Friday morning, 12 of the 14 girls in my group hopped on a bus for Perugia. We spent the night in Perugia but visited 4 towns over the course of 2 days. It worked well though, these were some tiny towns and you really didn't need more than a couple of hours in each one to learn about it.
We had a German tour guide who was super cool. His accent did throw me off though because he could totally pass for American with the way he spoke English.
The first thing we went to was a church. It was interesting though because while the inside was super fancy, the outside could have been any sort of building. It could have been any building that we went inside of.
That's our tour guide on the right, explaining something about the church. I actually did learn a lot, but it's hard to remember all of the details...especially since we saw so much in two days.
We exited through a different door of the church into the main square of Perugia. Pretty, eh?
That's the front of the church, by the way.
This weekend was full of lots of gorgeous views of the countryside. These are obviously very difficult to capture with a smart phone, but that didn't stop me from trying.
The building on the left is another church. We didn't go inside but we walked passed it as part of our walking tour.
Pretty view :)
And that's me in front of the pretty view...just as proof that I was actually there.
We had a couple of hours for lunch so we took advantage of the sunshine and sat outside. There were some absolutely adorable puppies that were running around and playing. Most of you know that I'm not a huge dog person, but the carefree frolicking of this puppy actually made me laugh. There was a tiny fence (probably about 8 inches tall) that went around the grassy areas on the edge of the paths, and the little dog would take a huge leap over it every time. Then they drank out of the water fountain. It was adorable.
After lunch, we got back on the bus and took a short journey to Bevanga. Bevanga is TINY and adorable. It was very quiet, which made it feel super authentic, but of course there were a couple of tourist shops, because those literally exist everywhere now.
We went to a silk shop and got a demonstration of how they raise the silk worms, harvest the silk, make thread, and then weave it into cloth. They still use techniques of the late Medieval period, and it was cool to see how it was done.
So that's kind of pretty...
Also a cute little door with daisies that was just asking to be photographed.
And another pretty view. I think you kind of get the idea. But that doesn't mean I'm going to stop with the pictures...
Also some pretty purple flowers. Siena is absolutely gorgeous but there's not a lot of plant life around here. You can see the countryside but I enjoyed visiting a place with plants everywhere.
We also got a Medieval paper making demonstration. This is the machine that turns the fabric (this paper is made out of fabric) into pulp. It's powered by the water that I showed in the picture above.
Then the pulp is put into very salty water to keep it from getting gross. When they're ready to make a piece of paper, they mix up the liquid to pull the pulp up from the bottom.
That's the mold the paper is made it. It has the seal on it so people know that it is authentic and exactly where it came from.
They also make bells here, at the paper shop. I missed the part about why, but apparently they have to keep a fire going for 3 days in order to obtain the temperature necessary to make these bells.
After our tour of Bevanga, we went back to Perugia for dinner. This Italian dinner was above and beyond. I've grown pretty accustomed to the first and second plate situation, but we had 2 plates of pasta. I was confused and very full...but it was delicious. First we had pasta with pesto typical of Umbria and then gnocchi with a wild boar sauce...and then we had the meat dish and dessert. Yum.
We were also exhausted, and I'm pretty sure at least 80% of the group was asleep before 11.30. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I know I was definitely asleep.
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Saturday morning went to Assisi. We got a tour of the Church of St. Francis there. It's a pretty important church, and pictures are definitely not allowed inside, but take my word that it was beautiful. We went downstairs and saw the tomb of St. Francis. I don't identify with the religious aspect of this experience but it was still super cool to see.
The garden says PAX which means peace. And that's the view of Assisi from the other side of the church.
Oh, also, our tour guide talked to us through a microphone and headset for this part. We felt super cool...there was only one earbud.
Fun fact: Not only is it beautiful to hang flowers, but the these geraniums are used to keep the mosquitos away.
After an extremely rushed, but absolutely delicious lunch, we got on the bus to go to Perugina. Perugina is the home of this chocolate factory. It's now owned by Nestle, but this is where they produce the Bacio candy. Bacio in Italian means kiss. These chocolate kisses are even better than the American kind.
This is a model of the world record for the largest candy. It was created for some event, but I don't remember which one. At the end, it was given out in pieces for free...and this entire thing was consumed in only four hours.
Also, there's a love note inside of every wrapper. It's adorable.
That's all for now. I fully intend on posting some Siena-related stuff this week so hopefully I actually manage that...
Ciao!
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