat and lacked some of the more developed painting techniques compared to the Renaissance paintings. The other thing that bores me about religious iconography is that it is usually the same thing over and over again, yes from different interpretations and expressions, but still, the context usually comes across the same to me. I am much more interested in paintings of events, people (unique people, not Jesus and Mary all the time), or nature. So, the museum was interesting, but a lot of the same that I had seen on this trip already. Something else that I find really weird about the religious artifacts are the crosses or other religious artifacts which contain body parts from saints or other religious persons. I find that to be incredibly bizarre. I understand the meaning and rationale of a religious person wanting a piece of a saint, since the saint was a vessel for Christianity, but still, very weird to save that, cherish, and display it. I wandered in the museum more and came across a stained glass window that was at more eye level and it was beautiful. It was wonderful to be able to look more closely at the artistry of glasswork like that. That was about the end of the museum and I was hungry at that point so I decided to go and get some food on my way to the monastery of saint Augustine.

I stopped at a small pizza place called Pizzeria Gurgu. I got a quick bite while I walked, the food was fine, nothing incredible, but good. I walked along the street and looked around in the monetary, but it seemed like it was an actual school so I didn’t venture inside. I saw there was a park on the rear of the grounds so I walked over there to see what I could see. The park had a nice view of the backside of Siena, or maybe the front? I’m not sure what is the front and what is the back. Either way, it was another great view of the city and a little out of the way so it wasn’t nearly as populated as other parts of my walking. There were some kids in the back of the school listening to music and a teacher seemed to come out and tell them to stop being so obnoxious haha, I don’t speak Italian, but that’s as much as I could assume. I finished up looking out over Siena and then I walked over to the basilica of San Francisco, it was about a 10-minute walk through town to the other side. The map also showed an escalator to the old walls which I thought would be cool.

I walked through town and made it to the basilica which seemed to be sparsely populated. Just not many people over on this side of the town at all. I walked into the basilica and there was me and two other people. It was a bit smaller than I thought it would be, but it was lovely and I was able to sit and enjoy the art. I didn’t linger too long since there wasn’t really all that much to see inside. I was going to wander the grounds a little more, but it seemed that there was a university in the rest of the building grounds so I don’t know if I was able to wander around anymore. I decided to just go and look for that escalator that went to the walls. I followed down the road and it seemed a little weird that it was tucked away, but also that other people seemed to be coming and going down this one-way road with groceries and other shopping. I found the escalator and it turned out I was the weird one, it was just a normal escalator to the bottom part of town, not for some tourist attraction to the walls. I was bummed, I thought the wall would have given some good views! I made my peace with another lost attraction of the day and then I decided to walk back to the Duomo so that I could see the crypts and the baptistery, I didn’t get to see them before I got lunch.

So, I walked back over there which took about 10 minutes, and went into the crypts. It was cool but different than what I was expecting. I thought there would have been a bunch of tombs and other burial sites, but I didn’t really see anything like that, it had more of the older buildings before the Duomo was built and more religious artistry on the walls. It was also a very small space so it took me less than 30 minutes to go through the whole area. I finished up and went to the baptistery next which was at the rear of the duomo. I walked in and it was even smaller than the crypts were! It also had scaffolding over the main attraction in the center for baptisms so I was missing out on the most interesting part. I spent maybe 15 minutes in there looking at the altar and other paintings, quite brief. I was really bummed that so many places were smaller than expected and not what I expected. The day actually had quite a few disappointments with the tower, the size of the museum, the escalator to the walls, the crypts, and the Baptistery. I had some more time in the day and I could have done some more, but I did all the recommended locations so I started heading toward the hotel. On my way back I saw the Basilica of San Domenico which reminded me I had not been in yet so I decided I would go there since it was not very far from my hotel. When I entered the basilica it was also not very populated, with maybe 10 people inside. It was much larger than the San Francisco basilica and I wandered through it a little longer. Something really surprising was how bad the stained glass looked, it seemed really simple, but also just not intricate. As if they used large glass pieces when making the faces and other parts so that it was kind of blocky and unrepresentative of the people they were trying to depict. Everything else was similar to other churches, but I sat and took in the view/art. I looked at the arches over the altar and the massive roof structure made from wood. I wondered why no churches in the United States try to emulate something like this in the modern day. There are megachurches, but they used modern and plain engineering, nothing like these magnificent arches that mix art and engineering together. Maybe an engineer would scoff at what I’m saying and say there is art in modern-day engineering. However, it still does seem like the arches and roof took an effort to create in an artistic manner pleasing to the eye whereas modern buildings are just blocky. Also, why were the churches so large and tall? What additional space would be required for the amount of room overhead? It is lovely to have that open space and feel like the church is larger than life so maybe that was the purpose, to remind the patrons that in this place it is for a service to something greater than you. Another thing that is not as common in the US, is buildings that have empty air space just to have it. We have lots of buildings that have open space, but the headspace above with no purpose is not that common I feel. After pondering and embracing the architecture I left and went back to my hotel. I really did have a busy and long day, but it was still pretty early in the afternoon. I decided I would rest my feet and then go out a little later for dinner and drinks.

While I was sitting in my room there was this drumming that started playing. I didn’t think much of it at first, but after a little bit, it became incessant and repetitive so I had to go and see what it was. I thought at first it would be a parade or something? But it was so repetitive and the sound was at a constant level that it didn’t seem like it was moving. So I left my hotel to find the noise. I walked closer to it until I finally found it and it was just some dude playing a drum over and over again in a corner of the city. I had no idea why he was doing it or to what end. When I reached him I also discovered the Fortebrada which was a medieval fountain for the city. It initially had three separate pools; one for drinking water, another for animal drinking water, and lastly one for washing clothes. It was pretty cool to see it still with running water, I don’t think up to present-day standards but quite clear still. There were also some koi swimming in the pool now, they were no longer separated so it was just one large pool. A cool spot to see for sure, but I had had enough of the drumming and had to get away from the noise.

I walked back up to the main city close to the square and thought to get some food. I wanted to go to this one spot that was a pub so I could hopefully have a more open space to meet people rather than a sit-down meal. It was called San Pablo Pub and it was on one of the pathways that led into the square. They had terraced seating on the steps outside and then a cozy typical pub-looking inside. There was also this really cool balcony that overlooked the square, but there were people smoking outside so I didn’t go out. I ordered some food and a drink while I talked with the bartender a little bit. They had Lagunitas so we talked a little about Petaluma. Then I sat near the balcony so I could at least see through the window overlooking the square without inhaling all the smoke from the people sitting outside. I got a panini with bacon, cheese, and rocket leaves. It was quite good but so salty and my tongue was destroyed after eating it. I sat there and drank for a little bit after eating, writing in this journal actually, but also scouting to see if there were any people I could approach and talk to, but it was still all sit-down meals for the most part and I didn’t want to impose. It is so strange that even at a pub there is not really standing room just to hang and meet people. It was still somewhat early at 7 so likely I was before the crowd actually shows up. I finished up and then went back to my hotel, I thought since it was not really that entertaining for a solo traveler that I would head out to Rome somewhat early the next day and it was going to be a long trip anyway so no need waiting around twiddling my thumbs.

November 19th

I woke up early and got some breakfast as much as I could since I would be traveling quite a bit for the day, I think the train rides would be about 3 hours. Not to mention all the walking to and from train stations I would have to do. After I got food, I went and packed up my things to head out. I stopped at the desk to check out and I had to pay a city tax of 2 euros per night, which I don’t know why they didn’t charge me that at the start, something a little odd. I headed out to the train station which was about a 20-minute walk. It didn’t feel as long this time nor as steep which was nice. I got to the escalators leading down fairly quickly it felt and got to the train station. I got my tickets which wound up being about 50 euros to get to Rome with a connection in Florence. I would have to go back a little before heading further down to Rome. When I got on my train to Florence a guy sat across from me who kinda dressed in American brands and it gave me the impression he was from the US, so I asked if he was. He wasn’t haha, and he seemed a little taken back to hear I would think so he asked why I thought so, which I told him because of the clothing brands mostly. We had a little laugh and then went to our earbuds.

Rome

November 19th

My train ride from Florence to Rome was quick at about an hour thanks to the super-fast high-speed train! It only had one stop before mine so it was pretty efficient too. I think I even took a little nap when I was on the ride. I arrived at the Rome Termini station, the main station and the largest. My walk was a little long to the hostel at about 25 minutes. I stepped out into Rome and it instantly felt dirty. The shops surrounding the train station were covered in dirt and the water from the recent rain was murky and dirty. It didn’t provide me with a pleasant first impression of the city. I kept walking towards my hostel and came to walk down an avenue lined with trees which was a much nicer atmosphere than the original train station view. It somehow made me think of what Paris might look like, the avenue of trees with tall residential apartment buildings from the 1800s maybe? It all looked very nice and again different than any of the other Italian cities I had seen so far. A component that was different in particular was the space that was allowed for cars and a more modern city. When I was in the other old Italian cities the streets were narrow and more walkable whereas these streets had definite sidewalks and plenty of room for cars. I wonder if the space for cars was a feature added later when construction continued in the city as it changed through the centuries or if the space that was required in Roman times was similar to the present day so that the avenues were large. I continued walking and reached my hostel after crossing some of the large avenues. Another interesting component is that cars do not have priority at all and pedestrians can jump out into the street as they’d like and cars have to yield. Buses might not be as accommodating so be careful of those vehicles, but cars for the most part work around people, going slow, moving around, and such. It creates a more fluid ecosystem, a living city of transit. Anyways, I made it to my hostel and I was tired. So, I got checked in and went up to my room. When I got in there one roommate was already there, Joe, who was from England. He was a talkative fellow not stopping to talk even if I needed to answer a question of his. It was a little exhausting while I was settling in and just meeting him, but I was polite and waited until I could relax. After I got settled I thought I would go to the colosseum at least and see that as a first sight even if it was a little late already.

I walked over to the colosseum, following Google maps to try and figure out where I was in relation to the stadium. It was not very far, maybe 10 minutes. I was also pretty hungry since I hadn’t gotten some food for a while due to traveling and I thought I would get some food on my way. I found a pizza slice place that was nothing special, I can’t even remember the name, I just needed something quick to eat and ate it on my way to the Colosseum. When I arrived at the colosseum it was definitely a sight to behold, massive and dominating the skyline. There were hordes of people walking around and lining the sidewalks trying to get to the colosseum and also to try and take pictures capturing the entire arena. Somehow the path that I took was more convoluted than it needed to be because the route back to my hostel was in the direction that I was now walking to the colosseum, don’t know how that happened. Regardless of my convoluted way to get there, I was there, and I was able to get some good pictures before it got too dark. I walked around the entire outside of the arena trying to get better photos, but it was so large that I had a hard time capturing the full scale of the structure. I also came across the arch of Constantine which was directly next to the Colosseum. I had my fill of sights for the day since I was already tired and decided to go back to the hostel to try and plan my next few days in the city.

When I got to the hostel I got my Rick Steves guidebook and the suggested sites map that the hostel provided before I got my drink and sat at the large table while I looked over some suggested sights and mapped out my weekend. It was going to be tight to get in all that I wanted in just two days. I already had some tickets and then got some more, but I should have gotten the colosseum ticket earlier because the one for under the arena was sold out for the next two weeks! I was bummed, but I was still able to get into the main levels and the arena which would likely be plenty. After I made a gameplan I joined another two people, Jake and Millie, who were sitting and talking. Millie was from England and was staying at the hostel as a volunteer. She was touring Europe for three months before heading back to England. Jake was from San Francisco and had recently left his prior job and was taking three months as well to tour Europe, Rome was his last stop. He was going to go back to his parent’s house in Ventura county to figure out what his next steps would be since he currently didn’t have a job. Jake was also talking about his plans for the evening and mentioned a restaurant name Ai Tre Scalini which he had gotten some recommendations for previously and it was listed on the hostel suggestions for drinks. He had another friend that was going to join him and her name was Emerald. He offered to join and I was game! Millie said she couldn’t because she was technically working at the hostel. We talked about our travels and had some drinks until Emerald arrived. She was from Australia, Perth, and she was traveling for three months as well I believe, but Rome was her last stop after being in Greece for most of her time. We finished our drinks and then decided to head out to the restaurant, hoping there wouldn’t be too much of a wait.

When we got to the restaurant, after taking a little windy way since Jake got a little lost, we put our name down and had about a 45-minute wait. So, we got another drink and waited outside. Jake and I talked about our jobs, he was recently laid off from Indiegogo which was a crowdfunding support platform. I learned from him that it was a relatively small company with less than 100 employees. The company had some rough times in his final days and he was part of a reduction in working staff since the revenue had been declining. He vented about some of the end working conditions such as the pressure, management, and what it all meant for him. It was nice to hear someone around my age in the working world talk about the struggles of their job, it helped to put my work in perspective and to hear some of the other working conditions of outside companies. I talked about my job a little and how I have come to enjoy it despite not knowing much about the line of work before I joined. I shared what I might want to do in the near future and a little about owning my own business previously. Jake seemed like a great person and I was glad that he was a bay area local so that maybe we could reconnect when we’re both back home. While Jake and I were talking, Emerald had started talking with two people, a mother and daughter, from Portugal that were vacationing for the mother’s birthday. We had a nice conversation and then they were called for their table. Not shortly thereafter we were called for our table as well. We got seated and it was a very small and tight restaurant, similar to all the other restaurants in Italy. Jake had mentioned that the lasagna was supposed to be good here so I thought I would give that a try and see how it compared to the one I got in Siena. The waitress was fun and patient with us being foreigners and not really knowing what to get. It didn’t take long for our food to get there and we started to dig in. The lasagna was very good, I could have had another helping probably. Emerald mentioned that her dish was actually quite cold, not even room temperature which was unfortunate and it made Jake and I realize that ours was not really hot, just warm, thankfully not cold like Emerald’s. After our food we got dessert as well, I got a tiramisu, Emerald got some berry and cream dessert, and Jake got some cake type of dessert. We all tried a little of each other’s and they were all delicious. Luckily, those didn’t have to be warm and could be cold haha. Overall the place was fine from my experience, but it could be bad given how Emerald’s food was prepared. After we paid the check Jake said he wanted to go to this bar that a few other people had mentioned in the hostel group chat called Yellow Bar. It was actually another hostel’s bar and a little further out past the Rome train station.

Yellow Bar was packed, filled to the brim with people. They were actually limiting people from coming in because it was so full, but luckily since it was just the three of us we were able to go in. When we got in, the line for drinks was even longer so we waited to get some drinks for about 10 minutes. While I was waiting in line with Jake and Emerald the guy who had been messaging in the group chat about a bar started offering shots so I ended up getting a shot as well, Jake got one too. Finally, we got to the bar and got our drinks. Now we just had to find a place to stand or sit, Jake knew a couple other girls at the bar so we hung out with them for a little, but the spot was in the middle of the hallway basically and was not very enjoyable. So, we split up a little and started talking with some other people in the hopes of finding some better spots. The bar also had karaoke scheduled for the night and it was just about to start. We had hung around for a while at that point so we were ready for new drinks, but the line had gotten even longer. Jake offered to buy the round this time and he went up to wait in line. I hung around with Emerald for a little, but she started talking with some other people and I decided to give Jake some company. We waited in line for a while and decided that we would get shots as well so that we hopefully wouldn’t have to wait again. After we got our drinks we went back to our spot and Jake was pondering doing some karaoke. I was tempted, but there were way more people than the time in Florence so I wasn’t feeling as bold haha. I found a spot to sit next to some Brazilians who were friendly and chatty and also on my other side a girl and her friends from the Czech Republic. I might have made eye contact with her already in the night so sitting there might have been a little strategic. It was hard to talk with her unfortunately since it was so loud, but I got her name, Lorien, she was very cute. She spoke English pretty well from what I could tell, but we were working extra hard to understand each other since it was loud, I initially heard that she was from Cinque Terre, but she corrected me that it was the Czech Republic. She said she was only visiting for a short period of time celebrating with her friends. I wasn’t able to hear what they were celebrating, unfortunately. We got closer to each other, but she was still hanging out with her friends as well. The night was getting a little late and Emerald was looking to head back to the hostel soon and I had already offered to walk back with her and I didn’t want to make her walk home on her own at night. I asked Lorien for her Instagram and said that hopefully, we could get together while we are in Rome for a brief time. I should have just stayed the night and spent more time with her partying because we wouldn’t get together again as she was leaving Rome the next day, which she might have said, but I couldn’t hear. Emerald and I went back to the hostel though and took the metro which was pretty safe and quick so it seemed. We got back and I went upstairs to bed since I was going to have a busy day the next day anyways.

November 20th

I had a hard time sleeping the night before because I was feeling energized when I tried to go to sleep. So, I woke up early and a little groggy, but I got dressed, brushed my teeth, and went out for the day. First, I stopped down at the breakfast that the hostel put on, pretty minimal offering, some bread, croissants, OJ, and cereal. Enough for me, but not really much of a breakfast. I ate and then went out, I had a packed day planned. I was going to go to the Pantheon in the morning, then the Trevi Fountain, the Spanish Steps, the Capitoline Museum, some history and ruins related to Emperor Trajan, and then Circus Maximus. I set out for the Pantheon, but not before, luckily, getting the last ticket online for 9am. I didn’t realize that on the weekend I needed to get a ticket for a time slot, it was free, but just needed a reservation. Luckily, I did get one for the day. It was already fairly close to 9 so I had to quickly walk over there and Google Maps told me it was about 20 minutes of a walk. I set off and walked through some open spaces that were roads, but mostly dominated by walking tourists. I also noticed that there were a lot of runners in Rome, more than I had seen in other cities. The city was much larger so maybe it was proportional. I walked past some live performers setting up for the day and a lot of other people making their way about town, locals and tourists alike. I also passed a really massive building that I didn’t recognize or have on my list of things to see while in Rome. It was called the Altar of the Fatherland, I thought that I might make a stop on my way back from some of the spots I was already planning on seeing today. Still, I was somewhat hurrying and making my way over to the Pantheon. I got there and there were not many people outside with virtually no line. I showed my ticket and got let in even though I was a little past 9. I walked through the doors into a massive open space. The first thing I noticed was the open hole at the top of the dome. It was an engineering marvel because I remembered Brunelleschi coming to Rome and studying the Pantheon before he built the Florence Duomo. A funny and incredible part of history is that he had to study an ancient building in order to construct something in his present. Anyways, the dome was beautiful and lined with inlaid rectangles decreasing in size as it progresses to the top of the dome. I was listening to the Rick Steves audio guide and he said that the rectangles were there to remove weight from the dome, but it also created a lovely design. The ground level of the Pantheon had an altar and many tombs for some of Italy’s important persons. The altar was of Christian faith but it was originally for the gods of Rome, I can’t remember which god, in particular, was on display originally. The Pantheon also had religious depictions of Mary and other important figures. It was a shame that even in this Roman monument and relic, the Christian faith had taken over. I was bummed that I couldn’t see more of the history captured from its original use. Throughout its long history though it made sense that the new faith took over. There were two tombs, one from Emanuele Vittorio the second, and his son Umberto the first. Emanuele Vittorio was the first king of Italy and the person to unify the many Italian nations. He was of the Savoy family and region so at the time he was the only Italian noble person who was of Italian descent at the time. It was interesting to see that these two tombs were made for later, more recent rulers, especially since I didn’t even know that Italy had a King. I didn’t realize how important the royal family was in Italy. They were beautiful burial sites. I finished looking inside and went to take some pictures outside before I went on to the Trevi Fountain. The outside was well-lit now that the sun was a little higher and I was able to take some decent pictures, it was hard to capture the entire front facade, but I got some that worked well enough. The building was really a lot larger than I anticipated.

After I the Pantheon, I walked to the Trevi Fountain. It was not very far away, about a 5-minute walk. The fountain was definitely massive and much more grand than the other city fountains that I had seen in previous cities. I wondered what it must have been like to have a fountain like this in the Roman times. It was packed with people so I wasn’t sure if there was anything giving additional information about it or when it was actually constructed. I wonder if a fountain like that was a direct source of drinking water for the population or if it was really just something for display. I got some good pictures, but again it was so large that it was hard to capture the full scope of the fountain. The main issue is that these monuments are tucked into random places in the city so they are closely adjoined by typical residential buildings and I can’t back up far enough. I couldn’t believe how many people there were and could only imagine what it would be like during the summer season. I continue to be shocked just by how many people there is all the time at these monuments.

After lingering for about 15 minutes or so, that’s all that was really necessary for the fountain, I walked over to the Spanish steps which were maybe 5 minutes away. The steps were not as grandiose as I thought they would be, they were big, but I thought that there would be something more spectacular about them. Luckily there was more space for these and people could actually go on the monument so the mass of people wasn’t as overwhelming. It was hard to take pictures because the steps just weren’t as picturesque as I was made to believe, maybe my camera wasn’t good enough, or maybe I didn’t have the right angle, but whatever it was I was not as impressed with what I saw as I expected. I climbed to the top of them and that was about as much as I could do. So, I decided I would pretty quickly walk over to the next exhibit called Trajan’s Columns and stop at the Altar of the Fatherland on the way since it was free and around that same area.

I first stopped at the Trajan’s Columns area and tried to get in there, but unfortunately, the pass that I had purchased would take effect after my first scan of the barcode and allow entrance for 24 hours and my appointment for the Colosseum was later than the time I was in there. It’s confusing to explain over text, but I couldn’t get in without risking access to the Colosseum; so, I decided not to go into the Trajan monument site. Luckily the Altar of the Fatherland was right across the street so I walked over to that instead and it was free admission.

The Altar of the Fatherland was massive, I don’t know how many stories tall, but the largest building in the surrounding area. It had a large set of stairs leading up to the many levels of platforms until it reached a top platform. The first stop contained the Italian tomb of the unknown soldier and as I arrived they were completing the changing of the guards. It was interesting I suppose, but nothing I would go out of my way to see again. I walked up to the next platform which had a statue on a pedestal, the statue was of Emanuele Vittorio, who had unified Italy. It was gigantic and he was riding a horse. The views were also lovely looking out on Rome, there was a roundabout that was surrounded by tall dense buildings.

I continued to climb the stairs until I reached the final platform level which contained a stone that was taken from the battleground at Monte Grappa during WWI. It was a moving monument in dedication to those who had perished and defended Italy successfully. I continued following the tour into an interior section of the Altar which had a room that seemed to be closed off for paid tours of some sort, I wasn’t sure how I could get that. I was then led out to another overlook point which allowed me to view more of the Trajan monument section, but also more of Rome with a view of the Colosseum. I turned a corner towards the back of the building to find an elevator that led to an even higher overlook point on the roof of the building. It required a ticket to go to the top though and the line for tickets was quite long. Unfortunately, I wasn’t looking to wait that long and I wished that there could have been some online ticket that I could have bought earlier, even though I wouldn’t have known about it, just for the future. I think if I was to go back again I would want to go early and get a ticket before the line is very long. Of the day I thought that this Altar was my favorite so far. The Pantheon was interesting and historical for sure, but since it was overtaken by Christian iconography I was less interested. This Altar also has significance to WWI which was an interesting part of Italian history that I had not had many opportunities to learn about; so, something different. After walking past the elevator the tour led into the Altar interior where there were some statues, more plaster molds than granite carvings though, and some other historical memorabilia. The interior was not as interesting as the exterior in my opinion and I moved quickly through it until I emerged at the base of the Altar on street level. At this point, I was still planning on going to the Capitoline Museum which was not very far. So, I walked over to see about getting in.

The museum had a good amount of people lingering outside in the front where there was a display of the history of Rome through the years. I didn’t really look at that all that much and went to get my tickets; luckily, there was not a line that I had to wait for. I went inside and tried to figure out what I wanted to see. At this point in my trip I was feeling a little tired of museums so I tried to figure out what might be more interesting to see, unfortunately, the map was not very descriptive of what exhibits were. So, I ended up just wandering through the whole museum but moving more quickly through some parts that didn’t interest me as much. In the museum, there were a few exhibits in particular that interested me with the first being a more in-depth analysis of Capitoline Hill where the Temple of Jupiter was located. The exhibit included two other time periods, one from the iron age and another from even further back, the actual time period eludes my memory. It was interesting to see the evolution over time from small camps, to a more established community, and finally to a grand and large temple to a god. Even more interesting that they were able to find so much information about the history of the land from archeological excavation. There was another exhibit that showed the evolution of Rome during the Flavian rule of Rome. It had many pieces of art from the time period, but also models of the developments that occurred during that ruling period. I was pretty tired at this point of wandering around the museum so I decided to head out and look for someplace to eat. There was a lot more in there that I could have looked at further, but I was getting burnt out from museums and was hungry so didn’t want to spend any more time there. I found this one pizza place not too far away called La Prezzemolina which had some pizza slices to go. The pizza was pretty good, but I also got a spinelli which was a risotto or rice with cheese and sauce fried ball. I had one before somewhere else, but it was really good here. I didn’t stay for too long after I ate though since it was already about 2pm and I wanted to get over to Circus Maximus before it got dark. So, I head out for the metro station close to the Colosseum.

The metro was pretty easy at this point and I felt comfortable moving around the city. Even though I was only going one stop away it was so easy to go in and out of the transit system. I wasn’t sure what to expect from Circus Maximus, but I knew a little about the history of the space, being a massive and monumental games and entertainment space. When I arrived, it was a little less impressive than I expected, there were virtually no ruins and it seemed to be more of an open space park now. There was a small fenced-off section where ruins were contained, but the rest was just a valley with some raised grass hills on the shoulder of the open space. I saw that online it was free to access, but I guess that was only the park part of the space because the fenced-off portion with ruins did cost for entry, not too bad, but still did cost. They also offered a VR experience that would reconstruct the former arena. I considered it, but knowing somewhat about VR I wasn’t all that hopeful that it would be worth the money; so, I opted for just walking and reading the placards that they had scattered along the ruins. The placards explained how the arena was built and what its purpose was, how it evolved over time and grew to a larger scale with each expansion. Something interesting was where the stone for the construction was sourced bringing some in all the way from modern-day Turkey. The arena also grew in size and importance by housing temples in the center aisle of the circuit. I was able to walk a little through the ruins, but it seemed almost too open for the ruins to be real, I would have thought that they would want to preserve it more and not let people walk around in it too much. The placards didn’t say if it was the actual ruins or not so I’m still unsure what to believe. Something else that was interesting was the history after the general use of the arena; there was development to convert it to a mill in later centuries after the arena had fallen out of use. It made me wonder about the preservation of these great spaces during the time, how could it fall out of use with something so large and grand, why would they not want to preserve it further? Maybe there was something bigger and better that the crowds flocked to. I also wondered about the large monumental spaces that we have in use today, like the stadiums in the US, how some of those are preserved, but also how some are remodeled for more modern design. Interesting to think how much a space changes and that ultimately it turned into an open space, but also a space for history. While there might not have been all that much to really see, it was fun to see how big the space really was and see some imagery of what the reconstruction might have looked like back then. One of the more fun and interesting things of the day that I got to spend time at. Something that was really focused on Roman history as well, something that hadn’t been overtaken by Christianity, and something that was more open than a museum. After spending some time at Circus Maximus I was pretty tired and ready to be done for the day, so I went back on to the metro and head back to my hostel.

I decided to lay in my bed while my phone charged and I could rest my feet from walking all day. When I was in my room I met a new roommate Sol, who was from Korea. She had just gotten there so she was getting settled and we didn’t talk all that much and then went downstairs. Not too long after that, I went down to the common area to see if I would run into any people and if I would meet anyone new. There weren’t too many people down there at the time, but after not too long Jake showed up and we sat and talked for a little bit. Then Joe showed up with a friend he met the night prior, Melissa, who was from Chicago. Joe shared a story from the night before in which he was pickpocketed and had his passport stolen! I could not believe that he had his passport on him that would lead to him having it stolen, but he said that Melissa had taken his backpack back to the hostel since he was staying out with some other people. Unfortunately, it was a rough night for Joe, but he was trying to stay positive since other than that he had fun. He went to the British embassy to see about getting a temporary passport and was working on that. It seemed like he would be able to get back into the country well enough, but it did take some time out of his vacation which was a bummer. We all decided to sign up for the BBQ that the hostel was putting on for the night since we had all been out the night before and wanted something a little more relaxed. That was still an hour or so away so in the meantime Joe brought out a card game and we played that for a little bit, I wish I could remember the name of the game, but it was not all that interesting to me at the time because I wanted to just talk with people instead. Sol was sitting at the table with us as well and she joined in on the card game and then there was another person who saw we were playing and asked to join. Her name was Leah and she was from Brooklyn. The game was fun, but I was distracted talking to people so I wasn’t focusing all that well. We played for about an hour or so and then we decided to head up to the terrace where they were having the BBQ. They made some tomato salad dish, which was basically all tomato, so I stayed away from that. There were also some roasted potatoes which were pretty good and then they were also cooking some sausages which were actually quite good. I am not usually a fan of pork, but this was surprisingly good, maybe I was just hungry. They also made some bacon and as always bacon was delicious, I know I just said I don’t really like pork, but bacon doesn’t count. We all ate more than we probably should have and talked with some new people up there too. We talked about a lot of topics like capitalism, environmentalism, the war in Ukraine/Russia, the world cup, and more. I spoke with Melissa a little about her job that she was going to be starting when she got back to the states which was developing wind farms and she asked me a little about my job as well. After we were good and full we wanted something sweet so we decided to head out for some Gelato, somewhere… It was a little late and a Sunday night so we weren’t sure what would be open. There was a fairly large group of us at this point; Jake, Joe, Melissa, Sol, Emerald, another girl named Levken from Germany, and myself. Jake was leading us to a Gelato place he heard about, but when we got there it was closed. There was another one around the corner on Google maps so we went over there, but it was also closed. Hope was looking dim at this point, it seemed on Sunday many places roll up the sidewalk earlier than we expected. Until finally, we found a place that was still open called Don Nino, it seemed a little more touristy than what we were looking for, but we figured that would be fine enough to satiate our craving for something sweet. I got a flavor called American Cookie which tasted more like graham cracker than any other cookie, but it was still quite good. It was pretty cold outside so we were coldly eating our gelato. Levken and Sol at this point decided to head back since they were not having any gelato after all and wanted to warm up back at the hostel. We weren’t sure what we were going to do after, go out to a bar or go back to the hostel, but we stayed a little longer eating. While we were standing around a guy came up to us and started singing Waka Waka, the Shakira song, and he was peddling some bracelets of some sort. He finished his song and dance and offered us to buy them but we declined which seemed to upset him so he told us to go fuck ourselves and then went on his way. That was a pretty strange interaction, probably the oddest and most aggressive that I faced while in Italy, but it really wasn’t all that aggressive, just rude. After that, we finished eating, and we decided that we would just go back to the hostel for more drinks, it was already pretty late and we wanted to just chill. Jake and I wanted to play a little Foosball that they had in the game room anyway. So, we walked back. We got some drinks and then Jake and I played some foosball like we wanted and Joe and Leah played some chess. It was a fun and pretty chill night, more relaxing than the night before, but a different kind of fun with the wonderful people I had met. This was Jake’s last night in Italy so we said our goodbyes and exchanged information so that we could hopefully stay in touch once were back in California. Then I went off to bed, I had another early and packed morning tomorrow.

November 21st

I woke up fairly early again because this was going to be a gauntlet of a day. I was going to the Vatican for the Sistine Chapel, the Vatican Museum, and Saint Peter’s Basilica. Then, I was going to go to the Colosseum and the Roman Forum. If I had time I thought I might go over to Apian way since that had been a historical site, or famous in some capacity. I got dressed and went downstairs for a quick breakfast. While I was down there Joe joined me and talked about maybe meeting up during the day if it worked out, but he was going to have to try and figure out stuff with his passport so we’d see how the day goes. I quickly finished eating and then I took off for Vatican city. I walked down to the Metro, this time taking the orange line instead of the blue line. It was a little bit of a further train ride this time, I think something like 6 stops, but it was still faster and saved my feet compared to walking all the way over. While riding, the train pops out for a second to cross the river and I got a brief glimpse of the water. The station for the Vatican City is a little bit away so I had to walk over which took 5/10 minutes. It was still pretty early so there weren’t many people wandering around, but as I got closer to the walls of Vatican City I started to encounter a larger mass of people. I saw the walls and for some reason, it reminded me of the Mission Impossible movie, the third I think, where Tom Cruise slides over the top and impersonates a priest. Funny premise, but I did see cameras all over the perimeter of the walls, so a little truth to it. I got to the line for the Vatican Museum entrance and was able to get in fairly quickly since I had already purchased my ticket online many months before. I was a little uncertain about how and if I would be able to get into the Sistine Chapel since I had a set time on my ticket. I was worried if I made my time for the museum I would miss my time for the Sistine Chapel since they were both for the same time. It was a little too late at that point since I was already inside. So, I continued on the tour and hoped that I would still be able to get into the Sistine Chapel at a later time. The museum was packed! I had never been to a museum that was so utterly packed before. I tried to navigate through people as well as I could, but it was pointless. There were also so many tour guides with differing group sizes, but the participants were still wandering around like zombies listening to the small earbuds that their tour guides were talking through. Standing in the way of exhibits, blocking the hallways, standing in doorways, walking in front of people as they took pictures, taking pictures themselves, just an utter nuisance of obliviousness. I tried as well as I could to move around them, but I gave up, I couldn’t take it anymore. I saw very few exhibits in the museum because I was exasperated most of the time. Of the exhibits that I did get to see a few stood out; first, the exhibit on Egyptian artifacts had some incredible old relics. There were some from Mesopotamia as well. Incredible to see the old languages in stone and carvings. There were some interesting scarab beetles which I learned had not always been a mainstay of Egyptian culture but came into prominence later. It made me wonder about some of the odd trinkets that people use nowadays like crystals for example. Nothing that provides real value other than the value that a person places on it or is tricked into thinking the item is of inherent value. It made me think further about the people who brought about that fad in Egyptian culture, were they snake oil salespersons? Did they believe it themselves or was it just to make money off of the gullible. Another exhibit that was interesting was a map room, it had many maps of Europe which was fascinating to look at. I didn’t get to spend as much time in the room as I would have liked because the tour groups were guiding the flow and making me claustrophobic.

At that point I was ready to leave no matter what I was going to miss out on; however, I saw a sign that said would lead to the Sistine Chapel. I wasn’t really sure if it meant the Sistine Chapel since it was in Italian, but it sure did look like the Sistine Chapel. I followed the sign and sure enough, I was led into the Sistine Chapel, it seemed to be a back alleyway instead of the main entrance. It turned out I was in the clear with my ticket after all. I walked into the chapel and came across signs that said there must be silence and no photography, not just no flash but no photography of any kind. It was the first museum that I came across that didn’t allow any photography. When I was there I navigated through a bunch of people, at least in the chapel the tour guides weren’t talking since it had to be silent so people were a little more aware of their surroundings. I stood in the center and looked up at the ceiling, first trying to find the finger point, it was pretty easy, right in the middle. I stood there for a while looking up at the ceiling just trying to take it all in and understand what I was seeing. Luckily I remembered that I had the Rick Steeves audio guide for the Sistine Chapel so I turned that on and let him explain what I was seeing and a little more of the history. I was also able to find a seat along the edge of the room which helped me look up at the ceiling since my neck was getting a little sore turning up like that. I thought it was a spectacle for sure and interesting what Rick was saying about the creation of the ceiling by Michelangelo, but overall I was not all that taken back by it. I think painting is just a medium of art that I am not all that interested in. It was impressive to see the scale and unique work that was completed, but when I left I felt satisfied whereas at other things like David I could have stayed there for hours just looking at the sculpture. There was a priest that came out after a while and lead a prayer, I am not religious so I left not too long after that since I felt a little uncomfortable not participating when there is an actual service that is being performed. I had my fill anyways. I left the museum and went on my way to find Saint Peter’s Basilica.

The Basilica was on the other side of the city so I had to walk around the walls to get to the entrance. When I got there I saw the columns encasing the plaza in front of the Basilica. There were gates that weren’t operating at the time which I thought was odd, later I thought that they might only be used when the Pope is going to speak and anyone who would be going into the plaza would be searched and pass these checkpoints. I then saw the line to get into the Basilica, it stretched way out, further than the line markers were. I considered if it would be worth the wait and how long I had until my Colosseum entrance time. I figured I might as well go and I had enough time so I got in line and waited. It actually didn’t take as long as I expected, maybe 30 minutes. It was quite warm standing in the sun, but that was the only complaint I could really have about the wait. I can only imagine how sweltering it could be during the summer months when there are even more people waiting to get in and it’s hotter.

I got past the security checkpoint and was able to go into the Basilica. It was gigantic. I knew that it was big, but there was no way I could have imagined the scale of the building. The ceiling was incredibly high, some 300 or 400 feet high and the dome was 500 feet high. The ceiling was decorated with gold, intricate art, and religious text inscriptions. There were large, thick, and dominating columns guiding my eyes toward the altar below the dome. I got out my Rick Steeves audio guide and listened to him talk about the history and what I am looking at in the Basilica. I also saw the Pieta, but I would get to that at the end of my walking through the Basilica. The gold on the ceiling was so incredible, probably the most stunning space I had seen on my trip. I moved forward to the altar which was covered by a tall bronze structure called St. Peter’s Baldachin. It was a beautiful sculpture and massive. Everything in this Basilica was enormous. At the head of the Basilica was the Chair of St. Peter which had more bronze and a stunning sculpture, something that I had not seen before, metal work in such a stunning and intricate fashion. The details were impressive and lifelike with sun rays illuminating the bird at the center of a stained glass window. I wish I could explain in writing how stunning this Basilica was to see in person, but I don’t think there are words to aptly describe the awesomeness of the building. I am not a religious person, but there was a feeling of otherworldliness when I was wandering through the halls. Something as impressive as this must have had some divine guidance to create the works of art that this Basilica housed. Even more impressive of thought is that even without a god humans are able to create such impressive feats just by the will of their minds.

There was much more to see in the building, but the most important piece that I saw there was Michelangelo’s Pieta. I had seen his David in Florence and was struck by its beauty and scale, but the Pieta was truly something fantastic. The marble glistened in the light presenting Mary holding her dead son. The lifelikeness of the sculpting was unbelievable with the marble appearing as if the two bodies were frozen and transformed into marble, that precise moment captured in stone. The body of Christ draped and folded in Mary’s arms. Mary’s face shows the solemness of her loss. I have never seen something so beautiful and I was glad that I waited in line in order to see this masterpiece. No matter a person’s religious affiliation, I would recommend this work of art. I left so that other people could get closer and see the sculpting, but again, I could have stayed there for hours taking in all that I could of that work of art.

I wanted to see if I would be able to go to the top of the dome since it was one of the largest buildings in Rome. However, as I was waiting in line I realized that I didn’t have much time before my Colosseum appointment and I still hadn’t had lunch so I would have to leave. I went to a local shop to get something quick to eat, it was a pizza place called Alice’s Pizza which was quite good. The pizza was some of the better that I had in Italy, of the thin crust pizza, but I would have liked some focaccia bread pizza again. While I was eating I saw that next door was pasta and it was fresh and made to order. There was a line at that place and I thought I probably should have gone there to see what all the interest was. Next time. I finished up quickly and went to the metro station so I could get over to the Colosseum. I was pretty tight on time so I had to move quickly. I was going to take the Orange line to the Rome train station and switch to the blue line, but when I got to my transfer station the blue line was closed! That was a first. I was still tight on time for my entrance time at the Colosseum so I had to walk quickly over there, it was about a 15-minute walk. I made it just in time, but I doubt it mattered that much and I was able to get into the Colosseum.

I again consulted the Rick Steeves audio guide as I walked through the entrance and found my way to the arena floor. There was a platform that allowed people to stand in the arena and look up at the walls and terraced seating of the Colosseum. It was quite the view and I could only imagine what it would have looked like when it was all still intact. I was able to look out over the platform and see the bottom underside of the Colosseum where there were narrow hallways and some larger rooms. I knew that at the time of its use there were doors that could open for animals or people to emerge from the floor of the arena. It was incredible to think that so many people had used this space, so many people had been entertained, and so many people had died.

I walked up to the next level which allowed me a higher view of the Colosseum and a better view of the arena. There wasn’t really all that much to see or interact with while I was walking around, but it was still impressive nonetheless. This timeless and always present piece of human history standing as a testament to the ability and ingenuity of humanity.

It was already getting a little late in the day at this point and I still wanted to go to the Roman Forum which was right next door. I had already felt that I had seen all that the Colosseum had to offer so I went to the exit and found my way to the Roman Forum entrance. Luckily there was virtually no line so I was able to get in rather quickly. For the last time, I listened to the Rick Steeves audio guide while walking through the Roman Forum. It was a large expansive valley with many ruins and artifacts. Temples, avenues, housing, administrative buildings, parks, and more. This was the center of the Roman city at its height.

There was a massive administrative building, or rather the remnants of one, with three large arches that were to house the judicial portion of the government. If the citizens had claims to dispute they would be brought to this building for resolutions. I thought that was something particularly interesting, mainly for the mundaneness of it all. That it was just something likely taken for granted in the common Roman’s life, but the law was such a grand idea at that time it stood out to me. It also was so large, like a palace for law.

There was also a dormitory that was for the Vestal Virgins of Rome. They were tasked with keeping the eternal flame of Rome for the goddess Vesta always burning. They served terms of 30 years and after their term, they would no longer be required to remain virgins. If however, they broke their vows during their term then they would be buried alive in a tomb. Quite a harsh sentencing.

There was also a city center that had at the time been used by merchants, but also by not as honorable characters such as criminals. Rick Steeves mentioned that Julius Caesar himself may have walked and touched the very stones that I was walking on and touching. Such an unbelievable thought, that centuries ago the first Emperor of Rome strolled along the same road that I was walking down. I continued to walk through the Forum, but I was running out of time and I didn’t even get to Palatine Hill. I quickly walked up to the hill in order to get a better viewpoint of the Roman Forum and unfortunately after getting to the top I was nearing closing time so I wouldn’t be able to tour any further through the hill.

It was a busy day sightseeing, but I saw a lot and I was tired. So, I started to head back to the hostel. It was my last real day in Rome and all of Italy since I would be going to the airport fairly early in the morning. I had seen a lot and done a lot, but hopefully, I would be able to have one last bit of fun with people for dinner.

I got back to my room and rest for a little before going down to the common area of the hostel. I messaged Joe to see if he would like to join me for dinner. While I was waiting for Joe in the common area, I met a guy named Alex who was from Scotland and was an auto mechanic. He had just gotten in after having been in other parts of Europe. He was also looking for dinner that evening so I offered for him to join us. Not shortly thereafter Joe showed up with Emerald and two new people named Violeta and Yuma. Emerald was getting ready to leave for her flight back to Australia so she wouldn’t be joining us for dinner, but we said goodbye as she left. Yuma went upstairs to get some things and to see if his roommate would like to join us as well. While we were getting ready another girl named Lizzie joined our table and we offered for her to join us for dinner. Finally, Leah who Joe and I had met the night before showed up and she joined our dinner outing gang as well. We had a pretty large group at this point, 8 people, and it was hard to corral people so that we could actually go and I was getting fairly hungry and it was getting a little late for me to get to bed in time for my early wake-up and flight the next day. So, I decided to make an executive decision and head out, other people could join us later if they still wanted to go. We took off and went to the restaurant Vecchia Roma which was recommended by the hostel. However, when we got there the wait was about an hour long. Thankfully, we had a backup prepared, another recommendation from the hostel, that was not very far away called Trattoria Morgana. We walked over and were able to get outside seating for all 8 of us, 3 people showed up after we were seated, but we were sitting down and ready to order. We got some wine for the table, and a Chianti, and then ordered some appetizers while we waited for the others. Alex and I got a meat platter to share which was quite good. By the time our appetizers came, the others had joined us and we ordered our main meals. I hadn’t gotten Carbonara while I was in Italy yet and it had been suggested by a couple of people to have that dish. It was quite a simple dish with just pasta, egg, and bacon bits. However, the taste was quite good, something better than I was expecting for something so basic. I could have had a second helping! Instead of getting more main course food, I decided to get some dessert, a dish called Zabaglione and chocolate cream cake. I’m not exactly sure what Zabaglione is, but whatever it was it was delicious. I polished that off quickly. Our waiter was fantastic to top off the night so we all chipped in to give him a nice tip since he was patient with our large group, funny, and helpful. It was a wonderful final evening to my stay in Italy and I could not be more satisfied with my stay in Rome. I walked back to the hostel with the group happy that I had been able to experience such an amazing trip on the other side of the globe. I said my goodbyes and went up to my room for a quick shower, light packing, and then to bed.

November 22nd

I woke up early and tried to keep quiet since my other roommates were asleep. I got dressed and packed up my things quickly to head out. I stopped at the front desk to check out and ask the receptionist about the metro blue line since I was supposed to take that to the Rome train station and it was closed the day prior. He suggested taking the Orange line since it would get me there as well. Thankfully I asked him because the Orange line was much quicker and easier than walking to the train station. I got to the Rome train station and got my ticket for a direct train to the airport, got on the train, and was on my way to the Rome airport. The check-in and security were quick and seamless. Just like that, I was waiting at the terminal for my plane out of the country. I couldn’t believe it was over, two weeks that felt like a quick snapshot of time but were filled with innumerable new experiences and joys. Hopefully, someday I will come back to Italy, but for my next trip, I would like to see other places in Europe because there is so much to see.

Overall Final Thoughts

Where to begin, this trip was fantastic. As I have said numerous times probably the most memorable and enjoyable time in my life so far. This journal will help to keep it memorable. There were some other components about Italy that I observed that might not have made it into the daily diary that I want to note as well.

• Smoking. The prevalence of smoking in Italy and Europe is astonishing. At the airport in Zurich where I had my connecting flight, there were dedicated smoking lounges, multiple in each terminal. They were enclosed, but still so surprising to see. Then in the cities, the smoke was inescapable. Young people were smoking e-cigarettes predominately, but there were definitely a lot of traditional cigarettes.
• The focus on Art. It seemed that the Italian cities had a greater appreciation of art and the preservation of art. The museums are a component of that and the fact that there was so much historical art, but the number of people sketching, taking pictures, and focusing on the importance of art.
• Fashion. The common person in Italy appeared to have a more respectable wardrobe. Young people seemed to still dress quite haphazardly, but young adults and up there seemed to be a greater appreciation of the daily dress that an Italian wore outside.
• City interior transportation. The cities that I visited put cars secondary and pedestrians first. Pedestrians could walk anywhere and have the right of way. Sure, that rule might not always be respected and the buses hardly yield to pedestrians, but personal vehicles are not dominant on the streets. The vehicles are much smaller to accommodate the narrow streets and there are more bikes/scooters. They also block off many roads altogether from personal vehicles so that pedestrians can take up the entire avenue or square.
• Shopping. Supermarkets are sparse, and even what they call a supermarket is a corner shop here in the US. In some of the larger cities like Rome and Milan there were more traditional large supermarkets, but in Venice and Vernazza, the supermarket as they called it was smaller than a single aisle in an American supermarket.
• Trains. The trains can take you anywhere. There are high-speed trains which Americans always talk about being better in Europe, but the fact that there are regional trains going to just about every town is the really impressive part. There is no need for a car it seems, maybe a bike, but it appears that a person could get by without a car altogether.

A final thought on how important this trip was for me. It changed me personally, understanding myself in the world more. I realized how insignificant I am in the grand picture. Which can sound defeating, but after this trip, it feels liberating. There is nothing to hold me back and no one to restrict me from enjoying life to its fullest because I can do whatever I want. Within the guidelines of my morals and society’s rules of course. Still, the idea that I can do whatever I want for my life and not worry about other people has helped me to grow in my confidence, independence, and tranquility. I was not stressed once while I was in Italy and if you know me well you would understand how astonishing that is. I am lucky to be able to explore the world and get out of my comfort zone. Other people in the United States and the rest of the world are not so lucky. Being in another country, having to adapt to their culture, language, and lifestyle pushed me to be more accommodating to others. I think there is a lot to be said about Americans who never leave the country that speaks their language or goes somewhere where they have to adapt to understand what they are going to have for dinner. I didn’t have to work that hard since most people spoke English, but it is still different. Getting to a different part of the world where someone has to change themselves will ultimately change how a person interacts at home. I wish that more Americans could have the opportunity to explore the world and feel the need to accommodate others. Either way, I am hooked and already want to go on my next trip. Not sure exactly where, but Scotland has always been an interesting idea, or maybe the Germanic countries, who knows.

Ciao