florence and cait

No, Cait is not another city in Italy. She is one of my best friends from home who I spend about 2/3 of my time at Stout with. I haven't seen her for nearly ten months save for a couple skype video chats here and there. So when I heard that she was planning to do a two month long summer session in Florence, Italy my head almost exploded with anticipation!

So this past weekend I was able to head south one of the most beautiful country sides that I have seen so far, the wonderful Tuscany landscape. Landing in the Pisa International Airport threw me off a bit considering it was about the size of a football pitch with no more security than one. They didn't even have a customs check, which disappointed me because I couldn't get my passport stamped. The one good thing about flying into a country is getting the stamp and I got jipped... Oh well.

The train ride between Pisa and Florence was the perfect way for me to get acquainted with the amazing place. There is something about Italy that was just kind of dirty and messy, but in a beautiful way. All the houses are very old, with the plaster facades chipping away in multiple places revealing faded clay bricks beneath. There are window shutters hanging lopsided on one hinge. And the vegetation grows ramped throughout yards. But then I noticed some old buildings that just weren't used anymore and half caved in, which had to have stood there for a long time because there were huge cypris trees shooting out of the interiors through the open roof. It hit me that the civilization has some quality where it blends into nature seamlessly.

Once arriving in Florence Cait found me right away and I couldn't have been happier! She brought me back to her extremely huge apartment, which was situated right behind one of the cathedrals in the center of town, and I got to meet the whole spectrum of her roommates. Over the weekend I was there we really took it easy and just explored the city through the narrow streets, more just site seeing and not doing too much of the tourist stuff (ok we explored some of the churches and the like). I was really enjoying seeing everything considering Italy was one of the important ones on my travel list to make and I was finally there but I was really just there to see Cait again and experience a bit of Europe with her.

I do wish I would have been there a bit longer so that I could have seen some more of the Tuscan landscape but I couldn't complain when I got a beautiful view of it all from the Ryanair jet. I am sure I will be heading back to Italy sometime in the future to take some more in. All - in - all it was an amazing trip!