Barcelona: Part I

Friday morning we left the Villa at 8 for a train to Milan. Once in Milan we took a bus to the Bergamo Airport and waited for our flight to Barcelona. We flew RyanAir, which is one of the cheap airlines that flies throughout Europe. This was my first experience flying with it and I soon realized that all amenities are cut in order to lower the prices of tickets. But if you can get past the crowded free-for-all seating arrangement, the extra fees that are charged and the constant advertisements over the intercom for things like smokeless tobacco and lottery tickets, the 37 Euro I paid to get to Barcelona in only a few hours was definitely worth it. We got into our actual hostel around 4pm (still a long day of traveling with many modes of transportation) and dropped our things off to look around. Our hostel was right off of Las Ramblas, a main street in Barcelona, with vendors and weird moving statues down the entire thing…so definitely interesting to walk on. We headed back to our hostel after grabbing a quick dinner and got ready for the night. We stayed in Kabul Hostel, who has the tagline “If you want to sleep, don’t stay here,” which was a total blast. They had a downstairs bar where a ton of kids were constantly hanging out and every night they organized transportation to a different club around Barcelona that was free of a cover charge for anyone staying there. So on Friday night, we hung out at the hostel bar for a while until we headed to Chipitos, a very popular bar in Barcelona that has upwards of 200 shots to choose from. (Chipitos means shots in Spanish) We were told to get one where they placed an orange slice and whipped cream on top of the shot and lit them on fire…pretty neat. BUT, the night took a downturn when one of the guys in our group, Corey, got pick pocketed on the way to the bar. He didn’t even realize it had happened until he met us at Chipitos. Luckily it was only the cash he had put in his pants and not his wallet or Blackberry, so it could have been worse. Ever since we made these plans to go to Spain everyone told us that getting robbed in Spain was pretty commonplace. Out of all of us, Corey was the one making the most jokes of our inevitable robbery so when it happend to him it was extremely ironic and quite hilarious. We went back to the hostel around 1:30 for the group that left at 1:45 – yep, 1:45 was the meeting time to go out to the clubs, things don’t get going around Europe until about 2:30. But, only half of us decided to go out and I stayed in due to a tummy ache and an exhausting day of traveling.

Saturday morning we got up early and walked to a famous market off Las Ramblas. As you can see from the pictures above, it was pretty sweet! There were rows and rows of fruit, vegetable, meat, fish and candy stands. We ate there for breakfast and then started to walk to the La Sagrada Famiglia cathedral. Halfway there the boys parted ways to get a beer and the three girls, Kate, Lindsay and myself, went onwards without them. The cathedral was huge and structurally really impressive but there was so much construction both inside and out that I could barely see the architecture. After the cathedral we went to Park Guell, a famous park overlooking the city of Barcelona. It was such a nice day that it was packed with people eating lunches, hiking and just lounging in the sun. A bit of trivia for those of you who watch America’s Next Top Model, it was in this park that Melrose and Caridee did their last runway show of those wedding dresses! We spent a good amount of time walking around the park and then headed the opposite direction towards the beach. We are so lucky we were there on such a beautiful day because it was so much nicer walking the boardwalk. We ate outside at a really nice restaurant and ordered tapas and Sangria (a must when you are in Spain). Afterwards we headed back to the hostel to meet up with the guys and get ready for our rollerblade tour!

Leaving for Spring Break

First mid-term down and I can now finally enjoy the fact that I am leaving for Spain tomorrow! I have been pretty caught up in studying for the exam and I haven't even gotten excited until now :-) Tomorrow morning 6 of us leave for Barcelona. We are there until Monday afternoon when we leave for Madrid. Two nights in Madrid and then we head to Seville for another two. We are flying out of Seville on Friday afternoon and headed back to Riva. I really hope the weather will be nice and maybe, just maybe we could venture to a beach?! I will make sure to update as soon as I get back. Love Love

Dogsled/Locarno

Well, as some of you may know, my weekend did not turn out as planned. My roommate Kate and I spent all last week planning all sorts of things to do in Paris (Moulin Rouge show, booked our hostel, had our days planned) all that was left to do was book our train tickets, which have not been a problem in the past. Unfortunately, this time, they were. We went to buy reservations on Monday (since we have EuroRail passes, all you have to do is pay for a seat, usually around $5-10) and the trains we wanted were all booked. So we headed back home, spent the rest of the night creating a new travel game plan and went back on Wednesday only to find that every train leaving from Paris on Sat/Sun coming near Riva was booked. So, defeated, we came home Tuesday night and just said forget it. We talked a bit about different places but just didn’t feel comfortable throwing together a last minute trip just to go. SO, we decided on a relaxing weekend in Riva :-)

Since this was our long weekend, we didn’t have classes on Thursday. Of course, I woke up around 9 since I am so used to getting up early. I got a lot of work done before lunch (we have mid-terms this upcoming week) and afterwards we went on a hike. Friday I actually slept in until 11am! It was quite exciting and sooo nice not having to get up. I did some work again, went on a long run since it was around 50 and beautiful here and then went into Lugano with Kate for a delicious dinner out. We decided we could treat ourselves with all of the money we are saving from staying here this weekend. While we were in Lugano we booked our train reservations for a trip to Paris the last weekend in March, so I will definitely be going then!

Saturday was awesome. I woke up early and headed to San Bernardino -the same place I went snowboarding a couple of weeks ago- to see a dogsled race! I was the only one who went but it was actually pretty nice to have some time by myself. It was such a neat thing to see! Apparently a section of the races is one person on skis tied to a dog who pulls them? When I got there that was what was happening and I was going to be really mad if that what I had come all the way to see haha but soon enough the actual sleds came out :-) Luckily, it was a shorter event so each sled would go off in intervals of 5 minutes and would race against the clock. The event was only about 20 minutes so I go to see a couple teams start and finish. It was definitely something I will probably never get another chance to see, so I am super happy with my decision to go. (check out the video up top!)

I left the dog races around 12 and met up with Kate in Locarno, a pretty big city in the canton of Ticino, and about an hour away from Riva. After some research on Friday, we found a way to get to Cardada, a city 1360 ft high on a mountain with incredible views. Luckily, we stumbled upon the rail lift somehow and got to the city of Orsilena about 10 min after getting off the train. From there we paid to go on a gondola ride up to Cardada. The ride itself was like a rollercoaster, with my stomach dropping more than a few times...the crowded glass space didn’t help either. But, once we got off it was more than worth it. The views were absolutely breathtaking. There was a bridge that jutted out over one of the most scenic settings I have seen since I have been in Europe. We spent a while taking it in and wondering around the little ski town up there, had a cappuccino overlooking the mountains then headed back down. After that we shopped around the boutiques for a bit until it was time to leave in order to get back in time for dinner at the villa. All in all, I wish Paris had worked out, but this weekend ended up being quite productive and surprisingly enjoyable!

Bern/Geneva

Friday morning was such a treat to leave for a weekend trip when it was still light outside! Usually, we schedule trips with the first train out of Riva (somewhere in the 6AM range), but today we got a little extra sleep before the trip. The train ride was around 4 hours and we got to Bern around 2PM. It was really terrible out, raining and cold, and to top it off, apparently Bern is a week behind in their Carnival so it was the weekend we were there! It is like we cannot escape it, Carnival is following me. Despite the weather, I really liked Bern! It’s the capital of Switzerland so there are a lot of political buildings around but also some really neat sites. But it still maintains the feel of a quaint German town, it is awfully cute.

We found our hostel to put our stuff away and headed to the Einstein Museum, a huge site in Bern since it was here that Einstein lived and worked while developing his Theory of Relativity. The museum was interesting, but very hard to follow. There was almost too much information in it and I now know more about Albert Einstein that I ever wanted to, but it is a must see site in Bern. Afterwards we trecked through the rain to the cathedral (which was closed) and then to the one thing I was really excited about seeing, the bears!! The bear is the city symbol of Bern and there is a bear pit near the river running beside the city that 4 live. They have a pretty sweet set up, tons of space and things to play with. Unfortunately, I found out the hard way that bears don’t like the rain…they were all inside :-( The picture above is the only bear I saw that day.

After the disappointing bear pit we headed back to the hostel to get ready before dinner. Before going on this trip, we had heard rumors about how expensive it would be. Apparently, not only is Switzerland one of the richest countries in the world, Bern and Geneva are the two most expensive places in Switzerland. This wasn’t that noticeable until we needed to eat. We found a pizza place that had pizzas starting at 15 (the cheapest we found) and decided to suck it up and pay. This wouldn’t have been that bad except the pizzas were personal pan sizes! It took us all only few minutes to eat them and then begrudgingly pay the check. As soon as we left, we found a grocery store on the way back and stopped in for our actual dinner haha That night we walked around the streets of Carnival but did not partake, I was tiered and frankly uninterested in it, although I did get some great Halloween costume ideas :-)

Saturday we took an early train from Bern to Geneva and got in around 1PM. We found our hostel easily, dropped our bags off and started exploring. Lake Geneva was absolutely gorgeous! It has the Jet d’Eau which is a huge geyser type thing that shoots up in the middle and there are boat tours that you can take around the area. We walked around, found some lunch, then headed up to see the United Nations building. You couldn’t go inside (we are guessing it was closed), but I got the general idea of it. We then went to the American Red Cross Museum, which was started in Geneva, Switzerland. It was a really great museum (much better than the Einstein one) and I learned a lot about the start and the current work of the Red Cross. Our original plan was to go to Cern, the world’s largest particle physics laboratory that was written about in Dan Brown’s Angles and Demons, which is supposed to be nerdy but a really cool experience. Unfortunately, the tours are booked up until mid-march so I didn’t get a chance to check it out. So after the Red Cross Museum, we headed back to the hostel for a quick nap before going to dinner and then out.
Since I have the rail pass that allows me to use any trains on a day I specify, I wasn’t limited to a specific train to take back on Sunday. Our group of 8 split up on Sunday as some went home fairly early and mine walked around Geneva a bit more. We visited the St. Pierre Cathedral, which was in service, making it even better since we could hear the music from outside. My original plan was to go to the contemporary arts museum nearby but we found a really awesome market by the water where we spent a lot of time walking through. After that, I decided against another museum and headed home around 2, getting us back into Riva around 7.

This week is a short one for us since half the students (the theater kids) are going on a field trip Wednesday night. Since I have a 4 day weekend, my roommate Kate and I have planned a trip to PARIS!

And the Carnival Continues...

After getting a lot of sleep Sunday night, I was ready for another night of Carnival in Bellinzona. The tickets we bought (and used on Thursday night) were valid until the last night, Tuesday. The trip was actually quite impromptu since most everyone was worn out from the weekend, but a second wind blew through the classroom and somehow we scrounged together a group of about 15 kids wanting to go. Since costumes were an afterthought, we threw on anything sport team or American related and made that our theme haha Somehow I wound up wearing a US soccer shirt and a USA bandana (and received some dirty looks throughout the night). Monday night wasn’t nearly as crowded as Thursday but it was still a ton of fun.

On Tuesday, there were bigger things going on in Europe than Carnival…the AC Milan v. Manchester United soccer game. All along I had planned on just going to Milan and watching the game in a bar, since the cheapest tickets in a terrible section ran at about $175. But, the group I was going with were dragging their feet on getting there early and with the train schedule, it didn’t make sense for me to go there and have to leave on the last train midway through the first half. So, I decided to stay home, watch the game around here and save some money – UNFORTUNATE because the 5 that went ended up scalping tickets for only 50 Euro and getting into the game…yea, really kicking myself on that decision. But, I ended up going to Lugano and met the VT kids there to watch it. The rest of the week was fairly uneventful as I tried to rest up for a weekend in Bern/Geneva.

Carnival: Part 2

Friday we had an early train trip out of Riva…6:45. So when I went to bed around 4, my 6:00 alarm was not pleasant. Surprisingly, our whole group made it to the train station on time! There were 8 of us that went on the trip, 5 girls and 3 boys. We had a connection train in Lugano (about 15 min away) and then got on our train to Basel, Switzerland. That leg of the trip took about 4 hours and I may have slept 2 hours…and that is probably an overestimation. We switched in Basel and headed towards Cologne, another 4 hour trip…quite a LONG TRIP if you can tell. But, the early morning paid off when we got into Cologne around 3:30 and had time to look around before heading to our hostel.

The first thing you see when you get out of the train is The Dom, a HUGE cathedral in the center of Cologne. It is one of the UNESCO World Heritage sites and is one of the best known architectural sites in all of Germany. I don’t think the pictures do it justice, the inside is awesome, the windows are floor to ceiling stained glass and I love the gothic/medieval feel it has. After checking that out, we grabbed an early dinner at a little Kebob store, which are all over the place there then went to the hostel to shower and get ready. Our reservations were such that there were 4 in one room, 2 in another and 1 all alone (yea, that’s only 7 rooms…one guy slept on the floor since we booked the last 7 rooms that hostel had for Friday). My friend Lindsay and I were in a 4 person room but with two other girls they put with us. It could have been weird but they were not even there when we arrived and I only saw them for a few minutes Sat morning. We showered and put on our matching leggings and colorful tops (what our costumes consisted of) and met everyone at our hostel’s happy hour. We hung out there and left to go check out Cologne around 9pm.

Just walking through the city was so neat. The costumes were great and the coolest thing was that everyone was dressed up, no matter the age. We were headed to a bar that we were told would have a huge party that night and stopped along the way to warm up – it was snowing all weekend – and grab drinks. The band playing at the bar was a Reggae band which was really fun. We didn’t stay there too long though because it seemed like something we could go to in the States. Our solution was to grab a cab and tell them to take us to a place that is a lot of fun…he did not disappoint.

We pulled up to a street that was blocked off and each side had clubs blaring techno and people everywhere. It was called The University since it was near the college, making it full of kids our age. It is what I would expect Bourbon Street to look like. Since there are no cover charges anywhere, we popped in and out of places whenever we felt like it. Our group got split up 4 and 4 as my group stayed at one bar longer than the others but we all made it back to the hostel (pretty late).

NOW, let me preface this story with what our original plans were. Only 4 of us wanted to stay in Cologne for both nights (Me, Lindsay, Corey and Mike) and the other 4 made plans to leave Sat and go to Heidelberg, Germany for Saturday some of Sunday. My group booked the hostel for only Friday night thinking that we would just sleep in on Saturday morning and put our stuff in lockers at the train station. Since clubs in Europe (especially during Carnival) stay open until at least 7 am, we planned to stay out all night and catch our 6:50 train on Sunday. This all went downhill when we found out the hard way that this hostel had a strict 9:30 check out policy. I woke up at 9:15 to a harsh looking maid yelling at me in German to get out of the room. We were literally kicked out. You should have seen us in the lobby, we were quite haggard. We decided to try our luck and see if there was ANY way we could book another night and luckily, they had a room of 4 we could have. The purchase of another night there was the best $25 spent all weekend. We went back to sleep until around 1 when we left to check out some more sites around Cologne and get ready for the night.

We showered and me and Lindsay put on our same costumes…yea, I felt/smelled terrible. We walked around the city for a bit getting the feel of things but a lot of things were closed for the festivities. I really wanted to go to a contemporary art museum there that supposedly has one of the best Picasso collections, but that too was closed. For dinner we found a HardRock Café, about as American as it gets and I had a hard time justifying going, but those chicken fingers were worth every penny! We met a group of American guys who were stationed in Germany and they had been there for a few days and knew where we should go. After dinner, our now expanded group went to a brewery, Fruh.

It was soooo cool! It was about 3 floors with tons of rooms and German music. There were also guys that would walk around with small glasses of the bar’s brewed beer (the only thing they served there). They were cheap and apparently is was ok to just smash the glasses when you were done. A bit dangerous but I took part :-) That stayed open only until midnight since it had been hopping all day long, so we headed back to the street we were at the night before. It was about 3 when we started thanking our lucky stars that we got a room for the night. Exhausted, we headed home for a short nap until our early morning train. Since we were so tiered, we slept most of the trip, making it go by really fast. We got back to Riva around 3pm and I immediately threw my clothes in the wash (since we decided Germany has a collective smell of cigarettes and meat) and took a shower. Not the most educational of trips, but I definitely got the feel of Carnival and had a great time! (This is not the end of the Carnival posts either; there are still 2 more nights of Belinzona we paid for!!)

Carnival: Part 1

This Thursday started the celebration of Carnival in all of Europe. It is the Thursday-Tuesday before Lent begins and entails tons of parties and festivals each day/night. It is what Mardi Gras is modeled after but from what I saw, much more classy! On Thursday we kicked it off in Riva by checking out a parade in the street of all the kids from the local elementary school. Each class was dressed as a different insect (like ladybugs, caterpillars, bumblebees), all super cute! They had tents for food and drinks lining the streets and I think the whole little town of Riva was there. We listened to the band for a little bit until a huge group of us headed to catch the train to Belinzona at 8:45.

It was a 45 min train ride there but the train was a party in itself! I had bought a mask in Venice for the weekend but didn't realize that Carnival is more like our Halloween (except they wear way cooler/less revealing costumes haha). It was sprinkling that night so I opted out of wearing my mask, as to not mess it up, and just wore bright colors. To state the obvious, our whole group looked a bit out of place because we were no where near as dressed up as everyone else on the train. Regardless, it was really cool to see the costumes and the ride was a blast with people drinking and dancing through the isles, gearing up for the night.

The first picture shows Belinzona during the day since it gives a better idea of how it was set up. Down that road there was a gate where people checked your ticket - the tickets were $25 and count for train tickets and admission all 6 nights. Once through the gate, there were tons of vendors, bands playing and huge white party tents. We spent the night going from one tent to another dancing and having an awesome time. It was so cool! There were SO many people there. I caught the 2:30 train and a group of us headed back since we had an early trip Friday morning for Cologne, Germany...continuing my Carnival celebration! (See next post)