Summer Vacation Part E

June 16: Drive to Lake Como

We drove several hours to get to Lake Como, but it was beautiful!

After we checked into our hotel room, we took a boat ride from Como to Bellagio. This is what the hotel in Vegas is designed after. And it is such a cute city! Again we ate some tasty, tasty pizza for lunch and everyone got gelato!

When we thought there could be no cars!

The cutest husband ever!

 We got back in time for dinner and watched one of the soccer games on TV.

June 17: Milan

Happy Father’s Day! We woke up early and decided to hike to this old castle. Good thing my dad doesn’t need a map or directions, but we found it! And it was a beautiful view!

With the Chief!

We rushed back to get ready, and rode with the group to Milan. This is the mall we were dropped off at. Not your ordinary looking mall huh?

This is the church. And it is the third largest Christian church. Its unbelievable! The details on everything are exquisite.  

Inside, when we walked in we saw the end of mass. And our guide told us that the stain glass windows on the right side are original and they let in more light. The glass on the left side was replaced and painted because the original windows were shattered due to bombing.

We took a taxi to try to see Da Vinci’s painting of the Last Supper, but we couldn’t get tickets. But this is the building and the church that are next to it. We were able to read some interesting history about the painting though – in most paintings of the last supper it is easy to tell which is Judas, but in Da Vinci’s painting he wanted all the light to be on Christ, and it is supposed to be right after he tells them that one of them will betray them, so they all have looks of confusion. During one of the wars, the room where the painting is was converted into a stable for the horses!

We were also able to go into the Opera house! W.O.W! it was beautiful! Here is one of the rooms just out side, which would have been used for intermission or for showing off the fancy dresses and mingling.

We did some shopping and then made our way to the softball field for our final two games! For the first game the two America teams played against each other. I played short stop and again had some excellent plays and no errors. I hit a change-up to the first baseman, but then had a solid line drive to right field. We won 4-0!

The "Stars" and "Stripes"

Team "Stripes" - the winners!!

We then had a dinner break while the other team played Milan. Then it was our turn. Milan had a pitcher who used to play for the University of Hawaii and she was awesome! I sat the first two innings, but played the last three and did well. And I also just had one walk. It was such a fun day to end my fast pitch softball career on.

This was such a great experience and it was so fun to meet girls from all over the country and play some ball with them. We were able to see so much and learn so many things! A huge thanks to all those who helped us be able to get to this point in our lives to come here and see Italy in this way! Ciao! 

Summer Vacation Part D

June 14: Parma

We drove about 10 minutes to get to the center of the city Parma. This is the where Parmesan cheese comes from. We had a few hours to explore the city. So first we went to the Church. It is amazing that in these little cities there are these ginormous churches.

We then went into a separate building, which is called the baptistery. We were given a book to read while we were there to understand more about the symbolisms. Hundreds of years ago the people were not allowed to read, so pictures and sculptures were created so that they could understand and remember their scriptures. One thing I though was interesting was that in the center of the building there is their “font” and it said that they baptize by immersion. But this was also a beautiful building of marble from around Italy.

We then headed to a wine tasting. Super fun for us that don’t drink wine huh! Well, because we were a group that came on short notice they called out to a bakery and had fresh bread for us. They also served delicious types of pig and bologna. And of course being in Parma we got lots of cheese with scrumptious jellies. We ate like kings and that’s all that mattered!

All the girls!

I’m just glad that my team had a day off of playing because we were stuffed! My parents, Lyndon, and I all went back to the hotel and took a two hour nap. Our lives are becoming really difficult as you can tell! But then we walked a little bit and found a fun pizzeria place. Lyndon ordered horse meat on his pizza, my mom and I shared a calzone, and my dad had a mixture of several pastas. It was lots of fun to just sit, chat, eat, and laugh!

June 15: Bologna

We took about an hour bus ride into the city of Bologna. Here we were given a tour and were able to learn more about this city. This is the Fountain of Neptune and his triton is where the Maserati car gets their logo from. And we thought the ladies at the bottom of the fountain were hilarious too! 

  The church here was in line to be bigger than St. Peters, but once the pope heard word of this he demanded that the construction of the church be stopped. So the church was never  fully completed. Some interesting facts we learned while inside the church (sorry we were not allowed to take pictures), but inside there are different chapels along both sides and they are all decorated differently. This is because the wealthy families could buy and decorate their own chapel. One chapel has a painting where the painter put Muhammad in hell, and this caused a lot of contention with the Muslims, and this church is under constant watch for terrorists. It is also interesting that they are just finding a lot of the paintings on the walls, because by the time the artwork at the end of the church was finished, the art at the beginning was out of style. So it was covered with plaster and painted over. We also learned about how they are able to tell what month it is and how many hours there are left on sunlight, because of one whole and one line. Extremely impressive.

You can really see in this picture where the church building was stopped!

We then went to their university. This was divided into two – one side for medicine and the other was law. There are coats of arm on every hallway/wall in the school and these represent the students and faculty who attended.

 This is the room where they would bring in a dead body so that they could study. The one who cut open the body was usually a barber because they have steady hands. The teacher would sit up in his seat and with a long stick point at and explain that part of the body. Around the room were sculptures of famous doctors and philosophers.

 We had some free time and ate lunch, and went and explored the city a little more and found these towers.

Then we drove back so that we could prepare for our game #3 against the team from Parma. I played shortstop this game! And it was so fun! I had an awesome backhand and several plays, but didn’t hit very well. I struck out twice, hit to right field but was caught, and was walked. But our team dominated. The scorekeeper left after the fifth inning when it was like 9-0.

 Washed uniforms by hand, and went to bed!