A wonderful day in the neighborhood

Just some random fun. made for you. (not by hallmark) by me.

heart heart. <3>

significance : 44th day in italy.. 66 days left

Pienza in my pants, Montepulciano and Montalcino aka Chianti

Welcome to my adventures in Chianti. Chianti... like the famous wine region.. Ask me how many vineyards I saw. zero. funny I know, and I know I don't drink wine, but still.. Chianti and no vineyards? Anyway despite that, Chianti was beautiful. This was another one day trip with our school, so it was free so that means it is always worth it. Plus I got another strawberry and creme lollipop. 

The towns were called Montalcino, Pienza, and Montepulciano. All three were cute, small and hilly. Supposedly there were secret underground wine and cheese tasting places, but we weren't told of this so we spent the whole day just wondering through the towns.

All three towns had amazing views.

Marie aka. virgin marie (italian translation of Marie) and I shooting our new cd album cover.

This is for the more upbeat songs in the album.

Marie and Becca on a bench. So much excitement in this day haha.

  

Peter looking at the landscape.

 

At the second town, Pienza, we had lunch.. guess what.. it was pizza. I know that my pizza loving friends (you know who you are) would enjoy that I have eaten more pizza in the last month in a half than I have in my whole life. Also Pienza is known for its amazing cheese, but did I eat any of this cheese? no. Why not? Because I didn't know haha :) 

In the last town: Montepulciano

 

picture on the right: a really neat market that I wish I would've boughten something from, but I am cheap and a selective buyer so I came home empty handed 

Overall the trip to Chianti was really relaxing, not much happened, but it was still a really fun day. 

Marie and I spiced it up with some Nelly Country Grammer. And if you know anything about Country Grammer, you know that any day with it is a good day.

Low Street in a range rover.

Mckling

Cinque Terre

What a perfect picture to start off the perfect trip. So. It italian cinque means 5 and terre means lands. Which is what cinque terre is; 5 lands...or better translated, 5 towns. 

Now to explain the picture. So we were all sitting together in a group of four on the train, but there was no one else in the area so we decided to spread out; however! this guy (shown looking suavely at the camera) asked Vivi if anyone was sitting next to her...Of course Vivi let this modern gentleman, wearing this nice, tight, bollywood style spandex shirt and low jeans, only slightly exposing his sexy hairy belly, sit next to her... He over heard us talking about Barcelona, and from that point on opened up and let us into his realm. He told us about his 4 different jobs, spirituality of life, and only things that you could imagine a fellow like this would be saying. The point is that I couldn't really pay attention because Vivi kept mocking him while he was talking to me and I couldn't keep a straight face. And yes this is another NO you don't have to be there.. it was hilarious

  

Cinque terre was amazing.. Favorite place so far, and possibly the closest thing I will get to Greece until I convince my non-existent fiance to go there on our honeymoon.  On the left is our dingleberry of a tourguide, Remmington.. Remey for short. First of all awesome name, second of all really fun. In this picture he asked me if I was from Tokyo because of how many cameras I had, so we decided to take a stereotypical japanese photo. So Hitomi.. if you are looking at this.. This ones for you and I miss you!

So fellow Iowa Staters.. look who we found! There are supposedly 10 other Iowa State Students studying in Florence, and we just so happened to be on the same "Florence for Fun" trip. Also please notice how most of them are wearing Iowa State gear.. gee gally (credit back to Remey) such loyal fans.. smiley face

This town was just full of love. The road that you hike on between the towns is called via dell Amore and this was the symbol/logo that was everywhere.

even the graffiti was cute
 

more cinque T love.. I told you they love hearts. and future husband, if you are reading this right now... remember this place

Town on a rock... also. it was October 14th.. and 80 degrees. 

Postcard number two. 

love from me.

I wish this was my grandpa.



 
 

Abbey sporting Remey's saweeet glasses. 

So folks. Cinque Terre. Check.

love hump,

McKenzie

Here comes the bride....rome sweet rome

Rome!!! Note to everyone who told me rome sucked: you are all nay sayers! I loved rome, and it was somehow even less touristy then Florence. Now that I've made my peace, lets begin the tour.

First stop... train station.  We were allotted 30 minutes to get something to eat and familiarlize ourselves with the location of our hotel. We spent 10 minutes getting some pastries and the rest of the time in a book store. I found the book that I used to love looking at while at the borders in Ames. I took this picture for myself for later inspiration, but decided to include here for you all to enjoy.

  

Just a few pictures from the metro... everyone should get a metro
  

Rome may be forever confused with Florida. 
  
  

Here is the whole group that went on the Rome trip. If you like to notice details you are probably enjoying our hilarious tour guide in the back of the group waving.

  

There were a lot of these fake old roman/ sparta guys standing around. Many times they asked if I wanted a photo with them, but I think it was because they were charging for photos.. There would really be no other explanation why there were so many of them... This picture is also cut because of the two kids.. if they didn't look so cute holding hands, I may have considered them to be ruining this picture.. instead they complement it i think

Niki is overjoyed because she can see the Pantheon through a side street

  

Please take note of how cute our tour guide is.. oh and on the left is the pantheon :) haha

here is the first of I think 5 weddings that I saw this weekend. This one was on its own at the pantheon, how her husband pulled that off.. nobody knows.  Also the other 4 weddings I saw occurred within 2 minutes of each other... so basically every time I turned around there was another bride and groom passing me.

  

Inside the pantheon... this side braid is dedicated to James Judge. and no I don't know why.


   

I really don't remember the name of this church.. I promise I will figure it out.. unless I forget.

Now begins the journey through the Vatican. 3 hours and about 8 million paintings later, I was tired of taking pictures of statues and ceilings, so please forgive me for not including every interesting portion of the Vatican. But really I don't want to ruin it for you just in case you want to visit it yourself some day.

  
  

Courtyard of the Vatican. Again a small portion of the group waiting to begin the tour. It was raining.. Rome is kind of like Iowa, at times it was 80 degrees and at others it was around 50 degrees. 
  

Here we are standing with our umbrellas and experimenting with my color pick option on my camera.

  
  

again our tour guide.. whose name might have been close to something like... musacelli.. that could be ridiculously wrong though

I tried to take a picture of the hall of each room we passed through, so that you could feel as if you were actually taking the tour with me

 

now walking towards the sistine chapel



  

no pictures were allowed in the sistine chapel, but I pulled off getting this illegal and blurry and poor quality picture to give you an idea. 

I like this metro.. a lot

at the pizza party for arcadia.. Again I am not a part of Arcadia, but luckily they will let me pay to come to about anything haha

really it was a good deal

14 inch pizza

2 appetizers

wine/water/beer (I drank water just to let you know)

and dessert ( tiramisu was my choice) willy and ryan if you are reading this.. which you probably aren't you would be happy to know that nutella and creme was a choice and I didn't get it.

anyway the point is, that all of that was only 10 euro. Which in my opinion is a really good deal.. for italy anyway.

this was the end of day 1. Afterwards a bunch of people went to the Hookah bar, but since we have such a fancy one in Ames and plus the fact that I don't smoke hookah.... I decided to go back to the hotel and take a bath. You may be thinking and wondering why I am so lame. But when you live with 3 other people in a small apartment, with a small shower and no bathtub.. you would enjoy your alone time too. Not that I don't love living with Vivi :) 
  

  
  

Day 2: first stop, another chapel and of course I don't know the name of this one either. 
  

This one had an added feature! If you paid 50 cents then you could turn the light on! 

On the road looking down towards the Colosseum...

  
  

  
  

the colosseum was amazing as expected. But heres an added bonus to the visit. My body decided that I needed to go to the bathroom. Thankfully for tourism, they had installed bathrooms.. And let me say this is the first time I've ever seen a women's bathroom line that looked like it would take 20 minutes actually only take about 10. 

Another crew shot: Peter, Marie, Jessica, and myself
   
   

Our Advisor's daughter, Tori, who likes wine and strawberry and cream lollipops

   

   

this first wedding, we couldn't decide if it was a fashion shoot or an actual wedding. still to be determined and being researched.. this one I definitely won't get back to you on

There were so many weddings! There were two more that I didn't capture, but seriously 5 weddings all at the exact same time! Also notice how all of the brides could care less that they are dragging their dresses on the very dirty ground! crazy italians!

   

Here is my last tribute to all the weddings that day




   

In front of the Trevi Fountain. Amazingly huge fountain, and yes we threw a coin in so that we could return to Rome.

My very artistic display of the oil and vinegar aka Marie's life which = complicated

Andrew was obviously exhausted. Some guy mistook him for actually being in trouble and got out of his car to help. Just another way to lighten the reputation of us out of control americans!

Sorry I didn't write many comments on the pictures, but there were so many! Also I have been doing this for quite a long time now and I could use a break!

Next blog look forward to hearing about me getting my palm read!

big hugs!

also just to let you know I have only done the kiss kiss once while I've been here. That is either proof of the lack of italian friends I have made, or the amount of tourists that are here

Mckinley (dedicated to Joe and Melissa)