Hunting Bears With Landmines

So... I'm really sorry about not keeping this blog up to date, but there was really nothing I could do. I didn't end up with enough time on Thursday and on Friday night we spent the night in Sorento. Thursday was the strangest day I think I have ever experienced. Our day began perfectly normal, besides being unusually cool. We traveled to Ostia, the ancient port city of Rome, saw some amazingly cool stuff like the ancient fast food joints. But once we had reached one of the temples at the far side of the site, it started to rain. It wasn't bad at first but eventually it got back enough for us to need to take cover under the one of the archways. Then it started to pour! Lightning struck about a thousand yards off with a loud KABOOM! Hail bounced off the ground, and we were 1.5 miles from the bus with nothing else to get us us there but our feet. So my friend and I ran... fast. By the time we reached the bus I was completely soaked, squishy shoes and all. Needless to say our beach trip was canceled. We got back to the hotel and I spent the better part of an hour blow-drying my shoes. Later that after dinner, one of my buddies wanted to show my an Irish pub he had found. We started out in a plaza and followed one of my other friends who took us in the wrong direction and thought we needed to cross the Tiber. I heard them say that it was close to the Colosseum so I led the group along what I thought would be the quickest route. We soon discovered that we had to walk all the way around the Paletine Hill and when we got to the Colosseum they told me that it was actually closer to the Victorio Emmanuel Monument. We arrived at the Pub about an hour later, it was about 300 meters from the plaza where we had started, and it was closed. I couldn't go back empty handed so I stopped off at a Gellateria, picked out a cone, and was charged 13 dollars. So yeah! But when you add everything up and grade on a very steep curve we actually did alright.

Friday we went to Pompeii. Really an awesome place with incredible artwork. I was so tired, and sore from the previous night that I didn't really do a whole lot there. We did see all the classic stuff there and I took tons of pictures. We also got our trip delayed by the Giro- Italia, a popular bike race. Supposedly Lance Armstrong was in the group, but I couldn't see him while I was filming. It was pretty cool. The group of about 60 riders flew around the corner at 40 MPH. I had no idea they went so fast.

Today we went to Herculaneum. I thought it was a much better place than Pompeii. There was less people, cooler stuff, and I wasn't dying of exhaustion. We also got to hike Mt. Vesuvius the infamous volcano. The volcano is still active and is predicted to erupt again. That may be a huge problem for the area of Naples around it, which is the most densely populated area in all of Europe. Why are people still living here?!

We have one final day in Rome tomorrow and then we start to work our way north on our way home!