Can you believe it... We coming home!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rjFaenf1T-Y

-On the way soon. Can't believe. I've lived abroad for six weeks, meet wonderful people, seen amazing sights, had some crazy experiences, but I wouldn't change one second. This has been one of the most rewarding and life-chaning trips. I have grown so much as an individual and developed strong relationships (i.e. mi hermana y yo). Thank you to Mom and Dr. P who provided me with this chance of a lifetime. So ready to see my family and friends!

I'm seen the Eiffel Tower, the Coliseum, Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, and many other sites.... but all I wanna see right now is fields of corn, cows, trees, Maggie (and Angel), 101 Teal Pointe Dr, my family, Will, friends, and of course that old man that always tells me how sick I make him.

Don't worry I'm going to video the whole experience of me being reunited with my family so I can remember this wonderful moment forever.

Thanks again Dear Lord for blessing me beyond anything I could imagine and giving me more love than I deserve.

London....oh London

SO, we have been in London for three days now and it is pretty interesting. London definitely has the most sites to see, but the weather here kinda brings ya down. The first day it was cold and rainy, the next burning hot, and today back to cold and rainy. But thats ok, because we are solving our problems with a little shopping. Found the shopping district last night and we are sooo ready to see what they have for us! You know how we like to shop! However, considering everything is really expensive here and the pound is not like the dollar (1 pound= $1.71, so a 20 pound shirt is more like $40), we are going to be looking for some FINDS. But we gots a whole day to do it! Love you America and can't wait to be back in your arms!

picturessss

Paris...thought I would hate you, but actually I'm in LOVE

Paris- one word-awesome.

Jessica was super pumped after Paris, but I was a little hesitant and thought that I would hate it, but really it has been my favorite place we have visited (besides Spain obviously). Everything we really wanted to see was relatively close and on this one long street full of stores! You know we were sooo excited. Not only were there lots and lots of stores, we were there for the three days of super sales! YES, Super SOLDES (sales) everywhere!!!!! It was fantastic. As Jessica stated, "There are some finds!" After shopping we head to the Eiffel Tower. You think that is it just some big thing that you just go and look at, but at night time it is absolutely gorgeous! GORGEOUS! We decided to take a break and have some chocolate and strawberry crepes while watching the sunset and the Eiffel Tower get brighter and brighter. Yes this sounds like a movie but it actually happened! Of course we were all totally in a dreamlike state pondering all the wonderful romantic things that awaited us in our future lol. Silly girls, I know.

On the way back to the hostel (looked like a mental hospital), we walked under this lovely row of overlapping trees alongside the river. At the end of the path there were two lovers just chatting, clearly smitten with each other. All of a sudden the man reached into a bag and pulls out two glasses and a bottle of champagne. Yes-another unrealistic movie moment that actually occurred right in front of us.

June 19th and 20th 2011-Rome

June 19-ROME

DUDE, Rome is beautiful and the historical sites are fabulous! It’s real hot here (they don’t understand this usage of real-like an adjective-in Spain by the way) and water is a precious commodity; water with ice is like precious gold in these parts. We try to eat cheap for lunch by eating a sandwhich from a street cart. I thought it was delicious, but going from eating five huge Spanish meals a day to eating barely 2 small meals a day, I would find anything delicious. Words can’t describe the sites, literally breathtaking, so I’m going to try and add some more pics of Rome so you can understand.

June 20-ROME

Welp, it finally happened, we got bamboozled. After our tour of the Coliseum went so well we decided that another tour of the Vatican would be great (ok I made the call to take the tour so it is basically my fault). We start the hike to the Vatican and then are stopped by a lovely lady with a butterfly tattoo on her back. She persuades us that for only 10 euros more than the regular price of the Vatican we could skip the three hour line and get a tour! So we think oh why not. We don't want to wait for three hours in the burning sun. So we head down this path to the tour shop (should have know right then this was a bad idea) and we sign-up. We start walking with our tour guide to the Vatican and literally just skip a hug group of people. This skip is not like "hey I'm an official tour guide and I get to go around you" this was like "hey I already have one group in line here, just get with the other people." Soon, our audio headphones start ringing as this American woman grabs the microphone of the tour guide and starts shouting at him (in English but in an Italian accent). "YOU ARE A LIAR!, THIS DOES NOT GO TO THE FRONT OF THE LINE! I WANT MY MONEY BACK, YOU ARE A LIAR!" Then she is escorted off by another member of the tour company. Jessica, Caroline, and I are dying laughing but realize this is going to be the worst tour ever and we definitely got ripped off, but oh well-WHEN IN ROME!

Once inside the Vatican we totally tune the tour guide out and start exploring and taking pictures. Oh man! The things I got to see were incredible, obviously my favorite being the Sistine Chapel and the famous picture of God and Man almost touching. You aren't supposed to take pics in here, but how could we not!?

After the Vatican we had a lovely hotdog (yes a hotdog! I was so happy, even if it wasn't red). Jessica got her another boyfriend as the old man making our hotdogs asked her about her love life. Once he found out that she didn't have a boyfriend, he asked if she would wait for him...haha. Oh Italians. They love them some Jessica!

Lo Siento...Been Real Busy

Ok blog followers (the few of you who are still out there) sorry for the long delay in updates but our lives have been very crazy these past couple of days. I’m going to do the best I can at an overview of the past week of traveling and let you know what is coming up on the schedule for the last couple days here.

So June 18,

Started with a long and sad taxi ride to the Madrid airport; before I knew it Sarah and I were parting ways and it felt like my left hand was being chopped off and flown to London. Literally I had spent the past four weeks with this wonderful person and I didn’t know how hard it would be to say goodbye. I thought that my sadness would be relieved when I would see my beautiful sister and amazing friend Jessica at the AirEuropa gate waiting for me. However, I was wrong. Instead I spent the next hour traveling up and down the AirEuropa terminal, calling my mom, trying to find Wifi, and asking airport staff about a tall brown-headed girl with a short blond-headed girl. Turns out they were at AirPuerta which they thought was the same thing as AirEuropa just in Spanish (yep, this actually happened). Finally they made it to the right gate and we hugged and took photos and I gave Caroline all her bday presents!!!

We checked in and got ready to depart.

We arrived in Rome and took about 30 minutes to find our way out of the airport, where we met our driver. Thank you Mother for arranging this wonderful, old, hilarious, English-speaking Italian man to drive us to our hostel. It was such a blessing.

So get the hostel, carry our 50 pound luggage up one flight of stairs, and realize….we are at the wrong hostel. We don’t check in here until the 19^th, so we basically say “ok, what are our options?” This hostel doesn’t have anymore rooms but a neighboring hostel does (and by neighboring I mean 10 blocks away). A thus starts the trek with multiple bags of 50 pound luggage down 10 blocks of cobblestone to the next hostel. After 35 minutes of sweating, running into objects, and yelling at each other we made it. We check in, get to our room, and realize we don’t have wifi. So we head out for dinner, so excited about our first Italian meal. We all get some form of pasta, which was delicious, and all get dessert (yeah we indulged ourselves the first night). We quickly pay and then run out because we aren’t sure about the tipping situation (I know terrible, but he wasn’t very good). Then we sit in the hostel lobby to get one free hour of wifi (I have a new found respect for free wifi). Then we head to back to the room to go to sleep which takes a few minutes because it is hot, really hot. But who cares we are in Italy and we know that tomorrow we are going to be visiting some of the greatest sites in all of the WORLD. Crazy.

ROME