A Super update...and some (possible) sad news!!

Well, I know that I need to fill ya'll in on the last couple of days!! I have not had that much time on the internet, but now i DO! :D

Saturday(october 4) we all woke up really early to head to the Vatican and St. Peter's Basilica. We wanted to have a decent place in line for the Vatican museum. The Vatican is only open until about 2 on Saturdays sooo we went at 6:45am since the museum opened at 8:45am. We did stand in line for quite some time. The Basilica is BEAUTIFUL! It was pretty empty when we were there, which was enoyable for me. There was even a choir practicing...which reminded me of Concordia Choir and Arborsong.....i miss you guys!! :) The Vatican Museum was sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo extensive and overwhelming. I heartily enjoyed the Egyptian, Greek, and Roman art. The Sistine Chapel was NOT what I was expecting. For some reason I thought it was going to be this GRAND building....and no. it is what it says it is: a chapel. it is a small room. about the length of all the Riverside Rooms....and very tall.(like the chapel on the inside) It took me a long time to find the fresco of God reaching to Adam....and i DID sneak a picture. :) We spent all morning til early afternoon there and then headed back to our hostel before getting ready for dinner. All of my traveling buddies went to a ritzy place to eat...I stayed behind b/c i had a headache and was not hungry. I then later met our new room mate, a French student named Frank(Franco...really). He was studying in Rome for a year, but was having trouble aquiring a flat....so he stays in hostels for now. He was nice and very talkative. Rome is very busy and def a tourist city....it made me miss the peace and quiet of Segovia.
Sunday(october 5) we woke up early again, about 8am, and went to go and visit the Christian catacombs in the outskirts of Rome. We recieved poor directions 5 times but eventually found them. Well, one of them. There are 16 Christian catacombs throughout teh Rome metro area. We just went through one called The catacombs of San Callixstus. We were not allowed to take pictures but i bought a postcard of my fav room in the catacombs. After that we went to the part i was MOST looking forward to: the heart of Ancient Rome! We walked through the Colusseum, Palatine Hill, and the Forum. I was not a huge fan of Palatine Hill...but i LOVED the Colusseum and the Forum. Lots of photos there....and soo much history. I wanted to start chanting "Maximus!!" in the Colusseum but i felt it might be a bit too much. :) At the Forum, there was a man named Jason who was giving free tours, so we wandered with him. He was very good and memorable. He said he has been reccommended by Rick Steve's and the NY Times many times....i was happy. :D It was too dark after our Forum tour to go and see teh Circus Maximus so we went to get a crepe.....mine was lemon and sugar. YUMMY!!
Monday(october 6) we ran back to St. Peter's Basilica to visit it again because my firend had not seen it yet....she was with her bf all weekend who is studying in Rome. I sat outside the building and read....for a long time. (a very interesting book...i would like to hear some feedback from those who have read it, if possible!!) Then we went to the Pantheon. Cool building as well. Then we grabbed our luggage and hopped on a train to Siena for the next day. it took us 3 hours to get there but we did and BOY what a beautiful place. Our Bed and Breakfast was outside the city limits so we had to take a cab into the city that night, but it was worth it. We ate a small dinner at El Campo, the big hang out in Siena. Its basically a giant plaza. really pretty.
Tuesday(october 7) we had a nice continental breakfast and took the bus into Siena again. We visited the Duomo, a huge church made of black and white marble. It was gorgeous. Then back to the Plaza for a quick descansa y siesta. then back to the train station at about 4 to head to Firenze(aka Florence). We arrive in Firenze at about 6:30pm and settle into our super nice hostel(that I booked! heheh) then we go out, grab some food, and wander around the city. we stumble upon this acoustic guitar guy and so we all join the small crowd and listen to him for about 1.5 hours. it was such a chill way to spend the evening...in Florence, Italy.
This morning we took a 3 hour walking tour around the city which was nice and very imformative. Then my friends and I walked the HUGE market of San Lorenzo for hours. (until about 1 hour ago! haha) needless to say, i might sum this all up saying: I loved the history of Rome, the BEAUTY of Siena, and the city life of Florence!

Okay: the possible bad news....so i was trying to see if this computer would read my camera's memory card so i could FINALLY upload some pictures. The computer would not take it, so i put it back in my camera. when i turned it on again, the camera said "no image". now, i have taken about 300 pictures since i left last Friday. if they are all gone.....i personally have NO photo memories of anything i have seen....i dunno what happened but i am about to take my memory card somewhere and find out! please pray that my pictures are not gone! :D

i hope you all are well! God's Blessings as we live and love in this beautiful world He has created!

-Emily Joy