Hurry! Before the Tower falls over!!

Today, we had plans to go to Pisa with Ari & Co. (& Co.= Allie, SJ, Brent, Brian, & Momo, just in case that was confusing anyone haha.) The plan was to meet at the train station around 12 because we were going to take the 12:30 train, and some of us didn't have tickets yet, so we wanted to get there early.

So, I woke up around 10:30, lazily sauntered to the kitchen for my usual bowl of Rice Krispies, and ate them while checking my e-mail. After a while I got in the shower, taking my time, as I had gotten up plenty early to leave by noon.

Unfortunately, I did not take into account that Ari's roommates would change their minds at the last minute...and by last minute, I mean at about 11:00 when I was in a towel with dripping wet hair and no makeup on- they called to say that they wanted to catch the 11:30 train instead. Ari was very apologetic, it wasn't her idea, but she was still sorry for the trouble. A little annoyed, but not enough to ruin the day over, I hurriedly got dressed, dried my hair, and threw my makeup in my bag without (too much) complaint. haha.

Julia and I had to literally push and shove our way through the mob of leftover Valentine's day visitors and run to the train station. Somehow, we managed to make it there by 11:25. That gave us just enough time to get our tickets at the automated machine and get to the track.

There was just one little glitch in the plan: we were there, and Momo and her roommate Dana were there, but everyone else had not shown yet. Julia called- they had tried to take a shortcut or something and ended up getting lost. Slightly more annoyed at this point, we shrugged it off, and all went to find some means of entertaining ourselves in the station until the 12:30 train came.

So Julia and I are chilling out in the sunshine on the street on the side of the station, when Ari calls. They're on the platform getting ready to get on the train that apparently is still here! WHAT?! ugh...so we book it over to the complete opposite side of the train station, climb onto the train and sit down only seconds before it gets moving. ugh. Annoyed much? What do you think? But still, trying to keep it in check as I don't want the completely unnecessary stress of the whole situation to ruin the trip.

The train ride goes smoothly, all except for a little short-lived panic between Momo and myself when some confusion with our tickets led us to believe that we were supposed to change trains at some point. But overall, it was an enjoyable journey- the countryside on the way to Pisa was lovely!



We pulled into Pisa and found a map to get our bearings. After getting oriented, we started walking in the direction of the Tower. We saw some really cool buildings and artwork on the way, but were in such a hurry for some unknown reason, that I really can't tell you much about them. Oh well.



We finally got to the Tower!....and I'm not going to lie, it wasn't quite as impressive as I had expected. Mostly, it was not nearly as tall as I expected it to be.....there must be a LOT of tricky camera work going into the PR for the Leaning Tower.

Anyway, so we made our way through the piazza. There were some more interesting buildings, and a beautiful church that I would have liked to explore, but again, we seemed to be in a REAL hurry!



On one side of the tower, there is a big lawn (that the signs tell you to stay off of, by the way haha) where people walk around and take the oh-so-famous "holding up the tower" pictures. If nothing else, I think everyone should go to Pisa just to have the fun of laughing at the lawn full of people standing in the strangest positions (because you can't tell from the other angles that they are posing with the tower, so they just look like idiots). and then once you're done laughing, of course, you have to be one of the idiots, because who comes to Pisa without taking the holding up the Tower picture?! There were a bunch of Italians hanging out on the steps of the church watching the tourists- honestly, I can understand how that would be a good source of entertainment. :)



After much experimentation with camera angles and much side-splitting laughter, we finally got the hang of it. We got some really good pictures, and had a great time doing it!


front row L->R: Allie, Me, & Momo,
back row l->r: Brian, Dana, SJ, Ari, Julia, & Brent

We had just wrapped up our photo shoot when two policemen walked onto the lawn blowing whistles and telling everyone to get off the grass. I'm not gonna lie- it was pretty funny. And I guarantee that every single one of those tourists were back on the lawn taking awkward pictures minutes, maybe seconds after the cops had left.

But, I wouldn't know anything about that, because suddenly we were in a big hurry to get back to catch the 3:00 train! WHAT?!?! We just got here!! (Keep in mind, we had taken the 11:30 train, which didn't end up leaving until closer to 11:45- and it takes about an hour and 20 minutes, putting us there a little after 1, and furthermore, that the tower is about a 10-15 minute walk away from the train station...yeah. you do the math. ugh).

So, we rushed back to the train station. I mean we didn't like run, but it certainly wasn't a saunter! Got to the train station, got tickets, checked the board to see what track we were on, and went to the platform. We stood on the platform for a few minutes until someone realized that the sign on the platform did NOT say Florence. Momo ran back to check the schedule again, and sure enough, we had missed the 3:00 train!.......I told Julia, "Just don't allow me to speak for a little while."

SO, with an hour to kill at the station, not enough time to try and go see anything, my irritation quota for the day had definitely been filled. Just in the nick of time, someone mentioned gelato, and that literally saved my travelling companions' lives. Julia, Brent, Ari, and I all went and got gelato and cooled off a bit (haha- see, I made a joke, which means the threat of a massacre was over at that point.) :)

An hour later (an hour of my life that I will never get back, by the way), we got back on the train and headed back to Florence. We parted ways with everyone else at teh train station, and I silently vowed to myself that I would never allow so much unnecessary stress to plague my travels ever again.

Julia and I went home and made dinner, nothing fancy, just spaghetti with ricotta red sauce, and watched a movie while we caught up on some homework. A little while later, Shannon and Marla got home- they had gone to Viareggio for the opening of Carnivale. They had a great time, and their pictures looked like sooooo much fun... I would be lying if I said I wasn't mad at myself for not choosing to stay back and go with them when the plans for Pisa had changed abruptly that morning, which I had considered. Oh well, that's life!

Aside from all the unnecessary stress of travel and the extremely rushed manner with which we went through Pisa, we still managed to have fun!

Ciao!