As I walked with my tour group along the city wall, we approached the open gates slowly, unsure if we were to go straight in or wait for our guide. Peering through the gate we saw in the distance one of the most iconic buildings of Italy: the Leaning Tower. We were finally in Pisa. [...]
Arriving into Florence, I had no idea what to expect. Everyone knows the Coliseum in Rome, the leaning tower of Pisa, and the canals of Venice but what is Florence famous for? As we passed through the city gates (which has become one of my favorite parts of old European cities), I tried to imagine [...]
As we drove by the massive walls of Vatican City, I saw a multitude of people in a line that snaked around several blocks. “My god,” I thought, “we’ll have to wait all day to visit the Vatican.” My third day in Rome, Italy and it looked like most of it would be spent in [...]
Ring, ring. Ring, ring. “Who’s calling me this early,” I thought to myself as I reached for the phone, half-awake and disoriented. “This is your wake up call,” a voice said in English with a distinct accent. Slowly I began to realize I was not at home any more but at a hotel in the [...]
As I peered out the window of the plane on our final descent into Rome, I noticed an oval-shaped building far below. “Oh wow,” I thought, “that’s the Coliseum.” Having just watched Gladiator days before, the Coliseum was an unmistakable landmark in the Roman cityscape and definitely one of my most anticipated destinations in the [...]