End of the Tour

The tour ended this morning and I’m a little sad about it. I’ve spent 8 days with some incredible people and have made some new lifelong friends. There were people from New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, Singapore, all over the US, and many other places. It was obvious very quickly how the groups formed with people who are similar and have fun together.

Our last day was spent in Venice. We had traveled all day long from Florence on the 3^rd stopping in Verona and some outlet shopping mall. I really liked Verona. We got to see Juliet’s home and have a nice afternoon prosecco at a local eatery. The shopping was incredible in Verona. I bought a really cute green bikini.

There was an included dinner in Verona. We had dinner there at about 7:00pm. It wasn’t the best dinner we’ve had on this trip but not terrible. The cheeses are always great, 2^nd course was Gnocchi which is always delicious as well, but the 3^rd course was a bland chicken and some potatoes. I was not impressed at all. But, the wine and gelato made up for it later.

We left the restaurant ready to make the 1.5 hr drive to our hotel just outside of Venice. We didn’t stay in the town of Venice because the only way in is by a 30 minute train and then you would have to walk with all of your luggage through uneven streets, over bridges, and loaded into boats. Not easy at all unless you have the bag like this lady I saw that had three wheels on it that were arranged in a circle so her bag was capable of actually climbing steps. Anyway, we made it only about 10 minutes outside of town and Yannick was going over the survey’s that he needed us to complete and a few other things when all of the sudden he says “Ok, we may not make it to the hotel by 10:30pm now, we must stop for a short time to repair a belt on the bus.” We all started laughing because this happened just as we were to complete our survey’s about how wonderful the trip was. Ironic, right?

It wasn’t that bad after it was all said and done but we had to get off the bus because it was so hot without it running. We all made quite a few jokes about the whole ordeal. We had just taught Yannick about the term FML earlier that day so it was quite appropriate when he was standing behind the bus helping the bus driver remove 4 giant belts from the engine’s alternator and try to replace them. He looked back at us and said very affirmatively “FML!” We all died laughing.

To kill time we decided we should open a bottle of wine that we had purchased the night before to drink while watching the sunset in Florence from Piazzale Michelangelo. We were always prepared with wine openers and tiny plastic cups. All in all it turned out to be an ok pit stop except the fact that we didn’t get to our hotel until 12:30 am and we were all exhausted because this particular day started at 6:00am and none of us had slept the night before considering it was our last night in Florence and we wanted to end it on a good note.

I actually went out every night in Florence. I didn’t care how tired I was or how early we would have to be up the next morning. It was completely worth it every single night. So with that being said, the day we drove all day and stopped in Verona was a beating for me. I am not one to sleep on trains, plains, and automobile’s but I was OUT during that bus ride. I fell into my bed when we arrived and woke up pretty early because we had to catch a train into Venice at 8:20am. I swear I didn’t actually wake up until I started drinking wine again at about 1:00pm for lunch. Of course, after lunch we all split up to go see and do the things we wanted to do on our own. I just walked around and got lost over and over and over again. I stopped for some truffle’s in a very nice chocolate shop. Every so often I would come across a piazza and stop to sit down around the fountain or statue that was in the middle. I’d watch people and rest my feet. 

In on piazza in particular I saw a young girl kicking around a little ball and had a Barbie in her hand. I started kicking the ball around with her and we laughed and giggled. She was adorable but of course didn’t speak English so we just kicked the ball and chased after it time and time again. After a bit I decided to continue on, so I headed back towards the San Marco Square where we were meeting prior to our final dinner. I stopped for some gelato. YUM! I found a little garden/park area with some benches. I still had about 2 hrs to kill before we were all meeting back up so I sat on a bench, took off my cardigan and rolled my pants up a bit. I couldn’t hold my eyes open any longer I was so exhausted so I laid down half on the bench and my feet on the ground and literally took a nap with the sun shining down on me in this park. It was amazing!!! I wasn’t the only one napping so I didn’t feel out of place. I wrapped my purse around my shoulder and just zipped it up, clasped my arms around the zips and napped away.

Once it was time to meet back up, I walked to our meeting spot. We had another group dinner that we had to pay extra for but we (the fab 6, Brian from CT, Sarah from OK, Allison from NYC, Jacob from Ft. Worth, Marissa from Singapore, and myself) decided to do it so we could have a final dinner with the group. Yannick sat with us and he told use some incredible stories about previous trips he’d been on and crazy stories about Ibiza and Brazil. He meets some really crazy people but also very nice ones as well. We’ve all decided that if we go on another Contiki trip it will be one of his. We all have is email and I got his phone number so we can stay in touch. 

I'm in Monterosso now and it is breathtaking. The cliff views over the ocean are just amazing. We had dinner outside sitting on the edge of a cliff pretty much. Just lovely. We are headed out to do the hike this morning. Just finished up breakfast and about to head out. 

Ciao!!!!