Sketchy (but exciting) Travel Stories OR Italy, London and Spring school!

Unfortunately, it’s been quite some time since I’ve written. I will do my best to get you briefly up to date on what has been happening in my life in the past couple of months. The last time I wrote, I told you about my trip to Paris. After leaving Paris, I came back to Capernwray for 4 days to work on staff here. I really enjoyed that time as I worked in the Dining Hall preparing the tables for the guests and serving them during the meals. That time here was also valuable to me because I built up some really great friendships with some guys who have become really good friends of mine. My friend Amelia and I left for Italy after being back at Capes for a few days.

We arrived at the airport in Venice and met our friends Tad and Cindy who we stayed with for a week at the hospitality house that is their ministry to the local military base in Vicenza. My friend Peggy also joined us there the next day. We ended up spending a lot of time with one of the guys in the Army, called Ryan. We did an assortment of things during our time there such as go to church on the base, go out to dinner with church friends, bake cookies, play Ticket to Ride: Europe version, help clean the Aldrich’s flooded basement, and snack on Nutella fondue while watching a chick flick! Our day trips while we were staying with them included Vicenza, Venice, Basson del Grappa and Verona. We managed to have gelato every day we were in Italy...and felt quite accomplished at that. This may be a bit clichéd, but I think of all the places I’ve been to, Venice may very well be my favourite. I can’t quite put my finger on what I like about it so much, but I think it might simply be because it has so much character and color. I can’t say I’ve been anywhere else where I didn’t see any cars in the city because they only walk or use boats.

Venice

Amelia and I enjoying the sun in Venice

Venice

Cindy, Tad, Peggy, Amelia and me in front of the Hospitality House

After staying with them for the week, we made our way to Rome to stay in a “Bed and Breakfast”. We were sad to leave our friends Tad, Cindy and Ryan, but excited to experience Rome. Our journey to get there is quite the story so bear with me as I relay names of places and events. (Disclaimer to my Mother: I deeply apologise for not telling you this yet, but as you know I made it safely back to school and aside from this weekend, I will not be travelling again until I go home.)

The following is the record of my life on 14 April 2013: We woke up and finished our last bits of packing before we enjoyed breakfast with Tad and Cindy. Around 10, we left for the Lerino train station, giving us two and a half hours to get to Vicenza to catch our 12:25 train to Rome. We said our goodbyes and went to the ticket booth to look up and buy tickets for the next train to Vicenza. We assumed that since it was only a couple stations away and it was the most popular direction to travel in, we wouldn’t have an issue getting a train there. We were wrong. The first train there arrived in Vicenza at the same minute that we were supposed to be on our way to Rome. So we panicked slightly, knowing we really didn’t have many options from there. I had Tad and Cindy’s cell phone number so our first response was to try to find a phone. There were a total of 3 people at the train station. Two women and a young boy were standing together and we approached them and asked if they spoke English. Unfortunately they didn’t, but we still tried to ask if they had a phone we could borrow. They didn’t. So toting around two carry-on rolling bags and one very large backpacking backpack, we turned away from the train station and turned left down the road. We knocked on the first house we came to without any luck. Since it didn’t look like there were many people home in the few surrounding houses anyway, and it was a Sunday morning, we looked for more people on the streets. (Oh, and all the businesses were closed.) We walked in the other direction going out to the right from the train station. As we walked, we saw a guy getting out of his car and crossing the street toward us. He was wearing shorts and a t-shirt and smoking a cigarette. He looked as if he was about 20, but the dark circles under his eyes aged him a bit and showed evidence of possible drug use. As he walked toward us, I asked him if he spoke English. He told me he speaks a little bit, but his girlfriend speaks more. I promptly asked him if he had a cell phone we could borrow. A bit hesitant, he pulled one out of his pocket. I eagerly took it and began dialling the cell phone number I had for Tad and Cindy, hoping they weren’t in church yet. I called three times with no answer. As I was trying to call, Peggy and Amelia were asking the guy if he knew the number for a taxi. He informed them that the taxis don’t normally go that far out. We were at a loss for what to do when he offered to give us a ride to the Vicenza train station. We glanced around at each other and accepted. As he went in his apartment to change, our nervous conversation mostly consisted of “Are we really doing this?” and a confirmation between us since we had no other options. He came out smelling strongly of Axe and led us to his small car, which we barely crammed all our stuff into. Amelia and I sat in the back seat passing her iPod back and forth writing notes to each other about stranger danger. Since he spoke very little English we couldn’t really make conversation, but he cranked up his gypsy music so it didn’t matter too much anyway. The whole way there, our eyes desperately scanned road signs for “Vicenza”, none of which we saw. We rejoiced inside and breathed sighs of relief when we recognised the train station. We made it! All we know about the guy is that he was Romanian and has a girlfriend. We realised 2 or 3 hours later that we never even asked his name.

So we made it safely to the Vicenza train station...thank goodness. We walked in and began to check out what platform we would be leaving from. We weren’t too concerned because we had a good hour and fifteen minutes or so before our train left. As we were standing there trying to decide what to do, I looked down at the ticket in my hand and suddenly realised that our train bound for Rome was leaving from VENICE, not Vicenza! I exclaimed this to my friends and ran over to the automatic ticket booth and began searching frantically for a ticket to Venice, which took an hour and a half when we had gone a few days before. Amazingly, we found a fast train that only took 45 minutes and arrived in Venice just 10 minutes before our train to Rome left. It only cost us 16 euros each! We quickly bought the tickets and ran to catch the train. From there it was mostly smooth sailing (er...training). We arrived in Venice and I had to yell at Amelia in the train station to keep her from poking her head into Venice one last time before we missed our train. There was a moment on the train when we thought it wasn’t going Rome. When we arrived in Rome, in took us about 10 minutes before we saw anything that said Roma to reassure us that we were indeed in Rome. From the train station, we set off to find our Bed and Breakfast. Boy, were we ready for that! We walked for about an hour and a half to a sketchy neighbourhood where our bed and breakfast was supposed to be. When we got to the address, it was a graffitied garage door. Like many other places in Europe, the same address could be found elsewhere in the neighbourhood so we found our place on the next street. But we got there and found that it was not a bed and breakfast, but a hostel where we got our own room. It really wasn’t all that bad, but it was definitely a downgrade from what we were expecting.

After we unloaded and left our passports on the front desk with the guy for about an hour, we set out to find some food. We wandered through a local gypsy market in our sketchy neighbourhood and found a family-owned pizza place. The pizza there was amazing and we ate there every night we were there, despite the sketchy neighbourhood it was in. We grew to adore the people there and built up rapport with them to the point that on the third night they greeted us warmly. After we got pizza, we found gelato to get our daily dose. I had pear and chocolate...probably my favourite combination.

That basically concludes that crazy day. During the rest of our time in Rome, we saw the Roman Colosseum and the Forum and surrounding remains. That was amazing and beautiful. I loved wandering through buildings and pathways that date back thousands of years. We also spent some time at St. Peter’s Basilica, a church on the location where Peter is said to have been martyred. Amelia and I climbed 551 steps to the top to look out over the city. We then found our way to Vatican City where our main priority was to see the Sistine Chapel. I didn’t know much about it before or why it was so famous, but I was so in awe. That Chapel is absolutely gorgeous. It was definitely one of the main highlights of all my travels. Amelia and I spent probably about 45 minutes in there getting violently shushed and staring at the ceiling figuring out what stories the paintings were and what the symbolism meant. We also made it to the Trevi Fountain and the Spanish Steps while we were there. Other than the sketchy neighbourhood and bus rides, I quite enjoyed my time there.

Peggy and I in front of the Roman Colosseum!

Ancient Roman ruins

Amelia and I :)

The view from the top of St. Peter's

St. Peter's...all the chairs were still set up from when the pope was there

I couldn't take pictures in the Sistine Chapel, but this was right before we went in!

The Trevi Fountain

The Spanish steps (Amelia and I)

When we arrived in London at our hostel on the 17^th of April, who was there to surprise us but our dear friends, Jacob and Grant, whom I mentioned at the beginning. When we walked into our hostel, we found them just sitting there waiting for us. It was so surreal I almost didn’t believe it. It was like the surprise birthday party I never had...and it wasn’t even my birthday! After we freaked out, checked in and got settled, we started wandering about the town in Piccadilly Circus. We went to M&M world, Thai food, grocery shopping, and spent hours browsing in book shops.

The next day we saw the Tower bridge, London bridge (we played London bridge on it), Millennium bridge, and Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre along the Thames River. From there we made our way to Big Ben and ate lunch in the park. It was decently sunny out and we enjoyed taking a lot of creative pictures with Big Ben. We made our way to Westminster Abbey in enough time to take a few pictures and then run for cover as a major thunder and rain storm began to surround us. We took cover in Westminster for a few minutes before running to the metro station. We wandered through the British Museum for awhile and I saw the Rosetta Stone. That evening was another highlight of my travels: seeing Les Miserables on Broadway in London in the Queen’s Theatre. It was absolutely incredible. I can’t really describe it any more than that only to say that I’m glad that was my first impression of Les Miserables, and not the movie or anything else. What better place or show to see as my first Broadway show than that?

Grant, Jacob, Peggy, Amelia and I in front of the Tower Bridge

Reaching for the sky with Big Ben

Taking cover from the torrential downpour in the Westminster metro station

Amelia and I about to see the show

The inside of Queen's Theatre

After the amazing show

 Our last full day of travelling we went to the most awkward tourist attraction ever, that is, Abbey Road. I mean, how frustrated would you get if you were just driving through your neighbourhood and there were some crazed Beatles fans trying to take pictures on a crosswalk? We also made it to the Sherlock Holmes museum, Whittard’s Tea, Platform 9 3/4 and Harrod’s Department store. In the evening, we decided to go out and catch the metro to wherever we felt like going and jump off whenever we wanted and run to get on another line. Unbeknownst to us, the metro closed at 1am so we got stuck on the other side of town after we went to see the Tower Bridge lit up. We had no money and no idea how to get back. Eventually we waited for a night bus and the guy let us on for free and took us near where we needed to be. Yet another moment in our travels when God was looking after us.

Abbey Road

Sherlock Holmes Museum

Platform 9 3/4

The Tower Bridge at night

On the morning of the 20^th, we went to check out Buckingham Palace and then made our way to Victoria Coach station to get on the Capernwray coach back home. We were reunited with many friends, but there were also so many new faces. Spring school has been in session for four weeks now and is halfway over. It’s honestly a little bit hard to be motivated to get to know new people when I know I will only be around them for a total of 8 weeks. But that’s ok because while I have met some new people, I have been able to build up previous friendships even more. Also I feel as if I have spent less time socialising, and have been able to use that time to spend with Jesus. I have been loving the lectures and learning more about God’s character and the history of His people. I really look forward to putting to action the things I’ve learned when I get home...and to organise and review my notes! One of our lecturers once said “Capernwray will be nothing to you unless Christ is your experience.” I have held onto that ever since then and I think the greatest thing I have learned is to walk with Christ.