One of the best weekends of my life!

This week has been crazy, its so hard to find the time to blog, but nonetheless I will continue to keep yall informed about my italia adventures because they are just too amazing not to share :) Sunday I got back from beautiful Vesuvius, Sorrento, Capri and Pompei! It was one of the most amazing, yet completely tiring weekends of my life. Friday started bright and early with a 5am wake up call, since we had to be on the bus at 6am to the southern coast. After only 3 hours of sleep the night before, the 6 hour bus ride was used to sleep mostly. We got to Vesuvius around 12:30ish and got to climb to the top of the active volcano. It was pretty cool at the top, but getting there was another story. Since it's a volcano the soil is very dusty, ashy, and not many big rocks or compact dirt so it was easy to slip and difficult to climb. Even though I was wearing my sneakers I slipped several times. Although the hike was annoying, (and dirtied my perviously white sneakers) the views of Naples from the top of the volcano were worth it. The bay of Naples is so beautiful.





Once we got to the base of the volcano head, we had this crazy tour guide who told us about the history of Vesuvius and about Naples. He was really crazy and kept telling jokes that weren't quite funny. After the hike we jumped back on the bus for a long ride down to Sorrento. We only hiked about 1/4 of the volcano, so the bus took us the rest of the way down the winding, narrow roads. And since were in a bus, we took up more than half the road so the bus driver spent the majority of the 30 min ride down on the horn, trying to avoid a head on collision, which was very close to happening on more than one occasion. And if we were to drive off the road the drop was pretty far down! But we survived. haha The ride to the hotel was pretty uneventful after that. We checked into Hotel Michelangelo, a really nice 4 star hotel in the heart of Sorrento.

Once settled in the room I took a shower to get all the lava dust off, and then headed to the hotel pool. It was so nice to lay by the pool and relax for an hour before dinner. I ended up meeting Hope and Jordan at the hotel bar to enjoy a cocktail from our new favorite bartender!



Dinner was at the hotel as well and it was amazing! The ravioli was specially made in Sorrento and it was delicious. After dinner Luca took the entire group downtown to his favorite limoncello factory for a little tasting. Sorrento and Naples are known for its limoncello, so I couldn't resist the urge to taste it all! Strolling back to the hotel after an action-packed day, a few of us decided the best way to watch the France vs. Uruguay World Cup game was with a cool beer with our favorite bartender. While in the misted of watching the extremely boring game, the power in the hotel goes out, along with the rest of the street. After a mild panic from Daniel, they hotel staff informed us that it happens sometimes, so all of us just chilled in the lobby for an hour just hanging out waiting for the power to kick back in so we could use out keycards to get in our rooms. The worst part was that Luca got stuck in the elevator! (He rescued him shortly after) The power came back on in waves, so Jessica darted to the room, and managed to get there just in time. I used the torchlight on my phone to navigate through the dark halls and my room. The power managed to stabilize soon after I feel asleep, since the last thing I remember was a huge gust of cool air hitting my face so I could finally sleep soundly.

The next morning, was early as well. I woke up around 7am, went downstairs for an amazing complementary breakfast, filled with everything!!! Before taking off to the harbor at 8am to catch a ferry to Capri-- also know as paradise! Once on the island, our group boarded a smaller boat for a private tour around the island, guided by the one and only Luca. The ride was beautiful, and so refreshing to be on the water.



Capri was so amazing, just from the water. My favorite part of the tour was getting to take a tiny boat into the Grotta Azzurra. The entrance to the cave was barely big enough for the boat, so we had to lay down to make sure we didn't get hurt--it was kinda scary. But once in the view were amazing! The water glowed a bright beautiful blue, and the temperature was so refreshing!



After the tour of the island, a few of us decided that we needed to do everything we could possibly do on Capri, since we had 6 hours on the island. First thing was first, lunch. We grabbed some sandwiches and the best gelato in all of Naples. Luca pointed out this gelato shop that severs 3 specially favors only found on Capri. And let me tell you, they were amazinggg!!



We then boarded the bus to take us to Anacapri, the mountain top on the far end of the island. The bus ride up was an adventure in itself. They drivers drive as such high speeds, winding up the mountain, and just one look out the window could make you freak out a bit--you can see all the way down to the rocky waters. But once we made it to the top, we took the mountain chair lift to the highest point on the island to get a birds-eye-view of the all of Capri. It was truly breathtaking!







Next we took the scary bus back down to Capri. We decided since we had been to the top, now it was time to go all the way to the bottom, so we went in search of the smaller of the two beaches, which is typically less crowded and less touristy. The beach wasn't anything special, it was full of rocks of all sizes--no sand. But nothing beats jumping into the Mediterranean after a hot day! It was so nice. We swam around a bit, jumped off a few rocks. But time was running out and we still needed to shop! haha We dried off, and did a little damage, before it was time to leave Capri. It was such a beautiful, amazing day! We got to do everything, with just enough time to shop! :) Capri is by far my favorite place in Italy!



Back on Sorrento, dinner was at this pizza place, that was just ok and the service wasn't much better. But the USA vs England game was on, so we hurried through dinner and stopped at this bar down the street to watch the game. It was a lot of fun, but my energy level was quickly fading after another long day. USA tied England, which is so anticlimactic, so I decided to call it a night.



On Sunday we traveled to Pompei and got to walk around all the ruins. Pompei was a pretty big, thriving city at the base of Vesuvius but went to volcano erupted, the city was buried alive and forgotten. It was really cool to see what they have dug up and how much of the city had been preserved by the volcanic ash.



The tour of Pompei was just over 3 hours in the blazing heat of Naples. So after about an hour and a half I was just done and ready to go home. But we trailed on...saw the amphitheater, the main square, many homes, some bars and a brothel. It was really awesome, minus the heat, just thinking about how much we have found out about this time period because of a volcano is really interesting! After the tour we grabbed lunch and boarded to bus to Florence. Six hours, a pit stop, and a viewing of New Moon later we arrived back in Florence and in desperate need of a shower.

The entire weekend was so amazing, I would go back to Naples in a heartbeat! <3