Jayda and Chris's Around the World Trip: 2009

Jayda

Starting out Italy was a huge disappointment. Rome and Naples were nothing like the pictures you see. There were homeless, beggars, thieves(we actually saw pickpockets) and people selling illegal goods on nearly every street. I have never seen so much graffiti in my life! We even saw cathedrals that were grafittied. I felt like I was in Mexico, except the Mexican people are much friendlier. The people were constantly pushing and shoving and always passing you in line.

The day we made it to Florence I was in awe! The streets were clean, there was no graffiti, the people were so nice and the train station actually spoke English. Florence was so pretty with many sites and it seems as if it only gets better the farther north you go.

We arrived in Bologna to see tons of snow. It was so excited! I will post pictures as soon as I can so you can see how beautiful it was in Bologna. We ate dinner at this tiny little
pizzeria where we watched them make the pizzas by hand and stayed at one of the nicest hotels yet. We went to the rather huge and confusing university. It is the oldest in Europe. It was founded in 1088! It was so cold we mainly stayed inside playing cards and drinking some delicious Tuscan wine.

Next we arrived in the fascinating city of Venice. The Grand Canal is a sight to see! It is crazy that this whole city is sitting on water. There's not to much to do other than walk around the little shops and art galleries. There are many glass blowers here. We found one shop that was having a sale and bought a few things. We are going to attempt to find a midnight mass in English tonight. This is a huge tourist town, so the odds are not so bad. For tomorrow we made dinner reservations at this little Venetian restaurant right on the water. A couple we met in Rome are going to share Christmas dinner with us. Its crazy how you always meet the nicest people while traveling. Buona Festa!!(merry Christmas in Italian)

Chris

We spent 3 days in Rome which as far as history were amazing. However I had no idea that it was such a nasty place. We saw Trevi fountain, the Colosseum, the Pantheon, Vatican city, and many other amazing pieces of roman architecture. After departing Rome we went to Naples. We stayed at a really neat hostel called Giovanni's house. This guy named Giovanni owned the place and was an amazing host. Although Naples was probably the dirtiest city I have ever visited. Even some of the churches had graffiti on them. I joked to Jayda that I expected to see a dog any moment that had been tagged with graffiti because it was everywhere. I also did not feel safe after seeing a pickpocket the first night there. We did get to see Pompeii which was absolutely amazing. The city is so well preserved. We also met new friends on the way there from Rome. Ryan and Stephanie Mcmahon who we toured Pompeii with and enjoyed a couple of pizza pies with in Naples. This is the home of pizza and needless to say I ate my fill here everyday we were there.
We left Naples and headed north for Bologna after stopping for a few hours in Florence. We found the people here much friendlier and the cities much more beautiful. We saw an amazing cathedral in Florence and also enjoyed some delicious gelato, which is Italian ice cream. We arrived in Bologna to about 4 to 5 inches of snow. We arrived at our hotel thinking we had misread the price of our hotel and thinking we were in real trouble. It was a very nice place but very well priced to our delight. In Bologna we saw the worlds oldest university and got some well deserved rest in a private room which we had not had since leaving Ireland.
We are now in Venice. This is truly an amazing city. I expected a few canals and to see the gondolas but I had no idea there were no roads for cars and the amount of canals present. The quickest way around the city is by boat. It is really cool and there are a lot of American tourist which makes it nice because even the locals speak English. We are expecting our hotel to flood tonight because there are signs all over the lobby warning of high sea levels. We are meeting with Ryan and Stephanie our new friends for Christmas dinner tomorrow night at a little local place. So to everyone at home we love you all and wish you a very Merry Christmas.

Yesterday we finished booking all our hotels and mapping out the trains for the rest of Italy. Today we will head to Naples and Pompeii. We are staying in Naples until the 21st. Then we are heading North and stopping in Florence and maybe Pisa and a few other small stops. We will stay in Bologna till the 23rd. We found a class about learning to make pasta in Bologna. So hopefully we can find that when we get there. We are then going to head to Venice for Christmas. We may travel around to some other nearby towns. Several hotels in Venice offer Christmas dinner and I emailed our hotel about making a reservation. Then we are going to Bergamo on the 26th and staying one night. The airport is 7km from there. We fly out of Italy on the 27th and head to Frankfurt to meet Matt and Brandy for the new year!! So we will be busy this next week and if you don't hear from us have a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year Everyone!!