Summer Session

 Our program has three terms - Fall, Spring, and then an abbreviated six-week Summer Session. It was a very different, but really fun term. Because the students are only in Italy for six weeks, a majority of them travel every single weekend. They don't have classes after lunch, so they also do many half-day trips in the afternoons. We did our Opening Tour in Rome, same as for Spring Semester, and it was nice to be back in Rome. (That was my third trip in a year, fourth overall).

Inside the Colosseum - my first visit inside

We did many of the same trips - a walking tour of Rome, a tour of the Vatican museums, and a tour of the Villa Borghese (one of my favorite museums). I also went on two optional tours - one to the Colosseum, which I had been to the outside of twice before, but never actually inside. It was really cool to walk around inside, but it's also cool to see just from the outside. What is most striking to me is just that millions of people have stood where I stood, at different points throughout history, with such a vast variety of things going on in their worlds. Wow.

Fede, Linda, Shelley, me and James at a delicious dinner in Rome

The other optional tour that I did was a Jesuit tour of Rome, led by the Dean of our program. It was cool to see the insides of some really gorgeous churches, although I had to leave the tour a little early to find something sugary when my blood sugar dropped. Damn diabetes. 

We did Tuesday evening barbecues for the students during the summer, as they don't get dinners provided. It was a really fun weekly event, and nice to spend some time outdoors, with American-ish food!

I did not go on any other trips with the school during the Summer Session - it's a smaller group of students, so the trips were staffed by Shelley and Linda. However, James and I did lead a group of students and a faculty member on a day trip to the Cinque Terre. That was a really fun, beautiful, and tiring day! 

The beach at Monterosso - the only town with a real beach

We met at the train station at 9am and took the train to Monterosso, which is the most western town. There we had a delicious seafood lunch, and then we hiked the trail to Vernazza. All five of the towns are built into the cliffs along the coast, and are connected by trains, but also by hiking trails. Unfortunately, last October there were really serious floods, and now only the one trail is open. Our school is actually doing a service trip to the Cinque Terre this month to help in the rebuilding process. 

View of Monterosso from the trail

Hiking the trail

It was a really hot day and the hike was hilly and it took us about an hour and a half. Absolutely stunning views though - well worth it! The first thing we did when we arrived in Vernazza was to take off our socks and shoes and wade in the Mediterranean.  

View of Vernazza from the trail

 In Vernazza we got gelato and walked around, before hoping on the train to take us to the next three towns. We were pressed for time, as we needed to make sure we got a train back to Florence that night. So we didn't actually go into Corniglia as it invovled a hike up a hill (or lots of stairs) and so we saw it from afar and then went to Manarola and Riomaggiore.

The streets of Manarola

Both of these two towns were absolutely lovely, and we all had a great time wandering through the streets and looking at the views. They really are indescribable. There's a "love walk" between these two towns, that we did, and while many couples have written their names on the walls, so have lots of other tourists - it was fun to spot previous students' names up on the wall :)

Looking out onto Riomaggiore 

We caught the train home, which broke down along the way, causing us to only just make the last train from Pisa to Florence. The day was hot and long, but really, really awesome.