and the study part is over...

Yesterday, our final studio project of the semester was due, and with that I finished the study part of my experience abroad this semester. Critiques were surprisingly relatively painless, and today has just been a clean up and pack day. Saturday I leave in the morning for Basel, Switzerland.

These are some photos of the 2 "beautiful drawings" that I recently finished for my watercolor class this semester:

This one is of Venezia (Venice).

and, this one is of Prague.

Last night was the last meeting with our church family here in Orvieto. Over the semester they have welcomed us into their family and it was really hard to say goodbye last night. I think that they will be the one thing that I will miss most about Italy right now. It has been such a blessing to see their love for the Lord over the semester! I hope in the future I will have the opportunity to come back and see them again!
After the church service, they prepared an awesome meal that we enjoyed together and presented the four of us with hand painted ceramic mugs from Orvieto. My friend Andrew had his camera, and took lots of pictures, so hopefully I will be able to get some of them to post sometime.

I don't know how much access that I will have to update this while I am traveling until the 26th of May, so check my flickr for new photos!
The itinerary for my post-travels:
Basel, Switzerland
meet Melissa in Frankfurt, stay in Dusseldorf,
Brussels, Belgium
London, Great Britain
Paris, France

Things are wrapping up

Sadly, my time this semester in Italy is coming to an end. A few of my classes are already over and I go on my last field trip of the semester on Tuesday. Then I just have to finish some larger "beautiful drawings" and then a studio project and we are done on the 8th. This is bittersweet because while I am sad to leave Italy, I am super excited for my after travel plans, especially since Melissa will be joining me!

Sorry that I haven't finished putting pictures up about my spring break, but I think now it is time to move on to more recent things.

The most recent field trip that I went on was to Perugia, the capital of Umbria. It has been more difficult to get many pictures due to my camera screen being broken, but luckily that has not impacted the quality of the photos, I am just surprised if they turn out. Perugia was enjoyable and we had lots of fun (and learning, of course).

Since most of my roommates went to Milano for design week this weekend, Christie and I decided to take a hike to "La Rocca," where you can see a great view of all of Orvieto.

Here is La Rocca from a distance...

and, here is me with Orvieto in the background on top. Overall a lovely hike, and beautiful weather to hike in.

Spring Break Part 3

From Verona we took a night train to Vienna, Austria. We had a room to the four of us with beds!
We arrived in Vienna at 8:30 in the morning, to a little bit of rain, but nothing too bad. We stayed in Vienna for 2 nights at a very nice hostel with a very nice view of the city.

Our hostel in Vienna.

The view from our hostel in Vienna. It was rainy/cloudy most of the time we were there but that didn't stop us from enjoying our time!

This was my favorite building that we visited while in Vienna. It in English is called the Donau City Church by architect Heinz Tesar. The inside of it was my favorite part. I also really enjoyed our tour of the Spanish Riding School, but unfortunately we weren't allowed to take pictures.

I love the warm feeling of the wood and all of the natural light that the small circular windows let in.
By the time we were in Vienna, we were ready for a break from Italian food. We found some great Viennese food the first night that we were there, and then the second night we stumbled upon a Mexican Restaurant. (We had been craving mexican for 2 or 3 weeks). Then the next morning we left for Budapest.
Budapest met us with amazing food, an amazingly located hostel, some awesome museums, and a day at the public baths, so overall, a great time!

This is our hostel...

...and this is the view from our hostel window. St. Stephen's Basilica and piazza!

We happened to walk by as people were arriving for some event at the museum. If you look close you can see one of the men that was twirling fire.

A view of the stained glass skylight in the Museum of Applied Arts in Budapest.

Spring Break Part 2

So, from where I left of from the last entry about Spring Break, we went from Venezia (Venice) to the Brion Cemetary (designed by a modern Italian Architect, Carlo Scarpa) and Vicenza for a couple of hours and then on to Verona for 2 nights.

The Doge's Palace with St. Marks in the background. (Venezia)

Believe it or not, this is part of the Brion Cemetary.

This is Al in Vicenza. We had so little time there, that we saw a few of the Palladian Buildings there, but spent most of our time in a park enjoying the awesome weather.

Wendy (right) and Christie (left) even did some acrobatics in the park.
Then onto Verona, which I loved! I really had no expectation of what Verona was going to be like, but it was awesome, as well as the 60-70 degree weather!
My favorite day was the last full day we spent there, in which we spent most of the day outside. The day was comprised of amazing gelato, a lot of park time, and an amazing sunset!

Here is some of the group that watched the sunset, closest first: Brad P, Eric S, Sam, and Wendy. (with Al and part of Christie in the back)

I love this piazza in Verona. We spent a lot of time here.
Well, that concludes the first week of spring break in Italy. Part 3 hopefully to come soon!

If any of you are wondering... we survived the earthquake

The earthquake did not affect us much here, although some people from our program did feel it a little bit. I did happen to wake up about the time that it happened, but I don't remember feeling anything and none of my roommates do either.

Spring Break Part 1

Well, we made it back from spring break, which was awesome! The first week was part of the program, so we started out on a tourbus and stopped at the church of the autostrada, which is right outside of Florence on the autostrada (highway).

After that stop, we made our way to Venice. We had been told not to expect it to be nice the entire time that we were there, but we experienced beautiful weather and not too many tourists (still plenty though). I really liked Venice! The colors of the buildings against the water of the lagoon are amazing, and it is like no other place in Italy.

Well, that is all the pictures that I can get to work for this part.

On the Way...

In less than 8 hours I will be on a train to Vienna! Venice, Vicenza, and Verona have been fun, but it is super exciting to be leaving Italy for a short while! We are taking a night train to Vienna, so I will wake up there! (yea for getting a good deal on couchettes!) Later in the week we head to Budapest, and then Prague, both by train. Then we fly back to Rome.