Ciao
Stranger,
GUESS WHO'S BACK?! :) I know you missed me lots, and I didn't mean to take so long to upload a post but I've been busy hanging out with my friends in Rome whom I haven't seen in a week (feels like a month), my brother flew in last night so we've been touring the city together, I need to go through all my hundreds of pictures from the cruise to decide on which ones to upload, plan for my upcoming trips and "study" for my midterm on Tuesday. I need to time watch Hermione had to pause time. Before I go off topic, let's get to the topic of today...my cruise trip!
We’ve all
been in this situation before: it’s late at night and you’re browsing the web,
looking at cheap vacation packages and dreaming of what it would be like if you
could go to one of those places. You hope that perhaps you’ll run into a
markdown so appealing that you just might be able to go, although
realistically, you know that that will never happen, no matter how cheap the
trip might be. I too was in a similar situation, but instead of turning down
the offer; I booked the 300 euro cruise that was leaving in a week and got 5
friends to join me on this spontaneous escapade. Now a day by day breakdown:
Day 1.
The 6 of us
all skipped our classes and met up at Termini Station at 1:30pm. Yes we’re missing
a week of class. What can I say, we’re top quality students. But being the one
who organized and booked the trip, I felt nervous all day, fearing that
something might go wrong and I would feel responsible for dragging everyone
down. Thankfully everything went according to plan and 6 starving monsters
boarded the ship, ready to eat as much food as our stomach can hold.
First, let
me introduce you to our cruise ship, Costa Pacifica. The ship is relatively
new, being built in 2009 and displays a general musical theme in terms of
decorations. There are 12 decks in total, and Arlette and I live on the 6th
floor while the other 4 boys are all on the 10th. Because I had just
recently gone on a cruise in January with "Carnival", a sister company of
Costa, I got used to the ship’s layout very quickly. Because of this, I was
expecting the two ships to be identical in every aspect, and boy was I wrong.
Pacifica spends a lot more time on the port so the time spent at sea is
shorter, with little entertainment on board. It’s also difficult to cater
something to one audience because everyone seems to be speaking a different
language. Every time there’s an announcement made, it’s repeated 8 times:
Italian, English, Spanish, French, Japanese, German…(and possibly more but by
then I've zoned out already). The ship’s crew members are nowhere as energetic
and polite as the ones on Carnival. Either they’re overworked here or
they’re paid too low. But really, feed me yummy food, provide me a comfy bed
and give me hot water and I’ll be a happy camper any day. After a delightful
dinner, we made our way to the casino and spent 2 hours there…losing money.
Being the risk adverse person that I am, I played vicariously through my
friends. We had to wake up early the next morning so the majority of us headed
to bed while Min stayed in the casino and did his thing.
Day 2.
Today was
the day for Cinque Terre, my most awaited destination in Italy. It consists of
5 small villages on the coastline, with picturesque scenery. The ship docked at La Spezia, where we could
take a short train ride to the villages. Us before we got all sweaty and nasty...
We started with the northern most town
called Monterosso with a small beach and while looking for a high ground to
take better pictures, we discovered the hiking route to Vernazza (another
town). I've heard the hikes are phenomenal so we buckled down and went on the
90 minute hike. I would give the difficulty level a 6/10 if the Grouse grind
was 10/10. The path is tiny and at many places, you wouldn't be able to fit two
people standing side by side. I'm not sure if you can see it in the picture but far off in the distance, you can make out the village we were headed to. Yeah, we hiked along the winding coastline.
One false move and you would fall off the cliff
and into the abyss. This was made even
more difficult because you now have to watch your every step while trying to admire
the scenery at the same time. Riskiest double tasking ever. I would've loved to
have seen all 5 villages but we only made it to 4 due to time restrictions but
that’s enough for me. The hike was definitely the highlight of my day, with a view like this, I could hike this path all day, ereday!
Once we
got back on board, we all went straight to the restaurant and stuffed ourselves
with a 5 course dinner. Min and Guido purchased the all you can drink package for the
cruise so they’ll be drunk for the remainder of the trip J. Arlette Matt and I headed off to
bed early again while the other 3 stayed and got drunk.
Arlette and I being photogenic tourists :)
I wanted to buy one of these paintings but they were so overpriced. You think you can fool me? If I can't have you, I'll just take a picture of you! Take that!
A picture with my favourite companion of the trip: Costa Pacifica <3
Day 3.
Arlette
Matt and I got up at 7:30 AM so that we could catch the 9 AM train to Genoa. We
didn't find the train in time and decided to lay on the beach for a while, just
relaxing and getting our tan on. I think the sun made us lazy because by the
time we could catch the next train to Genoa, we just couldn't bring ourselves
to do it anymore and stayed in Savona. While walking around, we found a bike
rental place and boy oh boy was it a blast. We biked up ramps just so we can speed downhill. We’re kids at heart, don’t judge. A picture of our trio bike!
The other 3
guys apparently took the later train in an attempt to get to Genoa, but ended up
taking the wrong train and going to an unknown destination. Maybe it was a good
thing we didn't attempt to go there ourselves. After walking around the city
for a bit (there’s not much to see), the 3 of us headed back to the cruise and
had a feast of a lunch. I haven’t had a burger in months now, probably since
the last time I was on a cruise…I've forgotten how delicious they can be. The
rest of the day consisted of eating more food and playing card games, very
intensive. Life's just so tough sometimes :)
...to be continued
...to be continued
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