giorni venticinque

Sunday, May 29, 2011

I just arrived back to Florence after the single greatest weekend of my entire life.

Did you hear that? Single greatest weekend OF MY ENTIRE LIFE!!!!

That is not an exaggeration and no, Colter, this is not me doing what all women do and talking in absolutes.

It really was THAT good!

Friday began with a quick stop in Pisa to hold up the leaning tower. It was so much fun to be an annoying tourist and snap a cliché picture with the tower falling into our hands! We took so many pictures, we were practically Asian. It was so incredible to see the tower in real life and realize that it really is leaning! A huge gasp fell over our entire group as we turned the corner and caught a glimpse of the tower… It quickly turned into screams and cheers. We were so excited to be a part of such an incredible monument. You wouldn’t believe how big it is! And how mind-boggling it is to see it still functioning although it’s leaning. It seriously is breath-taking.

I still can’t believe all the things I’ve seen with my very own eyes that most people only get the chance to see in pictures. You’d think after 4 weeks I’d start to believe that this is real life, but sometimes it’s just so good that I still wonder.

Although the tower was pretty much he only thing we cared to see, we also had the chance to walk through the Pisa Cathedral, Baptistery, and Cemetery. The architecture was gorgeous!

With the adrenaline of supporting the leaning tower still pulsing through our veins, we boarded the train for Cinque Terre. We were all so giddy and excited. We had been looking forward to this weekend getaway all month! Steve and all of us students went our separate ways at the train station. He headed back to Florence for a peaceful weekend away from us and we headed to the coast for a wild weekend on our own!

Somehow we arrived in Italy 4 weeks ago with grandeur thoughts of a resort and pampering when we imagined our getaway to Cinque Terre. So, imagine our surprise as we pulled up to a campsite and saw 10 two-man tents waiting for us.

The weekend got off to a rough start when we used flashlights to check our “room” for bugs… 5 spiders were found in my bed alone. Five spiders!!! In my sheets and crawling on my pillow! I won’t go into much detail about all the screaming and heebie-jeebies that took place, but I’m sure you all can imagine! After catching, releasing, and killing all the little critters we found, we doused our tent in bug spray and coated the entire outside with bug-repellent powder.

In efforts to push those thoughts to the back of our minds, we went exploring. We first stumbled across some frogs. After a lot of squirming and jumping (from ME!), I managed to hold the little guy in my hand and give him a kiss. I was absolutely petrified to let him near me, but how often do you have the opportunity to kiss a frog…? I wasn’t about to let that opportunity squirm out of my hands! No prince, but I got a picture… And in the scheme of things, nothing in life matters unless you can prove it with a picture!

Not too long after that, the bushes started to twinkle. I had to blink repeatedly and rub my eyes to make sure I wasn’t seeing things... Lights started to blink across the sky and someone shouted, “FIREFLIES!” I was absolutely awestruck. I was speechless. Of all the things I’ve seen in Italy, none of them made me as happy as those little lightning bugs. I was overcome with butterflies in my tummy and had to choke back tears. Seriously! It has always been my lifelong dream to see a firefly in real life and that was the last thing I was expecting out of this Italy trip. I couldn’t believe my eyes as I was standing there surrounded by them. Call me a sap, but it was absolutely enchanting. I went a little wild running around after them. I caught one and watched it blink and flicker in my hands. That is life’s simplest pleasure. It made me so thankful for my life and so thankful for this trip. I can officially cross “Catch a Firefly” off my bucket list! Thank you, Italy!

I’m not sure how anyone expected us to sleep in beds that we knew full-well to be infested with spiders. Seeing as how we were expecting a hotel, all we brought to sleep in were shorts and t-shirts. So not only were we absolutely FREEZING, but we had nothing between our skin and the ooey-gooey, creepy-crawly elements of nature! Linds and I shacked up together and we decided we’d keep each other awake as long as possible so we could fall asleep without thinking about the bugs we were sleeping with. After hours of talking, we finally fell asleep. I woke up with a cramped hip and shoulder from sleeping in the fetal position all night and refusing to move for fear of touching something hairy. Apparently, I was trying to avoid the inevitable, because when I was making my bed the next morning, I was appalled to find bright red bug-guts smeared on my sheets. As nauseous as it made me, I was glad to see I was the one that came out victorious from my encounter in the middle of the night!

That morning, we got up and caught a train to take us into the actual Cinque Terre. It‘s 5 cities lining the rugged coast of the Italian Riviera. Buildings painted in pinks and greens and yellows cover the lush, green cliffs that drop off right into the Mediterranean. It is hands down the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. EVER! You have the option of taking a train between cities or hiking the cliffs from one to the other. We hiked through two cities as we soaked in the gorgeous scenery we were a part of. Those hikes were cake… They were paved the entire way so it was literally a walk in the park. When we got into the third city, we took a break for some gelato and ended up in a spur-of-the-moment decision to hike one of the hardest hikes in the Cinque.

Before any of us really realized what we were getting ourselves into, we were scaling rocks in our skirts and flip-flops with our gelato melting down our hands. We really weren’t dressed for the occasion because of our misinterpretation of the “camping expedition”. You should’ve seen the looks we got from the hikers passing us from the other direction… Apparently shorts and Nikes are more appropriate for hiking? Who knew?

I’m not a hiker by any means! I’m sure all the St. George bike rides and Timpanogas Cave hikes you endured through my tears and screams have testified that to you. So I hope you realize the seriousness of the situation when I tell you that it was the most incredible 90 minutes of my entire life! Nothing has ever been so hard and I’m pretty sure my body has never known that much sweat, but nothing I’ve done has ever been so worth it! The hike was along the cliffs of the Riviera and was made up of steep, skyward steps and narrow ledges. In those moments where I started getting reminders of my aversion towards hiking, I’d look over my shoulder and literally see the Mediterranean Sea under my feet. There is no possible way to feel any less than a million bucks with that view out of the corner of your eye. The scenery was GORGEOUS! There is just about every type of vegetation here… We saw cactuses, pine trees, palm trees, vineyards, and a beautiful array of wildflowers.

With every corner we’d turn, we saw the next colorful city in the distance and our adrenaline pumped in anticipation to reach the water. When we finally reached the bottom, we all started sprinting towards the beach. We ripped off our clothes and threw them down with our bags and towels and ran screaming into the water. We all swam as far as we could out into the ocean before our laughter had us drowning in the salt water. We were all smiles! We were so giddy and giggly and all we could do was scream and smile.

I have never felt happiness like I did in that moment.

For a split second, time stood still. Nothing else in the world mattered. I was caught in a perfect moment when the beauty of this time in my life hit me just as hard as the cold water did. I was overwhelmed with gratitude and bliss. I just scaled the cliffs of the Italian Riviera and ran as fast as I could into the Mediterranean!! That thought, just like the water, was so refreshing! For a moment, all that mattered was what I had just accomplished and the unbelievable reality of the moment I was swimming in. Life is beautiful. My life is beautiful!

The water was perfect.

It was cool and refreshing.

The waves rocked us back and forth.

We floated in the water with smiles beaming on our faces. We couldn’t help but talk about how unbelievable the day had been and how wonderful this entire opportunity has been for us. We couldn’t explain, let alone fathom, the gratitude we were experiencing. I’ve never been so grateful. I’ve never felt as small as I did in that moment… My utter insignificance was proved by the large crashing waves and all the petty worries of life were washed away with them.

Life was absolutely perfect.

We finally climbed out of the water and crashed on the beach. By then, it was about 4 or 5 in the afternoon, so we slept for a couple hours on the sand until our growling tummies woke us up. We took a train back into one of the first cities we hiked through and grabbed some dinner.

We were able to make the last train back to our stop but we missed the shuttle that would take us to our campground, so we had to walk the 2 miles back to our warm, clean, bug-free tents. A few of us started belting out music by The Rocket Summer to pass the time. I had one ear-phone in to make sure we were singing the right words and we were singing at the top of our lungs. We had been singing a few songs when Linds stopped us and said, “You guys! Look up at the stars!” We stood dead in our tracks and gazed upwards and the clearest, brightest night sky. The stars were incredible. All of a sudden, the song continued on in the background, singing “I’ll be making up things for you to see like romantic lights surrounding Italy…” We all just started screaming and jumping up and down right in the middle of the road. We are such girls, huh? It was unbelievable! There we were: standing in the middle of nowhere in the mountains of Italy, staring at the stars, and it just happens to sing about romantic lights surrounding Italy. It was surreal! We were all so giddy after that. But, really, can you blame us!?

We made it back to our tents and fell asleep the second our heads hit the pillow. We were so tuckered out, the thoughts of spiders didn’t even phase us.

We woke up the next morning, packed up all our things, and went to lay on the beach near the train station until our train left at noon. We got there early enough that we were some of the only people on the beach. We took a nap in the sun for a couple hours… Until we were so rudely awoken by none other than an EMU!!! Yes, a wild emu was roaming the beaches of Italy! HAHA! Seriously??? How much more bizarre does it get? We were all rolling with laughter.

It was the perfect way to end our memorable weekend!

The Cinque Terre is officially my favorite place in the entire world!

I can’t even tell you how many times we said, “This is the best day EVER!” In between screams and giggles, it was the only thing on our lips. Believe me, it really was the BEST DAY EVER!

I love you guys!

Ciao!

Wit