The Honeymoon (Italy, Part 1)

When people started to plan the long weekend, Lauren and I always had it in mind that we wanted to spend that time going to Italy. With us both wanting to shy away from the normal go-to Italian tourist location of Rome, we just decided to do our own thing and the planning of our “honeymoon” commenced.

With two college girls deciding to take on Italy alone, you would think that we might experience a few bumps along the way in terms of security or travel failures, but we are both extremely proud to say that absolutely none of this happened. Between the proper planning and execution, we experienced no kinks in our travel plans over the course of the whole weekend.

With our last midterm falling on the early timeslot on the Thursday before the long weekend, we were able to get our stuff together and travel to make it to Italy on Thursday night. We traveled on RyanAir from London to Milan for about 30 pounds, a steal of a deal on a flight I thought. After flying RyanAir, I definitely realized why they called it the “Low Fare Airline” as we packed into the air-bus as my dad would call it, and got shuttled to Milan. We did take off on time though, and made it to Milan even before our estimated arrival time, getting some amazing views of the Alps along the way.

We made our way, via bus, from the airport in Milan to the center of the city in order to stay the night before venturing off on an adventure the next day. We made reservations using AirBnB once again, and the owner of the apartment met us at the bus station and took us to apartment only about 5 minutes away. We were pleasantly surprised by our accommodations, which included an outdoor terrace with a couch for lounging in the lovely Italian weather.

We got in a quick nights sleep and woke up early the next morning to take the train from Milan to Lake Como, where we would spend the whole day. For those who don’t know, Lake Como is a beautiful lake in Lombardy, Italy. The lake is surrounded by many villages, villas, and palaces, and is widely regarded as one of the most beautiful lakes in all of Europe.

After arriving in Como early, we grabbed a quick croissant for breakfast, walked around a bit, and then decided to take the ferry around the lake to one of the villages where we would spend the afternoon. The ferry ride was absolutely breathtaking with stops and views of the different villages on the lake along the way.

Lauren and I decided to stop and get off at one of the bigger villages, Menaggio. After scouting out the local area. We found a lovely little outdoor café attached to a hotel to get lunch at, with views of the Lake right from our table. This meal was the start of some of the absolute best food I’ve ever had in my life. The first of these amazing meals involved a pizza for each of us, which we both fully devoured in record time.

We spent the rest of our time in Menaggio taking in the quaint little village and the never-ending beautiful views the villa had to offer. We also experienced our second Italian food-loving with grabbing a quick gelato before hopping on the ferry to make it back to Como for the rest of our time at Lake Como.

We strolled down the random streets and wondered at the amazing architecture. After grabbing a quick dinner, we took an earlier train back to Milan to rest for the long weekend we still had ahead.

The next day we took an early train to Cinque Terre, which is 5 villages along the Italian coastline, which comprised of some of the most breathtaking views I’ve ever experienced in my life. Lauren and I started at the fifth village, Monterosso. At this beach resort type village, we had our second amazing Italian meal of focaccia. Cinque Terre is known for their homemade pesto sauce, one of my favorites, as this was where the sauce was invented. Lauren and I both got a tomato and pesto focaccia, which we enjoyed on the beach to fuel up for the trek we had ahead.

There is a mountain path between the fifth and fourth villages, which turned out to be a lot more exhausting then Lauren and I had determined. We both were dressed in nicer-type clothing, while the rest of the individuals on the path sported athletic garb and hiking gear.

During this 2-hour long hike, we had the pleasure of seeing some of the best views in all of Italy. Even though we were hot and tired from hiking up the mountain and down again, we both agreed that it was completely worth it. Upon arriving in the fourth village of Vernazza, we treated ourselves to a gelato for enduring the long hike.

Over the course of the day, we made it to the other 3 villages, which have continual trains running between them. This was not casual walking though, as most of the villages involved steep paths and steps just to walk down the street. These walks involved winding streets with colorful, dreamlike architecture that anyone would fall in love with.

After walking around all afternoon, we sat down at one the random restaurants in the second village, Manarola, where we both had two of the best pasta dishes, involving the famous Cinque Terre pesto, we’ve ever had. I had twisted pasta with pesto sauce, and Lauren had Pasta Primavera with pesto on top. We finished our day-trip with grabbing some more gelato and making our way to our second resting stop in La Spezia, Italy, where we would depart for Florence from the next morning.

To be continued…