Have you ever had the experience of being unable to find your train and only having a few minutes left before departure, so you start running frantically through the train station… only to have your backpack fall open and spew out a trail of your belongings? (*Note to self… make sure the zipper is zipped next time it is necessary to sprint through a train station.)



After arriving, (we did manage to find the the train on time) I had to keep reminding myself that I wasn’t supposed to walk around with my jaw dropped open, and that it is actually important to look where you are going when walking, instead of looking at the beautiful buildings… which can often cause collisions with tourists and random strollers… (In my defense… they materialized out of nowhere… and were going much too fast..)



When I saw the Coliseum for the first time I stopped short and pretty much lost my grasp on the English language. I pointed and said, “is that…I think…it is!…whoaa…” then continued to stare for a while.



Other favorites from the first day…


The Arch of Constantine

The Roman Forum


Trajan’s Column


The Basilica of St. John Lateran

Day two in Rome started with a visit to the Catacombs of Saint Callixtus, the official cemetery of the Church of Rome. They were started in the middle of the second century. They take up 90 acres of land, with four separate levels underground, and over twelve miles of tunnels. Unfortunately cameras were not allowed.

After lunch, (Pizza and Pasta of course!) I found my favorite place in Rome: The Trevi Fountain. This huge Baroque fountain stands over 85 feet tall and 65 feet wide.



The rest of the day included…


The Spanish Steps


Inside of the Coliseum


A visit to Rome is not complete until you have seen the Vatican. So on our third, and final day, we decided to brave the crowds and massive lines.


Saint Peter’s Basilica


The Gallery of Maps


Recognize this one?



After four nights and three full days of exploring, being lost, walking marathon distances, eating awesome food, having wonderful conversations, lots of laughter, and seeing some of the most amazing sights, it was hard to leave Rome. Luckily Florence had some pretty beautiful things to see as well.

The trip started with a seven hour ferry ride, unfortunately it became a thirteen hour ferry ride due to the bad weather that was determined to sink our ship… I was sitting next an old Italian man that did not speak English or Greek. I decided that it would be a good time to try to learn some Italian… Our conversation was a cross between charades, sign language, and ‘hot potato’ (also known as: ‘Pass the Phrasebook.’ The person holding it is the one that gets to talk…).

The ferry brought us to Bari, which is a nice little town, with some old castles and lots of shops. We got our tickets for the train and then left for Naples, which was our first official destination. The second I stepped out of the train station I knew why everyone had warned me to be careful in Naples. It was a massive explosion of chaos! People, cars, and buses were going in every direction at breakneck speeds. I am thinking the average blood pressure of someone who lives there must be through the roof… 

After much ado, we arrived at our hostel (Hostel of the Sun) which is one of the top rated hostels in Europe. If anyone ever needs a place to stay in Naples, I would definitely recommend staying there. By this point we had been traveling for almost 24 hours and we were extremely hungry… We figured since we were in Naples, pizza was the appropriate thing to eat. The people working at the hostel gave us a map and told us where to get the “best pizza in the world.” The place had huge brick ovens and it was a family owned and operated business for the past several hundred years. The pizza is now what I will compare every other pizza with. I ate the entire thing…

The next day our plans were to go and see Pompeii. Unfortunately we woke up to cold and rainy weather. But it’s not every day that you are close enough to visit Pompeii… So, we put on our raincoats and trekked out to the bus anyway.



Walking around the streets of Pompeii was a surreal experience. Knowing that people lived in the houses and walked along the same streets that I was on… and what a horrible experience that last day must have been. It really made me think about how important it is to enjoy our lives while we have the opportunity. Not that a volcano is going to erupt in Wisconsin or anything… but still… it makes one think.

Standing in front of the temple of Jupiter, one of the most prominent sites of worship in Pompeii. The goddesses Juno and Minerva were worshiped here.

The Basilica


Considered to be the world’s oldest known amphitheater. It could hold over 12,000 spectators! In AD 59, “a murderous brawl with a rival town prompted the Senate to ban any further games there for ten years.”

After spending a wonderful (albeit wet) day in Pompeii. We had some more pizza, said goodbye to our amazing hostel, and went to visit what would become my favorite city in Italy: Rome.

( Photo from the beach by the estate.)

(A few weeks ago.) My roommate and I were talking about how we both wanted to do some more travelling since it is not to often that we get to live in Europe… But we both felt uncomfortable travelling solo. So, we decided to see if we could get some time off of work and take a trip together…..

(Today) I am currently typing this with my backpack sitting at my feet packed ready to go. Our ferry to Italy leaves in a few hours! We will be visiting Pompeii, Rome, Florence and Venice over the next eleven days. I will not have my computer with me but I will be sure to write as soon as I get back to Corfu.

~I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving and enjoys the festive Holiday Season!

A movie about the life of Count Ioannis Antionios Kapodistria (Κόμης Ιωάννης Αντώνιος Καποδίστριας) is being filmed in Corfu. Kapodistrias was a Greek diplomat of the Russian Empire, and later, first head of state of independent Greece. Spiros, a Greek man who works at our barn, is playing the lead role in the movie.
A couple of the scenes needed to have Kapodistrias riding a horse, since he was said to be a very skilled rider. In order to accomplish this, a film crew came out to the Silva Project and I spent the afternoon helping out with the horses and the filming!

A few weeks ago we all decided it would be fun to visit Albania. Before our trip we checked with a car rental agency to see if we could drive across the Greek/Albania border. The man who ran the agency assured us it would be fine and he said he would meet us once we got to the mainland.

In order to get to mainland we took a ferry, the sun was setting just as we left, so we had quite the view.



After about an hour and a half on the ferry we arrived in Igoumenitsa. A little greek man greeted us and said, in broken english, that he was the one with our rental car and was ready to drive us to the Albanian border. We asked him what he meant because just a few days before he had told us we could drive the car ourselves. He responded that we needed a Green card to drive across the border and it would not be possible to get one until the next day, so he repeated again he would drive us to the border and drop us off.

Unfortunately this arrangement would have left us at the border of Albania, late at night, without a place to stay, and no way of getting anywhere. So with no hope of a successful visit to Albania we tried to improvise and asked him if we could rent his car anyway and stay in Greece. He said that would be fine but he wanted quite a bit more than the normal rental price for the car. At this point we decided to see if we could find another car somewhere else. About an hour later after wandering around in the dark, we finally found a place that was open and reasonably priced. We all piled into the car and decided to Ioannina, a larger city with a castle only a couple of hours away. Before leaving Igoumenitsa we stopped at an ATM, and our new rental car promptly died.



Lucky for us, a guy that was walking by happened to be a mechanic! He showed us how to jump start the car by pushing it down the road and popping the clutch. It felt  like we were the family from the movie Little Miss Sunshine…

Finally we arrived in Ioannina. It was late and we were all tired, so our next challenge was to find a place to sleep. Unfortunately finding a cheap hotel, for six people, without a reservation, was not the easiest things to do… after asking about eight hotels we finally succeeded in getting a room. We grabbed our bags, walked up the stairs, and just as we were walking into the room we heard this clattering coming from the stairwell. Outside of our room a lady, who looked absolutely terrified, ran from the stairwell and jumped against the wall with her hands above her head, following her was a man with a gun!

Before we had the chance to run screaming out of the building, a man with a video camera appeared behind the man with the gun. Then they all went running down the steps. We never did figure out exactly what was going on… Our theory was that they were filming a movie… hopefully…

The next morning we started exploring the town. In the center of the town is a castle, which is surrounded by massive walls.


According to wikipedia, “The bizarre, maze-like layout of the castle’s streets, (many of which lead to dead ends, or just go around in circles) were allegedly designed to confuse pirates of old who breached the castle walls, so that they would get lost within the fortress, and be captured before escaping with their bounty.”
Which would explain why were lost about 90% of the time we were there…







Then, (thanks to cell phones with Internet and wikipedia yet again!) one of the volunteers read about a town not too far away that had ancient theatre. I, of course, got very excited, and a short time later we were back in the car heading towards Dodona.



We, of course, could not pass up the chance to try out a little acting on the stage…


As our afternoon faded into the evening, we drove back to Igoumenitsa and caught a ferry back to Corfu.



It was certainly not the trip to Albania that I had expected. But sometimes things turn out better when plans get thrown out the window… or in this case, when a Greek man tries to drive you to Albania..

In addition to breeding endangered ponies, riding lessons, and saving almost every stray animal on the island, the Silva Project also runs an organic kiwi farm. Mrs. Steen originally bought land so she could have a new area for the riding center. On the new land she found entire field of abandoned kiwis. Since Mrs. Steen doesn’t like to see anything go to waste, she decided to rehabilitate the kiwi trees, and started a kiwi farm. This past week the kiwis were finally ripe and ready to be harvested. I volunteered to switch jobs for a couple of days and help with the kiwis.

In my new job as a kiwi picker I learned several interesting things:

• Kiwis are only harvested once a year.
• You cannot eat them right off the tree because they have to ripen for two weeks after they have been picked.
• Greek people laugh at you when you try to take a bite out of a whole kiwi without peeling it.
• Kiwi in Greek is Aκτινίδιο (Actinidia), it is from the Greek word aktin which means ray.
• Not all kiwis are alike… some kiwis keep growing… and become, “mutants.”
  (Which of course made me think of X-men and it took everyone a while to figure out why I was laughing and calling the kiwis Wolverine, Cyclops, and Nightcrawler every time I picked a “mutant.”)

The perfect kiwis (large and normal in shape) will be sold to local grocery stores. The other kiwis (some of them are as small as grapes!) will be sold to a yogurt making company called Danone (I believe its the Greek version of Dannon.)



Although I don’t think kiwi picking will be my new career choice, I did enjoy the experience and the time I got to spend at the farm.

Monday… what a wonderful day of the week! Then again, maybe I currently feel this way because my day off is on Monday, and on Mondays I get to explore. Winter has officially hit Corfu, which means no tourists, closed shops, colder temperatures, and last, but certainly not least, rain. This past Monday was no exception, but we decided to rent a car and drive to the other side of the island to a town called Paleokastrista. A town that, according to my roommate’s guidebook is, “the most beautiful spot on Corfu.”

It took about an hour to get to Paleokastrista. We stopped at the bay which is said to be the place where Odysseus disembarked and met Nausicaa for the first time. Which is why I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to go swimming (The change from two sweatshirts and a raincoat into a swimsuit was quite chilly!)



Our next stop was the Paleokastrista Monastery. Founded in 1225, although the current building was constructed in the 18th century.



The grounds around the Monastery are very attractive, it has arched walkways and beautiful flowers and plants growing everywhere. There was also a large number of cats and kittens.



Seeing an actual castle that was built in the 5th century is a completely surreal experience. We drove up another winding road a few miles out of Paleokastrista and when we reached the final turn we saw the castle Αγγελόκαστρο:Angelokastro (occupied by the early Byzantine period), perched upon the top of the mountain with sheer cliffs around it.






On the way back across the island we saw a sign that said “sunset road.” We of course, did not want to pass up the opportunity so we turned up the narrow dirt road that went pretty much straight up.
After about 10 minutes on this road we were greeted by another spectacular sight:
 

The magnificent Greek holiday Οχι Day is celebrated every year in Greece on October 28th  and mostly remembered for general Ioannis Metaxas’ strong reply of ‘oxi’ (no) to Mussolini’s request to allow Italian troops to come into Greece at the beginning of WW II.

In Corfu they celebreate Οχι day by having a parade. The volunteers got to finish work early and we got to the bus stop only to find that the bus schedule is not the same on Οχι day. Finally we managed to get a cab, but the driver would only take six of us and we had seven. Luckily at that moment Captain George (An amazing Greek man that runs a restaurant/bar right next to the Silva Estate) drove by on his scooter and offered to take one of us into town with him. I figured it would be a fun experience so I volunteered to go.



Driving in a car in Greece is a rather terrifying experience. Normal road rules are not followed….at all. Riding on a scooter takes driving in Greece to a whole new terrifying level. Add the fact that it is a National Holiday, everyone on the island is trying to get to the same place, and you are riding behind a man named Captain George… We weaved around and inbetween cars going in both directions, drove on both sides of the road, on the sidewalks, down steps, between tables in an outdoor cafe, and whipped closely by people in the back alleys. I am happy to report that I survived my first scooter trip and can’t wait to experience another one.

The actual parade was not at all what I expected it to be. They started with a band (There are 28 large bands on this island, apparently they like music here.)

Then children started marching past (not playing any instruments, not in floats, not throwing candy, just marching in school uniforms) after inquiring about what was going on we were told that these were the elementary children from each school and that following this would be the middle school children, high school children, and college students.

After over fifty different groups of kids and a couple more bands, the navy paraded by:


The police followed them and the fireman officially ended the parade.

We finished off our Οχι Day in Greece by eating Gyros (a word I still cannot pronounce correctly in Greek) and visited the old fortress which was built in the 15th century.

The Silva Estate, where I am currently living, is about an hour walk away from Corfu Town. Corfu Town is the main area for restaurants, shopping, and sightseeing. Besides walking, there is also a bus which runs a couple of times a day, and the occasional taxi that drives by. When none of those options are possible, and it is necessary for the volunteers to get into, or home from town, we have learned to use our remaining option: Hitchhiking.
When I asked the others if this was legal, the response I got was “…I don’t think it’s…illegal.”
On Wednesday evening all of the volunteers decided to go into town together. It was too late for the buses and no taxi’s were around so we decided to see if we could get a ride. Sure enough, a few minutes later a large van pulled over. It was quite dark so it took us a few moments before we realized what the side and the front of the vehicle parked in front of us said:


“POLICE.”
The Police officer jumped out of the van and asked us where we were heading. We told him that we were trying to get to Corfu Town, he opened up the passenger door and motioned for us to get in!


Between the Greek that we knew, and the English he knew, we all had a great conversation with our awesome police officer on the way into town. When we arrived we thanked him for the ride, said goodbye, and went to find a place to eat. We chose a place we had never been to before. When we walked in we saw several police officers sitting at a table, about 5 minutes later our policeman came walking in! We got introduced to the other police officers and ate dinner together. At the end of the night two of the police officers asked if they could have a picture with us.


My current thoughts on the subject of hitchhiking: it must be legal in Corfu, and the police officers must not have too much to do…

The Silva Project is a non-profit organization located in Corfu, Greece which is dedicated to preserving the Skyrian horse. This volunteer based charity has a riding school and is involved in the rescuing of abused animals and owns an organic kiwi farm.

My first week at the Silva Project has been an amazing experience. I have worked with Greek children, eaten Ostrich for dinner, and live in an amazing villa. But I am getting ahead of myself… 

 
The flights to Corfu (three of them) were quite nice.

 
After almost 19 hours of traveling I finally got to see Corfu.
This is the main house on the estate
A short walk from the house will bring you to a beautiful sitting area with an awesome view of the beach!

Old Town is an amazing shopping area with all sorts of beautiful buildings, churches and old streets.

This is from the beach right by the estate.

Life at the Silva Project has been both challenging and wonderful. We work 6 hours a day, 6 days a week. Our work includes looking after the 35 horses on the farm, tacking and untacking for lessons, leading the younger children during lessons, cleaning tack, and any other random things that come up. I taught a couple of grooming lessons and leading lessons, which was fun because most of the children are little greek kids and do not speak english. When the volunteers are not working we usually hang out at the beach or explore Corfu town. There are also a lot of other animals at the Villa Silva, 17 dogs, many different kinds of birds, cats, chinchillas, geese, and rats that like to visit us when we eat supper outside. So far this trip has been wonderful, I’m excited to see what happens in the coming weeks.