After our weekend in Cantabria, we arrived back at Salamanca around 8pm Sunday night and had just enough time to change suitcases and get to the bus station for our 10pm bus to Madrid. Once we arrived in Madrid (around 12:30) we had to find metro from Madrid center to the airport, where we slept on the floor for 2 hours and woke up around 4am just in time to check in for our 6am flight to Rome. Luckily, minus a few little confusions, we made it safely and only mildly exhausted (okay that’s a lie, I could have slept in the Rome metro station). Once arriving at our hostel, where we were so looking forward to a shower and nap, we were told our room wouldn’t be ready for another 4 hours and the manager recommended we do some sightseeing. I laughed at him thinking the only sight I wanted to see was the inside of my eyelids… but sightsee we did. First stop, the Coliseum, which we had previous booked tickets for and therefore were able to skip the line which wrapped around the whole structure. 1 point for planning ahead! After a few more stops including the Forum and roman ruins, we dragged ourselves to the hostel, poured ourselves into bed and woke up only for the free spaghetti dinner. The next day, after some well deserved 10 hours of sleep we hit the ground running. We visited the Vatican and Sistine Chapel, which again we had previously booked tickets for and were able to skip the 5 hour long line (1 more point for planning ahead). Afterwards we hit all the highlights… the Trevi Fountain, Spanish Steps, Piazza di Spagna, Castel Sant’Angelo, Piazza Venezia, and Circus Maximo (where they held chariot races). I must say Sameera and I are very efficient travelers and although I may have done permanent damage to my feet, we were able to see probably all of Rome in a very short time. We even managed to schedule in the best pizza lunch I have ever had in my life, a yummy pasta dinner, and multiple stops for coffee gelato (which Sameera got me hooked on).
On our last day in Rome, we woke up extra early to get in the line for St. Peter’s Basilica and be there when it opened. Turned out the Pope makes appearances in St. Peter’s Square on Wednesdays and the Basilica is closed for the morning. We used our new found time to hit some of the smaller sights we had missed and returned to St. Peter’s Square in time to not only be the first in line for the Basilica opening in the afternoon, but also see the Pope make his weekly appearance. Not something I would have scheduled in to see, but pretty cool when it just happened. Now I can say I have seen the Pope. With the rest of our afternoon before our train to Florence, we spent a leisurely few hours enjoying coffee and Viagra gelato (that’s right I said Viagra, it’s a chocolate flavor which was as good as the name would suggest) on the Spanish Steps and listening to an impromptu performance of an Italian marching band. Upon our arrival in Florence we experienced a difficult check in with the manager who had apparently forgotten about the email I had sent saying we would be arriving late, and was therefore not present at the time of our arrival. Luckily we got in fine, and the hostel was lovely. A shower, Skype session, and 8 hours of sleep later, we were ready to explore Florence.
We began with a nice breakfast at a little café near our hostel and then headed to Galleria dell' Academia where we had to wait in a 3ish hour line to see Michelangelo’s David. Good news… it was totally worth the wait and absolutely spectacular. Bad news… 1 point for not planning ahead, hence the wait. After waiting in that line we decided to get the planning ahead back on track and buy tickets the following day for the other main art museum the Uffizi where we saw works by Michelangelo and Da Vinci, Botticelli, and Raphael. We also saw the Ponte Vecchio (a famous bridge), Il Duomo cathedral, and multiple plazas and then shopped till we dropped. Then came the big snafu...
While waiting at the main Florence station for our train to Venice (early might I add) confusion began to set in when we didn’t see our train on the announcement screen. We then realized our tickets were for a departure from a different Florence station, which happened to be about 30 minutes away. Note to everyone wanting to travel in Italy: they are HORRIBLE at making travel clear and simple. There are about 3 different train stations if Florence, all with “Firenzie” in the title and multiple stations in Venice (again all with similar names). They fail to tell you that your destination may not appear on the departures screen because your destination may just be a stop on the train to Timbuktu (which is not noted anywhere on your ticket), oh and by the way, surprise you may get on the 3 hour train ride and not actually have a seat, but standing room only. Finally at 2am we arrived at our hotel in Venice to find it in the ghetto and owned by people who speak not Italian, not Spanish, not even English (all of which I can get by on) but instead Chinese. Sorry, I’ve got none of that. We also picked up some friends along the way (2 girls about our age that were studying in London) who, due to the delay on our train, lost the reservation at their hostel. After overhearing the heated words they were exchanging with the hostel owner on the train, I walked up and told them about our hotel which had 24 hour reception and may be able to give them a room. Little did we know they would have to solicit a room in Chinese, but after some difficult translating and the use of many hand motions, we all had rooms and woke up the next morning to enjoy a lovely breakfast of wontons and fried rice. That day we walked through the canals of Venice taking pictures, eating more gelato, window shopping, and enjoying the beautiful scenery. The next day we were headed home, well, our Salamanca home. After taking a train, metro, plane, and bus we were back in Salamanca, and I was immediately in bed. An exhausting adventure, but a life changing experience.
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