Amalfi Coast Trip and Italian Field Trip

Thursday was the last day of classes and I spent last weekend in southern Italy again, this time in the Amalfi Coast. The trip was run through my school which was nice because I didn't have to worry about booking or planning any kind of transportation, hostel, etc.
So the day started at 4am, yes 4am, on Friday. I woke up and got everything together that I had packed the night before. I ate a quick breakfast and then walked to Piazza Italia where I met Margaux and Jackie who were also going on the trip. There were at least 30 or so kids going on the trip and we all waited around, as usual earlier than the Italians, for the bus. The bus ride was a good 5 hours, I had brought my laptop but there wasn't enough room to really work on my paper, plus I was exhausted. The day before I had gone to Rome just for a few hours to meet with one of the Schools for Chiapas' workers to talk about my internship this summer which I am 99.5% doing as long as I can afford to go. But anyway, I was exhausted and unfortunately the bus wasn't the most comfortable thing ever, but after Jackie and I switched and I took the aisle seat it was much better.
POMPEII
After a rest stop and another few hours, we made it to our first stop: the ruins of Pompeii. I was really excited since it was one of the things I really wanted to see while living in Italy. They reminded me of all the ruins in Rome except much more expansive. Our group was split in two, and we had a fun little tour guide who had a funny red umbrella with ears. She told us many interesting things about the city and about the archeology efforts and reconstruction that has been going on for so many years. Restoring the site which is constantly under surveillance and construction is quite controversial because leaving everything under the ash and cement allows the buildings and artifacts to remain in far better shape than if they were recovered and tourists were allowed to walk all over them like we were doing on our tour. But, I'm glad they recovered a good amount of it- it was a lot bigger than I expected.
We saw shops, homes, walked on ancient streets, even went into a whorehouse. The most depressing part of the tour were the molds of the people who had died trying to escape from the eruption. Apparently people would run back for their belongings even though Vesuvius was erupting, our guide said most people could have survived but because they went back they were caught by the poisonous gases and killed, later covered by ash.
These molds were incredible, you could see the folds of their dress, their sandals, everything- the bodies inside were completely gone from the years, but apparently their bones were still inside, rather chilling. Other than that it was really neat, also surreal to see the volcano right there- how could anyone feel safe living under a volcano!? Afterall, Pompeii was built on volcano ash anyway! Weird!
After our tour we had some time for lunch and a few of us found a little pizza place and had really good pizza, much like the pizza in Perugia. Naples is the home of coffee and pizza so we were all set to eat lots of pizza this weekend.
SORRENTO
We left Pompeii and started a climb up the hills and mountains directly on the coast for Sorrento. A lot of the places I was in for the weekend reminded me of Sicily, obviously because both are in the south and on the water- but still some architecture was remarkably different. Not as spanish as in Sicily, but far more baroque and simple. We made it to our really nice 4 star hotel after it seemed like we were going to fall off the cliff a few times. The Umbra people kind of messed up our rooms so it was me, Margaux, and Hannah, who I had met and is really nice. Most of us were near each other in the hotel so it wasn't that big of a deal, except that there was only one key. Oh well. We left the hotel after dropping stuff off to explore the town. Sorrento is HUGE for lemons and there was a beautiful lemon garden across from our hotel so after shopping around, having some delicious lemon gelato, and getting free samples of lemoncello (basically lemon vodka- yuck), we relaxed in the lemon garden until dinner.
The dinners were in the hotel and we could pick from a menu- I had a great dinner of eggplant pasta and cod. We tried finding the beach at night and instead found a street with tons of little shops in it and then decided that it was late and we were tired and were going to the island of Capri early the next morning so we went back and went to bed.
Capri
The next morning we woke up and had a good breakfast at the hotel, I had brought bread and nutella (much like the previous weekend) and made some sandwiches for later, which was good because Capri was pretty expensive for eating. We met our group in the lobby and then walked to the port where we got our ferry tickets and headed to the boat. The weather was not nice at all, it had already started dripping and the sky was cloudy- sad, because the day before it was gorgeous.
Oh well, we boarded the boat and sat on the top, where a bunch of kids were goofing off and wearing their towels like capes and we took a bunch of pictures before it started raining a little harder and the waves started lifting the boat up a little bit more than I would have liked.
I got pretty seasick, and felt dizzy and gross for the rest of the day. After landing at the island of Capri, which is home of the blue grotto, which we didn't actually go to because of the weather (and my stomach) we decided to take the hike up the hill to where the natural arch was located. After wandering through many shops and homes and finally a natural path, we found the arch which was absolutely amazing.

It was truly a natural arch made out of the rock and you could look through it to see the coastal floor and the beautiful blue water washing up against the sand. We took a bunch of pictures and then headed back to the trail where we had seen a cute restaurant built into the side of the wall. We had a really good lunch, though a little expensive, pretty much inside of a cave. That was fun.
Then we headed back down to Capri where we decided to take the bus to Anacapri (Capri is a huge island with many different things to do- they gave us a list) where there was supposed to be some sort of lift to take us further uphill on the island to see some great views and etc. However, because of the wind and crappy weather, it wasn't running and instead we walked around Anacapri until we saw signs for the blue grotto which we then decided to walk towards. Well, we did but it was a bit of a walk and it was already getting late so we took the bus back and then shopped before taking the ferry back to Sorrento before dinner. We had another good dinner and then hung out a bit before watching a movie on my laptop before bed. I still felt kind of sick from the day so it was for the best.
NAPLES
We boarded the bus in the morning after breakfast and headed to Naples. There was a tour guide on the bus telling us many things about Sorrento and lemons and other things about Naples once we got there. Then we went on a bit of a walking tour around the city, we were mostly in the nicer part of Naples which is fine with me because I've heard that there are some nasty parts of it- it's a giant city. The tour was pretty short, but it was good because our guide showed us a place to eat lunch- where the pizza Margherita was first made, where to have the best espresso, and where to get the best pastries. Pretty much the most important information anyone could get on a tour. After that we wandered around, ate in all the places he suggested- the pizza was amazing, and so was the coffee.
Then we ended up in front of a giant castle lounging in the sun. Of course it was a beautiful day both days except the day we go to Capri. Oh well, it was still a great trip and I had a fun time, even though it seems like a short trip.
Italian Class Field Trip to Bevagna
So we got back from Amalfi on Sunday evening and then the next morning all of us were expected to wake up for our Italian field trip which was to a small town in Umbria, Bevagna. We had no idea what we were doing there or what was happening except that it was free and that it was through Italian class. So I met at Piazza Italia on Monday morning and met my friends and my Italian teacher as well as all 100 or so kids that were there, it was quite a scene. There were two large buses and a smaller one, we ended up on the smaller one. It, like many things run by the Umbra Institute seemed a little messily organized, but it turned out to be quite a fun day!
We arrived in a little town and got little metal pendants before splitting up into groups with our Italian teachers and then we got a little tour guide. Apparently, the town was having a Medieval Festival for a month and they had all these workshops modeled after the Medieval times opened up for tours and that is exactly what we did.

(Meg in the silk machine- this was women's work back then)

(vat of watery paper stuff)

We went to a painting, candle making, silk making, paper making workshops and then had a weird medieval box lunch (ha) in the park. After eating my friends and I headed back into town to find a wood store we had passed earlier, it was a really neat store- everything inside was made from olive tree wood, I bought a pretty ring. We were also looking for park toys (really hard to find in Italy for some reason) and saw a store with a soccer ball, after going inside we found some kind of disc toy that resembled a frisbee and we bought it for only 50 cents each. We headed back to the park to find my professor and some students and other professors playing with a frisbee so we headed to the other side to play with our much cooler discs. After dessert, we started playing again and attracted the attention of those who had been playing earlier and ended up having a lot of fun running around the park with my professor who is basically like a 10 year old boy.

(my friends and my professor, Francesco- we love him)

It was such a beautiful day and the weather is supposed to be nice for the rest of the week. Now that classes are done, everything seems to be winding down. We only have review sessions this week along with my Italian final on Thursday. Next week is all finals and then... we leave. I can't believe it, nor do I want to think about it.

I also want to take a moment to say that my heart goes out to the students, faculty, staff, friends, and family of Virginia Tech. This is the most terrible of tragedies.