Wow. It’s already been one full week here in Europe. I still have about two weeks here and to put that into perspective, I still have twice as many adventures to live as the ones I already have. That is so crazy.

Today was the most exhausting day. I had to wake up at 6:30 am to go down to the other hotel to eat breakfast at 7:00 and then we boarded the bus to Florence at 8:30. And because of everything I had to do last night, I only had about 4 hours of sleep. SO this whole day I was basically running on cappuccinos, bus ride naps, and adrenaline. A very interesting combination, if you ask me.

The bus ride to Florence was only about an hour and a half to maybe two hours. The ride was not bad at all…but I was asleep the whole way.

When we arrived at Florence, we started with a guided audio tour. So, the tour guide would speak into a headset and it would basically radio over to our headsets and I thought that was a neat idea. The only problem with it was that the farther away we were from her, the more it would fade in and out. But, at least when that happened I could tell that I was falling behind because a lot of the time you couldn’t see her unless we were stopped. Florence is such a crowded area. I feel like every place we have been to in Italy so far is just a HUGE touring area. There are always so many people all around us and that can get very stressful at times.

Florence is such a smelly area. It smells of sewage, cigarettes, and food. The combination is not a pleasant one. Florence really did range from being a beautiful place to being one of filth. In alleyways and streets, it was absolutely disgusting but in the center of it all it was very neat.

One thing that I really enjoyed about Florence were the statues. You never really see cities filled with great, tall statues in the United States and it was very cool to experience. Another thing that I really enjoyed was that kind of “arms wrapped around you” feeling I mentioned in my last post. There were horse-drawn carriages, artists, and guitarists spread all throughout Florence. I love that. The only way I can describe the feeling is when you sit next to a fireplace all cuddled up as you watch the fire crackle. It was wonderful and creative.

There was a church in kind of the center of Florence and if I recall correctly, the tour guide said that it was the 5th largest church in the world. It was so extraordinary. The colors of the church were a bright white, green, and reddish color and it was just so marvelous. Unfortunately, we didn’t get to go inside but I would’ve loved to see its beauty from the inside.

Eventually, we decided to part from the guided audio tour and we wandered around ourselves. We didn’t really have a set plan for anything so of course the first thing we decided to do was eat. We went to a restaurant that my grandparents went to the last time they were in Italy and the food there was AMAZING. I had the best pasta I’ve ever had there. It was Gnocchi in tomato sauce and I LOVED it. I also was able to get a shirley temple with my meal and that was so refreshing! I loved that meal so much. It was probably my favorite since I’ve been in Europe. But, I really do love a good pasta so that is probably why. I just really love the Gnocchi pasta as it is for the roundness of it and the texture so when I saw that on the menu, I absolutely couldn’t refuse. And my tastebuds were very delighted. I will say that afterward, my stomach felt so stuffed and we even got homemade gelato afterwards so my stomach was to its full capacity of food storage.

After eating we just walked around a little bit. We had to be back at the bus at 4:45 so we still had a couple of hours. I didn’t do any shopping there at all for clothes just because everything was so crowded and it was all very overwhelming. It was a hot day on a Friday so there were so many people. I couldn’t even count. But we did go into this pottery shop and the artwork there was so pretty. It was all handmade and the guy who owned the shop was very welcoming and so nice to talk to. My grandparents ended up getting a serving dish and the guy said he could ship it to them in Kentucky which I thought was very interesting that he did that for such a small shop.

We stopped at a coffee shop but I didn’t get anything because my stomach was at its absolute limit. Then, we headed to the bus. When we got to the bus and we were all on, I took another nap all the way back. I was very exhausted. We did so much walking around and touring and just running on such little sleep and being so stuffed, I was just out. We toured from about 9:30 am to 4:45 pm walking around in Italy’s heat. That is about seven hours of touring. And even when I got back to the hotel, we had two hours before dinner, I just slept the whole time. I just felt so absolutely drained.

After sleeping, I went down for dinner with my grandparents. I was still very full from lunch that I didn’t even eat much of what we had. I just had flat water and a cappuccino tonight with some pasta and some meat and green beans with, of course, bread and butter. For dessert, we had a type of vanilla ice cream with dark chocolate drizzled on top that eventually hardened. After eating I just felt so big. I’ve never wanted to hear my stomach growl more than that moment. I just feel so bloated and disgusting after eating so much and I just want to experience what it’s like to be hungry again. I know that may sound ridiculous but I just feel so uncomfortable with the amount of food I am eating here in Europe. They eat in such large portions and it’s hard to stop eating because they are real, cooked meals. Not like Wendy’s or McDonald’s or even Chipotle back home. All the meals are fresh and homemade and the quality is amazing. So to not eat feels like I’m missing out but then I overeat and I pass the level of satisfactory.

When we were all finished, we headed back to our hotel and I am so excited to sleep off the exhaustion that today brought. Tomorrow I will be visiting the leaning tower of Pisa and I hope the touring isn’t as hard on us as it was today. But even with the long touring hours, I still made memories for the book.

Laurel ❤

{I want to give a special shoutout to my mom today because it is her birthday! I wish I could see you on your special day. I love you so much and I hope today was wonderful for you because you deserve it. You are such an amazing person and you have made such a huge impact on my life. I can’t wait to see you when I get back in two weeks. Love you!}

Uncategorized Europe travel