A Tower, A Colosseum, & A Thousand Years of History

Italy has been amazing, the people are extremely helpful, the cities are beautiful, and the gelato is to die for. I started off in Pisa, where I climbed the Leaning Tower of Pisa, spent an evening at a bar on the beach, took a day trip to the Cinque Terre, and ate pizza everyday. I enjoyed watching the countless visitors do the traditional pose of holding up the Tower (to be somewhat different I stood behind all of them and took a picture of everyone posing). And while it's fun to be able to say I've been to the top of the Leaning Tower of Pisa, it actually was not that great of a view. The Cinque Terre has been by far my favorite stop in Italy. Myself and a fellow hostelmate (a lone traveler from Sweden) took the 2.5hr train ride from Pisa to Monterosso and spent the next 5hrs hiking from town to town. We lucked out and just so happened to do the hardest towns first cause this hike was no "easy walk in the park!" The view was abosuletly amazing with the brightly colored towns hanging on the sides of the mountains and the clear blue water crashing against the cliffs below... I hope to come back some day and actually stay in one of the towns. Once we finally made it to the last town, Riomaggiore, we treated ourselves to a swim, gelato, and a margarita (sadly the margarita was nothing like the ones back in Texas). The owner of our hostel took a group of us to a beach bar later that night... another scene straight from a movie. The bar/club had tiki torches throughout the sand, huge couches were spreadout under cabana huts, people lounged around on bamboo mats, and to top it off the moon was brightly shining off the ocean. I found it interesting to watch the way Italians interact with each other; it was very clear most do not have a personal bubble and are comfortable with any gender sitting or standing up against them. I've also learned Italian gusy live up to their sleezy stereotype.

I'm currently on my last day in Rome and even though I've been here for 4 nights, there's still so much more for me to see! I ended up spending half a day at the Colosseum with 3 couples from California. They were celebrating their 25th wedding aniversaries with a trip to Italy. They were missing their kids and I was missing my family so they adopted me as their daughter for the day... I had an absolute blast with them!
I also packed in a day trip to Pompeii during my stay here. It was a sureal experience to wander through the small rough roads and know that it was once a bustling city before the volcano destroyed everything. It was also great to wander through areas of it and be the only person on that road, every place I've visited is usually packed with tourist and tour guides. I did have a funny experience... as I was wandering through the ruins, trying to figure out where I was on the map, an older gentleman dressed as a security gaurd/tour guide came up to me and began explaining my surroundings to me in half italian/half english. I just kept smiling and nodding, understanding about a third of what he was saying to me. He then ushers me into one the houses that was baracaded off and explains the different rooms & textures on the walls. I kept asking if it was ok for us to be in there and all he would say was "it's ok, it's ok," I had to laugh when he tried to put the moves on me! I just smiled and walked out of the house... not many people can say they've been hit on in the Pompeii ruins.

I'm hoping to make it to more of the sights tomorrow before I jump on a night train to Amsterdam, where I get to see my mom... WHOOP!!! By the way she was the one that picked to meet in Amsterdam :)