29 4 / 2010
Italia & Greece
In a nutshell, our spring break trip to Italy and Greece was incredible. We beasted through Venice, Florence, (made a pit stop in gorgeous Tuscany) Rome, Athens, and… not Santorini. I’ll explain that later.
I won’t go in depth about all the sites/art we saw (lets be honest, no one cares) so an overview should suffice. Venice was beautiful with its intricate streets and tiny canals. No time for a gondola ride, unfortunately. Getting around was pretty difficult, given that it’s an easy city to get lost in. Florence was easily my favorite city. It was incredibly charming, beautiful, and had a great deal to offer. We visited the Uffizi museum (absolutely NOT worth the three hour wait), Galleria d’Accademia (no line because we arrived early, David statue was pretty epic), and took a day trip to beautiful Fiesole. Rome was nice, but probably my least favorite city. The ruins, monuments, and art were great, but that’s about it. The Vatican museum and St. Peter’s were the highlights. St. Peter’s is probably one of the most gorgeous places I’ve been. Everything in Italy ran surprisingly smoothly.
As for Greece, ferry strikes prevented us from going to Santorini. Ah, life. Almas and I promised ourselves we’d make it back there just to spite the world. Instead of Santorini, we spent extra time in Athens and took a daytrip to the nearby island Aegina. Anyway, Aegina was beautiful and I’m thrilled we went.
Unfortunately, the only real downfall of the trip was the group dynamics. This may sound harsh, but half the group was essentially useless and took absolutely no initiative to help with basic things like making decisions or helping with directions. This made it extremely difficult for those of us who were actually trying to get things done. When you don’t have any support coming from all your teammates, traveling can be extremely frustrating and irritating. Hopefully the next time I take a large trip like this, I go with people who are more willing to take initiative and control when necessary. This particular aspect of the trip was very disappointing, but everything else was fantastic.
I can’t believe this epic chapter of my life is essentially over…
