Italia!

When I began my Day Zero Project, I added a goal to write myself a letter, opening it on the last day of my "project."  Upon opening it, I had told future me to go to Italy, which was perfect, because I was already planning on it!

On November 12th my journey finally began as my ragazza (giiiiiirl) and I flew to Rome!  

After 15 hours of travel time, I turned my phone on only to receive message after message from family and friends asking if I was safe and okay. Confused by the messages, I told them I was fine, and inquired further only to be told there was a terrorist attack in Paris.  As more detail began to flood in, my heart became so sad - and at the same time angry.  It's so hard to know how to feel or respond during such in incredibly tragic time.  There was nothing I could do at all to help/fix the situation except pray - so that is exactly what I did. I prayed for peace, comfort, protection, and for God to take control of the situation and of our terribly broken hearts. 

Shortly after this moment, I had received a message from the US Embassy (I suggest you register your trip with them before leaving the country) warning US Citizens in Europe to be extra vigilant.  Even with the fear I was now feeling, I decided that terror can't take the joy of this trip from me - so we went to sleep (as we landed pretty late) and decided to be fearless as we continued on our great adventure. 

When we woke, we went to our hotel breakfast and had the most amazing croissant of our lives as well as our first cappuccino.  It was delicious and definitely met my expectations for our first food experience.  Unfortunately - we quickly realized that in pretty much all of Italy, breakfast is a croissant and coffee...so we were basically starving every morning.  Haha.  

Next we began our trip to Minori, where we would be staying for the next few nights. We used Airbnb for this trip and it could not have been more perfect!  When we arrived at our hotel, we were in awe! It was just steps away from the water and so close to everything - and just a short bus trip away from Amalfi.  Minori was a small town where everyone seemed to know each other.  We saw the most amazing sunsets and sunrises here - and it came to life at night!  Also, it was super safe.  "No criminality," as we were told.  

We had our first pizza, and while the pizza here - and everywhere else we had pizza - was good, it has absolutely nothing on pizza in New York!  

While in Minori, we made a trip to Amalfi.  It was stunning! Just as beautiful as the photos have shown and even more so.  The buildings were colorful and the city was so full of life!  Of all the places we went in Italy, this was my favorite.  I would come back just to experience more of this area.

From Amalfi, we got lost on our way to Positano and ended up in Sorrento with just enough time to catch our last bus back to Minori - thank you, Lord! 

Our next stop was to Florence!  our Airbnb here was an apartment in the center of everything!  We were about a 10 minute walk away from everything, which was fantastic because we ended up only spending one night here - but we were still able to see so much.  The highlight of which being the Santa Maria del Fiore Cathedral.  I have no photos of this place that do it any sort of justice.  Yessica and I literally turned a corner and there is was!  Just gorgeous!  The inside was even more beautiful.  It amazes me how much went into these buildings...every little detail - and there is so much history!   

It was also in Florence where we saw the first bit of support for Paris on the replica of David statue. The bottom was draped with the French flag, and they had placed a black band around his arm.  Others who were there seemed just as fascinated as I was by the gesture.  

Much to our surprise, this would not be the last time we saw such incredible support for Paris.

On our last day in Florence, we were able to do a ton with our few hours, including seeing the actual statue of David and climbing 463 steps to the top of the Duomo on top of the cathedral I mentioned above.  This was a tiring experience, but so incredibly worth it!

When we got to the top, we were able to see everything which was a really fantastic way to say 'goodbye' to Florence as we began our journey to Venice!

When we arrived in Venice, we could instantly tell it would be way different in comparison to the other cities we were in - and it was lovely.

We checked into our Airbnb and it was so cute!  We also really connected with our hosts here.  They gave us a ton of information which really helped us out in planning how we would spend our few days in Venice.

One of the awesome things we did in Venice was take an excursion to 3 islands: Murano, Torcello, and Burano.

Our first stop was to Murano, which is known for it's glass blowing.  We were able to sit in on a glass blowing demonstration, where a guy made a vase and a horse...RIGHT in front of us.  It was pretty amazing.  

Next, we went to Torcello which has some incredibly fascinating history behind it.  This was one of the first lagoon islands populated by those who were taking shelter from the Huns in 452...The year 452 - So much history on this tiny island!  It was at one time a powerful trading center - but eventually became more of a swamp, and malaria-carrying mosquitoes forced many to abandon the island. Today, there is a total of 11 people who reside on the island full-time.  This number was incredibly surprising because there were a good number of restaurants on the island.  Apparently enough tourists come to the island to keep them open.  Most of what I saw though was old buildings, a church, and some cute bridges.

We then made our way to Burano, which is known for it's colorful fishermen's homes and for making lace.  We were able to see an elderly lady stitching some lace which was just incredible to see!  Burano reminded me a bit of Venice, but on a much smaller scale.  It was just a cute little town.

After exploring the 3 islands, we headed back to Venice to get dinner.  Being right on the water, we thought it would be neat to try out some seafood.  We ended up finding the cute restaurant right near the Rialto Bridge, where I ended up having seafood lasagna which was soooooo good - along with a glass of house Prosecco, also super yummy.  

After our fantastic/fancy dinner, we began the hunt to get back to the bus station to go home for the evening.  Along the way, we noticed buildings in Venice decorated with the colors of the French flag.  Again, another incredible example of the support Italy has for France.  It was beautiful.

When we arrived at our hotel, we went to bed, as we would be traveling to Milan early the next morning.  Upon waking up though, we received a message from the US Embassy, warning us that there had been terrorist threats for both Milan and Rome (our last 2 destinations) at locations we were planning to visit on our trip.  I was definitely nervous to continue on our journey.  Prayer with Brian, my mom, and sister Tara - along with some encouraging words from a bunch of other friends and family - gave me a bit of comfort and I decided to be fearless and continue on with our plans.  On to Milan!

After checking into our awesome, Coca Cola themed Airbnb in Milan, we basically ate and went to sleep.  It was a long travel day, and I was feeling sick, which was a bummer because our fantastic host gave us a list of awesome things we could do (which we did eventually get to).  Along with the list of things to do in Milan, we asked for advice on Switzerland, as we had planned to stop there as well for a mini day trip.

We ended up going to Lugano, Switzerland.  Lugano is absolutely beautiful!  No photo that I took captured it's beauty well enough - but this photo is a start.

After arriving in Lugano, the first thing we did (after exchanging our money) was eat chocolate...and we did not at all regret eating it.  Oh man...best chocolate of my entire life!  We ended up buying a ton to bring home.

While in Switzerland, we quickly realized rich people live here.  Haha.  There were expensive cars everywhere and everything was expensive.  We tried to search for somewhere to eat, but didn't want to pay the restaurant prices, so we ended up going to McDonald's - which actually had a different menu - and their McCafé was a separate place in the same building.  It was fancy and had all kinds of treats.  Anyway - even my McDonald's meal ended up being around $15!  So crazy!  The burger was pretty fantastic though.

Later, our host in Milan ended up confirming that our suspicions were correct about rich people in Switzerland.  Haha.  He said a lot of Italians will move there because it is safe and clean.  It definitely felt very safe and was super clean.

After our quick trip to Lugano, we made our way back to Milan.  Our goal for the evening was to experience a little night life - Starting with an aperitivo!  An aperitivo is basically happy hour done right!  You buy a $10 drink and have access to an unlimited buffet!  It originally started as finger foods to have before dinner - but has evolved to basically dinner.  There was so much food and it was all delicious!  Thank you, Italy!

As we were walking to the bar for our aperitivo, we had a chance to see a "Je Suis Paris" sign, which light up the entire square in Milan.

Again, this was a really incredible way to show support for France - and I absolutely loved seeing it!

On our last morning in Milan, our host took us out for coffee and to just get to know us a bit.  It was super nice to be able to connect with him as he shared with us about his family and more about the wonderful city of Milan.

After this, we were able to explore a little more before having to grab our bags from our Airbnb.  Our first stop was Castello Sforzeco!  It was beautiful, but my fear certainly got the best of me for the first time here.  As we walked up, this was the first place we saw military and police - everywhere!  Italy was taking those terrorist threats seriously!  It was comforting to have them there - but also a constant reminder that there was a reason they were needed. We quickly looked through the the castle before leaving to see the Milan Cathedral.

As we stepped up to the Milan Cathedral - we quickly noticed there was an even larger presence of military and police.  I counted over 20 police and military vehicles and 4 ambulances.  Before we were allowed into the Cathedral, we were also wanted for weapons and had our bags and coats thoroughly checked.  I felt extra safe when we were inside of the cathedral.

The inside was just as gorgeous at the outside.  I've never seen a building like this.  It was just magnificent.

After we explored the Cathedral, we went back to the hotel for our bags and headed for Rome - our final stop on the trip!  Fun fact, where we were in Rome - there were over 1000 military dispatched throughout the city to guard and protect the city.  Super impressed by Rome and how seriously and quickly they acted given the threats they had faced.

Our first stop in Rome - the Colosseum!  It was kind of surreal walking through here. There is just so much history!  We stopped to read a ton of things and found out graffiti is not a new thing.  Spectators used to literally carve the fights into the walls as they were happening which was really cool to see.  Thinking about how many people must have walked through this blew my mind.  Definitely one of my favorite stops in the entire trip.  I learned so much here!

Our next stop was The Vatican!  St. Peter's Basilica was unreal.  We were also able to climb the duomo, allowing us to see the city!  I don't have words to describe it, so I'm going to use photos:

Next stop: The Trevi Fountain!  Again - I have no words to explain this experience.  It was everything I've ever wanted to see and photos do this thing no justice.  The Trevi had actually just reopened after it had been closed for quite a while - We were definitely blessed to have arrived at a time we were able to see it.

One of our last stops in Rome was to see the Roman Forum which is basically a bunch of ancient ruins of government buildings.  At one point, this was the center of public life in Rome. Again, this was such an incredible opportunity to see and walk among the streets where so many have walked before.  It was also super overcast that day, so the photos turned out extra neat:






Rome was an incredible adventure - and I am still amazed that it's all over.

This was by far one of my greatest adventures!

-jennilea