The next weekend we went to the famous Perugina Chocolate Factory in Perugia. It is home of the Bacio chocolate. We were able to tour the entire factory, learn how chocolate is made, and even were able to sample the different chocolate that they made.


This is the largest piece of chocolate made and even made the Guinness World Record Book as being the largest. When it was made for the Eurochocolate festival, the last day, it was broken up into pieces and handed out to the people at the festival. According to our tour guide, this year in Perugia, Baci will have some other interesting event.






On October 13th, my friends and I decided to go to a Perugian soccer match. We mainly went because we met one of the players who said to come to watch a match. The match was against Pisa. It was very fun and interesting going to the match because the entire time, we did not sit down. Italians are very passionate about soccer, even though the team lost. They would yell every time something happened to their players. They had chants throughout the game and we even joined in on them, once we figure out what they were saying.

My group of friends decided that we needed to go and see Cinque Terre (5 cities). It is named Cinque Terre because people go there to hike from one city to another city. We first took a train to Florence for the first day. Me and two other girls decided to take the train all the way to Pisa.

 There was quite a few tourists there, but not as many as I thought there would be. The photo on the left is of the river Arno which runs through Pisa.











We then took the train back to Florence and I decided that I wanted to tour Florence at night. So my friends and I stayed out until 3 am, touring parts of Florence.


 This is the Baptistery in the center of the city. It is octagonal shaped and even has the gold doors representing the old testament stories. They are called the Gates of Paradise. The Duomo Di Firenze Santa Maria del Fiore is the main attraction. It was built in 1296 and has a dome in the back. It is very beautiful both at night and the day. I also found out that one of my friends that I went with to see the duomo, his grandfather had worked on maintaining the roof of the dome a few years back.





 The David statue was standing outside of the Palazzo Vecchio. Although this is not the real David, it is still similar to the real one. To the right is the Ponte Vecchio. It is the oldest bridge known which may have been built during Roman times and is still now being used. It has shops built along the inside of it.


 This is the start of our trek across 2 mountains. It took 2 hours to walk from Riomaggiore to Vernazza, but it was definitely worth it. The view was amazing.

The past two weeks have been busy. The Umbra Institute set up a weekend in Napoli, Pompeii, Ischia, and Capri. These places were absolutely beautiful. We started from Perugia and drove to Pompeii in 4 hours. When we got to Pompeii, I immediately located Mount Vesuvius!

This is a photo of the old Pompeian basilica. It was the house where the citizens, senate, and foreigners would trade and have meetings. What was interesting about this site, was that the pillars still had some of the old paint and terracotta because the ash that was spread over the city had preserved it so well.

This was the Pompeian forum where they held assemblies and also dramas or singing. The acoustics in this area were really great. Our tour guide had one of the boys in our group go down to the bottom and start singing in front of everyone. Surprisingly, they did quite well.



 The second day at Ischia, the morning before we had to leave to come back to Perugia, my friend Fran and I ran into a man who had been in the Italian military in Pisa. We were sitting on the side of a wall taking photos of the sunrise, when this man came up to us and started talking to us in Italian. He was very kind and gave Fran and I some fruit and vegetables that he had grown for his restaurant that he owned. He also took us up in his house to get a good photo of Ischia from above. It was so beautiful and thankful that I had learned enough Italian to converse with him.

On  the second day in the South, we took a ferry to Capri. Capri is also a small island off the coast of Naples, a bit south of Ischia. This is home to some of the famous people around the world. George Clooney's summer house was on the island, along with Georgio Armani. It was a definite tourist island, but we were able to get a private tour around the whole island for only 15 Euros. The water was extremely blue, but also extremely salty. We also ended up hiking up a mountain and found the largest natural arch in Italy. It was very huge and was absolutely the most beautiful site that you can imagine.


 After our trips to Capri and Ischia, we took a ferry back to Naples and had a tour through Naples. It was a very dirty city compared to the other ones that we visited, but it also had a lot of history. Naples is known for being the home of the Margarita pizza, so of course, we ate some. Some of the other sites that we saw were the main piazza and center. In the Galleria Umberto, they had marble pictures of the zodiac signs. Our tours guide told us that if you stand in the circle and then jump into your zodiac and then make a wish, it would come true.
 This is a photo of the port in Naples. It is very important for trade and commerce. And of course, you can see Mount Vesuvius on the left.

 The Fountain Maggiore

In the Center of Perugia

From the Perugian Fort

 The tub of grapes!

Out comes the juice

 Alessandro, one of the owners working out the grape juice.








The first weekend we also spent some time in Siena. It was rough because we took the bus and the bus was 40 minutes late. So we waited at the bus stop until finally the bus came. Then, we took the bus and got to Siena. It took about 1.5 hours. When we got to Siena there were 7 escalators all the way up to the top of Siena where the tourists sights were. As we were taking the escalators to the top, there were two Italian boys who just ended up sitting down on the escalators on the other side. We had to ask a few Italians where the main center, Palazzo Comunale/Piazza del Campo was, but soon we found it. It was amazing. Made in 1297 by Consiglio dei Nove. The clock tower, Torre del Mangia, is the highest in Italy. It was built in 1344, by Lippo Memmi. It is 102m tall and 400 steps. We ended up not going up in it, but it was still amazing to look at. Inside the Torre del Mangia, was the bronze dog, Capitoline Wolf. Also within the Comunale there was a fountain. Its name is Fonte Gaia (Happy Fountain) and was built in 1346. Then a few of us went to the Cathedral and Baptistery of San Giovanni. The Cathedral stands in the Piazza del Duomo and was started by Giovanni Pisano in 1196 -1215. The interior contains a black and white striped theme with vaults of blue and gold stars. The Duomo Nuovo (New Cathedral) was the finished result. We unfortunately did not go into the Cathedral, but it was still amazing from the outside. We then walked to the Chiesa Di San Domenico. On our way, we went by the Casa di Santa Caterina. It was built in the 13^th century and for Santa Caterina which has a portrait of her in the chapel. Apparently Santa Caterina took her vows and performed some miracles in front of the chapel. Then we walked to the Studio Communale which is where Siena plays futbol. After that we quickly went to the Fortezza Medicea. We went to try and find the entrance, but I’m pretty sure we ended up going the wrong way around and did not have time to find the entrance and left after taking pictures with the beautiful fountain in front of it. Then we found a beautiful place to take some photos. They were amazing. 




 The San Domenico and San Giovanni can be seen in this shot.












The next week we started classes. The classes are amazing and I learned so much already in the first week. The culture of Italy is quite a bit different than American culture and you can see that any where you go an see in Perugia. At the end of the week, some of my friends and I decided to take a day trip to Assisi. Assisi is the beautiful sister city of Perugia. We rode the train for 30 minutes and got off at the train station and took the bus up to the very top of Assisi. In 1000 BC Umbrians built Assisi and was ruled under the Romans in 295 BC. St Francis, a soldier of Assisi in 1182, fought against the Perugians until his death in 1224. We started at the top of the mountain at Piazza Matteotti and walked up to the arch of Assisi, then we went down to the Piazzo San Rufio and toured the church at that Piazza. I think it was the San Rufio. Then we walked up to the Rocca Maggiore. It is the most beautiful sight of the Umbrian landscape. We spent quite a long time up there. The Rocca Maggiore is fortress built in the 14^th century  to ward off the Perugians. Then we walked down again to the Piazza Santa Chiara where all the tourists were. Santa Chiara is St. Francis’s counterpart and was said to have founded the Order of the Poor Sisters. She is buried in the crypt of the chiesa. Later, we walked up to the Piazza del Comune. There we found a small “museum” where this guy went crazy on us when we didn’t give him money. So I hid, “gave” him 0.01 euro cents. He was creepy so we left. Then we went into a small chiesa that was beautiful inside named, St. Maria Sopra Minerva. It didn’t say much about the church, but it was beautiful.

Gum on a fence

Then we went to the main Basilica di San Francesco. This is where Pope Francis will come to visit in a few weeks. Inside the church we met up with some more Umbra students. There were many frescos inside the beautiful church and it was divided into three parts, the upper church, the lower church, and the crypt. The church is built on Hell Hill (Colle d’inferno) in the 13^th century where many people were executed in the gallows, until St. Francis decided to be buried here and renamed it Paradise Hill. There are 28 frescos each corresponding to the New and Old Testament writings with each fresco describing the event above it. The crypt is where St. Francis lies, although I unfortunately was not able to go down there because I did not see it. Anyway, later we left and tried to take the bus back, but we were too late, so we walked 45 minutes down to the train station. It was a horrible walk because there was no sidewalk so the cars were literally 2 feet away. Pazzo!