Una vita bella

I apologize for the extreme lapse in time since I've last posted. In my defense, here are all of the crazy things that have happened in the last month:

* I was extremely sick when we returned from Venice and Verona. In fact, I ended up having to go to the emergency room here in Florence. It ended up being a respiratory infection and sinus infection, which antibiotics quickly took care of. However, for a while there I couldn't sleep due to all the coughing and pain in my sinuses.

* I made a grand 9 day European adventure for fall break.

* I made a week-long trip back to the United States for my cousin's wedding.

So let me tell you about all the exciting things I've been up to!

For the last nine days of October, we had no school. So my roommates Katie and Samantha and I planned this extravagant trip through 5 major European cities. We started bright and early on October 23, taking a train from Florence to Milan, Italy. We spent a day in Milan walking around and gawking at the beautiful Duomo there:

We spent a significant amount of time discussing whether we liked Milan's Duomo or Florence's Duomo better, a conversation that ended with the consensus that they are equally magnificent, just very different.

The next day, we flew to Prague. Immediately, two things struck me about the country:

1. The money is extremely different. In the Czech Republic, they use Czech crowns. One US dollar is equivalent to about 22 crowns. This made for quite an interesting time figuring out how much we were actually paying for things.

2. The language is extremely different. I never knew you could fit so many consonants together and still make a word.

However, the initial observations were quickly overwhelmed by the beauty and rich culture that flourishes in Prague. When we were checking into our hostel, I saw a flier for a free tour. Considering our budget, and the fact that we knew nothing about Prague, we decided to test out the free tour, despite our lack of enthusiasm for organized tours. We spent a few hours of our day on this tour, and I must say it was the most fascinating tour I have ever been on. The tour guide was funny and interactive and gave us quite the concise history of Prague. It was so nice to know what we were looking at and taking pictures of. We were thoroughly impressed with our free tour, and thrilled to find out that these free tours are offered in every major European city! Good news for us.

We spent the afternoon getting Starbucks (!!!) and then Czeching out (sorry, I had to...) the main attraction in Prague, the castle:

The cathedral of the castle.

Our next stop was Paris. Flying into Paris, we caught a glimpse of the Eiffel Tower, and it was magnificent. I don't think I've ever been so excited to see a famous building. We took our free tour, which was equally amazing to the tour in Prague, and it didn't take long for me to realize that Paris is as fabulous as it is cracked up to be. We saw all the major sights, walked up the Eiffel Tower, and toured the Museum D'Orsay, the Palace of Versailles and the Louvre (I got to see Mona):

The outside of the Louvre.

I must say though that my favorite sight was watching the Eiffel Tower sparkle at night:

It was magical.

Next we were off to London. We again took our free tour, seeing all the main sights:

The London Eye and Stephen's Tower, which houses Big Ben.

Westminster Abbey, where we attended an Evensong service one night.

Parliament, which is a spectacular sight by night.

We did all the touristy things, like got fish and chips and took pictures with red double-decker buses and red phonebooths. We all agreed that it curbed some homesickness to be in a place where there were similar foods and everyone spoke English. We also all agreed that as much as we loved every place we visited, London was our top pick.

Our last destination was Edinburgh, Scotland. Our trip here was short, so it essentially included our free tour and some time spent near the beautiful castle there: