Egypt was so amazing, it really sparked my interest in Egyptology. I had always been intrigued by the culture of Ancient Egypt, but after having seen and learned so much in the past 5 days—I am yearning to learn and read more about all things Egyptian!
We got off the boat at around 9:30ish, it took them a while to stamp everyone’s passports, and we passed through security in the port passenger terminal (which was VERY nice and new) and proceeded to the 4 bright yellow and blue buses that transported us to CAIRO. It was a 3-hour trip through mostly desert. I woke up that morning with a really intense stomach ache so I wasn’t feeling too hot on the way there, and was also a little car sick—but the bus ride was very interesting. Our guide was named Abir, and she is 43 originally from Alexandria but her family moved to Cairo and she lives on the outskirts with her husband and 5 year old son in this residential compound, where most affluent people live—most of the compounds have schools, country clubs, some stores, and are kind of desert oases. On the way into Cairo we passed all these small trucks carrying a various kinds of produce. In Egypt we discovered people honk all the time, and there is actually a sort of honking language. You use the horn to signal changing lanes, nudging cars on the road that are going too slow, telling people they are drifting into your line (seriously, line markers are taken to be a VERY loose guide on where people should drive), and so on. Our bus driver Muhammad was ALWAYS laying on the horn. We saw lots of thatched mud brick huts that were in the shade of looming tall billboards, it was sad to see modernity and destitution so close together. For the most part the ride into the city was completely desert terrain with a few hamlets of green land and very few trees. Once we reached the outskirts of Cairo we started passing the residential areas and compounds, but I noticed that most of the houses looked the same, with a Mediterranean style to them. We also passed some very new modern looking shopping malls, and one of them was totally devoted to the home, interesting. Abir also pointed out a new very modern business center that they have nicknamed a “smart center,” where the prime minister of Egypt has actually moved his office to, out of Cairo, so we passed his office building. Once we got into Cairo the traffic got 10 times worse. The local bus transportation were these small white vans that had 4 rows with probably 3 people in a row and were SO tiny and cramped, it was funny to see them zipping through the traffic. We had lunch at the Meridien Pyramids Hotel, and as we walked into the hotel were serenaded by a traditional Egyptian band playing Christmas carols…Lunch was pretty good, we had some Egyptian dishes:
After lunch we drive about 20 minutes to Memphis, which is 18 miles southeast of Cairo. It was the 1st capital of unified Egypt, and was founded in 3100 BC by King Narmer. We went to a museum, and saw a bunch of old monuments, and sphinx. My favorite was a huge limestone statue of Ramesses II, its on its side with a building built around it and 2 stories of balconies that you can walk around to get views of it from all side. The statue was probably 75 ft tall, and very detailed. You can see a very detailed dagger that’s at his waist, and his facial features are very distinct. After that we went outside to a garden that had more statues, mostly of Ramesses II, and we also got a glimpse of our 1st sphinx, made of alabaster. After getting haggled by some Egyptians to buy their carvings, papyrus, and scarabs, we retreated back to the air conditioning of the bus and headed to Saqqara.
It was a short drive to the entrance of Saqqara, which is basically the Sahara desert. Saqqara is best known for being the site of the earliest stone pyramid constructed in Egypt, the Step Pyramid of Djoser. Our first stop was going inside the tomb (or Mastaba, as the Ancient Egyptians called them) of Mereruka was the vizier to Teti, who was pharaoh during the VI Dynasty. We weren’t allowed to bring cameras into the tomb, and it was SCORCHING hot inside too, but it was cool to see all the scenes carved into the wall. They depict vivid scenes of fishing, hunting, metalworking (featuring dwarfs..that was interesting), and children playing. Some of murals still had the original colors on them, it was amazing to see. We into 5 rooms total and in each our guide would explain to us what was going on in the artwork on the walls. The last room we saw was where Mereuka and his wife and son were buried, but grave robbers robbed the treasures and their bodies in antiquity.
Next we went to visit the Step Pyramid of Djoser which was built in te 3rd Dynasty for the pharaoh Djoser by his architect Imhotep, it is 197 ft tall. We walked through a gate and then through long passage flanked by columns and then once we passed that we turned right and there was a vast space, that was once the Heb-Sed court and the pyramid was beyond that. After we took pictures of the pyramid, we walked up to a look out and could see the pyramids of Giza across the Sahara, and we could also see excavations of other mastabas that were in the process of being unearthed.
On our bus ride back to Cairo to check into our hotel, Abir told us about the agricultural villages that are on the outskirts of Cairo, and told us that some Egyptian movie stars buy plots of land that are sandwiched by the farmers, because the land is cheap and they build really nice large homes, she pointed some of them out to us, I thought it was pretty weird—but I guess Cairo is so polluted that most people would rather live outside of the city. The Cairo Marriot is the largest hotel in Cairo and was built around a palace built by Khedive Isma’il to give the French Empress Euguenie a place to stay during her visit for the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869. The hotel was ENORMOUS, and so so nice. It had 12 restaurants, and lots of shops, a place called “Funtasia” that was a play park for kids that had merry-go-rounds, jump castles, slip-n-slides, arcade games, popcorn, snacks, etc, it was pretty wild. There was also a huge open space with a garden and a patio area, a large pool, and an open-air movie theater on top of the hotel. Lauren and I switched with our room mates so we could room together and we had a large corner room that over looked the Nile and was on the 7th floor. We relaxed for a while and explored the hotel before we had dinner in a dining room that was actually the ballroom of the old palace, it was ornately decorated and at the front of the room was this huge wide staircase that I’m sure was used when the palace was still inhabited. After dinner we were all really tired and exhausted from our long day so we went upstairs and went to bed, anticipating our 4:00 AM wake up call the next morning to go watch the sun rise over the pyramids!
Wednesday, August 5, 2009
Sunday, July 26, 2009
ISTANBUL
Istanbul was so amazing! It was so different than last time, I saw so much more of the city and felt so much safer than the last time I went!
The 1st day in Istanbul, we got cleared through immigration a little later than we normally do, at like 10 am, normally is like 8:30. When we got off the ship we started out day at Topkapi Palace, it was cool, same as the last time we went, but this time we also went to the left side of the palace and there were a bunch of rooms with GORGEOUS mosaic on all the walls and ceilings and crazy rugs and pretty views of the harbor. Then we went to the harem, which is where all the women and children lived and they were guarded by huge black men called eunuchs (pronounced "u-nic") who were castrated during their training, kinda sad. The harem was decorated with tile mosaics too!
After that, we were pretty hungry for lunch and we got a recommendation for restaurants from my friend Camille’s 2 Turkish friends that live in Istanbul and go to UVA Ipek and Ece. They told us to go to Yesil Ev (English translation: Green House). It was right by the Blue Mosque, and was actually a hotel so we ate in the garden. It was so peaceful and quiet. Adelaide, Hannah and I ordered chicken curry and it was the BEST THING EVER! It came out with rice and cooked veggies, soooooo tasty! Lauren, Caroline and Maggie got chicken kebabs and they loved theirs too! Then we went to the Hagia Sophia and the middle of it was under construction and there was all this scaffolding and stuff which kind of took away from the experience, but we also went upstairs and on the left side there was this picture gallery of all these photos of the Hagia Sophia and on the right side were the famous Christian mosaics, they looked SO LIFE LIKE and the backgrounds were glittery gold, I don't know if we saw them the last time we were there.
Then we headed over to the blue mosque and Hannah and I got temporarily separated from the rest of the group because we were taking pictures in front of the Hagia Sophia, so we got a little confused trying to enter the Blue Mosque, and didn't know there was an entrance for JUST Muslims, hahahah I wish people could have seen our struggle and confusion trying to get inside. It was right before prayer time, when they close the mosque to non-Muslims, so were scrambling to get in before they closed the doors. Hannah and I were line with a ton of Turkish/Muslim looking people and def stood out, the whole time we were like, what is going on this is so strange, and then we got to the front and the guards started yelling and telling us the tourist entrance was "to the right, to the right" so we got out of line and got in the next line to the right, ohhhh that was still the Muslim line. So we were kicked out of line again and then had to run around the whole mosque before we found the tourist entrance, it was hilarious. I didn't remember but flash photography IS allowed, so I got a bunch of coolio pictures.
After the mosque we got these syrupy lollipops things, the man had this bucket of all these different flavors and he would take a stick and dip it in all the syrups that were hot and then it like instantly cooled and made a lolly! BUTTTT while I was eating it MY BOTTOM RETAINER CAME OUT OF MY MOUTH. Yikes, I guess I will wait until I get home to address the situation because I don’t really like the idea of going to a dentist in Bulgaria, Morocco, or Egypt.
After we saw the Blue Mosque we decided to call it a day because everyone was pretty exhausted so we walked back to the ship. It was about a 20-minute walk and we had to cross the harbor on the Galata Bridge, it was the coolest bridge! On the bottom level were a ton of restaurants, all of them had cool décor, and the people would yell at and hassle you to come inside and eat. Oh everyone loved my blonde hair, me more so than Caroline, I don’t know why, but I got so many catcalls and whistles, it was annoying but I got used to it after a while. We got back to the ship the 1st day and took naps before we got ready to go have drinks/dinner/go out.
We referred to our list from Ipek and Ece to find a good place to have a drink, eat dinner and go out. We decided to head to this district called Taskim, and walked down a pedestrian street called Istiklal, it looked like we were in China or something, the street was PACKED and there were tons of restaurants, and cool stores. We walked down the street for like 30 min trying to find this restaurant called 360 and finally found it after asking like 230983 people for directions. It was on the 8th story on top of some office building and we could even see our ship. It had the COOLEST 360 degree view of Istanbul, and the most badass drink menu that I have ever seen, the drinks were REALLY expensive, so we only had 2, but the ambience was super cool!
After that we started searching for this restaurant called Picante because they had Mexican food, and we again tried asking people but no one really knew where is was, and by this time everyone was STARVING and a little tipsy and getting frustrated and annoyed but we all really wanted Mexican food so we were wandering around this area, that had the neatest outside café type restaurants and it was so interesting, seriously every place was PACKED like no tables available anywhere and we had a big group of like 10 people so we needed multiple tables.
At last we found Picante and I had a really good crispy beef taco and we got guacamole, that was pretty tasty, and chips salsa, and people got fajitas, burritos, and tacos. Everything was surprisingly really really good, except the margaritas were like NEON green, but they tasted fine. At dinner Clark (my next door neighbor, and basically 3rd room mate) taught us this game called, physiatrist, where one person is “it” and everyone else picks a “disease” like you are the person on your right, or you are all the captain of the ship, or Michael Jackson, and the person that’s “it” goes around the table and asks questions trying to figure out everyone’s “disease” and you answer the question like the person you are pretending to be, it gets hilarious after a while. We were at dinner for like 3+ hours and then we went to some really cool bars. The popular drink over here is a “hazelnut vodka shot, and they are seriously the best things in the entire world. Carol, Hannah and I forgot that the shots contained alcohol because they were sooooo good and you didn’t need a chaser, that we got a LITTLE carried away.
We went to another bar and sat down and had some beers and then most of our group decided to go home except for Clark, Caroline, Jarrett and me. So we ventured out on our own and went to 2 more places and Caroline had a dance off with this European chica and Caroline SMOKED her, it was hilarious. Jarrett and I thought she wasn’t going to do it and all of the sudden she threw her bag at me and was like hold my stuff, and did her thing it was great. On the way home Jarrett bought multiple bags of popcorn that he tried to take on the ship much to the dismay of the security guards on duty, we sat there for 10 minutes trying to convince them to try the popcorn because we thought if they tried it and saw how good it was, they would let us bring it on the ship with us, no dice, FAIL.
The next morning we woke up and all felt a little sluggish so we decided to go see Harry Potter at noon at the COOLEST mall ever, called Kanyon Mall that also had the coolest movie theater. Inside the theater was like 3 times as big as the ones at home, and the movie had an intermission, which confused everyone! After the movie we had lunch at WAGAMAMA, it’s an Asia bistro type restaurant that is so delicious! They also have it in London; we have been a few times before. I got some sort of chicken and noodles and vegetables and it was great.
After lunch we walked around the mall for a little while and then because all of us were so tired from the night before we decided to go back to the ship and nap, so it was 6 of us and we got in 2 cabs and our cab drivers WERE DRIVING US OUT OF INSTANBUL God knows where. Neigher of them spoke a lick of English and didn’t even understand our hand motions. The lead cab driver got us horribly lost, and we were seriously headed into interior Turkey, I started feeling really faint and hot and was like freaking out. After 45 min in the cab we finally found the port, it was AWFUL. That night we wanted to do something a little more low key so we got some wine and the boys and Hannah smoked hookah at some restaurant on Galata Bridge, after that some people went out to the clubs but I just went to bed.
The next day we went to this shopping district called Nisantasi with lots of really really neat stores and I got a bunch of cute and clothes at Topshop! We just browsed around the other stores, Vakko is like their Saks here and we went in and looked around there, it was neat looking at all the Turkish designers. Then Caroline came back to the ship because she wasn’t feeling well and Hannah, Brooke and I went to the Cistern, its right across the street from the Hagia Sophia and was basically an aquifer where the Turks stored water, it was built in the 6th century during the reign of Byzantine Emperor Justinian I. Inside there are 360 columns that support the ceiling, because its underground. At the end there are 2 medusa heads that are carved out of stone and holding up 2 columns, those were interesting to look at. Inside the cistern it was dark and cool, a nice break from the extreme heat outside. On our way to the cistern I stopped and got some corn on the cob that is seriously sold on every single corner, it was yummy. Then we stopped at this Baklava store and the man probably in his mid-30s and another boy much younger LOVED us, and let Hannah go behind the counter and take pictures of all the sweets, and they gave us tons of free Baklava, and we sampled most of the flavors they had. We asked their names and they told us they were Mr. Delicious and Delicious Jr. We told them we could come back and buy more Baklava after we went to the cistern and when we returned Delicious Jr pulled out a white rose and gave it to Hannah and Mr. Delicious started referring to me as “his sweetheart.” They could not have been nicer, but it did start to get a little creepy so after about 20 minutes we bid them adieu and were on our way.
After that we went home and got ready for dinner, Camille’s 2 Turkish friends from UVA took us to this place called Joke Perestroika, which had a communist, Russian post WWII theme. It sounds weird I know, but it was one of the coolest restaurants I have ever been to! The inside was all light colored wood with lots of WWII Soviet propaganda, and then we went outside and there was a tank coming out of one walls and this barrack lighting with red wires was everywhere, an airplane was suspended in the air behind our table, and there were chandeliers and mirrors on all the tables. It had the coolest most sophisticated feel! There was a DJ booth right behind our table too, and he wasn’t playing the music too loud, we could still have comfortable conversations but he played the BEST selection of songs, lots of Madonna and MJ, and old rock! I got a Red’s (as in Communist, Red) mojito and ricotta spinach ravioli for dinner, it was delish! After dinner Hannah and I went up to the DJ booth to request some Lady GaGa, which unfortunately he didn’t have, BUT he did let us stay up on the DJ booth and dance to Black Eyed Peas--which was fun! After dinner we went back to Club Otto where we had been the 1st night, because Ece (Camille’s friend) had a friend that was DJing, it was a Monday night so not that many people were out but we had a good time and met some Turkish boys that were VERY cute and nice!
The 2nd to last day we woke up and Caroline was feeling a ton better, so we set out to go to the Dolmabahçe Palace which was built by the Turkish Sultans in 1845ish, when we got there we didn’t really know how to buy tickets so we got in the line that everyone else was in, and it was moving slower than a snail. Then all of the sudden this traditional Turkish band started coming down the road of the entrance of the palace, and they were playing drums and flutes and clarinet looking instruments. All of them were wearing traditional Turkish attire and FAKE BLACK MUSTACHES, I found it comical! They then made a formation in front of the palace and played a 30 min set, during which the ticket sales ceased. We waited for another hour and a half in line before we got close to the ticket office, then they posted a sign that said, “due to the crowdness of the palace we will stop selling tickets for 30 min.” COOL. So Carol and Camille went and bought us ice creams because at this point its like 12:30 and none of us had eaten all day. Finally we bought our tickets and went inside the palace gates, and then walked through the garden. The palace was right on the Bosporus and had gorgeous views of the water; the land across the strait was actually ASIA! After we walked around the garden for a little bit we went up to the palace and found out that you can’t actually walk through it on your own, you have to go with a guide. Also we had to put these red plastic bootie things on our foot, and duh my feet were a tad sweaty by the end of the tour. Our guide didn’t speak English that well, but thankfully there were pamphlets that gave a paragraph on all the rooms so we just read that instead of listening to her. The palace had 285 rooms and had all the original furnishings! It was so lavish and nice. 1st we went through a ton of reception type rooms, which were for parties, and gatherings. All of them were so ornate and gorgeous, with rich rugs and elaborate ceilings, crystal chandeliers that weighed multiple tons, you get the picture. After those rooms we passed through 2 ballrooms that were even bigger before we reached the Harem, where the sultans actually lived. We walked into the room that Ataturk, the founder of Turkey, actually died in—in 1938, and walked through his private baths. All of the living quarters had fabulous balconies that also opened up to the Bosporus. The last stop was this HUGE reception hall where the Turkish parliament actually met and where Ataturk had huge parties and made a lot of important government decisions. It was enormous and breathtaking.
After the palace Camille, Carol, and I went to the Istanbul Modern Art Museum and met Ipek and Ece (Camille’s friends) for lunch. We ate on this balcony overlooking the Bosporus and watched the ships and ferries go across the channel. I had this really good steak salad with basil and balsamic vinaigrettes, and then we spent a few hours in the museum. It was so cool, all of the artwork was AWESOME, I had a great time. After the museum we went back to the ship and took a nap before dinner. This was our last night to go out and Ipek and Ece made us reservations at this really nice club on the Bosporus called Angelique and we had bottle service all night, it was so so so fun! We were the only Americans and our table was right by the DJ booth, and the owner of the club would come over and ask us what music we wanted to hear and then he would tell the DJ and we would play it immediately, it was cool! I took lots of pics!
The next day we woke up and were a little tired, but slept for a little bit before we got to the Grand Bazaar at 2. We were all hung-over, but I couldn’t have imagined having a more fun time at the Bazaar, due to our hangovers we were all in really funny moods and got great deals on all our purchases, I bought jewelry, pashminas, a purse. I was surprised at the quality of the jewelry; I found a lot of really unique stuff that looks well made! I am excited about my finds. We got back on the ship at around 5 pm and went out and sat on the deck for a while just taking in the last of the city before the ship pulled away at 11:30 pm. We actually got to Bulgaria today, and put our anchor down outside of the town until tomorrow when we will get a spot in the port and go into town!
The 1st day in Istanbul, we got cleared through immigration a little later than we normally do, at like 10 am, normally is like 8:30. When we got off the ship we started out day at Topkapi Palace, it was cool, same as the last time we went, but this time we also went to the left side of the palace and there were a bunch of rooms with GORGEOUS mosaic on all the walls and ceilings and crazy rugs and pretty views of the harbor. Then we went to the harem, which is where all the women and children lived and they were guarded by huge black men called eunuchs (pronounced "u-nic") who were castrated during their training, kinda sad. The harem was decorated with tile mosaics too!
After that, we were pretty hungry for lunch and we got a recommendation for restaurants from my friend Camille’s 2 Turkish friends that live in Istanbul and go to UVA Ipek and Ece. They told us to go to Yesil Ev (English translation: Green House). It was right by the Blue Mosque, and was actually a hotel so we ate in the garden. It was so peaceful and quiet. Adelaide, Hannah and I ordered chicken curry and it was the BEST THING EVER! It came out with rice and cooked veggies, soooooo tasty! Lauren, Caroline and Maggie got chicken kebabs and they loved theirs too! Then we went to the Hagia Sophia and the middle of it was under construction and there was all this scaffolding and stuff which kind of took away from the experience, but we also went upstairs and on the left side there was this picture gallery of all these photos of the Hagia Sophia and on the right side were the famous Christian mosaics, they looked SO LIFE LIKE and the backgrounds were glittery gold, I don't know if we saw them the last time we were there.
Then we headed over to the blue mosque and Hannah and I got temporarily separated from the rest of the group because we were taking pictures in front of the Hagia Sophia, so we got a little confused trying to enter the Blue Mosque, and didn't know there was an entrance for JUST Muslims, hahahah I wish people could have seen our struggle and confusion trying to get inside. It was right before prayer time, when they close the mosque to non-Muslims, so were scrambling to get in before they closed the doors. Hannah and I were line with a ton of Turkish/Muslim looking people and def stood out, the whole time we were like, what is going on this is so strange, and then we got to the front and the guards started yelling and telling us the tourist entrance was "to the right, to the right" so we got out of line and got in the next line to the right, ohhhh that was still the Muslim line. So we were kicked out of line again and then had to run around the whole mosque before we found the tourist entrance, it was hilarious. I didn't remember but flash photography IS allowed, so I got a bunch of coolio pictures.
After the mosque we got these syrupy lollipops things, the man had this bucket of all these different flavors and he would take a stick and dip it in all the syrups that were hot and then it like instantly cooled and made a lolly! BUTTTT while I was eating it MY BOTTOM RETAINER CAME OUT OF MY MOUTH. Yikes, I guess I will wait until I get home to address the situation because I don’t really like the idea of going to a dentist in Bulgaria, Morocco, or Egypt.
After we saw the Blue Mosque we decided to call it a day because everyone was pretty exhausted so we walked back to the ship. It was about a 20-minute walk and we had to cross the harbor on the Galata Bridge, it was the coolest bridge! On the bottom level were a ton of restaurants, all of them had cool décor, and the people would yell at and hassle you to come inside and eat. Oh everyone loved my blonde hair, me more so than Caroline, I don’t know why, but I got so many catcalls and whistles, it was annoying but I got used to it after a while. We got back to the ship the 1st day and took naps before we got ready to go have drinks/dinner/go out.
We referred to our list from Ipek and Ece to find a good place to have a drink, eat dinner and go out. We decided to head to this district called Taskim, and walked down a pedestrian street called Istiklal, it looked like we were in China or something, the street was PACKED and there were tons of restaurants, and cool stores. We walked down the street for like 30 min trying to find this restaurant called 360 and finally found it after asking like 230983 people for directions. It was on the 8th story on top of some office building and we could even see our ship. It had the COOLEST 360 degree view of Istanbul, and the most badass drink menu that I have ever seen, the drinks were REALLY expensive, so we only had 2, but the ambience was super cool!
After that we started searching for this restaurant called Picante because they had Mexican food, and we again tried asking people but no one really knew where is was, and by this time everyone was STARVING and a little tipsy and getting frustrated and annoyed but we all really wanted Mexican food so we were wandering around this area, that had the neatest outside café type restaurants and it was so interesting, seriously every place was PACKED like no tables available anywhere and we had a big group of like 10 people so we needed multiple tables.
At last we found Picante and I had a really good crispy beef taco and we got guacamole, that was pretty tasty, and chips salsa, and people got fajitas, burritos, and tacos. Everything was surprisingly really really good, except the margaritas were like NEON green, but they tasted fine. At dinner Clark (my next door neighbor, and basically 3rd room mate) taught us this game called, physiatrist, where one person is “it” and everyone else picks a “disease” like you are the person on your right, or you are all the captain of the ship, or Michael Jackson, and the person that’s “it” goes around the table and asks questions trying to figure out everyone’s “disease” and you answer the question like the person you are pretending to be, it gets hilarious after a while. We were at dinner for like 3+ hours and then we went to some really cool bars. The popular drink over here is a “hazelnut vodka shot, and they are seriously the best things in the entire world. Carol, Hannah and I forgot that the shots contained alcohol because they were sooooo good and you didn’t need a chaser, that we got a LITTLE carried away.
We went to another bar and sat down and had some beers and then most of our group decided to go home except for Clark, Caroline, Jarrett and me. So we ventured out on our own and went to 2 more places and Caroline had a dance off with this European chica and Caroline SMOKED her, it was hilarious. Jarrett and I thought she wasn’t going to do it and all of the sudden she threw her bag at me and was like hold my stuff, and did her thing it was great. On the way home Jarrett bought multiple bags of popcorn that he tried to take on the ship much to the dismay of the security guards on duty, we sat there for 10 minutes trying to convince them to try the popcorn because we thought if they tried it and saw how good it was, they would let us bring it on the ship with us, no dice, FAIL.
The next morning we woke up and all felt a little sluggish so we decided to go see Harry Potter at noon at the COOLEST mall ever, called Kanyon Mall that also had the coolest movie theater. Inside the theater was like 3 times as big as the ones at home, and the movie had an intermission, which confused everyone! After the movie we had lunch at WAGAMAMA, it’s an Asia bistro type restaurant that is so delicious! They also have it in London; we have been a few times before. I got some sort of chicken and noodles and vegetables and it was great.
After lunch we walked around the mall for a little while and then because all of us were so tired from the night before we decided to go back to the ship and nap, so it was 6 of us and we got in 2 cabs and our cab drivers WERE DRIVING US OUT OF INSTANBUL God knows where. Neigher of them spoke a lick of English and didn’t even understand our hand motions. The lead cab driver got us horribly lost, and we were seriously headed into interior Turkey, I started feeling really faint and hot and was like freaking out. After 45 min in the cab we finally found the port, it was AWFUL. That night we wanted to do something a little more low key so we got some wine and the boys and Hannah smoked hookah at some restaurant on Galata Bridge, after that some people went out to the clubs but I just went to bed.
The next day we went to this shopping district called Nisantasi with lots of really really neat stores and I got a bunch of cute and clothes at Topshop! We just browsed around the other stores, Vakko is like their Saks here and we went in and looked around there, it was neat looking at all the Turkish designers. Then Caroline came back to the ship because she wasn’t feeling well and Hannah, Brooke and I went to the Cistern, its right across the street from the Hagia Sophia and was basically an aquifer where the Turks stored water, it was built in the 6th century during the reign of Byzantine Emperor Justinian I. Inside there are 360 columns that support the ceiling, because its underground. At the end there are 2 medusa heads that are carved out of stone and holding up 2 columns, those were interesting to look at. Inside the cistern it was dark and cool, a nice break from the extreme heat outside. On our way to the cistern I stopped and got some corn on the cob that is seriously sold on every single corner, it was yummy. Then we stopped at this Baklava store and the man probably in his mid-30s and another boy much younger LOVED us, and let Hannah go behind the counter and take pictures of all the sweets, and they gave us tons of free Baklava, and we sampled most of the flavors they had. We asked their names and they told us they were Mr. Delicious and Delicious Jr. We told them we could come back and buy more Baklava after we went to the cistern and when we returned Delicious Jr pulled out a white rose and gave it to Hannah and Mr. Delicious started referring to me as “his sweetheart.” They could not have been nicer, but it did start to get a little creepy so after about 20 minutes we bid them adieu and were on our way.
After that we went home and got ready for dinner, Camille’s 2 Turkish friends from UVA took us to this place called Joke Perestroika, which had a communist, Russian post WWII theme. It sounds weird I know, but it was one of the coolest restaurants I have ever been to! The inside was all light colored wood with lots of WWII Soviet propaganda, and then we went outside and there was a tank coming out of one walls and this barrack lighting with red wires was everywhere, an airplane was suspended in the air behind our table, and there were chandeliers and mirrors on all the tables. It had the coolest most sophisticated feel! There was a DJ booth right behind our table too, and he wasn’t playing the music too loud, we could still have comfortable conversations but he played the BEST selection of songs, lots of Madonna and MJ, and old rock! I got a Red’s (as in Communist, Red) mojito and ricotta spinach ravioli for dinner, it was delish! After dinner Hannah and I went up to the DJ booth to request some Lady GaGa, which unfortunately he didn’t have, BUT he did let us stay up on the DJ booth and dance to Black Eyed Peas--which was fun! After dinner we went back to Club Otto where we had been the 1st night, because Ece (Camille’s friend) had a friend that was DJing, it was a Monday night so not that many people were out but we had a good time and met some Turkish boys that were VERY cute and nice!
The 2nd to last day we woke up and Caroline was feeling a ton better, so we set out to go to the Dolmabahçe Palace which was built by the Turkish Sultans in 1845ish, when we got there we didn’t really know how to buy tickets so we got in the line that everyone else was in, and it was moving slower than a snail. Then all of the sudden this traditional Turkish band started coming down the road of the entrance of the palace, and they were playing drums and flutes and clarinet looking instruments. All of them were wearing traditional Turkish attire and FAKE BLACK MUSTACHES, I found it comical! They then made a formation in front of the palace and played a 30 min set, during which the ticket sales ceased. We waited for another hour and a half in line before we got close to the ticket office, then they posted a sign that said, “due to the crowdness of the palace we will stop selling tickets for 30 min.” COOL. So Carol and Camille went and bought us ice creams because at this point its like 12:30 and none of us had eaten all day. Finally we bought our tickets and went inside the palace gates, and then walked through the garden. The palace was right on the Bosporus and had gorgeous views of the water; the land across the strait was actually ASIA! After we walked around the garden for a little bit we went up to the palace and found out that you can’t actually walk through it on your own, you have to go with a guide. Also we had to put these red plastic bootie things on our foot, and duh my feet were a tad sweaty by the end of the tour. Our guide didn’t speak English that well, but thankfully there were pamphlets that gave a paragraph on all the rooms so we just read that instead of listening to her. The palace had 285 rooms and had all the original furnishings! It was so lavish and nice. 1st we went through a ton of reception type rooms, which were for parties, and gatherings. All of them were so ornate and gorgeous, with rich rugs and elaborate ceilings, crystal chandeliers that weighed multiple tons, you get the picture. After those rooms we passed through 2 ballrooms that were even bigger before we reached the Harem, where the sultans actually lived. We walked into the room that Ataturk, the founder of Turkey, actually died in—in 1938, and walked through his private baths. All of the living quarters had fabulous balconies that also opened up to the Bosporus. The last stop was this HUGE reception hall where the Turkish parliament actually met and where Ataturk had huge parties and made a lot of important government decisions. It was enormous and breathtaking.
After the palace Camille, Carol, and I went to the Istanbul Modern Art Museum and met Ipek and Ece (Camille’s friends) for lunch. We ate on this balcony overlooking the Bosporus and watched the ships and ferries go across the channel. I had this really good steak salad with basil and balsamic vinaigrettes, and then we spent a few hours in the museum. It was so cool, all of the artwork was AWESOME, I had a great time. After the museum we went back to the ship and took a nap before dinner. This was our last night to go out and Ipek and Ece made us reservations at this really nice club on the Bosporus called Angelique and we had bottle service all night, it was so so so fun! We were the only Americans and our table was right by the DJ booth, and the owner of the club would come over and ask us what music we wanted to hear and then he would tell the DJ and we would play it immediately, it was cool! I took lots of pics!
The next day we woke up and were a little tired, but slept for a little bit before we got to the Grand Bazaar at 2. We were all hung-over, but I couldn’t have imagined having a more fun time at the Bazaar, due to our hangovers we were all in really funny moods and got great deals on all our purchases, I bought jewelry, pashminas, a purse. I was surprised at the quality of the jewelry; I found a lot of really unique stuff that looks well made! I am excited about my finds. We got back on the ship at around 5 pm and went out and sat on the deck for a while just taking in the last of the city before the ship pulled away at 11:30 pm. We actually got to Bulgaria today, and put our anchor down outside of the town until tomorrow when we will get a spot in the port and go into town!
CROATIA
WOW! Croatia was the most beautiful place I have ever been! Our boat docked at the Gruz Port which is outside of the Old Town. 15 of us ended up renting a villa for the 4 days we were there. We couldn’t check in until 2 pm so we decided to have lunch on the ship and then get a cab to our house. We were told it was very close to a beach and about a 10 min walk to the Old Town, had a garden and a pool. Upon arrival we found out it was indeed very close to the Old Town and also our port but the beach was further away than we expected. The house was AWESOME though. The pool was pretty big and we had lounge chairs lining the pool and also a sweet patio with lots of seating. The house wasn’t enormous or anything but it had 5 bedrooms each with a king size bed and 2 bathrooms upstairs and one downstairs. Some people went to the store right when we got there to get frozen pizzas, hotdogs and stuff for sandwiches and cereal for the morning. The rest of us hit the pool! We got out my iPod speakers and found some blowup floats and the pool party was underway in no time! We all hung out in the pool for a few hours and then decided that we wanted to go cliff jumping. So Jarrett, Caroline, Kathryn, Spencer and I took off down a street toward the ocean. We didn’t really know where the cliffs were but we knew they were close. We ran into these 2 fourteen year old boys who both lived in Croatia but one of them grew up in Houston so he spoke good English. Turned out they were both going cliff jumping too, so they lead us across the street and down this path toward the water. This place had 2 cliffs that you could jump from and where the lower cliff was there was a pretty big platform where you could lay out and hang. The higher cliff was probably 40-50 ft high and it was kind of scary to go off at first but after a little convincing we all did it! It was so exhilarating and a BLAST! We stayed there for probably an hour and by this time it was getting dark so we headed home to eat dinner. Everyone had frozen pizza, I thought it tasted AMAAZING, seriously the best frozen pizza I have ever had, and definitely better than any pizza I have ever had in the US. We pre-gamed at our house for a while and some other Semester @ Sea kids came over, the party was pretty buumppinnggg! We heard the happening club that night was Fuego which was less than 10 min from our villa, so we decided to check it out. It was a latin dance club and turned out to be an absolute blast! We danced all night and hung out with the 50+ SAS (Semester @ Sea) kids that were there. When we got home that night we were all so hot and sweaty that everyone jumped in the pool! It was a Fun night!
The next day we woke up and went into town for a few hours and just walked around, and then had lunch on the way home at this place called Sesame, we ate upstairs on the balcony that was enclosed by all these leafy vines, it was a nice relaxing lunch! Then we came back to our house and had another epic pool party, lots of people came over and we had the music going! It was a blast, then we went exploring in town later in the afternoon because we had heard about this bar on the cliffs outside of the city walls, called Buza so we wanted to check it out. No one in our group really knew where we were going, but we knew it overlooked the ocean so we just took a bunch of right turns until we found a driftwood sign that said, cold drinks, and we followed this little passage through a break in the walls (the walls are 20 ft thick in some places) and then we went down some steps to a gorgeous view of the water and an island off the coast of Dubrovnik. Hannah and I went swimming for a little bit on the rocks off the walls and we watched the sunset, and then had dinner at this pizzeria in town. Then we all went to Fuego again and met up with a bunch of SAS kids!
Our third day was my favorite! We started the day in town and had lunch at a local restaurant and then some of our friends called and said they chartered a boat for us, and they would take us where ever we wanted to go around the islands near Dubrovnik. It was a flat bottomed boat that had railings and a canopy and 2 benches along either side, and then in the front had more seating. We left out of the old city port and started driving along the coast line, I got bunch of great pictures of the city walls. The water in Croatia was SO CLEAR! After about 40 min of driving, we stopped and all got out and swam around and the water was so clear you could see the bottom even though it was like 50+ feet down! The water was soooo salty though, after you got out and your skin dried off it left a film of salt. We drove to this beach that is only accessible by boat on an island that we never got the name of, but lots of really huge yachts were parked in the cove and people were lounging on the beach, some of the boys and our 2 boat captains, (Tony and Tony) jumped off the boat and swam to the shore to get something to drink, but most of the girls and some of the other boys stayed on the boat and just swam nearby because the swim was pretty far! Then after an hour in the cove we got off and went to this island called Lopud, that Tony and Tony said was an hour and a half from Dubrovnik, it was the cutest little water front town, with a beach where a bunch of locals were swimming and hanging out and they had lots of paddle boats, and slides that went into the water. At this point it was like 6 and we were all hungry so we ate at this little café on the water, and watched the sun go down. It was beautiful! Then we got back on the boat and drove home, it took about an hour and 45 min, and a group of us sat in the front of the boat and just talked and listened to music and had a dance party! We got home at like 8:30 pm and most everyone was exhausted so we went back to the house and showered and met Lauren and Adelaide for dinner at this restaurant that looked at the city walls and had a pretty view of a cove, and we had delicious caprese salads, wine. I was falling asleep at the dinner table, so I went back to the villa and went to sleep but everyone else went out and had a good time!
Our last day we woke up and took our bags back to the ship, 10 min from our villa, had lunch on the ship, and then headed into town to walk the city walls. It took probably an hour and was SO SO HOT, but the views were fabulous and the hike was definitely worth it! Then we just walked around and did some souvenir shopping. Having realized that I didn’t pack a single pair of flip-flops in my 2 large duffle bags, I bought my first pair of Havaianas! We shopped along the main street and then veered off into the side streets to find shops that were a little less touristy. We got separated from Carol at some point so Hannah and I decided to look inside the War Photography Museum that we read about in our Fodor’s travel book. It was very interesting, but also very sad. We saw exhibits about the conflict with the FARC in Colombia, and a really touching exhibit about war veterans from Iraq and their war wounds, it left me feeling sad and I wanted to leave. I got some ice cream to cheer me up and it was almost ship board time so Hannah and I got a cab and went back to the ship!
Croatia was far more beautiful than I expected, and everyone we met was so friendly and welcoming, and most spoke very good English! I am very excited to get to GREECE!
Thanks for reading, miss everyone!
Hayley
The next day we woke up and went into town for a few hours and just walked around, and then had lunch on the way home at this place called Sesame, we ate upstairs on the balcony that was enclosed by all these leafy vines, it was a nice relaxing lunch! Then we came back to our house and had another epic pool party, lots of people came over and we had the music going! It was a blast, then we went exploring in town later in the afternoon because we had heard about this bar on the cliffs outside of the city walls, called Buza so we wanted to check it out. No one in our group really knew where we were going, but we knew it overlooked the ocean so we just took a bunch of right turns until we found a driftwood sign that said, cold drinks, and we followed this little passage through a break in the walls (the walls are 20 ft thick in some places) and then we went down some steps to a gorgeous view of the water and an island off the coast of Dubrovnik. Hannah and I went swimming for a little bit on the rocks off the walls and we watched the sunset, and then had dinner at this pizzeria in town. Then we all went to Fuego again and met up with a bunch of SAS kids!
Our third day was my favorite! We started the day in town and had lunch at a local restaurant and then some of our friends called and said they chartered a boat for us, and they would take us where ever we wanted to go around the islands near Dubrovnik. It was a flat bottomed boat that had railings and a canopy and 2 benches along either side, and then in the front had more seating. We left out of the old city port and started driving along the coast line, I got bunch of great pictures of the city walls. The water in Croatia was SO CLEAR! After about 40 min of driving, we stopped and all got out and swam around and the water was so clear you could see the bottom even though it was like 50+ feet down! The water was soooo salty though, after you got out and your skin dried off it left a film of salt. We drove to this beach that is only accessible by boat on an island that we never got the name of, but lots of really huge yachts were parked in the cove and people were lounging on the beach, some of the boys and our 2 boat captains, (Tony and Tony) jumped off the boat and swam to the shore to get something to drink, but most of the girls and some of the other boys stayed on the boat and just swam nearby because the swim was pretty far! Then after an hour in the cove we got off and went to this island called Lopud, that Tony and Tony said was an hour and a half from Dubrovnik, it was the cutest little water front town, with a beach where a bunch of locals were swimming and hanging out and they had lots of paddle boats, and slides that went into the water. At this point it was like 6 and we were all hungry so we ate at this little café on the water, and watched the sun go down. It was beautiful! Then we got back on the boat and drove home, it took about an hour and 45 min, and a group of us sat in the front of the boat and just talked and listened to music and had a dance party! We got home at like 8:30 pm and most everyone was exhausted so we went back to the house and showered and met Lauren and Adelaide for dinner at this restaurant that looked at the city walls and had a pretty view of a cove, and we had delicious caprese salads, wine. I was falling asleep at the dinner table, so I went back to the villa and went to sleep but everyone else went out and had a good time!
Our last day we woke up and took our bags back to the ship, 10 min from our villa, had lunch on the ship, and then headed into town to walk the city walls. It took probably an hour and was SO SO HOT, but the views were fabulous and the hike was definitely worth it! Then we just walked around and did some souvenir shopping. Having realized that I didn’t pack a single pair of flip-flops in my 2 large duffle bags, I bought my first pair of Havaianas! We shopped along the main street and then veered off into the side streets to find shops that were a little less touristy. We got separated from Carol at some point so Hannah and I decided to look inside the War Photography Museum that we read about in our Fodor’s travel book. It was very interesting, but also very sad. We saw exhibits about the conflict with the FARC in Colombia, and a really touching exhibit about war veterans from Iraq and their war wounds, it left me feeling sad and I wanted to leave. I got some ice cream to cheer me up and it was almost ship board time so Hannah and I got a cab and went back to the ship!
Croatia was far more beautiful than I expected, and everyone we met was so friendly and welcoming, and most spoke very good English! I am very excited to get to GREECE!
Thanks for reading, miss everyone!
Hayley
CAPRI/SORRENTO
So we wake up in Naples, or locally known as Napoli and our 1st priority is to find the ferry ticket office so we can buy our tickets to CaPri! Problem is…no one really speaks ANY English in the port, we are talking ZIP, ZERO. So after walking aimlessly for about 20 min we finally get pointed in the right direction by this H-O-T Italian port guard who resembles ARNOLD SWARZNEGGER… We hop on the hydrofoil to Capri and are there by 11:30, woohooooo! I think it’s the most gorgeous place EVER and we have just landed in the port, and haven’t even made our way into the town. We are traveling with 8 people and it takes a while for everyone to decide what they want to do because we only have limited time on the island, much less coordinate our schedules. We heard that they was a man who makes sandals and custom fits them to your feet, but none of the styles really caught my eye, or anyone elses so we didn’t stop there. We knew we wanted to go to the Blue Grotto so we asked about getting a boat there. Finally after negotiation at multiple places we decide to RENT a boat and drive it OURSELVES around the island of Capri. We have the boat for 2 hours and the nice man who we rented it from (and who taught us how to drive it) said that it would take an hour to drive around the island without stopping so we had about an hr of hangout in the water/cave exploring time! We were SET! Lauren was our driver and everyone else assembled themselves around the boat to catch the best rays and we sped off (well not really, the max speed of the boat was pretty slow). We passed by so0o0o many sweet yachts and other boats (all of which were larger than ours), but it was a blast waving and yelling hi to people! The man who rented us the boat also gave us a map of all the landmarks and caves around the island, so WHITE GROTTO was our first stop! We had some trouble figure out the anchor, Hannah couldn’t initially grasp that you had to pull out the tongs before you dropped it in the water, so after love tapping another boat, we finally got ours anchored and I cannon balled into the Med! There was a group of strapping young Italian men who were in Capri for a friends wedding tied up next to us, they came over and we chatted for a little bit and then decided we all wanted to go into the cave, WEEELLLL neither of us realized that is was abt 3.5 ft from the water to the step and we ALL struggled getting out of water onto the ledge to climb the stairs into the cave. Most of us flopped around and it took 2+ Italians (3 in Clarks case) to get us on land! Then we had to climb like 5 stories up and then we went into the cave. It was pretty awesome with lots of stalactites and stalagmites, and the whole place kinda glowed white, hence the name, WHITE grotto! After that we swam around for a little bit and then got back on the boat to continue our voyage around the island. We didn’t stop for a while, but passed by tons of beach clubs with lots of sun bathers, and there was a constant stream of boat traffic that passed us, it was sooooo fun driving around! Finally we put our anchor down again right before we got back to where we started and swam to a beach. Hannah, Carol, Clark and I bought GOGGLES, so we all went rock hunting! I found some pretty kewl rocks that now reside in the my bedside table! Then we had to deliver the boat back!
All of our tummies were rumbling so we went into Capri Town and weaved through the tiny streets with AWESOME, but very expensive shops, and had a delicious lunch at Aurora (it’s the celeb hotspot in Capri, yet we didn’t spot any). I had gnocchi pasta and split a Caprese Pizza with some peeps. After lunch we tried to go see the Blue Grotto but it had CLOSED! I was SUPER bummed, so I had a gelato and we camped out on the beach for the rest of the day and then caught a ferry to Sorrento for the night!
When we got to Sorrento we hailed a cab and he took us to our hotel which was at the TOP of the mountain above the town of Sorrento. I found the hotel online and it was pretty cheap, but when we got there we were sooooo surprised how nice it was! We had breathtaking views of the whole city, there was a huge pool with views, and a upper patio with tons of loungers and more views, we even had GREAT views from our hotel room! We celebrated our good fortune with a bottle of wine and then went into town for dinner. These young Italian boys were STARING at us all dinner and then finally came over and asked if we wanted to go to the Blue Mar discoteca with them. They spoke little to no English so communicating with them was tough at best. We told them we would meet them at this discoteca because we still had to pay our bill. Getting there was a little hairy, it turned out this LOCAL place was 30 min outside of Sorrento, our cab fare was OUTRAGEOUS and the local italiano girls were totally not digging us infringing on their turf. We ended up in town at the English Inn and had a great time dancing! The next day we woke up and walked 10 min down the mountain to have lunch at this gorgeous hotel with awesome views! After that we went back to the hotel laid out on the upper deck and then went to town and walked around and explored for a few hours before we got back on the ferry to head back to Naples. Sorrento was so gorgeous; I definitely wish we could have spent more time there! It was a lot larger than I expected and there was a lot more going on than I would have thought! Italy has been my favorite country I fell in love with Capri and Sorrento and am literally itching to go back soon!
All of our tummies were rumbling so we went into Capri Town and weaved through the tiny streets with AWESOME, but very expensive shops, and had a delicious lunch at Aurora (it’s the celeb hotspot in Capri, yet we didn’t spot any). I had gnocchi pasta and split a Caprese Pizza with some peeps. After lunch we tried to go see the Blue Grotto but it had CLOSED! I was SUPER bummed, so I had a gelato and we camped out on the beach for the rest of the day and then caught a ferry to Sorrento for the night!
When we got to Sorrento we hailed a cab and he took us to our hotel which was at the TOP of the mountain above the town of Sorrento. I found the hotel online and it was pretty cheap, but when we got there we were sooooo surprised how nice it was! We had breathtaking views of the whole city, there was a huge pool with views, and a upper patio with tons of loungers and more views, we even had GREAT views from our hotel room! We celebrated our good fortune with a bottle of wine and then went into town for dinner. These young Italian boys were STARING at us all dinner and then finally came over and asked if we wanted to go to the Blue Mar discoteca with them. They spoke little to no English so communicating with them was tough at best. We told them we would meet them at this discoteca because we still had to pay our bill. Getting there was a little hairy, it turned out this LOCAL place was 30 min outside of Sorrento, our cab fare was OUTRAGEOUS and the local italiano girls were totally not digging us infringing on their turf. We ended up in town at the English Inn and had a great time dancing! The next day we woke up and walked 10 min down the mountain to have lunch at this gorgeous hotel with awesome views! After that we went back to the hotel laid out on the upper deck and then went to town and walked around and explored for a few hours before we got back on the ferry to head back to Naples. Sorrento was so gorgeous; I definitely wish we could have spent more time there! It was a lot larger than I expected and there was a lot more going on than I would have thought! Italy has been my favorite country I fell in love with Capri and Sorrento and am literally itching to go back soon!
Saturday, July 11, 2009
Last Day in Roma
The last day in Rome, Hannah and Caroline once again had to go back to the Vatican so I went sightseeing with Adelaide and Lauren. First we went to the Spanish steps because I still hadn’t seen them yet, and walked down the Via Condotti (its where all the high end designers have stores and off of it are best shops in Rome) for a few blocks window shopping in all the designer stores, they were all pretty packed and I wasn’t in a mood to really shop so we didn’t spend much time there. Then we got a cab and went to the Castel del San Angelo. It was built by Hadrian in the early 100s-200s BC I think. It’s the place in Angels and Demons where the Illuminati dude keeps the Cardinals hostage, and where Langdon and Vittoria go at the end and find the van, and the bad guy. It had 3 levels that you could look out from that had spectacular views of all of Rome. The very top level had amazing views of St. Peter’s and the square with the blocks leading up to it. The castle is right by the Tiber River, which I believe is the most polluted river in Italy, it had an uncanny resemblance to chocolate milk…ewww. I took a bunch of panamoric pictures of the Rome skyline! After we made our way down from the castle we decided to go to St. Peter’s square, it was a random decision and we weren’t dressed to go inside, but I thought it would be cool just to go walk around and take pics in front of the church, plus all of us had been inside before. After that we wanted to go have lunch in Trastevere at the suggestion of our teachers the day before. In my Rome Fodor’s book it suggested this restaurant called Romolo, but we couldn’t find it and just settled for a cute little place in the square. We all got Caprese salads, and this iced tea that was more Arnold Palmer than iced tea, but was sooo tasty. While we were eating lunch Isabel and Camille strolled by coincidentally so they joined us for the remainder of our lunch. There were some drunk hippie/homeless men playing soccer in the Piazza and drinking 40’s that also provided entertainment. They had so qualms about kicking the soccer ball against any building, and I think broke a few windows and definitely socked a few tourists in the head…it got a little out of hand. The police soon showed up and they hippies had to show some papers and after that were a little more reserved. After lunch we went into the St. Maria en Trastevere Church that had beautiful gold mosaics, it reminded me of St. Mark’s in Venice, but on a smaller scale. It was gorgeous, we sat and enjoyed the church for a while and then headed to the Colosseum again, because Adelaide had never seen it before. When we got there we saw all these boys handing out flyers for the aforementioned “pub-crawl.” One of them turned out to be Isabel’s friend from high school Ben, so we met him and talked with him and his friends for a while. They told us they just hand out flyers to tourists all day advertising this “pub crawl,” and write their names on the flyer and get 5E for every person that comes. They live in an apartment for the summer and he said they make a ton of money and get to party every night with the people that come, it sounded cool but they said they get terribly bored all day and just start messing with tourists after a while, and invent games to keep themselves occupied. After the colosseum we headed North back to the Spanish Steps area to do some shopping. There was a store called Energie that had a bunch of bright colored sporty clothes and the BEST selection of bright colored tennis shoes that Carol and Hannah had been to the day before so the rest of us wanted to check it out. I wanted to buy like 9804 pairs of tennis shoes, but they were pretty pricey so I refrained. Then I went back to the hotel to get my bags and ran into Carol and Hannah eating a late lunch, they had just returned from the Vatican and had a horrible day. They are both Catholic so the Vatican was their 1st priority in Rome but it really turned out being all they saw in Rome with all the trouble it took getting to actually get inside. Today they got SO LOST getting to the Vatican they ended up in some slums outside of Rome, got on a train going the wrong way, were so hot and sweaty that by the time they got inside the museum they were so exhausted and tired they couldn’t enjoy it. They didn't even make it to St. Peter's. I felt so bad for them, it sounded truly awful. After lunch the rest of the girls wanted to catch a 5:15 train back to Rome, but Hannah wanted to do some more sightseeing so we headed toward the Trevi Fountain. On our way we meandered to the Spanish Steps and down Via Condotti again, we kind of got lost, and were hauling our bags but we enjoyed it. I finally found the yellow Wayfarers that I had been looking for, FOREVER so I bought those and it instantly upped my mood! The Trevi Fountain was a mad house, again but we bought some gelato and took in the scene. Hannah threw some more coins in for me bc it was so crowded to get down to the actual fountain. Then we tried to find the metro to get back to the train station but after about 30 minutes we couldn’t find it and our bags were getting realllyyy heavy so we hailed a cab and headed to Termini to get a train back to the boat. We caught the 5:41 train, and had to walk like ½ a mile to get to the platform. We slept most of the way back and got on the ship around 7:30, then we went and sat up on the 7th deck for a while and hung out with everyone before calling it a night. That night the ship sailed from Civatavecchia to Naples. We were planning on catching a hydrofoil ferry to Capri early the next morning, so we wanted some sleep before another longgg day. Rome was so amazing; I loved it even more than the last time I was there! I could move there in a heartbeat, I just wish I spoke Italian! Every meal that we had was better than the one before, our hotel was AWESOME, everything we saw was so pretty. I am really enjoying my architecture class because we spent a lot of time on Rome and I really appreciated everything I saw a little more because I knew the history of it and could tell my friends all about it too.
Friday, July 10, 2009
Roma, Day 2
The next morning we woke up and Carol and Hannah set out for the Vatican (a trip that would turn out to be in vain, they got ripped off with their tour guide situation and the Vatican turned out to be closed… for a full account of this please refer to Hannah’s blog, http://hannahkitziger.blogspot.com) and I met Camille and Isabel at the Galleria Borghese. It was BEAUTIFUL! It was my favorite thing in Rome, if you don’t know what it is, it’s now a museum of all these paintings, architecture, and sculpture that the Borghese family had commissioned, it’s a 2 story palace and the whole building is a work of art. It features ton of work by Carvaggio, Bernini, and other Italian Renaissance artists. All of the rooms were painted and had sculpture everywhere. We spent the morning there and then headed to Piazza Navona to have lunch.
We settled at this place called Rust tucked away in an alley off the Piazza. I had Gnocchi in tomato sauce, Isabel had smoked salmon, and Camille had mushroom pizza. It was sooooooo good, all of our meals were AMAZING, and I think I had Caprese Salad at every meal in Italy, its safe to say I am now addicted. After lunch we got gelato and walked around the Piazza looking at the fountains and people watching. We ran into our Global Studies Professor, Alex Nalbach and his partner, my architecture teacher, Marc Vincent. We told them that we went to the Galleria Borghese earlier that morning and they were impressed that we made the reservations to get the tickets for it, we told them it wasn’t our 1st time in Rome. They told us since it wasn’t our 1st time, and we had probably hit most of the main tourist sights that we should go across the Tiber River to the Trastevere neighborhood, and spend some time there looking around. Then we parted ways and headed to the Pantheon, I hadn’t been there before and it was AWESOME. I learned about it in Architecture class and it was just breathtaking being inside, it is SO BIG. After that we went to the Trevi Fountain and sat for a while with the masses of people and then threw in coins, and took some pictures. I spotted some mariachis, complete in costume, sombrero, and with their instruments chilling across the fountain and took some pictures of them. After the Fontana di Trevi we went to the Il Gesu church because it has great fresco on the top, that shows the final judgment. It was built during the Baroque period during the Catholic counter-reformation. Camille and I learned about it in Art History, the people getting condemned to hell seriously look like they are going to fall on you, and the ones going up to Heaven look like they are glowing. You can’t tell where the fresco ends and sculpture begins, it was truly breathtaking! After the Il Gesu, we wanted to go to St Luigi de Francesca because it has 3 really pretty Caravaggio paintings, but when we got there we found out the Church was closed on Thursdays, bummer. Then I went back to the Hotel and met Caroline and Hannah who spent all day at the Vatican and were very tired, hot, and frustrated, so the 3 of us took a nap in our hotel for about 2 hours. Then we shopped around in the streets around our hotel, I found a cool swimsuit cover up, but that was my only purchase. Then we came back to the hotel and got ready for dinner, we wanted to have dinner at our hotel on the Terrace because we had gone up there earlier in the day and it was BEAUTIFUL and had great views, but there was a private party on the very top so we ate on the 2nd level, but it was fine. Adelaide, Lauren, Ashlea Feezel, and Maggie met us and we had a really fun time! I got Lobster Ravioli and it was amazing! After dinner our guy friends came and met us at the piano bar and we had drinks and just hung out listening to the piano man, who loved Hannah because she did a lovely duet of Crocodile Rock with him on mic and also played the bongo drums when she wasn’t gracing us with her beautiful voice. The piano man LOVED our group and we requested lots of Michael Jackson and danced and had a great time! Then we went back up to the rooftop terrace after the private party was over and had a drink. It was a nice night outside and I was soooo happy to be in Rome, life was good!
We settled at this place called Rust tucked away in an alley off the Piazza. I had Gnocchi in tomato sauce, Isabel had smoked salmon, and Camille had mushroom pizza. It was sooooooo good, all of our meals were AMAZING, and I think I had Caprese Salad at every meal in Italy, its safe to say I am now addicted. After lunch we got gelato and walked around the Piazza looking at the fountains and people watching. We ran into our Global Studies Professor, Alex Nalbach and his partner, my architecture teacher, Marc Vincent. We told them that we went to the Galleria Borghese earlier that morning and they were impressed that we made the reservations to get the tickets for it, we told them it wasn’t our 1st time in Rome. They told us since it wasn’t our 1st time, and we had probably hit most of the main tourist sights that we should go across the Tiber River to the Trastevere neighborhood, and spend some time there looking around. Then we parted ways and headed to the Pantheon, I hadn’t been there before and it was AWESOME. I learned about it in Architecture class and it was just breathtaking being inside, it is SO BIG. After that we went to the Trevi Fountain and sat for a while with the masses of people and then threw in coins, and took some pictures. I spotted some mariachis, complete in costume, sombrero, and with their instruments chilling across the fountain and took some pictures of them. After the Fontana di Trevi we went to the Il Gesu church because it has great fresco on the top, that shows the final judgment. It was built during the Baroque period during the Catholic counter-reformation. Camille and I learned about it in Art History, the people getting condemned to hell seriously look like they are going to fall on you, and the ones going up to Heaven look like they are glowing. You can’t tell where the fresco ends and sculpture begins, it was truly breathtaking! After the Il Gesu, we wanted to go to St Luigi de Francesca because it has 3 really pretty Caravaggio paintings, but when we got there we found out the Church was closed on Thursdays, bummer. Then I went back to the Hotel and met Caroline and Hannah who spent all day at the Vatican and were very tired, hot, and frustrated, so the 3 of us took a nap in our hotel for about 2 hours. Then we shopped around in the streets around our hotel, I found a cool swimsuit cover up, but that was my only purchase. Then we came back to the hotel and got ready for dinner, we wanted to have dinner at our hotel on the Terrace because we had gone up there earlier in the day and it was BEAUTIFUL and had great views, but there was a private party on the very top so we ate on the 2nd level, but it was fine. Adelaide, Lauren, Ashlea Feezel, and Maggie met us and we had a really fun time! I got Lobster Ravioli and it was amazing! After dinner our guy friends came and met us at the piano bar and we had drinks and just hung out listening to the piano man, who loved Hannah because she did a lovely duet of Crocodile Rock with him on mic and also played the bongo drums when she wasn’t gracing us with her beautiful voice. The piano man LOVED our group and we requested lots of Michael Jackson and danced and had a great time! Then we went back up to the rooftop terrace after the private party was over and had a drink. It was a nice night outside and I was soooo happy to be in Rome, life was good!
Ciao Roma
Italy was AMAZING, and has definitely been my favorite place so far. We arrived in the port of Civitavecchia, which is about an hour train ride to Rome, the morning of July 1. We disembarked the ship with all of our bags, and soon realized we had NO IDEA where the train station was…oopstini. We were with a group of about 20 SASers (pronounced “sassers”) all heavily laden with baggage as well. After finding our way out of the port, is was about a 10-minute walk to the train station and we caught the 10:41 AM train to Termini Station, Roma. The train was PACKED with SASers, and I didn’t have a seat and had to stand for most of the hour train into Rome. When we got to Rome we navigated the seedy area around the train station to our hostel, 5 of us were going to stay there (Hannah, Caroline, Camille, and Isabel). We found it to be on the 3rd story of an unmarked apartment looking building. The lady who ran it was NOT friendly, and the whole place stank. In this tiny room were 4 single beds and a double crammed in all with mismatching covers, and some other assorted furniture haphazardly thrown around, and the kicker: no air conditioning. Needless to say we were all a little freaked/uncomfortable, but tried to make the best out of the situation.
After we put our bags down we decided to go have lunch and begin sightseeing. Camille and I had been to Rome before so we wanted to see a little bit different things than the 1st timers (Carol, Hannah, Izzie)—but we wanted to start the day out together. We went back to Termini and bought a bus ticket to Piazza Venezia, and had lunch at the cutest little sidewalk café. The waiters LOVED us, and we LOVED the food. We ordered a bunch of Caprese Salads and delicious pizza and had some wine. When we told the waiters we were from the US, they started chanting “VIVA OBAMA,” and when we told them we were from Texas, this little man, Miguele who is definitely not over 5’3”, cocked his hands and pretending to be shooting guns and yelled “COWBOYS, BANG BANG.” We all started laughing hysterically.
After lunch we headed to Capitoline Hill and checked out the Capitoline Museum. On Capitoline Hill is a copy of the statue of Marcus Aurelius, an old Roman Emperor, riding a horse. It is the only statue from the Roman Republic that survives today, the only reason that it survives is because the Romans thought it was Constantine, and not Marcus Aurelius. Anyway, the museum was pretty neat, lots of sculpture and paintings from the entire history of the Romans, from ancient times up to Renaissance and Baroque. The security guards at the museum despise me though, bc when I was taking pictures inside, I would turn my camera off in between and when I turned the cam back on to snap another pic the flash would automatically turn back on and the ladies who sat guard at all the rooms yelled at me in Italian for like 5min straight, I kept apologizing over and over again and trying to tell them that I DID NOT UNDERSTAND her chastising me in Italian, oh well, I’m sure I added some excitement to their otherwise boring days, hah.
We then headed to the Roman Forum, which is behind Capitoline Hill and walked around and snapped some pics, then went to the Colosseum and walked around but didn’t go inside. Caroline and Hannah wanted to go to the Colosseum before the rest of us were finished in the museum, so I had some trouble meeting up with them but we finally reconnected right in front of Marcus Aurelius! By this time huge storm clouds had rolled in and it started pouring rain. We were trapped in the square on Capitoline Hill for abt 15 min, and we tried to formulate our next move. Unbeknownst to me, Hannah had talked to Leslie about our sub-par hostel accommodations and Leslie found us a room at the Hotel Valadier, right off of Piazza del Popolo. We ducked into a little Trattoria and had a cappuccino to perk us up after the rain and traveling to Rome we were all a little tired. After our coffee we decided to go back to our hostel, grab our bags and then make our way across town to our new and improved hotel! While we were deciding if we were going to hail a cab or try our luck with the public bus system we saw this HUGE protest making its way toward us down this little alley. DUH, all of us were deeply intrigued, but failed to make out what their signs said in Italian, so we decided to walk with them a little ways until we figured out how we were going to get back to the hostel. All 3 of us were amused that this protest had police escort of about 20 cops in full riot gear in front of them, kind of leading the way, and also behind them. Obviously this protest was planned, later we deduced it was something having to do with welfare, anyway we jumped in a cab after the cops started shooing us away from Hannah kept insisting on taking pictures with them.
When we got back to the hostel our landlady was pretty hostile, we had trouble opening the door to our room, and then with all of our bags proceeded to get stuck in the tiny elevator on the way back down, we were so excited to get out of there. We heard about this “Spanish Steps pub crawl,” that takes you to lots of bars and you pay ahead of time and get free drinks everywhere, so we were trying to reach our hotel in time to get ready and be at the Spanish Steps by 9 PM (at this point it is 8 PM, we need to figure out how to get across town, get dinner, and shower). We are trying to move as fast as possible so I suggested that we take the Metro instead of a cab bc it would probably be quicker. Once we walked the few blocks back to the train station we realized we had no idea how to buy a metro ticket. We ran around the station for abt 20 minutes looking like chickens with our heads cut off before we finally asked a some sort of security guard and he told us we could buy them at any magazine stand. We raced to the nearest magazine stand and bought the 11E 3 day unlimited public transportation pass (or so we thought..more on that later), and hoofed it 3 stops on the A line to the Piazza del Popolo. Now its 8:30 and we are having doubts that we are going to make it to the pub-crawl on time, we check into our hotel, Hotel Valadier, and have dinner at a little sidewalk café outside of the hotel. I ordered this AWESOME cream pesto pasta and Hannah and Carol got really tasty dishes too. Then we went up to our room, 512 on the 6th floor and got ready to go out.
The room turned out to be PERFECT, it was so nice, we had a little balcony that overlooked the street, the bathroom was huge with 2 sinks and lots of mirror space, and the shower faucet came like directly down from the ceiling and had lime green tile, it was great. After we got ready we got a bottle of wine to our room and engaged in a lengthy talk about religion and afterlife, nope I’m not kidding. Then we met up with everyone at this bar in the Campo de’Fiori, it was fun! But the best part of the night was when we got back at like 3 AM there was a full fledged after party going down in the piano lounge of our hotel. It was all locals. There were 2 pianos and the guys playing were singing all these songs in Italian and the bar was PACKED with people dancing and singing along, it was so FUN. Of course we didn’t know the songs bc they were in Italian, but we made a lot of friends and danced for a while! A great end to the day!
After we put our bags down we decided to go have lunch and begin sightseeing. Camille and I had been to Rome before so we wanted to see a little bit different things than the 1st timers (Carol, Hannah, Izzie)—but we wanted to start the day out together. We went back to Termini and bought a bus ticket to Piazza Venezia, and had lunch at the cutest little sidewalk café. The waiters LOVED us, and we LOVED the food. We ordered a bunch of Caprese Salads and delicious pizza and had some wine. When we told the waiters we were from the US, they started chanting “VIVA OBAMA,” and when we told them we were from Texas, this little man, Miguele who is definitely not over 5’3”, cocked his hands and pretending to be shooting guns and yelled “COWBOYS, BANG BANG.” We all started laughing hysterically.
After lunch we headed to Capitoline Hill and checked out the Capitoline Museum. On Capitoline Hill is a copy of the statue of Marcus Aurelius, an old Roman Emperor, riding a horse. It is the only statue from the Roman Republic that survives today, the only reason that it survives is because the Romans thought it was Constantine, and not Marcus Aurelius. Anyway, the museum was pretty neat, lots of sculpture and paintings from the entire history of the Romans, from ancient times up to Renaissance and Baroque. The security guards at the museum despise me though, bc when I was taking pictures inside, I would turn my camera off in between and when I turned the cam back on to snap another pic the flash would automatically turn back on and the ladies who sat guard at all the rooms yelled at me in Italian for like 5min straight, I kept apologizing over and over again and trying to tell them that I DID NOT UNDERSTAND her chastising me in Italian, oh well, I’m sure I added some excitement to their otherwise boring days, hah.
We then headed to the Roman Forum, which is behind Capitoline Hill and walked around and snapped some pics, then went to the Colosseum and walked around but didn’t go inside. Caroline and Hannah wanted to go to the Colosseum before the rest of us were finished in the museum, so I had some trouble meeting up with them but we finally reconnected right in front of Marcus Aurelius! By this time huge storm clouds had rolled in and it started pouring rain. We were trapped in the square on Capitoline Hill for abt 15 min, and we tried to formulate our next move. Unbeknownst to me, Hannah had talked to Leslie about our sub-par hostel accommodations and Leslie found us a room at the Hotel Valadier, right off of Piazza del Popolo. We ducked into a little Trattoria and had a cappuccino to perk us up after the rain and traveling to Rome we were all a little tired. After our coffee we decided to go back to our hostel, grab our bags and then make our way across town to our new and improved hotel! While we were deciding if we were going to hail a cab or try our luck with the public bus system we saw this HUGE protest making its way toward us down this little alley. DUH, all of us were deeply intrigued, but failed to make out what their signs said in Italian, so we decided to walk with them a little ways until we figured out how we were going to get back to the hostel. All 3 of us were amused that this protest had police escort of about 20 cops in full riot gear in front of them, kind of leading the way, and also behind them. Obviously this protest was planned, later we deduced it was something having to do with welfare, anyway we jumped in a cab after the cops started shooing us away from Hannah kept insisting on taking pictures with them.
When we got back to the hostel our landlady was pretty hostile, we had trouble opening the door to our room, and then with all of our bags proceeded to get stuck in the tiny elevator on the way back down, we were so excited to get out of there. We heard about this “Spanish Steps pub crawl,” that takes you to lots of bars and you pay ahead of time and get free drinks everywhere, so we were trying to reach our hotel in time to get ready and be at the Spanish Steps by 9 PM (at this point it is 8 PM, we need to figure out how to get across town, get dinner, and shower). We are trying to move as fast as possible so I suggested that we take the Metro instead of a cab bc it would probably be quicker. Once we walked the few blocks back to the train station we realized we had no idea how to buy a metro ticket. We ran around the station for abt 20 minutes looking like chickens with our heads cut off before we finally asked a some sort of security guard and he told us we could buy them at any magazine stand. We raced to the nearest magazine stand and bought the 11E 3 day unlimited public transportation pass (or so we thought..more on that later), and hoofed it 3 stops on the A line to the Piazza del Popolo. Now its 8:30 and we are having doubts that we are going to make it to the pub-crawl on time, we check into our hotel, Hotel Valadier, and have dinner at a little sidewalk café outside of the hotel. I ordered this AWESOME cream pesto pasta and Hannah and Carol got really tasty dishes too. Then we went up to our room, 512 on the 6th floor and got ready to go out.
The room turned out to be PERFECT, it was so nice, we had a little balcony that overlooked the street, the bathroom was huge with 2 sinks and lots of mirror space, and the shower faucet came like directly down from the ceiling and had lime green tile, it was great. After we got ready we got a bottle of wine to our room and engaged in a lengthy talk about religion and afterlife, nope I’m not kidding. Then we met up with everyone at this bar in the Campo de’Fiori, it was fun! But the best part of the night was when we got back at like 3 AM there was a full fledged after party going down in the piano lounge of our hotel. It was all locals. There were 2 pianos and the guys playing were singing all these songs in Italian and the bar was PACKED with people dancing and singing along, it was so FUN. Of course we didn’t know the songs bc they were in Italian, but we made a lot of friends and danced for a while! A great end to the day!
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