the ultimate STAIRMASTER

Today was my favorite day so far. Cinque Terre! This morning we had breakfast at 7:15 and left by 8 on a private bus. It was a 2.5 ride to the train station then 20 minutes to the first village Monterosso. When we got off the train in Monterosso we all got so excited. The beach was absolutely beautiful. Also, there weren’t many people around for once so that was nice.

We walked up a hill, along the ridge of a cliff and arrived at the beginning of our “hike.”

Now, yesterday Massimo had ASSURED us that today wasn’t going to be some strenuous hike but a “concentrated walk”. Baloney. Baloney. Baloney! The beginning of this .. walk… consisted of about 30 million steep stone steps. We were all huffing and puffing and decided we had to rock just a sports bra because it was so hot. It was cool though because when we got to the first plateau there was a lemonade stand made from lemons grown right there on the pathway. Thankfully the path flattened out from here just a little ups and downs and I loved it- the view was unreal!

Once we made it to Vernazza we were all so exhausted from our 3 hour trek! We split up in groups and got to eat wherever we wanted. Stephanie, Holly, Erin, Rachel, and myself went to an open air café right next to the water for sandwiches and personal pizzas. We enjoyed the food but enjoyed our cute Italian waiter even more! We all met back up and went down to the beach. Even though the water was FREEEZING we were like “when are we going to get another chance to swim in the Mediterranean?” so we went for it! It was so salty and so easy to float. I loved getting to swim and relax on the beach for the afternoon. 

We boarded the train once again and got back on our bus. The exhaustion set in and it was a very quiet ride home. Since it was our last night in Italy we wanted to have a nice sit down meal instead of our pretty usual grab and go meal. We didn’t have time to shower so we all changed and prowled around looking for a restaurant that had room for 18. We ate at a cute neighborhood place with great food. I had a penne pasta dish and also sampled every other dish on the table! After dinner we wanted to get gelato for the last time – so sad! I got my new favorite pistachio. Strangely enough I ran into my cousin Jenalee there! (no we didn’t plan to meet up) its so fun running into her in this far away place. She told me that all the stores were still open and would be for the night because it was the beginning of fashion week! No wonder the city was buzzing with excitement. Unfortunately the real festivities were taking place down the street and we didn’t have time to go. David told us we had to be completely packed by 3AM so he and Massimo could get our luggage down stairs and loaded in the bus- how nice of them! So we headed home and packed. It took me a while since my side of the room was practically a yard sale! I spent the rest of the night trying to upload pictures to my computer and post blogs from days that I had missed. Now it is 2:30 AM and I’m finally going to bed! Have to be downstairs at 4:30 ayyyy. Greece tomorrow! 

"maybe if we lounge on the steps we'll look like locals..."

It is very very hard to get up when your alarm goes off at 5 in the morning. Good thing I had already packed my bag and picked out what I was going to wear for the day. We met downstairs at 5:45 and walked to the bus stop. After a quick ride to the train station and some much needed cappuccinos we boarded the train for Rome. It was a very quiet 2-hour ride. Everyone fell asleep immediately! We had to catch this time because the later one was a little too late to accommodate everything we wanted to do today. We made it to Rome and got to have a real breakfast in a really cute café near the train station. I had an amazing nutella croissant and another cappuccino (it was necessary). It was really nice to get to sit down and relax for a while. 

I was so excited when I heard our first stop was the Coliseum. I’ve always wanted to go and see for myself exactly what it looked like. We walked there, of course, and I could see the crowd from a mile away. There were some very interesting people dressed up as roman warriors standing around offering themselves for a picture. One in particular entertained us for quite a while…

I loved getting to walk around inside that enormous building. I still can’t believe it was built so long ago and is still standing to tell the story. 

It was really hard to get actual interesting shots because I’ve seen so many pictures of the coliseum I felt like they all started to look the same. I gave up a little early and decided to just enjoy it without stressing about the pictures. We walked to the forum and got an assignment to take the same picture 3 times with 3 different F stops. Things like this are starting to really help me realize how to set my camera for a good shot.

Even though Massimo wanted to hit the Trevi fountain before lunch, we convinced him we would all die if we didn’t eat before. So we ate before. I had the best pesto tortellini and asparagus. I already know I’m going to miss this real Italian food! No one had exchanged their American money for Euros yet so we literally spent the next 3 hours trying to accomplish that. It was actually a nice break once we got to a bank (after trying 2 different ATMs that wouldn’t work) cause we got to rest our feet and have air conditioning YAY.

I FINALLY got to throw a coin in the Trevi fountain! It was fun but the excitement didn’t last too long..

steph me claire 

Once again we convinced Massimo we needed some time to shop before going to the Spanish Steps, so we shopped! But mainly just bought gelato- my new obsession. Sitting on the steps and people watching was so much fun.

me and rachel laughing... really hard

Next we walked to the Pantheon. I still can’t get over the size and beauty of the buildings here.

Riding the subway to the train station was interesting- my first subway ride! We had a quick dinner in the train station and headed home. Ordering was so complicated I felt like we were one big family arguing and rushing each other to order take out! Haha. It was such a long day we are all going straight to bed!

olives olives olives

We had to be entirely packed up BEFORE 8 a.m. breakfast. Ouch. We ate again in the hostel and loaded up a baggage taxi with all our suitcases. I began to recognize stores and street names during our walk to the Duomo and Cathedral. David and Carolyn gave us another OA (on assignment) for the morning of taking every angle possible of any building- not just the clique tourist picture. Thinking this would be an easy assignment I started firing away. After a couple of shots I started to realize they were ALL the touristy pictures- exactly what we did NOT want. I started to analyze my frames and subjects before I took the picture. Taking my time really proved to enhance the quality of my pictures. 

The only other thing we had to do today was visit an olive grove. We rode the public transportation for about 20 minutes to the very last stop and got off. I felt like we were ‘in the country’ Italy style. What Massimo forgot to tell us was that we were going to have to walk 45 minutes uphill to get to the grove… gratzie Massimo! It was difficult but the scenery was beautiful and we really got some pretty shots. When we finally made it up to estate 13 I could hear the sigh of relief from everyone- of course today was one of the hotter days here in Italia!

Touring the olive grove was really interesting but pretty much exactly what I thought it would be. A bunch of olive trees! But we did get a lot of interesting inside scoop from the owner and an up-close look at the process. After seeing how it’s done we got to be the judge of what’s good oil and what’s not. We each had 3 numbered cups and tasted each one. Number 1 was an example of what it tastes like when you only get vegetable fat. Kinda tasted like the Texan version of olive oil. Cup number 2 was fermented. Not so good either. Finally cup number 3 was what real traditional Italian olive oil is supposed to taste (and smell) like. Much better than any I’ve ever tasted! We enjoyed it with bread, tomatoes, and even some homegrown peppers. Yum.

Getting back on the bus (after a nice downhill trek) we headed for the 2^nd hotel we’d be staying at. We’re now located much closer to the insides of the city and there’s much more commotion.  THANKFULLY someone had already carried our bags up the 3 flights of stairs to get to the first floor of the hotel. God bless that person. Another plus was that this hotel actually has an elevator! Using that after not having an elevator the first time to get up to our rooms was so nice. Did the daily routine of downloading pictures and had our first critique. Everyone put their top 3 pictures on a hard drive and we projected them up on the wall. Massimo critiqued each one and made suggestions as to how to make the specific picture and our techniques better. We were all starving after such a light lunch and we went out for pizza. A night shoot had been scheduled for that same night but we were all way too tired to go. Plus, tomorrow we go to Rome, which means we have to get up at 5 a.m. Not really looking forward to that! But I am excited to see the coliseum, Spanish steps, and trevi fountain! 

"i think everyone here smokes"

Waking up was so so hard.. gotta love that jet lag! Thankfully breakfast wasn't till 9. We ate in the little dining room of our hostel and the owner/ waiter/ chef is too sweet. He happily served all 18 of us, made individual expressos, and wouldn't let us help him clean up.
After a short National Geographic video and some sample pictures we headed out to conquer Florence. The entire morning we split into groups and had a scavenger hunt around the Duomo which was so fun cause the list had pics and videos on it... 'acting out a street performance' was very interesting haha. My cousin Jenalee is living in Florence as part of a Baylor University study abroad program for 7 weeks and I got to see her today! What a coincidence were both here at the same time

We ate a pasta lunch at Pizzaria Nuti - the tortalini benisimo! and so were the nutella waffles that were served for dessert. We definitely needed that carbo load to make it all the way to the statue of David museum. David sure is a whole lot bigger in real life! The museum was filled with lots of interesting sculptures and paintings. After concentrating on photography this change of art pace was nice. After that inspiration we headed out and challenged ourselves to take 3 different category pictures: leading lines, rule of thirds, and framing. Looking for specific shots turned out to be a lot more challenging than I expected.

This is one of my rule of thirds shots.
We walked quite a ways to get to our Italiano cooking class. we had SO much fun. Isabella and Marchela were our chefs and taught us how to make spinach ravioli, baked vegetables, a chicken dish and tiramisu -ALL from scratch! a REAL Italian meal.
We had a long walk home but it was nice to see the nighttime movement and the city lights

We had a quick group meeting making sure we downloaded our photos correctly and made folders to categorize the type of shot and our "hotshots" for the day. 

My first impression of this city so far is exceptional. I love everything about it

Longest day of my life

This is what we had to endure to make it to Florance, a fiasco!

8 hour 40 minute plane ride to Paris (Steph and my personal TV screens wouldn't work, awesome.)

6 hour lay over (we all slept on the floor of the airport)

2 hour 30 minute plane ride to Rome

30 minute tram from air port to train station

2 hour train ride to Florence

Sitting next to Stephanie was the most entertainment I had on that first flight. After buying a pig neck pillow and taking a melatonin pill she was O.U.T. so funny. 

Trying to communicate at the France Airport was somewhat of a struggle-especially when trying to pay for chocolate croissants with american money! The workers got a kick out of our broken French and hand gestures. Getting absolutely no sleep on that first flight made me so tired during the layover I slept on the FLOOR of the airport, well so did everyone else. It was more comfortable than our plane seats! After making it to Rome we got to meet our two leaders, Carolyn and David. They are both really fun and I am so excited to get to know them more. Carolyn actually lives here in Italy so she has lots of knowledge to offer! She is also fluent in Italian and I love hearing her speak the beautiful language. The train station was definitely a culture shock for most of us from all the interesting clothes, to all the dogs, to a bathroom you could only use after you paid a fee! We finally arriving in Florence we met our National Geographic Expert, Mossimo! He also lives in Italy thankfully showing us the quickest way to a gellato store! yum. Now we are showering (much needed) and relaxing in a quaint hostel.I can not wait to lay down in a real bed and get some sleep! 

It's been a long day, or was it 2?

24 hours to go

Tomorrows the day!

We had our last class this morning, mainly just talking about last minute details and more fancy picture lingo. We got out pretty early and I spent the rest of the afternoon running around town on errands for the trip. I think my mom is just as stressed as I am which isn't helping the calmness level in the house right now! Since I'll be gone for oh 15 days I decided dinner needs to be something i definitely cannot get in Italy or Greece. So i'm thinkin Mexican or Chinese food. But first things first I really need to actually put my clothes into my suitcase! what. a. struggle. I really would prefer not to fall into my usual ritual of an all nighter to pack the night before a trip! 

The New Zealand/Fiji trip left today, I am so excited to see the pictures they come home with! I can't even imagine going from someplace so cold like New Zealand to hot and tropical like Fiji. Regardless, it sounds amazing.
I promise these posts will get more interesting once I am actually IN italy and greece...

City Center Test Run

This morning we met at city center to practice adjusting the ISO, F stop and shutter speed on our cameras. We used objects such as flowers, rocks and fountains to help us understand these somewhat confusing concepts.. (for me at least). Unfortunately we weren't allowed to practice using our tripods because of private property laws but we did what we could. Today was very helpful because I got to really practice outside and i'm starting to really appreciate good pictures and how much work goes into them. I used photoshop for the first time today and I love it! I'm so excited to get to Italy, take some amazing pictures, and show them to all my friends so they'll be JEALZZZZ (they better be reading my blog too!) 2 days to go... maybe I should start packing