Archives: Pigeons and Asiago
When you think of Venezia, I would guess you think of Carnevale (Masks! Costumes! Wine!), gondole (Canals! Romance! Bridges!), Piazza San Marco, or…PIGEONS (PICCIONI!). I never went on a gondola ride (was too cheap), but Carnvele, Piazza San Marco, and pigeons…well, those I have experienced. Namely the birds.
I went to Venezia three times, and I believe it was the second that became all about the pigeons. We actually 
went to check out the Guggenheim Museum, but somehow our trip became more focused on whether we could get Andrea to let a pigeon land on her (today is her 23rd birthday! whee!) and whether Matt would wind up following his dream of just feeding pigeons (because even though he’d be poor, their happiness would feed his soul).
Below: that pigeon-filled day and a summary of Asiago: the most active weekend of my life. Aside from taking in some gross cheese factory smells, we went horseback-riding, skiing, and iceskating (and, er, watched hockey). It was intense.
P.S. I’m slowly getting more intense myself: worked out Monday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday last week and made it there again today. Wheee! I’m still a sweaty mess at the end and walk a significant portion of the workout (but on an incline! woot woot!)…but it’s an improvement. I’m loving having my ipod save my workout info and send it to nike.com…nice to see progress. I recommend it.
Thursday
As we didn’t have class, Matt, Andrea, and I decided to go to Venezia for the day. Our primary goal was to see the Guggenheim Museum, but we spent the bulk of our time in San Marco just playing with the pigeons. It was great to see Venice on a non-Carnevale day…took far less time to get around. Crowds just aren’t for me, but Venice without them was pretty darn beautiful (which seems like a given for any Italian city, but I’ll keep putting it out there anyway). After taking a very creepy route back to the train station, we made it home sometime after 10. I pretty much cleaned the room, packed for the mountains, caught up on my Gilmore Girls (naturalmente), and crashed.
I left for Via Mario around 8:50AM as the cleaning lady was coming at 9–and there was that whole “Unofficial” thing. Wound up just lazing around Mario until about 11, after which Andrea and I went to cappuccino/croissant it up. Although we weren’t really feeling the Unofficial spirit, the gorgeous weather led to us each buying a bottle of wine and sitting in the Bra for a few hours. I’ve never been a major Unofficial fan at U of I (Freshman year I didn’t even begin to celebrate ’til about 5PM and wound up just going to a concert at night…last year I was bored by 1PM and watched What Not to Wear at the Bromley for most of the night), but it was nice to at least quasi-celebrate something from ‘home.’ The bus ride to the mountains was certainly entertaining.
Once we got to the hotel it was almost time for dinner. This particular meal wasn’t too impressive (and the waiter accused Jackie and me of lying about ordering the soup, so we were not pleased), but the following days’ were pretty delicious, so I’ll let it go. The rest of evening was just spent watching Italian TV–mostly the musical festival in Sanremo–and getting some sleep.
Saturday
We ate breakfast around 7:30 as the bus to the cheese factory departed around 8:20. As most of the pictures demonstrate, the smell was not very pleasant (as us Wisconsin-ites know well 
), but it was crazy to see how much time/effort goes into making cheese. The end result was pretty tasty–and this is coming from someone who pretty much never ate cheese until she got here. Italy’s making less of a picky eater out of me, day by day.
After the cheese factory we wandered the streets of Asiago for awhile, then returned for a yummy lunch (all I’m remembering right now is that they served us french fries, but I suspect the pasta was good, too) and got ready to go skiing. I fell. A lot. The first one was the worst (my nose and chin still look a little pathetic), and eventually it was fun. Not that I ever left the bunny hill, but still.
Post-skiing we all got a chance to shower/chillax before another nice dinner in the hotel. Highlights included a wine-drinking competition and an amazing dessert. After dinner we all got back on the bus to see the tail-end of a hockey game. Once the game ended it was time to huddle under blankets outside and enjoy the lunar eclipse (which none of us could capture well on camera, but it was pretty sweet—I think I kept expecting the whole sky to turn red or something, but the red moon was good enough, I suppose).
That about sums it up. Only other big news to report= parts of Spring break have been booked. Greece isn’t going to happen, but break will commence in Paris, then take us to Barcelona….then maybe Madrid, possibly Portugal. Paris + Barcelona are set, though! Whee 
.
No class ’til Friday–off to straighten up the room and figure out what I’m doing ’til the end of the week. Might be a cookie dough/girls night/shopping day kind of week, might wind up in San Marino…we’ll see! Ciao!
