the accident and mustaches

This past weekend I took the students on an orientation overnight to Assisi, Perugia, Siena, and San Gimignano. About half an hour into the trip, we got stopped in a massive traffic jam and found out that a tractor trailor carrying refrigerated meat had overturned about 10 cars ahead of us. Seriously. There was meat everywhere. The truck blocked our entire side of the highway and some lanes traveling in the other direction... Fortunately, no no one was hurt. Unfortunately, it took about 4 hours to clean up.

After about 45 minutes of sitting in the buses behind the accident, the Italian Polizia decided we would be allowed to walk past the wreckage to a rest stop about a half mile down the highway... and by past the wreckage I mean we literally had to climb over and through the wreck of this overturned truck, surrounded by tons of wasted sausages and hams... and walk down the highway to the rest stop. It was surreal, to say the least. If only a bread and cheese truck had overturned too. free sandwiches!

So we spent the time that was meant for Perugia in an Autogrill in Chianti (it's not as bad as it sounds... there was Burger King.)

this is what we walked past/ through... picture stolen from Caroline.. click to make any of the pictures bigger

When we were finally able to get on the bus, we entertained ourselves for the rest of the 2 hour ride to Assisi by doing this

...and this is what I get paid for. Thank you, Fairfield U.

Here are some pictures of the places we've visited the past two weekends...

Pisa's 'Campo dei Miracoli', with the leaning tower

Viareggio Beach

The Church of Saint Francis, in Assisi

Is that... Matt May or... Ferris Bueller??

View of the countryside from Assisi

The church of Santa Maria delle Scale in Siena...

Tuscan countryside...

And the towers of San Gimignano...

Crumpets are everything I'd ever dreamed they'd be and more

Kait's feet in the Irish Sea in Harlech, North Wales

 I spent about  a week in England with Wilkey, from August 17- 23, and I learned a few new things while I was there:

• If someone advises you to go somewhere called The Golden Nugget, you go. You just can't argue with the reasoning that "it's golden... and it's a nugget... what's not to like??". (The Nugget ended up being a casino where I won money for the first time ever... besides the 2 cents in Monte Carlo)
• You should always drink tea with a little bit of milk in it, or else its bad for your stomach (thanks Richard).
• Welsh is a ridiculous language.
• The Tower of London is not really a tower, but a series of small connected buildings that we definitely could have escaped from.
• What I've always thought was the London Bridge is actually the Tower Bridge, and the London Bridge is pretty much your basic bridge.
• Crumpets are like English Muffins made out of pancake batter. Needless to say, they are amazing.
• Wilkey secretly loves musicals.

The first two nights Kait and I stayed in a hostel close to Russel Square in London, and got shown around by a friend of hers, who explained to us the story of Tower 

Bridge:

Apparently, a few decades ago us Americans, being American, decided we wanted that beautiful bridge in the background to be in America. So we went through a whole negotiation process to buy what we thought was the London Bridge. The Brits, knowing exactly what they were doing, went through the whole process and sold us the completely unremarkable London Bridge, instead of the Tower Bridge that we wanted. The London Bridge that we bought is now located somewhere in Arizona... I'm guessing that was England's way of getting us back for winning the Revolutionary War. Now we're even.

We went to see Les Mis one night and afterwards we stumbled on a bar nearby called "Walkabout"... after about 10 seconds of being there I realized that Walkabout was the same bar we had gone to during our 1 day in London in 2007... and we just happened to find it twice. So strange.

We spent the next few days touring England and Wales, and I can't believe what beautiful countries they are... we went to Bath and saw the Roman baths (and drank "Bath water", which is supposed to be really good for you but tasted like lead), saw the Clifton Bridge, spent some time in Cheltenham and Brewood, where Wilkey is staying with Richard and Stewart, and visited Wales for a day, where we went to the most confusing and beautiful little town I've ever seen, Port Meirion.

Below is a picture of the not so tower-y Tower of London...

And an ice cream truck that apparently doesn't only cater to kids.

We stopped in Tetbury- where Will and Harry play polo- for breakfast, and found a Chef's Table!

We spent the rest of the day in Bath, hands down one of the prettiest places I've seen, besides Port Meirion (and Florence :] ). Behind us is a famous bridge that I forget the name of.... we saw a lot of bridges.

 

Kait hanging out at the Roman baths...

We stopped by the Clifton Bridge, the world's first suspension bridge, on the way home to Brewood

...and caught the beginning of an amazing sunset

Then we spent a day in Wales, which was impossible to describe in words, especially Welsh words, which are pretty much all consonants.

Sheep were everywhere, including in the middle of the road...

We spent the afternoon in Port Meirion, Wales... an colorful little town built on  the water that nobody actually lives in but you have to pay 7 pounds to walk around it. I know... I don't get it either. Still, it was the coolest place I've ever seen.

After Portmeirion we visited Harlech, where we put our feet in the Irish Sea and ate dinner at a Castle.

And in between all of that, we found time to go see a production of High School Musical put on by 5 to 11 year old British kids in Brewood. Not kidding. Best week ever. One more week until Wilkey is back where she belongs in Florence. :]

the last 15 weeks

Since I've proven to myself that I'm really... really terrible at journaling (i.e. the last time I wrote something was in June) and am also really bad at putting up facebook pictures (I'm about 3,000 behind right now), I thought I'd give blogging a try to record my adventures in italy and abroad. So here's a rundown of some of my travels over the last (almost) 4 months... weird

Got to Florence on May 28th with the Summer I students... I took this picture of the Ponte Vecchio from Alyssa Ginelli's apartment when she was here visiting for a few weeks...

...visited Venice for a day in June with my Summer I girls...

... spent the weekend in the Amalfi Coast

- Sorrento, Capri, Positano and Pompeii...

Why do I have a feeling someone scratched the "L" off of this sign on purpose?

(It's really hard to get these pictures to go where I want them to on this post... I'm new at this)

...we celebrated the feast day of Florence, June 24, the feast of San Giovanni Battista, with Calcio Storico, a historical soccer game in Piazza Santa Croce, and fireworks...

and then Michael Jackson died on our last night out with Summer I... not cool.

Summer II was also awesome...

Went to the French Riviera with Erica and Monica Palaia.. who I miss... a lot. Above is a picture of the famous casino in Monte Carlo, Monaco. I won 2 cents in the "Cafe de Paris" casino next door... ballin.

We also spent a day in Cannes, where the Norweigan GEM was also at port that day?! So strange, I wonder if Mags was on board...

..and went parasailing in Nice... the beach was beautiful, but just a little rocky, as you can tell by these freaks trying to gracefully climb back from the water.

It was also filled with really attractive men in speedos, as you can tell from the background. 

Below is a picture of a main street in Nice...

and then my Summer II's had to leave too :[

Katie came to visit with her roommate Linda for a week in August! We went on a vespa tour around Chianti, and rented a boat for the day in Cinque Terre after eating the world's best pesto at a restaurant on a cliff above the sea...

and also, Linda got pooped on... (sorry Linda, I couldn't help myself )

After Katie left I flew to England to spend the week with Wilkey, but I'll leave that update until later since its 12:22 am (or 0:22 according to the Italians) and I have to meet at 7:30 am to take the students on an overnight orientation field trip to Assisi, Perugia, San Gimignano, and Siena. buona notte!