Before I start on Wednesday, I forgot to tell about something that happened in Trieste. We were at the mall after worship eating lunch and we were talking to some of the girls that we'd worshiped with that morning. One of them asked if Logan was my brother!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That really made me feel good!!!!

Wednesday was another day of transition for us. Unfortunately, we had to leave Florence at this point. I could have stayed there for the whole trip! But that day we were heading to Rome 143 miles away. Before we left we ate breakfast downstairs at our hotel. The first morning in Florence I noticed there was this red drink - I thought it was some sort of punch or something. I was wrong. It was orange juice from red oranges:

It was as delicious as it was pretty!! But the milk at this hotel wasn't very cold. The milk in Venice was cold and delicious. It tasted different than ours. (I'm sure it's what they feed their milk cows) Logan could have drunk gallons of it!!

Once again we all boarded our wonderful bus and started on our way. Our only big stop that day was 85 miles away in Assisi. (besides restroom breaks and lunch) I knew when we got to Assisi that I wouldn't be fit to do much walking. We walked into Assisi up beside the Basilica di Santa Chiara. It was a beautiful church. We stayed outside in the square for quite a while. We even had time for free time before our tour guide met up with us. It was a nice little square with shops on one side, the church on one, and a wall that looked down and up on the countryside and architecture around us. Logan found a castle that was WAAAAAY up from where we were and he really wanted to walk up to it.

While we were waiting in the square it started thundering. Logan and I were so excited and hopeful that it might rain!! But it went on and on and teased us.
Finally, our tour guide came. He took us into the Basilica di Santa Chiara and we walked around for a bit. It was a nice little church. It had the prettiest little window:

The walk through Assisi was going to be over 2 hours. I had decided that I wasn't going to be able to make that walk. So Lara gave me her spare cell phone and her other cell phone number. There were taxis waiting right by the basilica the whole time we were there. So I stayed behind on the church steps in the shade and waited. I had my sock that I was working on and I was also reading New Moon. After they left it started raining lightly. I just put my book, sock, and sock pattern back into my backpack and just enjoyed the cool and the rain. It did start coming down pretty hard at one point and I went inside the church and waited for a while. I must say that the whole time I was waiting to catch the taxi I felt a little nervous and on edge! I was afraid the taxis would be gone and I'd have to call the taxi service to send one. So i decided to leave a few minutes early. I walked over to the taxi and he said no he was taking a tour group. So I went to the one behind him and he was taking the rest of that group. I had been sitting there forever and the taxis had been there the whole time and had never moved until I needed one!!! YIKES!! So I called the taxi office and they sent a taxi. In a few minutes a taxi came. I don't think it was they were sending, but I got in. He told me to sit in the front seat. He asked me if the a/c was OK and we were off. It was an interesting ride through these tiny little narrow streets. We wound around and around. I don't think I'd ever get used to those windy little streets!! Anyway, he took me in the pouring rain to St Francis Basilica. It was a beautiful church. I walked up to the door and asked a guy working there where the square was. I ended up walking up this really steep staircase to the square. It was pouring down rain by this time. I walked to the door of the church and looked inside for my group. I started trying to call Lara's phone. It wouldn't put the call through at all. So I heard these two older couples talking. They were speaking English and were British!! They were so cute. So I asked them if they knew if I was in the right place. One of the little old men was very friendly and smiley!!! He told me stay right where I was and stay out of the rain!! If I hadn't been so worried about meeting my group I would love to have hung out with them for a while! (another picture I wish I'd taken, but Logan had the camera). In a few minutes Lara met me at the door of the church and I was relieved to see her but I had to say goodbye to my British friends! Anyway, we started walking back through the church and, funnily enough, walked back downstairs and ended up where I had started at the lower entrance to the church. From there we had a pretty good little walk to meet the bus. We were finally on our way to Rome.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot...After the group took off Logan saw something that he thought was very funny:

I guess even monks like to rock out!!

Every time we changed hotels I was a bit nervous because there was no guarantee that we'd have a/c. The hotel in Rome was called the Princess Hotel. It was the nicest one we stayed in. It had a nice big lobby. We all got our keys. Donna and I had room 809. Unfortunately, the elevator only went up the 5th floor. I was so angry and complaining about how uncivilized it all was. We got off the elevator and walked up one flight of steps and it stopped. I had held the number upside down - it was 608!! I felt so stupid! One flight wasn't too bad! Anyway, we had really nice rooms! We had lots of room and a really great a/c!!!! The only air conditioning problem we had was that the cleaning staff turned it way up while we were gone everyday. Once we got our things deposited in our rooms we went back downstairs, back to the bus, and to a restaurant.
That was a particularly enjoyable dinner. We stayed at the restaurant for a long time and ate and laughed and had a good time. That was also the first night that we got to have Tiramasu!! It was good. The coffee flavor was very strong, but I think we all enjoyed it very much!! I also went around from table to table and got pictures of everyone!! I forgot to take a picture of the adult table. That night Lara and Maurizio sat at a table with some of the kids!! We were so happy that they joined in with us!! We all gathered around and started taking pictures of them. I finally said it was like the paparazzi and everyone laughed. My picture isn't that great because I was off to the side, but here it is:



Logan said that Maurizio reminded him of George Clooney! He really was neat! There are a lot of neat things to say about the people on this trip, but that's what I'm going to talk about after I finish talking about each day.

After we finished eating we went back to the hotel and were able to get a good night's sleep.

Knit On,
Shama D