When in Rome...

Rome
City of ancient civilization! Oh how every place you step has known someone yet before. There is not a crevice, stone, molecule of air untainted in this fine city. Modern Rome is not the same size as ancient Rome but it seems not much has changed.
In Rome we stayed with Miss Lindy Long from Ohio. She is a good friend of Lisa's and gave us a place to sleep in her apartment in Trastevere the south eastern portion of Rome.
The first day we walked up Janiculum Hill, second tallest hill in Rome and viewed the layout of the city before us. Afterwards we walked down to the streets of Trastevere where the beautiful Church of Santa Maria in Trastevere stands keeping a warm shining face to the square that holds many restaurants and gelato stands.
Afterwards we walked across the Tiber river and found ourselves in Argentina, one of the many roman temples that has been made into a square because of the encroaching modern buildings and roads. Lindy volunteers at the Roman Cat Sanctuary where a home is for the abandon cats of Rome. They need help and are a non-profit working to spay and provide medical attention to the felines that rule the cobblestone streets. Walking around the streets of Rome the first thing that strikes you is the warmth of the sun, the amount of people no matter what time of day it is, and of course clergy members everywhere.

After our first day, our second was a bit more ancient.
The Roman Forum, Colosseum, Palatine Hill, Circus Maximus
Early morning wake up call for sightseeing. The sun was shining and we bought our tickets into the Roman Forum, only French maps where available (they always run out of english) so Lisa and I made use of that extra language we have.
The ancient birthplace and civic center of Rome sits between the 2 biggies of central Rome, the Colosseum and Capitol Hill.
After the Forum we drifted up Palatine hill while the sun was shining and looked out over the vast expanse of the circus maximus. The museum at the top was interesting, housing many of the found sculptures, pottery and materials found at the sight. There are even bronze and iron age huts that have been found underneath the Roman senators palaces here. The hill of Palatine is thought to have housed the first tribe of Rome and gave the myth or possible real history of Romulous meaning.
As the sun continued to shine we noticed omnious couds of rain in the distance and thinking better of it, moved to start our tour of the Colosseum. Only after a late Roman lunch did we start the tour, which gave us plenty of sunshine until the very end of our hour inside the Colossol theatre of gladiators and place of entertainment. I had to use the word colossol.

Italy- Venice, Padua, Verona

Vacation !
My friend Lisa Beebe joined me for a two week adventure through Italy and Bulgaria. These are our stories.
Why?
Italy because Lisa has a friend studying in Rome and Bulgaria because of my friend Zach who lives in Sofia.

It all started on an early February morning. Walking out of my tiny apartment in Montataire with my necessities for two weeks vacuumed sealed and squished into my big green backpack. After taking bus,train,taxi and almost missing our flight (nice work of arguing Lisa!) we arrived safely in Milan, the valley of the Italian Dolomites.
Huge mountains and sunshine, constant sunshine from when we parted the clouds above France to when we touched down in Italy. Oh, how I missed the sun.
Speaking Italian proved to be a bit interesting for me and Lisa. We forgot that we left France (it was only an hour plane ride and neither of us had slept for 24 hours, to say we were tired and a bit groggy is true) and continued speaking in French to Italians, until one of us realized they had no clue what we were saying. Haha.
We struggled and laughed with our si's and oui's constantly changing them back and forth. Learned dov'e? et chinquay but to say italian is similar to french...no. Italian is similar to spanish. But we made friends everywhere with our fren-talian. The Italians are tri-lingual easily and probably nicer than they seem.
Italy has amazing cappucino's and brioche. These saved our lives many a dire moment. Mmm nothing compares to that nice milky foam that you can scoop up with your tiny spoon after you have finished the dark liquid adrenaline that is italian cafe. Tangent! Anyways....

After our cafe wake up call we headed out to Milan Train station about an hour away and to get on a train headed for Venice. This was our ultimate planned destination. Venice during Carnival. Luckily before we left, Lisa contacted a couch surfer named Guiseppe who was kind enough to let us crash with him a few days on the condition that we make peanut butter pasta for him. It's quite the american delicacy.
That cute Italian man is Gusieppe and the bowl Lisa is holding is full of peanut butter pasta.
Sidenote: Couchsurfing is a network of people throughout the world that offer their homes as a place to stay for travelers (for free) in the belief of sharing one anothers culture and being able to have a place to stay with someone who is willing to contribute to your experience of thier home and country. In other words, friends you haven't met yet. All fellow travelers and world traveling supporters.

So far.... Milan> Verona> Padua> VENICE!!

On the train to Venice looking out across the northern Italian countryside were many farms and small villages. Then, slowly, the mountains faded and we entered into Venice.

There are no cars on the old island just thousands of boats, gondoliers, skiffs, I think we even saw a few kayaks. The city when it first appears to you seems so tiny. Get lost a little bit in any of it's backstreets and you will be assured it is anything but that. It's just a myriad of mazes, bridges and canals. The air smells so fresh and clean and the canals do all they can to seep out into the lagoon surronding the fish shaped island. On our first day (Friday) Lisa and I stumbled around eating gelato and admiring the booths set up for Carnival. Masks, capes, toys, souveniers, food and milling about were people already dressed up as fairies, royalty and clowns. We retired back to Padua, where Gusieppe lived, about 30 minutes by train from Venice. Arriving there we dressed up to the best of our travelers ability in masks and painted our faces for a Carnival party in Verona. An hour drive later we arrived in Verona, the middle of a vineyard with about 30 other people dressed in the most imaginative things. There were pigs, amoebas, a cactus, phantoms, clowns, bellydancers and puss in boots. A lot of competition for the best dressed and most original prize to be awarded at the end of the night. Take a look at the photo and geuss who won. So that was Verona and the Couchsurfer party.
The next day we walked around Padua, enjoyed Europe's largest square full of Roman inspired architechture and beautiful statues surronding (what else?) a canal and beautiful fountains. Padua was very peaceful and gave us a taste for the Northern Italian lifestyle.

Venice for the Carnival weekend was packed. Honestly. If this city is sinking slowly then it goes a little bit faster during carnival. The sheer numbers of people, mostly italians, who attend the masked balls, dressed up and walked the streets of Venice is nuts. So the tourists were of course sore thumbs do to our lack of appropriate costumes. Even though on our trip we made the best of it by buying masks, we came no where close to fitting in. By hitting up the big tourist spots (St.Mark's square, Grand Canal etc.) early, we spent most of our time in the side streets and wandering. We were taking pictures, eating gelato, which is a huge theme of this trip, and just enjoying the atmosphere. Best way to enjoy a city is to jump into the melee and then retreat. A little flavor of both. No matter where we went Carnival found us. Such as a drum corp of smurfs, Uncle Scrooge ducks that want a hand out from Obama, and hundreds of others.