Pisa, Italy

When we woke up in our little Pisa room over a church courtyard, we shook off the groggy and planned out the bus route to the leaning tower before having to head to the train station.

A traveler's mistake: Do not take your luggage with you. Do. Not. It was heavy, awkward, heavy, miserable to carry, and was awful. We got on a bus and hoped it would take us where we needed to go! Wellllll, we got off in a panic because I had no idea where we were going and we ended up in a University part of town. Very cute but it was 100 degrees and we were hungry and we were weighed down by our luggage. Thankfully, before too many twists and turns, I asked a passerby lady who kindly pointed us to the courtyard with the tower not too far off.

We found a nice little cafe, got mom an italian espresso and a pancetta sandwich and browsed the adorable market set up in front of the tower/cathedral. Walking through the huge arches and through the insanely huge crowd was great and not so great. Seriously, believe me when I say- do not take your luggage! We had to stop so many times and we were dripping in sweat. Not fun.
But beautiful place! Everything in Europe is just so grand and exquisite. I love the architecture. It is like nothing else in America!!

As we finished our route through Pisa, we ended up at a little restaurant just across from the train station. We ate our hearts out! Some divine bruschetta, meatballs, and salad. The waitress was a sweet girl probably around 23 or so. Mom asked about her music tattoo and she got to talking about her favorite artists and such. Her dream is to visit America and we definitely invited her to come to Seattle where so many great musicians came from. She was tickled. I gave her my email in case she ever came to America!

Finally, after enjoying our time in Pisa, we conjured up some strength through the 100000 degree weather and dragged our suitcases over to the train station. We ended up getting on an earlier train but seemed no problem. We were so excited to get to the coast! Mediterranean sea? Sign me up!

Our train went from Pisa to La Spezia where we had to catch a bus to get to Porto Venere. I lucked out on choosing Porto Venere as our place to stay because it was magnificent but it also caused a lot of pain and heartache (okay, some hilarious laughs now but it was rough!)

Anyways, when we arrived in La Spezia, I befriended yet another bus driver who went clear out of his way to drive us from the station to another bus stop so we could get on the correct bus to La Spezia. I just love these Italians!! The bus ride was beautiful and went up and down these cliff edges that way too small for a bus! But the driver, just like every other European driver, made it work juuuuust fine.

La Spezia deserves a post all to itself because of the extent of what I want to say so move on to the next post to get your fill of laughs.

Au Revoir, les enfants!

Wednesday was my last day with the kids since I was leaving to Italy with mom.
We took the kids to the park and walked the wretched hills all around Sevres and Parc de St. Cloud. Definitely a thing you have to get used to, sorry mom!

That afternoon, I finished giving the kids their t-shirts and icebreakers and waited for our driver to arrive. As the ending neared, I took pictures with Malo and Julie out front and attempted to with Alex, but that didn't really work out. In fact, he wouldn't stand up or open his eyes, little stinker! I think as a combination of tiredness and denial that his (favoritely awesome) au pair was leaving, he wasn't up for the final goodbyes. Malo on the other hand, was full of hugs. He didn't quite understand the fact that this was his final time seeing me so he got pretty emotional after I had left according to Delphine. I love that kid so much! And then there's Julie. I gave her a second hug right before I left and as I went to pull away, she squeezed harder! We've decided that she has become the little sister I never had and I'm the big sister she never had. I mean, we nearly look related.

 Either Alex's or Malo's attempt at taking a photo of Julie and I!

My goodbye with Delphine and Fred would come after I got back from Italy. And let me tell ya, it was a great good bye.

Our neighbor Martine arrived and took my mom and I to the airport. We tried communicating in French but apparently what I was saying didn't make sense to her....I dunno. But the Orly airport was so much easier to navigate than CDG so I think mom appreciated that. Especially since the trek to get to my house was insanity!

As we sat on the plane to Pisa, I got so heavy-hearted because 1) that was the last goodbye I would have with the kids, I was on a plane to Italy with my mom who's dream has been to visit Italy, and my contract as an au pair was OVER. I could not even express how magnificent it was to be done nannying. I kind of hated it.

As we took off, I looked out the window and saw the teeny-tiny little Eiffel Tower from the window and the Champs-Elysees and all the huge landmarks I lived around looking like little game pieces. Then we flew over the Alps! What an amazing view. Then we flew over the South of France and marveled at the beaches and basically just got super excited about heading to Tuscany where it was 100 degrees outside.

When we got to Pisa, the bus situation was kind of ridicules. We had to first figure out where the bus even was and then we had to figure out the chart that made no sense and we had to figure out which bus we needed in order to reach our hostel. Wowowowow it's hard traveling sometimes. As we parked our butts on the curb, we happened to witness the most magnificent sunset. I knew I was going to like Pisa. I already knew I loved Italy!

When we got on the bus, the bus driver was kind and basically waived everyone on without paying. As I sat there, I was all nerves trying to figure out what stop to get off at. Nothing was clearly marked or understandable because of, ya know, it being in Italian! I took the initiative (thank heavens) and asked the driver about our stop/hostel and he knew what it was! In very broken English, he personally stopped for us to get off and told us to walk down the street and where to turn at the church. What a saint!

Before we headed down the neighborhood road, we decided to get a pizza because we were starving and knew that we wouldn't come back out of the hostel. It was late and poor mom was still way jet-lagged. We went in and ordered a wood fired pizza to go that not only had a million amazing toppings, but had the authentic Napoli characteristics, was huge, and literally only cost 8 euros. MAGNIFICO. Welcome to Italy, mom.

We found the funky little hostel, opened the window to the 100 degree nighttime air, listened as the Pirates of the Caribbean soundtrack blasted from the courtyard party, and stuffed our faces with pizza. What a way to kick off the trip through Tuscany.