Mantua, Verona, Sirmione, and Torino

I honestly can’t believe how fast this semester is going. I have been living in Italy for 2 full months now. I have visited 2 other countries, and countless cities. Oh, and my Italian has improved a little (but not much). I’m hoping I didn’t fail my elementary Italian final this last week... fingers crossed. But hey, on the bright side, I don't have to go anymore! 

Also, here’s a nice little warning that this is a super long post. There’s just so much to share :).

This week we had a nice 4 day weekend and went on our program overnight trip. We woke up early Thursday morning to a nice inch of snow that covered the entire region. Unfortunately Reggio is a lot like Portland when it snows, in the sense that a “snowpocalypse” happens and everyone freaks out! They aren’t prepared, don’t know how to drive in snow, and almost everything shuts down. They shutdown the freeway for goodness sake! Come to find out, this weekend was the most amount of snow the region has seen since 1995 (some areas got 3-4 inches of snow). Reggio hasn’t seen snow since 2012, and being that it’s the first of March, it caught a lot of people by surprise. Long story short, we were supposed to leave Reggio at 8:45 am to head to Mantua, but left a little later than expected because our program staff couldn’t get to school. 

Eventually we made it to Mantua and we got to explore the “Tea Palace” which was a palace that was once on an island in the middle of Mantua that was owned by the royal Gonzaga family. The palace was big and beautiful with large paintings that covered the walls and ceilings. Fun fact: Mr Gonzaga had separate rooms for each of his lovers. And it’s been said that of all his lovers, his wife was his favorite... so I guess that’s good. 

After visiting the palace, we made our way to the city center where Simona, Carlotta, and Mirco treated us to a traditional sbrisolona cake. It was more like a really crunchy chocolate-chip cookie that should have been dipped in milk. Either way, it was delicious! After our little treat, we had lunch at a local pasta restaurant; 30 of us squeezed into this small little restaurant and I’m sure we completely overwhelmed the staff, as we were talking, eating, and taking up the whole place.  As we were waiting for our bus, we had a snowball fight and almost got in trouble for hitting Mirco and Carlotta. Whoops :)

We made it to Verona by mid afternoon and Christina, Ciara, Lauren, Jordan and I set out to explore the city. We found our first “to go” coffee in Italy, in a small cafe called “I ♥ New York coffee” that promised “large American coffees”. It wasn’t exactly what we expected, but it warmed us up. We visited Juliet’s balcony and rubbed her boob for good luck (I don’t know.. apparently it’s a thing). For dinner we went to a local restaurant recommended by a local guy we met in a shop. It was very good! Our waitress’ husband was from Denver, so it was fun to talk to her about Colorado. She was so sweet that she wanted to give us a free desert. A traditional ____. Essentially it was an oat and almond cookie that they pour grappa on. For those of you like me, that don’t know what grappa is.. essentially 78 proof alcohol that tastes like rubbing alcohol. The dessert was soaked in this stuff. It was horrible. Lauren said it best, “it’s like ever clear poured on cornmeal.” But of course we had to finish it. It’s considered rude in Italian culture if you don’t finish your plate. Looking back we think it must have been a  funny joke for the waitstaff as the 5 dumb Americans eat this nasty dessert soaked in alcohol. 

On Friday we took a walking tour of Verona and were supposed to go into the arena, but because of the snow (2 inches) the city deemed it “unsafe” and closed it for the day. Instead, we got to tour the inside of Romeo and Juliet’s house and write a letter to Juliet which was kind of fun. After our tour, we had lunch as a group at a traditional Italian restaurant before exploring more of the city. Friday night, Emily, Lauren, Jordan and I went up to this point that overlooked the city of Verona. We could see the river wrapped around the city lights. It was gorgeous! I think Verona may be my new favorite city in Italy. I highly recommend visiting! 

Saturday morning we left Verona and went to Sirmione, a small vacation destination for many Italians that is on the end of a peninsula in the middle of Lake Guarda. There are palm trees and lemon trees everywhere! There’s a giant castle that overlooks the lake and the entrance to the city that we got to explore. As we were walking in Carlotta yells “hey, if they ask, you are all 17 years old”. It seemed a little odd at first, but fun fact: USAC tells museums and other attractions that we are all 17 year old students from the UK, so we get in free or for a very reduced price to each of the attractions. We used this little secret to our advantage as we lied our way into the Sirmione grotto after lunch. I told the ticket lady I was 17 and from the UK and she didn’t question it.. so good to know that when I can’t pass as a Italian, I can definitely pass as a child from the UK. We made it back to Reggio by late afternoon and spent the rest of the evening relaxing after our crazy weekend of traveling. 

Clearly that weekend wasn’t enough travel for me, so Lauren, Jordan and I left at 5:45 Sunday morning and took a spontaneous trip to Torino for the day. The first Sunday of every month, every attraction in Italy is either free or has a reduced ticket price. So we took advantage of the date and  visited the second largest Egyptian museum next to that in Cairo, Egypt. Who knew Torino, Italy had such a history with the Egyptians?! I didn’t. It took us almost 3 hours to see it, and I still don’t think I saw all of it. It was crazy! We had lunch and walked around the entire city. We saw palaces, churches, the Po River, and lots of parks. We even got to see the start of the Italian breast cancer race. It was so cool! There was an endless sea of pink. So many people were participating in the race it was unbelievable. It was cool to see the impact of breast cancer from across the world. It was really fun cool way to spend our free day.

This weekend was crazy fun and we did so many cool things! Hopefully the weather will start to cooperate and warm up in the coming weeks for some more great adventures!