Italy 2014

Had an unforgettable time in Italy this summer. Currently sick in bed still finding myself finally having the time to go through all the footage and photos of all the memories. From Rome, to Sorrento, to a day trip to Capri, north to Florence and Venice…here are some of the things I loved most plastered on the internet (.GIFS YAY!).

R O M E

Rooftoop Peroni’s.
Surprisingly, we drank a lot of beer compared to the amount of wine we thought we would be drinking.

Itsy-bitsy cuties. Look at this car. Now look at the guy driving it. Total gangster. I didn’t fall crazy in love with Rome, but I do miss these cobble stone beauties that rode the streets through Italy.

A little tourist-y and highly stereotypical, but we gave these guys a few euro’s and they played us some great tunes while we stuffed our faces with pizza.

I don’t support the church so much these days, and paying to get inside St. Peter’s sort of threw me off, but it was well worth it. The church to rule all churches. Even for someone who is not particularly religious, every room was like candy to my eyes. We stayed at an excellent AirBNB that was situated right near Vatican city.

What’s better than little Italian boys who can’t speak any English? Uhmm, nothing.. here they are playing soccer outside of our apartment.




S O R R E N T O

Naples was beautiful. After taking an hour train/subway ride into Sorrento from the train station I could instantly smell the sea. Tropical environment, palm trees, flowers bushes exploding in every corner, to-die-for-sunsets and rock-crashing waves.
























We barely spent any money in Sorrento (except for one occasion), went to bed sun-burnt, swam in the sea and adventured the coast.







March took us to a sentimental spot near a hostel he stayed at a few years ago to grab some homemade lasagna. Worth the trip.

Went to a restaurant we couldn’t afford. Stumbled upon a beautiful hotel (Grand Hotel Excelsior Vittoria) and wanted to enjoy the sunset while we ate so we ignored looking at the menu–next thing we know we have 3 servers at our table, wine in a chiller and someone asking me if they can hang up my purse. It was ridiculous but also nice for a change. Well spent money for the view. Drank so much wine we stopped worrying about how expensive our 3 pieces of 1 ounce lamb cost. Here’s march laughing at the fact that his menu has prices on it and mine doesn’t. Zero regrets.

And here’s a photo of me in a sari drinking Prosecco. I have a long explanation for this one but for now I’ll just say sari’s are the most comfortable form of clothing and I might consider wearing one everyday soon.







C A P R I

I think the Isle of Capri was my favourite out of all the places we visited (a hard first place to choose). Capri is expensive so we rented out a 10 person boat with some lovely people and took a tour around for an entire day instead of staying over-night.












March with the GoPro inside the Blue Grotto. I was scared and almost everyone cut their legs on the sides of the rocks. There was blood. Still no regrets. Would do again.








Oh man, Capri was a beaut.







Eatin’ Grapes and March Divin’.

If I ever get the chance to go back I’d love to stay on the island, we didn’t get to do much exploring inland (tourist town was cray cray) and I don’t think I could ever get sick of that coastal view.

F L O R E N C E

We became desensitized in Florence. All the art and old architecture became regular sight-seeing for us.
I often found myself saying: “Oh, another gold gilded hand-painted ceiling..” Not to say I could ever get bored of it, but it was a lot to take on all at once. I envied the students that took their undergrad in Florence, really getting the chance to take everything in over the course of 8 months would have been better than cramming it all in between 4 days. Still no regrets. Long live the David.

We rented bikes and rode around, ate at some of my now favourite places, saw not 1 but 3 David’s. Zero complaints.




Favourite meal hands down the entire trip was at Osteria Santo Spirito. It was so good we went twice. 3-cheese Gnocchi with truffle oil and the TO-DIE-FOR Rigatoni (with the freshest tomato sauce I’ve ever had) and dry ricotta cheese. The simplest dish perfected to greatness. I dream about it to this day.





…We also got a little carried away there, #VINO.

Ate gelato everyday…
sometimes twice a day…














…mostly twice a day.

My favourite church in Italy, Basilica of Santa Maria Novella.














The view, atop the Duomo Belltower.



V E N I C E

When I was younger, I thought Venice was just the big “S” grand canal and that everyone was being dramatic.
NO-ONE was being dramatic, Venice is ACTUALLY a city full of little canals and at the age of 24 I finally got to experience the rare wondrous maze of river streets. My imagination ran wild. I still can’t decide if I loved it or if I was obsessed with the curiosity of living there and discovering all the little cracks, corners, and bridges.
































Venice is such an old city, everywhere you look there’s a bridge, it’s one big maze, it’s sinking and covered by the sea. I can’t wait to visit again, (however will NOT be visiting St. Marco Sq. again, the tourist traffic was enough to give me an anxiety attack).





What I will repeat in the future is the 1 hour gondola ride accompanied by my two favourites: March & A bottle of red.

My first trip to Europe was a successful one. I’m going to plan on seeing a few more countries at the same time instead of traveling 12 days at a time, (there are pros and cons to both).
Where to next?


- jm !

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