Good news and bad news. Plus, the tale of me riding a donkey.

I have some good news and some bad news.

We’ll start with some bad news.

BN- You know how I’ve been a blogging fiend these last few years? Well, apparently there is a cap as to how many pictures your blog can store and as of now, my blog has reached that limit. So, from hence forth and forever my blog can have no more pictures added. UNLESS, I either pay to get more space {not happening} or I figure out a way to transfer old posts to a new blog so I can continue using this blog cause I like it. I don’t know. Do any of you people who read this know any solutions to this un-heard of and terrible situation I’m having?

GN- Greece is beautiful. If I could upload pictures, I’d post a few to show you. But then you’d probably be really sad that you’re not here right now.

BN-I’m leaving Greece tomorrow to start my journey back to the land of America, or more precisely, Utah.

GN-  Tomorrow I get to start my journey back to the land of America, or more precisely, Utah. {yes, I just copied and pasted that sentence because I was too lazy to type it again even though telling you this just added even more length that I had to type.}

BN- Riding the donkey was not exactly what I had imagined it would be… {**see asterisk story under all of my  BN/GN updates**}

GN-I totally went parasailing!!! We went up to a tent set up on the beach that said “crazy sports” on it because it said on the side something like “parasailing, waterskiing, tubing, boating, anything your heart could imagine doing in water” just to see how much it would be to go parasailing. Well, I told myself I would do it if it was under a certain amount. And guess what? It was 5 under that amount. But, Beth and I had left our wallets at the hotel because we wouldn’t need them at the beach and we told the guy we’d be back and wanted to do it.  Well,

BN- he didn’t believe us. So I pinky promised him {this is a true story. I really pinky promised the Greek man who probably thought I was insane} that we’d be back in a little bit. AND

GN- to ensure that we’d be back, he gave us ten dollars off! So instead of Beth and I paying 70 total to go, he let us pay 60. Probably the best 30 bucks ever spent.

BN- we had to wait like and hour and a half to go.

GN- I had never been on a speed boat on the ocean before

BN- it was windier than the point of the mountain.

GN-I worked on my modeling hair in the wind.

BN- when they unpacked the parachute thing I thought I was in serious trouble because all the fabric and strings and clip thingies were in a mega mess and knotted ant tangled and I had no idea how that thing was going to work.

GN-the man from Nigeria and the Greek man with his 2 sons under 10 pulled of a miracle and made the parachute go up.

BN- the Greek man asked us how much we weighed. And when I told him in pounds, I’m pretty sure he looked at me like I was a fatty mc fat pants. {kilos are more than double what a pound is for those of you who don’t know}.

GN-  It’s waay cool how you get up in the air! You sit on the back of the boat, they let go and in a split second you’re literally flying super high. The wind was blowing really hard, and it was a bit terrifying at a few points, but can you imagine the view I got of one of the most beautiful places on Earth??  The guy driving the boat made us go sooo high. We were literally directly over the boat and then he swooped us down so low a few times that we dipped our feet in the ocean. Let me clarify- a ma zing.

BN- I’m not so graceful at the landing part of parasailing….. I may or may not have slid into the boat on my rear end nearly knocking the poor Nigerian man down in the process, trying to wipe a big splash of salt water off of my face, while the Greek man was yelling “quickly madam, quickly madam! Madam madam!”. I’m pretty sure he meant, “get off of your rear so you don’t get caught and drown in the parachute.

GN-I’m alive.

BN- the pictures the 10 year old boy took of us were fantastic. So fantastic that you can’t even tell if it’s Beth or me you’re looking at. Again, if blogger didn’t hate my guts right now, I’d post a really fantastic picture of me parasailing. Or like one of my white legs parasailing. That good. :P

GN- I got to ride a donkey a second time. And this time it was the donkey ride of my dreams.  {***once again, donkey story will be last. Hang tight. I’m probably half way done or more by now.***}

GN- I had lobster for 6.50. SIX FIFTY!! Can you believe that?? I couldn’t. that’s why I got it. To prove that in fact it wasn’t a lie. And it wasn’t.  :D

GN- I ate squid. Well, a bite of squid. I didn’t really feel like ordering a whole thing of it so I just ate a bite of steeve’s. Kinda weird. But I did it.

GN- I hiked to the very top of the volcano.

BN- when the lady said the tour included “seeing” the volcano, I thought she meant seeing it from the ship. No no. she meant hike the whole darn things. You may be thinking “why is this bad?” Well, I’ll tell you. BAD because I was in flip flops. I mean, let’s be honest, you go to an island, you don’t wear hiking shoes. You wear cheap 99 flip flops cause it’s gross to put socks on when your feet are wet and salty.

GN- I hiked that whole volcano like a boss in those cheap purple flip flops. {thank you Lindy and Steeve for teaching me that phrase}

BN- my feet were super hot the whole time and I found out why. The tour guide dug a 20 cm deep hole {he told us it was 20 cms’. Whatever that means} and the earth started to steam. And he picked up a rock down there and let us touch it and it was hot! He said it was so hot that “you could boil eggs down there” {out of everything you could say you could boil he chose eggs. He should have said something more fun than boiled eggs. I mean, boiled eggs aren’t even really that good when comparing it to say boiled chicken, or boiled potatoes, right?} Regardless, you can boil stuff 20 cm below the ground on that volcano. Which explains why my flip flops look semi- melted and my feet were burning.

GN- I hiked that whole volcano like a boss.

GN- the boat we took around the little islands looked just like a pirate ship. I wanted to war an eye patch, call a parrot to come sit on my shoulder and say “argggh mateys!” but I didn’t. instead i….

GN- jumped off of the boat in my little 1 shoulder swim suit into the hot springs by the volcano that…

BN-dyed my skin orange for a little bit and made me look like I had a beard. It’d be a good look on me I think.

GN- I jumped off the boat into the ocean!!

BN-there was a male on the boat that drove everyone insane. He is yet another American that gives us American’s a bad name to the world.

GN- Lindy got the best picture of him ever. {I’d post it, but yet again, I cannot because I have no room for pictures. :’( }

GN- pita wraps {known to Greece as soulvaki has French fries in it. Like IN the wrap. It’s possibly the greatest invention known to mankind.}

GN- I tried musaka {you know, like in My Big Fat Greek Wedding when the main character brings her Tupperware of leftovers to school for lunch as a child and all the blonde girls eating wonder brand sandwiches asks what it is and she says, “musaka” and they laugh and say “moose ca ca?” that’d be it.} It’s sweet. Like not quite a dessert, but not salty. And it has eggplant. And I’m a big fan of eggplant. {That’s not a joke. That is in all seriousness. mmm}

GN- I also ate this thing called Gemisa {I probably chose this because it looked like my darling niece, Gemma’s name.} and it was stuffed bell pepper and a stuffed huge tomato with rice, and pine nuts, and seasonings, and raisins. And surprisingly, it was tasty.

GN- I’ve discovered this thing called “fanta lemonade.” Not a good thing.

GN- the bakery across the street from where we’re staying has some really good baklava. That piece was huge too! And rich. I had to save half for breakfast.

GN- we rented 4 wheelers for 3 days while we were there to get around.

BN- Beth and I’s was having a trial. It would only go an average of 15 up a hill [kph, not mph} when the guy told us to go at 50 as to not get ran over. It took forever to get anywhere, but alas, it was faster than walking and cheaper than getting a taxi or bus.

GN- I bought myself an apron with a donkey on it with bright pink lipstick that’s cooking and it says “santorini donkey cooking on it” and it’s cute.

GN- I bought Gemma a little {nearly matching my apron} bib with a donkey on it. Don’t tell her though, it’s a surprise.

BN- I sliced my leg on a beach chair on the beach under a cute cabana. And I didn’t even have any band aids because I gave them to the poor and helpless –aka {mainly steeve because he seriously has had some trials here. I’m going to take a break from my GN BN and tell you about just the ones involving his left foot}

First steeve crisis- make a story short, he fell off a bed and tour a huge chunk of flesh off the bottom of his foot  that looked nasty. So I gave him Band-Aids as to not have to see this nasty wound. 

Second steeve foot crisis- His shoes gave him some pretty incredibly bloody blisters. So, I gave him some more Band-Aids.

And just when you think his poor left foot was done being injured so he could stop limping and walk normally again….

Third Steeve left foot crisis- a super market cooler door literally fell on top of his big toe. Like he opened the door to get a drink {I think} and the door fell off of the cooler and onto his toe. I wasn’t there to witness this but I laughed my face off when he recounted the story to me. I know it’s not funny, but how he described it and just the series of events that happened after and before this was just so ironic that I laughed so hard my abs hurt! So here’s how he described what happened after- a guy that works there saw that the door was on the floor and said to steeve something like, “oh, don’t worry about, it happens all the time”. You’d think that if the door to this cooler thing fell off all the time, they’d have fixed it. How many people have to leave that store, limping and bloody for them to fix it? His toe looks nasty. Like it’s really blue and purple and he’s definitely going to have a fantastic black nail. Anyways, hopefully that ends the bad news streak for steeve’s left foot.

BN- sunscreen here is the price of an artificial knee.

GN- I used nearly a whole bottle in 3 days.

BN- I still got a little sunburnt.

GN- I’m mostly just really tan now.

BN- sunscreen is nasty. Think about it. You are applying loads of this greasy white cream stuff that you can feel your pours clogging and in revenge you know they’re going to send you the gift of pimples.

GN- I found my mom a souvenir. Mom’s are the hardest to shop for.

BN- there was a cockroach on our toilet.

GN- we flushed it down the toilet.

BN- you can’t throw TP down the toilet….. Kind of grosses me out to put it in the trash…

GN- I can’t think any more GN/BN.

Wait!!! I can

GN- I only have 30 pages left in the Book of Mormon. Goal of reading cover to cover in 2 months while in Europe will be a success. :D

Okay, now for the Donkey stories.

Since I was a wee little teenager and watched sisterhood of the traveling pants for the first time I have wanted to ride a donkey in Santorini. So the entire time in Europe I’ve {naturally} been really excited to ride one.  So I finally get the opportunity and it was not at all what I had expected. In fact, it was slightly terrifying.

We enter the port on our little pirate ship and pay the man to ride the donkey up the stairs. He literally picks me up, slaps me on this donkey that was probably cranky because it had a cage muzzle around it’s mouth, I hold out my camera to the man to ask if he could take a picture, and instead, he yells something really loud and whips the donkey and the donkey thinks it’s the Kentucky derby. It is charging up the stairs like there’s no tomorrow and I’m trying to a- stay on the donkey. B- trying to not let go of my camera. C- trying to not scrape my legs against the wall while the donkey is trying to win getting up the hill. D- trying to enjoy my dream of riding a donkey. And e- feeling bad for the poor donkey for having carry my sorry back side {if I cussed, I would have used a fitting word there} up these stairs and for his bum bum to cause it was just whipped!!

So we get to the top and you’d think that I just charged up the hill because I didn’t breath the whole time and so I was out of breath.

I then try to hand the guy my camera again {because I’d wanted to ride a donkey for so long that I had to have a picture of it.} and this time he keeps yelling “madame madam madam madame madame!! Quickly quickly!” and once again, picks me up, and takes me off the donkey. And the second I got off, the donkey started charging down the stairs. Sigh. Not at all what I had imagined.

Poor Beth had a worse experience than I did. The donkey scraped up her legs and made her toe bleed.

So we came up with a grand plan to go back and pay them more money if they’d let us go slow, not whip their donkeys, and let us enjoy it.

So we went to a different part of the island and the old man in charge of this one was really sweet and nice. We told him we’d give him 10 euros instead of 5 if he PROMISED we could go slow, and that I could get my picture taken on the donkey. He didn’t speak much English but he understood perfectly because he gave us really nice donkeys {none of his donkeys had cage muzzles and looked healthier} and didn’t whip them. He helped us up on donkeys and instead of going up and down the stairs, he took us on a nice walk along the coast! It was beautiful!! And every once in a while he stopped a random person and asked if they could take our picture for us. I kept patting my donkey and whispered what a good donkey he was into his ear, and thanked him too. It was seriously the best donkey ride anyone has ever gotten in Santorini. We got down off of our donkeys and then got pictures of us with our donkeys and with the man who led us on them. He was so sweet, he put his arm around me and leaned his head on mine. And even though he was old, and partly toothless, he was an adorable Greek man.  {you know the drill, I’d put some pictures up, but I can’t.}

I’m writing this post on a 4 hour ferry ride from Santorini to Athens and my stomach is feeling slightly queezy, so I best go.

Ta ta. Next post I’ll probably be back on US soil.

XOXO

More Italy and Greece.

It’s fantastic that I have a ton of long train rides. Because if I did not have them, I would not have time to write on my blog. Currently I am riding a 5.5 hour train ride to Athens. :D And it’s about 100 degrees outside, 55% humidity, and there is no working air conditioning. Like I said on facebook, Sweat has become a normal part of my wardrobe.

Going to sleep at night is hard. I’m learning how to sleep completely spread out. My legs spread apart because I don’t want them to touch each other, and my arms not touching my sides, and my fingers not touching each other.

Cold showers feel so good. I haven’t turned on hot water since leaving Germany.

Funny story. We’re in a little room thing on a train and there’s a little thermostat thing and we cranked that baby up to “max” and then we’re dying of the heat. When my conductor man comes to check our tickets he saw us sweating to death and changed it to min. Either we had it on max heat and he decided to help a poor soul out, or he’s trying to pull a {non funny} practical joke on us by turning whatever cool air there is off. As of right now, it’s still just as hot and we’re currently fanning ourselves with paper. :D  beth said, “We’re going to have buff arms after this!”

So, I’ve done a million and a half things since my last novel of a post.

Italy. It’s pretty fantastic. My favorite part of my trip so far.

So, here goes “a whole nuther” bulleted list.

·      Naples- Kind of a dirty city. I think Berlin was worse though. At least it didn’t smell as bad.

·      Shipped a package home full of 2 jackets, my long sleeve shirt, some things I bought here, etc. It was a trial. Because the post office spoke minimal English and I speak minimal Italian. I’m limited to  “salud”, “Gratzie”, “exschoosy” {no idea how to spell that}, and that’s about it. So I’m pretty well versed now.

·      Met up with Beth’s cousin, Jack, who is studying to be a priest at the Vatican. He came to Naples with us and it was fantastic because he speaks Italian, and he could get us around a bit.

·      We went to a pizza place in naples that Julia Roberts once ate at. It was a popular place and was pretty good. Also, did you know that Naples is the birth place of Pizza?? Cool, eh?

·      Skyped with Quinton

·      Took a train ride to Pompeii.

·      Pompeii was stellar! It was really cool. Not temperature wise. It was so hot. And the wind would blow every once in a while which felt so nice, but because we were all sweating the dirt got stuck all over us so we looked really tan, when in actuality, we were all just disgustingly dirty.

·      Went to the ocean. And everyone was making out along the side of the ocean. So I got some pretty nifty pictures to add to my “PDA in Europe” facebook album.

·      Swimming in the ocean!! It felt soooo good to be in cool water!

·      Saw a few baby crabs.

·      There was lots of trash in the ocean but I didn’t care because for the first time in a week I didn’t feel hot. :D

·      Went to a restaurant by the ocean and watched the sun set.

·      It was delicious with fresh shrimp. :D

·      Took an interesting train ride to Rome. Here’s how it went: couldn’t get to our little cabin area on the train because a psycho Italian lady was blocking the doorway with her panting dog. This dog was panting harder than I’ve ever seen or heard a dog pant. I felt like I needed to pass out listening to it. This lady was talking to herself and to the dog and no one could understand her. We finally made it on and there was a family from asia somewhere and the mom had her bare nasty gross looking feet and rubbing them on the seat across from her where her son was sitting. The dad was chowing down on this giant loaf of cake. And by chowing I mean chomping. Like a cow. I swear he said to himself, “I’m going to chew as loudly and as disgustingly as I can”. Then psycho dog lady puts a muzzle on her dog that is panting. So now the dog can’t pant and then I was even more concerned for it’s well being. So the dog looked like it wanted to die and the owner was talking to herself like she was crazy. Then the asian dad got done with his cake and the son got his loaf of cake out and ate the same way!!! Then it was mom’s turn and the son spilt his huge juice bottle thing all over beth’s seat and pants.  And the mom started yelling in chineese and the son got ticked and yelled back and then there was a massive amount of TP involved to try and clean it up and dog lady wouldn’t shut up and beth’s pants were wet. And then we were in Rome.

·      Found our hostel. {easiest one to find yet}

·      Trevi fountain

·      Made a wish and threw in a coin

·      Took some pictures of people taking pictures

·      Bought a few things for my family.

·      Saw the tomb of the apostle phillip

·      Got a tour of the st Peter’s basilica from Jack. He knew pretty much everything there is to know about this beautiful building and it was so great that he could take us on a tour there! I found out so much more info and saw so much more of it than I would have if he wouldn’t have been there. It was great. He was wearing his collar thing to show he’s a priest student and so people wanted to talk to him a lot and such.

·      St peter’s is beautiful!! The Vatican is beautiful

·      Met the pope

·      Just kidding I didn’t. but I saw his room from the outside of the building

·      Jack took us to his favorite restaurant and it was divine. Got some fresh pasta and drank a few gallons of water from the fountains for drinking. He told us that a lot of the water comes from the ancient roman spring under the city. It’s good water.

·      He took us to his “seminary” where he lives and we got to overlook the whole city at night time from the top of the building. It was beautiful! Took a few thousand pictures.

·      He took us to his favorite gelato shop- Frigidarium. And got 5 scoops of gelato ranging from flavors called Mozart, pistachio, frigidarium, and a few other flavors that I’d never heard of, dipped in dark chocolate. Yum yum yum.

·      Took a bus home. On the bust there were three little kids under the age of 7 singing “yellow submarine”. Adorable.

·      Turned the fan on cause the air conditioner was broken {naturally} and the blade of the fan flew off of the fan. Not kidding. It sounded like this. Bzzzzzz bangbangbambamclunkzzzzzzzz z zzzz. And then the fan motor part was freaking hot and we turned off the fan and tried to fix it. It didn’t work. So we slept fanless in a tiny room with nasty bathrooms with water pressure of a leaking faucet. Haha.

·      The next day we went to st paul’s cathedral. Jack took us there too. And then we were all sad because he had to leave to go to somewhere cool to go on a pilgrimage or something of that nature. In a few weeks he’s going to India to work at the mother Teresa home of the dying.

·      St paul’s was cool too. All these churces are amazing!!

·      We then went to the Vatican museum and it was the largest museum I’ve ever been to. I’m sure there are larger, like the Louvre in Paris, but this one was crazy!

·      Just to walk down the main hall through the whole Vatican area would take a half an hour. That’s without stopping and going into any of the rooms and museums off to every side. There’s a lot of famous art work there too!

·      The ceilings of the Vatican museums are incredible! I would walk into a new room and gasp at the architecture and paintings and intricate designs of the ceiling alone!

·      Sistine chapel. Oh my lucky stars. Michelangelo was a rock star. He painted that whole thing by his self. There was soooo much to see in that place and so many pieces of work in it that I learned about in art history classes that I didn’t know where in it. And we were in the Sistine chapel about an hour I’d say.

·      All around the Vatican museum was sooo cool! And we were there probably 5 hours.

·      Got some gelato again.

·      Saw the Spanish steps and the American {navy, I think} band was playing on them! There was a bride there as well, and the music was great.

·      Ate a quick dinner

·      Did my laundry and it dried faster than any laundry I’ve ever done before. Hopefully this is the last time I’ll have to do my laundry by hand abroad.

·      Went to bed {and our fan worked. The hostel people fixed it…. But it broke again and so we ended up being fanless again.}

·      Woke up early to be at the roman forum right when it opened. Nope, the whole city was on strike. So we looked at the forum from a distance and then walked around the coliseum because that was closed too and got some pictures and had a million men try to make me buy their flowers. Too bad I didn’t have a man with me to buy me flowers. Next time. Next time I’m in Italy I full on plan to have a man with me to hold my hand while walking down the romantic cute little streets, buy me flowers from all the people selling them, have a “Lady and tramp” experience while eating spaghetti, and make out at every possible public area because “when in Rome, do as the romans do.”, right? Sorry, that was random.

·      Took a little break and then we went and did things that didn’t involve the strike.

·      Ate a cannoli. A piece of heaven, people. A piece of heaven.

·      Went to a cathedral and saw some cool art work.

·      Literally ran across town to get to the pantheon because we heard it was open again. Made it in and it was awesome!

·      Took some pictures of a horse decked out in Italian gear.

got my picture taken with a cowboy!!!!!!!

·      Ate some more gelato.

·      Ate dinner at ristorchicco. Got lasagna. My stars I love Italian food.

·      Went to old bridge gellateria and ate more gelato. So much gelato!

·      Got to take the bus home because the strike was over!

·      Packed

·      Said a tearful good bye to a city I loved.

·      Flew to Greece. Saw the coliseum from the airplane

·      Marveled at the pretty water of Greece.

·      Got off the plane and it was even hotter than Italy.

·      Walked up some hills at mid day heat with a 30 pound backpack to get to the hostel. Chugged a bunch of tap water that I’m not so sure I was supposed to drink.

·      Did you know, you can’t put TP down the toilet in Greece? That was interesting…

·      Took an hour nap.

·      Ate dinner at sunset on top of Thessaloniki that overlooked the whole city and ocean. Beautiful. This city is where the “Thessalonians” part of the bible comes from. It’s really old.

·      Greek food is delicious. So flavorful and carnivorous.

·      Counted 12 cats in one tiny yard. They don’t believe in fixing their feline friends here. I heard 3 cat fights last night and continuous meowing the whole time we’re at the hostel. Haha. But the hostel was fetchin’ adorable. And the lady who worked there was so incredibly sweet and helpful.

·      This morning I ate Greek breakfast. A Thessaloniki sweet bread, some other warm pastry thing, and a cereal thing and a cake thing.

·      It’s weird to be in a place where everything building looks like it’s a sorority or fraternity because of the Greek letters. I don’t know how to pronounce anything I see. It’s bizarre to not even recognize letters that are in words.

·      And now I’m going to go take a nap on the train if I can fall asleep.

I’m so excited for Greece. I can tell that I’m going to love it. And I loved Italy.

You guys, sometimes I just wish you could just see my face and see how incredibly happy I am and how extremely grateful I am to be able to do this. One of my favorite things in the world is being able to follow my dreams. To set a goal for myself and then accomplish it.

This trip has made me so grateful for a lot of things I take advantage of back at home {like free public bathrooms, drinking fountains, washing and drying machines, a kitchen, my car calvin, more than 2 pairs of shoes [which I only have 1 working pair now because the others fell apart and got holes and my one pair now is being held together, wait for it, with masking tape. haha], a wardrobe to choose from, smelling good, cooled house, etc.} and even more grateful for the gospel. I miss being able to go to church 3 hours every week in a language I understand. I miss having worthy priesthood holders around me. But, this trip has made me rely more on the Lord and put my trust and faith in him almost more than I ever have before. It’s helped me realize also that I want to share what I believe and especially the part of our gospel that teaches families are forever with people who don’t know about it. It’s made me grateful for so much. The more I learn about the world, the more grateful I am to have what I have, to believe what I believe, and to have the standards that I have.

It’s kind of a bitter sweet thing to be going home in a week. I’m so blasted excited to see my family and especially my little niece who’s doubled in age since I’ve seen her. {but I found out yesterday that my other niece, Caitlin, has to go to her mom’s house till right before I leave for school in august! So I can’t even see her! Which seriously made me want to cry! So, I’m hoping her mom will let me take her to ice cream and have an aunt/niece play day and so I can give her the souvenirs I bought her} I’m excited to call my BFF betsy up and ask her all about her wedding plans and take her bridal pictures, hang out with Lauren and catch up on her life, and send a mass text to everyone I know and ask them how they are. Haha. Oh, and I’m excited to have a giant dollar dr pepper from mcdonalds too.

But, it’s bitter because this trip has definitely made me want to go other places. I’m for sure going back to Italy one day. And I’m sure I’ll want to come back to Greece to.

Well, I’m really going to try to sleep on this hot train now. 

Catch up: bulleted novella edition.

Because my favorite thing to do on my blog is bulleted list, I am going to give you a bulleted list. Mmmm k?

Fun story first though. I am writing this on a train going from Florence to Naples. Fun story, huh?

Last part of Germany-

• ·      Went to a wooden carving store in Munich and it was incredible. Hand carved, hand painted. Beautiful nativity scenes. Wish I had a spare 500 euros to buy one.
• ·      Ate a magnum McFlurry. Magnum bars are sooo delicious so I couldn’t pass up on as a shake.
• ·      Bought some jean shorts that are really comfy,  and am incredibly glad I spent the money to get them because it is hotter than Haiti in Italy. They are my new BFF. {sorry, Betsy}
• ·      Tried on some leather leasderhousen and my legs thought they were going to suffocate because there is no breathing going on in that material.
• ·      Found that men in leaderhousen are almost just as attractive to me as cowboys are. :D
• ·      I may or may not have bought a traditional German dress. Ya know, the kind you see that has a cute lil apron with the sleeves off the shoulders and her bosoms are falling out? Well, I may or may not have bought an adorable blue one with pretty embroidery with a modest top. May or may not have. And it may or may not have a pretty white eyelet apron that goes with it. And I may or may not look fantastic in it.
• ·      Ate some more schnitzel
• ·      Skyped with Gma and Gpa cobb.
• ·      Watched an adorable video via email of my little niece, gemma being her cute, smilie self. :D made my whole life. Can’t wait to smother that child with kisses and loves when I get home
• ·      Went to church in munich and the ward memebers were amazing. So many people talked to us and a guy even invited us to the YSA dinner/ social event that night.
• ·      Went to the Englischer gartens. And have never seen so much green in my life. Pretty. Weird colored water.
• ·      Saw a slug
• ·      Saw the munich Olympic park and was amazed by the architecture.
• ·      Saw the Olympic pool and track and soccer field
• ·      BMW building
• ·      Went to the YSA activity and there were apx 25 people there, only 1 person was from germany. There were people there from 8 countries! Crazy. The Church is definitely spreading. Good work missionaries!
• ·      what appeared to be Ryan Reynolds. And then when I went to get a picture with him, I noticed it was just some guy that looked really close to what he looks like. Great LMH and all.
• ·      Got a cold and went to bed before 11pm 5 nights in row to try and pass it. I’m so glad it was a fast cold. Only lasted 6 days. And was gone in time for Italy. It was a blessing that’s it’s gone now. My colds drag on and on and on.
• ·      Ate nearly a whole bag of cough drops in 2 days. {did you know they sell cough drops here right next to candy. Like they are in between chocolate and European hard candies. Do people really eat them like candy??}
• ·      Saw the missionaries and I got really excited. I said “Hi Elders!” semi-loud and I’m pretty sure they a- thought I was psycho or b-didn’t speak English and couldn’t understand me. We’ll go with B.
• ·      Went grocery shopping for 14 people for 4 days, 3 meals a day. It was crazy.
• ·      Made 2 breakfasts and 1 dinner.
• ·      Made German food that I will make when I get home because it was yummy
• ·      Went to the documenta. It only happens once every 5 years. So it was kind of a big deal. But, it was not as cool as I had expected. I’m not too much into modern art. But some was pretty nifty. There was a section with cool eye trick paintings that made your head hurt to look at them and made you semi dizzy and looked cool.
• ·      Ate some nutella crepes. I love hazelnut!
• ·      Went to the most inept internet café of life. We were trying to print off our boarding passes so we could get our little happy selves to Italy to bask in the Tuscany awesomeness and it wouldn’t work for an entire hour. And we ended up having to go back the next day to attempt it again.
• ·      Half of facebook got engaged while I didn’t have internet.
• ·      Mailed a package home because I don’t have room for things anymore.
• ·      Went to see the castle in Kassel.
• ·      Saw an adorable, full grown, raccoon.
• ·      Took pictures of said raccoon.
• ·      Raccoon got closer and closer to us.
• ·      Backed up.
• ·      Raccoon followed
• ·      Snapped a few pictures.
• ·      Raccoon got even closer.
• ·      Started speed walking
• ·      Raccoon started running
• ·      Brianna started running.
• ·      Whole group started screaming like little girls as we ran down a hill in the middle of the forrest while a rabid raccoon chased us.  {okay, so  may have exaggerated that a little bit. But he really did chase us down a hill. And it really was kind of scary. And I really did run. And he really did chase us till we left the park}
• ·      Went back to dusseldorf to go to weeze to catch our hour flight to Pisa.
• ·      Tried to check in at our hostel next to the airport for the night- No reservation.
• ·      Beth gets out her sheet showing we booked it. Guess what.
• ·      We booked it for the wrong night.
• ·      Next good news-they don’t have enough beds for us.
• ·      Next item of good news- we booked our plane trip for a day later too.
• ·      So we had an entire day to hang out at the tiniest air port of man kind {next to Frankfurt-hahn. That one I think is tied for smallest.} and two beds for 4 people. I got the bed with no pillow and a 1/32 of an inch fleece blanket and beth got the floor with the comforter and pillow. All around it was a great nights sleep. {and this was the peak of my cold.}
• ·      So we checked in to our real rooms the next day and literally passed out from not sleeping the night before for nearly 5 hours.
• ·      Then I read my book of mormon for 45 minutes because the only thing to do I n weeze is go to the airport or chase a million {not kidding you} rabbits around the fields and forrest all day. Or get drenched by the rain.
• ·      Got cat called walking to the hostel from the airport. That’s a first, I think.
• ·       Met a really nice couple in their 60’s on their honey moon from Holland.

ITALIA!

• ·      Flew over some beautiful scenery.  Snow capped mountain ranges with little red-roofed villages nestled snugly in them.
• ·      Landed in pisa.
• ·      Got off the plane and immediately felt like I needed to drink a liter of water and put on more deodorant.
• ·       Keep in mind I had my life on my back {close to 30 pounds} in a black backpack that heats up faster than you’d think that helps keep me hotter than normal, a black camera bag, and my tan bag. All full. So lugging all this stuff around in 90+ degree weather was really fun.
• ·      We only had 3.5 ish hours in pisa till we had to catch a train to Florence. So after we located the right bus we needed to take to see the leaning tower and shoving more than a comfortable amount of people onto a city bus, and us with all our luggage, we made it to the tower. It was pretty nifty. And actually, the tower was leaning more than I had imagined it to be leaning. IT was pretty cool.
• ·      Took plenty of dorky pictures of ourselves next to it.
• ·      Ate pizza in pisa.
• ·      Train ride to Florence. But we have to have a trial because that’s what this trip is about. Learning all the ways that we can epically fail and have miracles that get us out of our hardships. We didn’t know we had to validate our train ticket. So when ticket master Luigi comes by and sees we don’t have a stamp on it he throws us off the train in to the middle of a dark alley where rapists and cereal killers live.
• ·      Just kidding, he hands us a sheet of paper in English {because I guess somehow he got the “American Tourist vibe”} saying how if we don’t validate our ticket we each have to pay 40 Euros. 40 euros??? Our tickets only cost 9 euros! But Mr. Luigi was nice enough to only make us pay 5 extra ones. So that was a miracle on 34^th street.
• ·      Got to Florence and got lost.
• ·      We lugged our luggage all around that city till my back felt like it didn’t want to be a part of my body anymore.
• ·      We finally locate our hostel after some help from this nice couple from London literally gave us their map and pointed out the street to us.
• ·      Inside our hostel room it was heaven at that moment. It was semi-air conditioned and it was magnificent. I then drank an amount of water that might have resembled the Atlantic ocean. :D

(Train travel update. I am just passing through rome. I’ll go here in a few days. :D)

• ·      After updating ourselves with the WWW we went out on the town and this, my friends, is when I fell in love.
• ·      Everything here is my favorite color. Everything is cute. Everything is romantic. It smells like flowers walking down the street sometimes. I feel like skipping or kissing a random Italian man to check off kissing in Italy off of my life’s to do list.
• ·      Ate not 1, not 2, but 3 whole scoops of Gellato. And it melted faster than you can say yum.
• ·      There are cute water fountains here that you can drink from, bath in, stick your face under, fill up your water bottles from, or just admire. It’s probably a must here otherwise there’d be a lot of people passing out from heat exhaustion.
• ·      We were on a bridge during sunset and I marveled at how pretty Tuscany was.
• ·      Saw a couple on a gondola in the water during this time and I’m pretty sure he was going to propose. Because let’s be honest, if this was just a date, imagine what kind of thing he’d have to do to propose. It was adorable.
• ·      Went to a little market thing and I bought a few souvenirs for people.
• ·      Went to the Accademia gallery and stood in line from 9 am till 1:30 pm to get in. I saw the David statue by Michelangelo!! And it is an amazing sculpture. Everyone knows this statue. It’s probably one of the most famous pieces of art every made but it was really cool to see. In all these art history classes I’ve taken I’ve learned a lot about this statue and the picture in all the textbooks and on the web do not do this thing justice. There are so many little details that you miss when looking at the pictures. Like his sling around his back, the veins in his arms and hands, and his neck muscles and Adams apple. It was a really neat experience and totally worth the really long wait outside in the heat of the day.
• ·      Tried to climb the Duomo but alas they were closed. L I was incredibly sad! So we took pictures outside of it instead.
• ·      Saw a parade that I’m still not sure what it was for. It was really long, almost all men in traditional Italian renaissance dress, some in armor on horses, and I was impressed they could wear that stuff in the heat.
• ·      A really annoying lady kept getting in our way to take pictures of the parade. She was literally in the middle of the parade and making people stop at her will so she could get a picture. She was just a tourist with a little point and shoot camera and I was baffled at her.
• ·      Saw the gates of paradise
• ·      Probably spent a little too much money on some things I can’t use till the future.  But it’s worth it. And I’ll be grateful I bought something nice in Italy.
• ·      Bought Betsy her souvenirc . :D
• ·      Ate some delicious food in a really cute little garden area. Mine had tomatoes, peppers, zucchini and egg plant. So good. Mmm.
• ·      Went to Michelangelo’s plaza {hiked a ton of stairs} to watch the sunset from high above the city. Best idea yet.
• ·      Watching the city change colors was beautiful.
• ·      We saw a few brides getting their pictures done. Jealous they have such a beautiful place to do it at.
• ·      Took some creeper picture of some cute couples
• ·      Watched the sun go down.
• ·      Rubbed the boar for “good luck”
• ·      Took a cold shower. Literally. Almost as cold as it could go.
• ·      And this is when I started to notice even more mosquito bites all over me.  I had about 5 I’d been itching all day but then I kept noticing more and more and more and more and more and more. And I’m pretty sure I was eaten alive by mosquitos in the period of 10 minutes. I have 7 on the top of my right hand, alone. It was hard to fall asleep last night because I was so itchy and hot. Poor lindy has one on her eyelid that swelled up. I did not know that bug spray was something that needed to be packed/bought. 
• ·      Packed up this morning.
• ·      Am on a train to Naples. Can’t wait to go to the beach! :D

fphew! that was a long one!

and here are a few pictures. 

XOXO. 

ii'm going to go explore Naples. and eat dinner on the beach while watching the sun set.