Trip to Trento
This week was mellow, this weekend has been an adventure. The Monday through Friday 9-5 like was pretty standard with regular classes, a few dinner parties and a trying to normalize sleep schedule, it was fairly standard. However there is still an element to life in Florence that feels surreal because I wake up every morning to the view of the Arno and the duomo and think that my morning cappuccino and croissant routine is normal.
On Friday, me and a friend from class left for Trento Italy, which is a small sliver of northern italy cushioned between Austria, Switzerland and Germany. After arriving in the dark and rain, we walked to our airbnb where we were met by an old man named Grigolio who showed us our shared room in his house, told us he would serve us breakfast each morning and that we can ask him for anything during our stay. All of that was muffled through loose translation considering that he spoke no English and I speak very minimal Italian. We settled in for a bit and walked to a restaurant that was a fusion of German, Austrian and Italian food, and found ourselves getting an amazing pizza and carbonara. After we hung out for about two hours chatting about life and the struggles that follow the study abroad lifestyle we grabbed gelato and headed to bed.
On Saturday we woke up and made our way to a bakery that had the best apricot jam croissant I think I have ever received and a 7/10 cappuccino. We woke up to a bit of a rain storm but still found ourselves immensely in awe of the place we needed, it felt like everywhere you looked there were huge mountains hugging you from each angle, wanting you to climb them and ski down. We found a panoramic lookout at the Cesare Battisti memorial site which looks over trento. After being poured on and a bit tired we wandered through town a bit before getting sandwiches and coffee at a cafe and then headed back to our house for a nap. I ended up going on a bit of a solo mission, finding both a patagonia store and a gorgeous park that look over the city from the opposite perspective. I perched myself on a church porch at the top of the park and spent some time doodling before heading back for a real nap and rest before dinner. Dinner was quite entertaining as we wound up at an italian restaurant that specializes in wine tasting down the street from our apartment. We both got a white wine apparently from the dolomites and got some pasta dishes and tiramisu. We were sitting next to a couple that also spoke english and ended up getting into some deep topics with them about politics in the U.S. and how trento is amazing before they shared the 70 euro bottle of champagne with us and said good night.
This morning we got up bright and early, said goodbye to Grigolo and made our way to the train on our way to Verona. Going into the Verona portion of this trip I was a bit unsure of what to expect, thinking that Trento would be a hidden oasis in the middle of the mountains and that Verona would be a large industrialized yet old city. Once arriving we headed straight to the panoramic lookout on the far side of town at the castle san pietro, and the minute we walked through town and made our way to the lookout, all my expectations were shattered and I fell in love. I don't know if it was the way the city is laid out or the beauty that shines from the pigments of the buildings or the old churches or the fact that we were in town the day of their huge marathon, but it was amazing. We stayed at the viewpoint while trying to soak in how incredible it all was before heading back down and going to a few of the catholic churches. We sat in on the beginnings of two masses and met a lot of lovely people on our way, wanting to know our story and what we were doing in Verona. At around 1 we headed to a tonic coffee cafe called Ammazza which served us the best avocado toast on sourdough bread I think I have ever had along with a mediterranean tonic beverage that knocked my socks off. We stayed there until it was a bit awkward for us to stay much longer because it was truly amazing, and then wandered around a bit more grabbing gelato and then heading to the train station!
So with an underwhelming week and an eventful weekend I'm ready to do it all over again, classes this week and then Paris and Lisbon!
