Croatia

I am sorry this has taken so long but I can never find the time of day to blog.
The first day I went with a large group of people to Barje beach where we hung out the entire day. The beaches are made of rocks and the water is crystal clear… that night the entire SAS boat went to a club called Fuego.. never have I experienced so much awkward dancing… The next morning I kayaked with a bunch of girls from 10:30 in the morning till 4. Why I agreed to do this I have no idea. The instructor warned that at least one of us would get sea sick.. and it was me. Thank you nancy Kosse for giving me the genes to get motion sickness from kayaking. We went to an island infested with peacocks and ate lunch… cliff jumped.. and ate salt from the shallow puddles in the rocks… the next day barrett and I attempted to meet some friends in Montenegro but the bus didn’t come for about 2 hours.. we gave up and went to a friends villa overlooking the water with its own pool… we picked lemons from the trees.. sunbathed.. got ready and went to a dinner party at the same villa where we drank wine and played a version of (dad you’ll like this) the name game.. went to East West Beach Club where I became engulfed with beautiful Croatian women that were all 6 feet tall. Unbelievable. The last day I walked the old city walls.. locals jump from the walls into the water which are around 60 ft.. Abbie and I shopped around the old city and I admired the crocheted tops that were all around 1,000 kuno.. and I ate the most amazing Nutella and banana crépe.. it was a good day

Villa

Capri

Ferry Line

Capri... The 4th of July

Quote of the day: “where were you on the 4th?”
  For some reason we thought it was an original idea to go to Capri on the 4th. Sadly mistaken.. We finally got a ticket for the 9:50 ferry after the man at the window decided he was overwhelmed and stopped selling tickets for 30 minutes. Almost everyone from the entire ship was at Capri this day…Annie Caroline Barrett and I took a boat ride with an Australian couple and rode around the island.. sunbathing.. seeing yachts that were so large they stored another boat inside.. and swimming in grattos.. this was the most amazing place I have ever seen.. never have I been so in awe of a landscape.. (well maybe the grand canyon).. one day when I am extremely weathly I will treat you all to a vacation there with all of the celebrities… this was a great great great day.. we ate at La Cisterna Pizzeria (another place in Rick Steeves) and we watched the sunset on the shore.. took the ferry home around 8

The top of the Duomo

candles at duomo

Florence/Naples.. July 3

The Train ride experience
   Unfortunately on this day we were unable to get into the Academia, the museum that has the statue of David because reservations had been booked for weeks. Barrett Caroline Annie and I ate at another restaurant in the Rick Steeves book.. I got the best bruschetta with tomatoes and ham and mozzarella and a bowl of papa soup.. it looked like mush but tasted as if glory danced inside of my mouth. We ventured to the Duomo and paid to light a candle (prayed for the fam). To Barrett’s dismay we decided to hike up 463 stairs to the top of the dome. Barrett stayed behind and ate gelato stating “why would I pay 8 euro to exercise” Even though sweat encompassed parts of my body that I didn’t know existed, the end result of standing on top of the dome was breathtaking. Afterwards we got our bags from the hotel and I fought with Barrett to walk to the train station only 10 minutes away (I won).
   The train ride was an experience in itself. All of our tickets got mixed up in seating so I sat in a group of four with 2 stereotypical looking Italian men and an African American woman. Barrett sat across the aisle with 3 italian boys in their 20s. to make a short story, the men on my side started yelling at the men on barretts side… pointing their fingers and not acknowledging my personal space. Thankgod for the woman across from me who knew English.. She said the men were fighting about drugs in discothèques. Obviously the older men wanted it to stop while the younger boys thought drugs were a choice.. (apparent as all their eyese were bloodshot)..  it was a hilarious 3 hour train ride…the older men, with broken english and hand signals, warned us about the huge crime rate in Naples.. that was scary..  we got into Naples late and took a cab to the boat.. another day going to bed exhausted.

Florence Hostel

Florence.. July 2

    Because we had no reservations, we got in line at 8am at the Ufizzi Museum, famous for housing Sandro Boticelli’s Primavera and Birth of Venus.. and coincidentally a Caravaggio exhibit was also there. We ate breakfast at an outdoor café where the waiter hovered until we put our money with the bill.. thinking we were going to dine and dash? It took about an hour to find the clothing store Zara because everytime we asked an Italian they would point their arm and  say down the street and take a left… not realizing that I am directionally challenged and there are a million alleys to the left… we also strolled through an enormous leather market.. oh how I love the smell of leather… we checked into our hotel.. (yes Barretts dad treated her and I to an amazing hotel room) took a shower.. got into bath robes and slippers.. (got to experience what it was like to have a room with a robe) and took a quick nap.. this was refreshing after a day sprinkled with a little homesickness.. missing my family and friends
        Here is my favorite part of Florence. 12 of us paid 35 euro a person to eat and have endless wine at ilLatini.. what I am about to list is our entire dinner in order of how it came out.
1.      tomato and mozerella
2.      cantaloupe and prosiutto
3.      pasta with red sauce
4.      chicken liver paste on toasted bread
5.      ravioli
6.      tortellini
7.      a tomato basil bread paste thingy
8.      a huge plate to choose from chicken, veal, or beef
9.      roasted potatoes
10.     a collard green kind of thing
11.     biscotti with a dark liquor
12.     custard with strawberries
13.     moscotto
14.      limoncello
once full of a food baby we went to some bar ouside of the Duomo and met some people from Colombia… went to another strange house bar named Twice with a strangely insignificant amount of women.. p.s Italian men like to dance

La Pietá

Vatican

Rome/Florence, Italy. July 1st

        Vatican day! Got there at 9:00 am and was able to cut all the lines because we were with SAS.. Spent two hours and learned so much information.. As a Kosse listening to one person for that allotted amount of time becomes difficult, but I occasionally was able to ask Barrett “wait what did she just say.” Barrett would roll her eyes and banter off the statement..  But seeing things from Michelangelo’s Pietá to the Sistine Chapel to rubbing St. Peter’s foot for good luck ended up being an amazing experience. (amazing becomes a common word on this trip).. especially the Sistine chapel.. how Michelangelo remained upside down for so long painting that enormous ceiling baffles me…
 Last minute we took a train to Firenze (Florence) at 12:45 because we were planning on going to a small town named san giminano.. On the train ride I sat next to an American woman from New York whose international teaching program sends her to a different country each summer… not a bad job… we arrived to Florence and immediately realized how the atmosphere differed from Rome. It wasn’t as crowded, more quant, and nobody was trying to run you over. We stayed in Hostel Greci, “the hostel with the big green door” as the lady said.. with Hannah, Katie, and Janie in our room and 2 other rooms rented out by other SAS people.
That night Katie’s parents met us at Risturante Acqua AL 2. This made all of us jealous that our own parents did not love us enough to come visit in Florence. sarcasm. I ended up sitting across from her parents whom I actually had a blast with.. we ordered so much food and wine and coincidentally her mother went to UK and name dropped a ton of familiar people. That night we attempted to go to a small bar, but I was exhausted and resided to my pillow around 1.. swearing my bed had bedbugs so I set down my towel and slept on top of it.. (such a Kaitlin move).

Trevi Fountain

Spanish Steps

Colosseum

Pantheon

Rome, Italy.. July 30

      Big day. Took the bus to Rome with Semester at Sea. An Italian woman named Dani was our tour guide. We saw Colosseum, Arch of Constantine, Roman Forum, Imperial For a, Capitoline Hill, Piazza Novana, Via Del Corso and Victtoriano- the wedding cake of Rome (as the locals call it)…. And we did this all before lunch. Never could I imagine my feet to feel as if they weren’t connected to my legs which were made up of toothpicks held together by jello knees. On top of that I think Rome sat beneath a heat lamp creating a hotbox for all of the tourists to walk around in… and I still have yet to go to Egypt.
        Around noon we had a lunch break. We ate lunch with our friend Austin and visited the Pantheon. In a million years I would never believe the Pantheon to be as beautiful as it was. As I walked into the center of the room I gazed up to the open dome and a huge bird soared in the sunlight. Truly picturesque. We met up with SAS, checked into the hotel (found out Europeans do not believe in air conditioning) and went to dinner. Dinner consisted of a three course meal (two kinds of pasta, a potato casserole thing, and Neapolitan ice-cream) and adorable old men singing “that’s amore.” Dani suspiciously became a little drunk and took us on a night tour to the Spanish steps and Trevi fountain. Barrett and I made sure to throw two coins over our shoulders to find love. After this day we were so exhausted I didn’t even know my own name so we went home and got rest for the next day.
p.s. even though this day was exhausting, i am still awestruck by the fact that I actually got to see Rome… all of the sites I have longed to visit from my art history books. Barrett and I kept turning to one another saying.. “is this real? Are we really in rome already?”

Beach @ Civitavecchia

Civitavecchia, Italy... June 29

        Semester at Sea gave us only one day to recoup, realize that we were just in Barcelona, and then threw us into another country. I don’t even think I regained consciousness until day 3 into Italy.
        Anyway, we got off the boat around 10. I went to an internet café in Civitavecchia, a small port city, and paid 2 euro for 45 minutes of internet. Let me tell you, that internet time was entirely filled with facebooking. With limited internet access, I can only quickly get online and sign off. As a 21 year old college student this is a tragic situation. Some of our guy friends were in the same city, so we ate an EXTREMELY long lunch with pizza and wine. Asked an interesting girl named Alice, who my friend Will saw sitting by herself at the same restaurant, to eat lunch with us. The day became full of wandering this small city, eating gelato, checking out their markets, meeting new people and lounging on the beach. Who ever knew meeting new people could be so exhausting. This may sound somewhat shallow (is that the word?) but as you all know chatting, and acting happy and being interesting becomes a task for Caroline Kosse… Found another café ate more gelato, drank more wine and skyped my mother while she was in Michigan. Ate dinner with some more people. That’s bout it.

Mont Juic

Mont Juic

Day 4. June 27

   The last day in port. Spain was a city that never slept with a ton of eyecatching vendors and endless amount of good food, music, jewelry, and of course nightlife. I realized that I have become an independent traveler, maneuvering my way around the city without the help or schedule of an adult. Barrett had a “moment” in the metro when she discovered we were actually doing things on our own (this independence seemed to be new for her)
        This last day.. a few girls and I rode a gondola up to the top of Mont Juic.. a small mountain with a castle at the top and small museums. The view was amazing.. not as good at the cityscape on top of Parque Guelle though.. we bought some coca colas and cervezas and sat and looked over the city.. we went to that cathedral that I cannot remember the name for the life of me.. went traveling through random streets, looked at shops, tipped some amazing street performers that did back flips overtop onlookers..and ate on the bay.  Oh. And I bought a small water color painting and some colored pencils that look like wooden logs from this small Spanish lady… this day was a half day so it was cut short.. we got on the boat and left at 6pm… oh how I could live in spain

St. Joseph La Boqueria

Day 3 of Barcelona. June 26

   This morning Barrett and I could not get up for the Montserat trip that some of our friends attended.. the train ride at 8 in the morning sounded miserable.. so we walked down La Rambla and looked at all the vendors.. Barrett had to eat her McDonalds which she could no longer resist. We meandered through St Joseph La Boqueria.. this was a HUGE food market with beautiful fruits and strange candies and smelly fish… we did the Picasso museum.. the museum is organized by Picasso’s life with timelines in each room. I got to go at my own pace this time without jeff having me on a time schedule. Later that night we went to Gothic square and saw a flaminco.. ate tapas at a place where you paid by each toothpick, 2 euro a piece… we went to a small underground bar where I somehow conversed with broken Spanish to a boy sitting next to me. They served beer at your table in enormous personal taps that calculated how many beers you drank.. we went to a club named Razmatazz.. yes it was as sketchy as it sounds with multiple floor and an outside terrace.. but we had a blast.. a boy from UK was in Barcelona.. and we hung out with some TCU boys that we met through an SAS friend.

Parque Guelle

Casa Mila by Gaudi

Sagrada Familia

Day 2. June 25

Day 2, June 25
        Long day. Woke up bright and early @ 8 and Barrett, Caroline, Abbie and I dismissed the cabs taken by the other girls and maneuvered through the metro.  Barrett had a “moment” when she realized she was actually traveling on her own. Our day was full of Gaudi. We paid 2.50 Euro to go up to the top of the towers of the Sagrada Familia, something nancy would have never wanted to do. It was breathtaking. We saw Casa Mila and Parque Guelle. We ate where Rick Steeves told us to eat, La Bodegueta… this is when I discovered Papa Bravas.. potatoes with mayonnaise mixed with an extremely spicy red sauce. Took the metro home to freshen up and went to a small bar to watch Spain beat Chile in the world cup. That night we went out with a bunch of SAS kids to Cyrano. Mom and dad will not be proud….but here you could pay 3 euro and get a tall skinny glass where you filled up as much as you wanted with alcohol. I also learned that Spanish bars give endless amounts of popcorn as finger food. We then ventured to Catwalk.. a Spanish club.. I swear the Spanish never sleep… your not supposed to get to the bar till 2 and leave at 6. As a traveler (that has to wake up at 8) this means I got no sleep the entire trip through Barcelona.

Barcelona

(This is extremely past due)
Ok. So a heads up to everyone. This blog is going to be extremely long. I am going to do it day by day. I am pre-apologizing for its lengthiness but I am doing it for my parents.
June 24, Day 1
Here is my first comment. Barrett Gargala looks at me after the first day of Barcelona and shares that she has never been site seeing. Why she thought this fact should not be addressed before an entire summer of traveling.. I have no idea. but she was a trooper. Barcelona was beautiful with perfect weather. Unfortunately the first day Semester at Sea decided to drop us off on a holiday. I think this was preplanned because the night before was a HUGE festival/ celebration where the entire town partied till sunrise. This holiday comes every year as a kind of mark of the beginning of summer and personally I think they did not want us to attend. Anyway, the day was full of wandering around the city, drinking sangria as a creepy redheaded man sang American music to us (my facebook picture), and eating baguettes filled with hamón and queso. That night we went to a small bar and on the way home the shuttle to our ship broke down at 3am. So around 70 students had to all get off and hail cabs. Wonderful.