European Family Reunion- Part 2

So I'm sorry that it has taken me quite a while to get to part 2 of this post but life has been a little crazy. Plus, it is really hard to write about a family reunion in Italy and all of our daily adventures.

So where did I leave off, slowly everyone started arriving at our pretty cool villa, a.k.a. Podere Macchione. First, the Philadelphia crew arrived, then Heidi, Donald, Rachel and Paulina (their Finnish exchange student from a few years ago, she's the blond in the pictures). It was getting kind of late after all of the hugs and excitement and we had to buy groceries (since the next day was Sunday and then Monday was a holiday and we were in the middle of nowhere Italy). The grocery shopping was an interesting experience in itself since everyone was confused and then we got in line to realize they don't except credit cards and no one had enough cash. I used my "Fritalian" to figure out where bank machines were and we finally got food, but not without a struggle.

When we finally returned, Steph, Grady and baby Phoebe were there and everyone was sitting around drinking wine. It was so exciting to see the new baby and she was really a highlight of the trip. So our group was finally complete and we did a potluck type dinner for the first night and enjoyed our villa. It was really the only full day of sun so it was a good thing we relaxed a little. (The picture up and to the right is a view of the Lago Montepulciano) from our Villa during sunset). All of the people just arriving in Europe were pretty crazy from the jet lag and excitement of finally have our family reunion in Italy and we went to bed pretty early. Which, contrary to the Strano/Ferrraro family tradition, became the norm for this trip. I think it was a result of the constant exhaustion caused by visiting too much of Italy too quickly.

We started slowly by waking up late the next day and going to a local town built on Etruscan ruins and kind of just exploring. We ate a "fabulous", in Heidi's words, dinner and went to bed pretty early. The next day started the craziness....

My immediate family had to go to Roma to drop my grandma off at the airport so most everyone else joined in and Maresa, Paulina, Rachel and I were relegated to taking the train. The day consisted of visiting the train station for about 3 hours while waiting for everyone who drove and seeing the Colosseum. Below is a video from our trip there. It was pretty cool because although I've been to the Colosseum before, I've never gone in because it was too expensive for my budget. But thanks to my lovely mom, I finally got to see it and it really is pretty spectacular. The tourists take something away from it though.


The next day we hung out and went to the town of Montepeluciano which would have been lovely if it weren't for the fact that it rained (a lot) the whole day. However, that night we had an incredible dinner in this little Osteria just a 2 km from our villa. It was all made of fish from the lake and it was pretty incredible. The next 2 days we did Sienna and Florence. So that was kind of a whirlwind. Both were pretty crowded with tourists but it only rained for part of both days, so that was nice. We saw the Duomo in both places and agreed that the Duomo in Sienna is more beautiful but it was cool to climb to the top of the Duomo is Florence. To the right you can see Maresa, Rachel, Paulina and I at the top. It was raining at the time but it was still pretty nice. We also saw the Synagogue and got quite a riveting recount of its history (more interesting then the one I heard 2 years-ago). We didn't end up going into the museums, something for which I was very thankful.

We got back and made a pretty big dinner that night. And decided that the next day, our last day we would take it easy and explore the "city" closest to us, Casteglione del lago, right on Lago Tresimeno. It was my favorite day there because it was super relaxing and the lake was so beautiful. And it was a real lake!!! It was a wonderful change from the gross ponds that I've been dealing with all year. It was a beautiful sunny day and my father had magically recovered from the "illness" that kept him from coming to Sienna and Florence with us. The last night, we all made a big dinner and enjoyed our last night dinner with lots of wine and 5 lbs of pasta, which my father wanted to send home with me in a plastic shopping bag. The next day we packed up and parted our separate ways.

All together, the trip was quite comical and definitely a landmark for our family. I hope that we get to do it again soon!!!! This blog entry really doesn't describe it as well as I wish it could but I hope you enjoyed anyways.

A dopo!

European Family Reunion- Part 1

So my parents and sister left yesterday morning. Of course, it happened to be a day when the SNCF employees were striking and their train to the airport was canceled. Needless to say, they are safe and sound in the US and I miss them. But we had a great vacation together and I will see them relatively soon, so I can't complain too much.

I won't be able to recapture the magic of the full 2 weeks but that probably doesn't matter anyway since the majority of people who read my blog were there. For those of you who missed out on the wonderful adventure...

It all began on a crazy Monday morning, when Maresa and I left Dijon, forgetting all of the paperwork we needed and haphazardly met up with my Mom, Dad and Grandma outside the apartment we were renting in the Marais, the Jewish and new hip neighborhood of Paris. We spent the first day allowing the 3 travelers to recover from jet lag and explored Paris a little. That night, Maresa, Mom, Dad and I took a walk to Notre Dame (where my dad was in complete awe over the flying buttresses and the stone work on the streets) and then we ended up walking all the way to the Louvre. For those of you who don't know, nothing compares to seeing the amazing sites of Paris lit up at night without too many tourists around. The next day, we went to Roland Garros (the French Open). It rained the whole day and we only saw one match. But it was pretty cool being there. Maresa, my Dad and I were soaked afterwards because we were lacking raincoats and umbrellas. That night, all 5 of us did another tour of Notre Dame (the outside) at night and it started to pour down buckets of rain again. My parents 2 weeks in Europe were quite wet. You'll notice the trend.

The last day in Paris, my Mom, Mima, Maresa and I saw "Sex and the City" in English, which was silly but highly entertaining. Then I had to head back to Dijon to finish this big final report I was forced to write before we went to Italy. Consequently, Maresa was left to lead the pack to Montmartre and the Latin Quarter. As well as, an apparently difficult journey from Paris to the place where they were staying in Dijon. I worked on my report until we had to dinner together in Dijon that night and then we prepared for our road trip to Italy!

The next morning, my dad and I picked up our rental car and all 5 of us left for our 1100 km journey to Italy. We stopped by Lake Geneva (or Lac Leman as everyone in Europe calls it) on the way, drove through the Alps and then stopped for the night in this amazingly beautiful little town called Santa Marguerita. It is just east of Genoa on the Italian Riviera and it is gorgeous. Apparently, it resembles the town my grandma was born in and we can see why moving to Brooklyn must have been a little disappointing; the beaches just don't compare. It was great to finally be in Italy with my family and really cool to be there with Mima. It was amazing hearing her speak Italian; it was the first time ever. When we were calling hotels from the road, we just kind of thrust my cell phone to her ear when it started ringing and she started speaking, like magic. It was also one of the first times I really heard her talk very concretely about her childhood. And we learned things, such as, when she left Italy, she departed from Genoa!!!

On our way back to the autostrada we got hit by a motorcycle, so that added a little bit of adventure to the already crazy Italian driving scene. The best part was that the motorcyclist was not hurt and seemed completely un-phased by the fact that if my dad hadn't swerved, he probably would have died. I guess that is Italy though. Maresa did not enjoy this part though, as she has her extreme fear of other moving vehicles on the road.

From the beautiful coast, we began the rest of our journey down toward our villa in Umbria (really the boarder of Tuscany and Umbria). We were all a little skeptical of the place since it cost so little and when we finally arrived at the "road with no pavements" that our villa was on we just assumed that the first dilapidated house we saw was the villa. We decided to keep driving and after Maresa and I scouted out the area, we found a 3rd house and our villa. It was so perfect for our family and our price range!! The landlord, Giovanni, was really nice and he gave us two bottles of wine to welcome us to Italian wine country. After he left, we only had a few minutes to wait until the rest of our party arrived....

Keep checking my blog for Part 2 of this long entry!!

Ciao for now!