La vita bellissima, la vita amore!

Life is beautiful, life is love!

We were told that Sicily is the most beautiful island in the world.  Check mate.  We discovered that this was 100 percent true, rain or shine.  This is a run down of our weekend:

Thursday night we took an overnight ferry with the whole group of 40 Jforce students and a crazy knight professor.  This ferry was more like a mini cruse ship, complete with a bar and dance floor.  We stayed up for hours with our group, laughing, learning funny dances, and having wonderful conversations.  Then we proceeded to share a tiny bed in a tiny cabin that we did not pay for.  hooray for close quarters and cheap attitudes courtesy of Jana and Adrienne!

Friday we woke up at the crack of dawn so to have very eventful day of viewing beautiful things.  In the morning we experienced a cathedral of radiant gold mosaics and a nunnery filled with tesserre arcs and columns,  fountains and flowers.  Completed with a nutella croissant and a cappuccino of goodness (the whole world should know this breakfast and eat it daily), we set off for more gorgeous sights of Sicily.

Rain doesn't stop us from having a blast, as was proved during a triumphal charge in the tumultuous downpour.  Our entire group braced the elements and sprinted toward the temple of Zeus proudly bearing our soaked attire and inside out umbrellas.  That's right, we invaded and conquered Sicily.   

Saturday we visited the temples of Hercules and Hera while soaking up some Sicilian sun.  All day we climbed on the ruins, ancient walls and tombs; we climbed the blossoming almond trees and overlooked the dazzling blue Mediterranean sea.  We'd like to share our theme song for this day:

The Sicilian landscape was absolutely breathtaking. It definitely will go down in the record books as one of the most beautiful places we have ever seen. We were blessed with the clear skies that made the Island shine on Saturday and Sunday. On Sunday we experienced an ancient Greek theater that had a perfect view of Mt. Etna (an active volcano covered with snow, talk about a mixture of the elements, bumph) The lush greenery of the Island was in view as it melted into the Mediterranean sea. We tried to take pictures, but it simply cannot do the beauty justice.

We were extremely lucky to have the set up we did throughout the course of the trip. A charter bus filled with hilarious people rocking to Abba, a brilliant tour guide with a child's heart, and views of Sicily that we would have never seen without this organized study trip. The food was excellent as always and we indulged in some wonderful pasta, delicious wine and pallet shocking gellato. Overall, this weekend is one for the record books. We are having a fabulous time here in Europa, and we are learning more and more that life is beautiful and life is love.