super quick...

So yet again we dont get internet in our hostel...so we are at an internet place, but i cant use my own computer. I had previously typed out the blog, but now thats worthless and i dont feel like retyping. It wasnt super exciting anyways. Hopefully tomorrow I will find time to write a real update. For now, just know that we made it Rome safely and I cant stop singing Dean Martin songs! haha. The real adventure begins tomorrow!

Wish i could write more, but it will have to wait till later! Over and out!

Cinque-tastic!!

Hello my dearest friends and family! I know you have been waiting at the edge of your seat constantly refreshing the blog site just waiting for me to post this. Wait no longer! Tis here…

Cinque Terre is amazing. Seriously, it is probably one of the most unique and relaxing places ever with a non-touristy feel. Quick update from last night…Lo and I bought crackers, slices of turkey, homemade pesto, strawberries, and of course some vino and brought it down to the rocks by the water where we ate our magnificent meal at sunset. The cool breeze was blowing, the sun was saying goodnight, and the sound of water hitting the rocks was incredibly relaxing. I could have stayed there for hours upon hours. However, the USA futbol game was on, so we decided to call it an early night so we could go back to our room and watch it. Lo and I got ready for bed and watched the game which was undoubtedly a sad loss, but for some reason I was kind of happy for Ghana. I mean, when else do you hear about Ghana? So good for them! Plus, I thought we played kinda cruddy. Anyways, we soon crashed because we were exhausted from our long hike that day.

This morning we decided to sleep in and see where the day took us. So we woke up a little after 10am and opened our shutters to the sunshine and looked out over the ocean. Not such a bad way to wake up! There is just something about waking up, opening up the blinds (shutters in our case), and seeing the sun shiny day outside. My roommates always thought I was crazy because I slept with my blinds open. I just like waking up to natural light….puts me in a good mood. Lo and I made breakfast again of toast, jam, and fruit. I forgot to tell you how we made our toast yesterday, please let me share. We don’t have a toaster, so we decided to stab our bread with a fork and hold it over the old school stove (that we lit ourselves) and roast our bread like marshmallows until it was golden brown. It worked deliciously! We walked down the million steps (actually 133 steps), found some nice flat rocks by the water, and caught some rays. It was perfect outside and everyone was merry. I finally finished my book and Lo was reading Pride and Prejudice for the 37^th time. We cooked ourselves like bacon in the sun, flipping back and forth to not burn too bad and then decided it was time to cool off and go for a refreshing swim. The water felt soooo good and the lil fishies swam around with us while we paraded around their territory. There were a group of guys all cliff jumping nearby that we had been watching all day. They were slightly crazy though…they were doing front flips, back flips, dives, and combinations of those off the rocks into the water and people were lined up all along the land watching them and clapping for each guy going. I thought it was so weird that I hadn’t seen one girl jump off the rocks yet and I was getting really antsy. Finally I made us swim over to the rocks and climb on up to join the boys and take the plunge. I was so excited and Lo was psyching up to conquer her fear of heights. I rock climbed like a mountain goat up to the top, didn’t understand a word of what the boys said to me in Italian, and jumped! Down I went, SPLASHHH, and up went the bathing suit top…luckily I got it all under control before I came back up again. Haha. In the mean time, Lo had made it to the top and was about to go….sure enough she conquered that stinkin fear and jumped off too! Woo woo! I loved the thrill and wanted to go one more time, so I did and then we swam around a bit more and after headed back to our rocks to dry out. What a fantastic day so far! Finally around 3pm we went and had a late lunch, went to our room, and accidentally fell asleep for a while. Side note…the bell tower here rings 8 minutes fast…every time. Just sayin. Moving on…we eventually made our way back down to the town, went to the grocery store and picked up more crackers, turkey, fruit, and pesto and went back down to the rocks that had cleared out by now. We poured ourselves some wine, Lo read her book, I started writing a book (yep, I decided I’m finally gonna write a book…been wanting to for quite some time now), and then later on we ate our dinner with glee. Again, it was stunningly beautiful at sunset. We sat there for a couple hours, but some stinkin Australian boys and some other chicks came down and were obnoxious, so we left and watched the rest of the soccer game in our room. Plus, we had to pack and get ready for our day of travels the next day.

So that was our day. Not incredibly eventful, but again, one of my favorite days on this whole trip. It is so nice to just relax and not worry about a thing going on. We are off to Rome tomorrow and we are excited to see all that it has waiting for us to discover. It’s crazy to think that we will be home in 4 days. But we must conquer Rome first! Overall, Cinque Terre has been amazing. I hope you all get a chance to visit this enchanting place.

Cinque Terre = so legit

Howdy folks! This update is going to be about a day and a half of update. We actually have to go to an internet café in order to update the blog (totally worth it), but we just can’t do it as often. So here it goes in bullet list format:

- Arrived in Cinque Terre and it is, in fact, beautimous! Cinque Terre is made up of 5 separate towns all along the coast of Italy. They span about 9km total. We found our hostel and the manager showed us where we were staying. We diligently followed him up about a thousand stairs with our heavy backpacks on and finally arrived at the most precious place. It’s basically like a mini-apartment. We have a big bedroom with a window that you can see the ocean right out of, our own bathroom with the weirdest tub and no curtain, and another little twin bed by the entry way. Plus, we have a kitchen right across from our room that is fully furnished and we have access to that as well. Legit!

- After unpacking we each got a corona and pesto pizza and relaxed at an outside table. Then we changed into our bathers and headed down to the beach for some more relaxation. The beach here is all rocks, so we found a great flat rock down by the water and enjoyed the sunshine. I was antsy to get in the water, so we swam around a bit and we can officially say that we have have swam in the Mediterranean Sea, which I think is pretty cool.

- Spark notes on the rest of the evening: showers, changing, dinner looking over the ocean with the soccer game on in the background, and then just chit-chattin in bed for another 2 hours. Good first day!

- This morning we woke up around 8:15am, got ready for the day, and made a delicious breakfast consisting of toast and jam and fruit. Oh and hot tea too! It was so fun to be able to make our own breakfast for once. It was a good way to start the day.

- Next to conquer was the infamous Cinque Terre hike that spans across all 5 towns in the mountains looking over the ocean. So off we went…and my lordy it’s a tough hike! Most people just go from one town to the next via the path or something…but no, we did the entire thing. If I counted how many stairs we went up I think my head would burst. It was challenging, but absolutely beautiful along the way and each town was so unique. The hike is 9km long and is supposed to take about 5 hours. We did it in 3 and a half hours. Anyways, I really can’t explain how amazing it was. Personally, it was my favorite thing that we have done thus far on this entire trip.

- So we went from Riomaggiore to Monterosso, which is where the biggest beach is. Monterosso was hip and hoppin with tourists. It was your typical beach filled with chairs and umbrellas that you had to rent out. So we got there and ate lunch. Sidenote: I actually was able to get a turkey sandwich! I can’t tell you how much I just want some chicken or turkey. But it is very rare. Everything is seafood or ham, and if you know me you know that I don’t like either. Struggle. Ok, back to the story, after lunch we rented out some chairs on the pebbley beach and fell asleep for a bit. Lo was out cold for about an hour and while she was napping I frolicked in the super clear water. It was glorious. We did some reading, more napping, it rained a bit, and then hopped on a train back to our town.

- And that’s everything so far! Lo and I just showered (trust me, we needed it!) and we are about to head to do some laundry (also very needed). I think the rest of the night we are just going to chill and probably just bring some food and wine down to the rocks by the water and eat dinner. Sounds like a good plan right?

We miss you friends! Talk to you when we can!

Florence - Last Day

Florence – Day 2

Hello my dearest blog readers! Sorry that this post is late, but we got distracted last night by a very worthy cause (that you will find out later) and it deterred us from writing. So without further ado, let me start from the beginning of our day on the 24^th of June.

We crawled out of bed around 9:51am when I had a massive coughing attack and probably woke up the entire hostel. What a great way to rise and shine. We got ready for the day, put on some kinda grungy clothes, and walked to go see the Statue of David. All of a sudden we see this massive line of people that just looked like a bunch of miserable faces and husbands that wished they were at the bar (yes, at 11am). Obviously this line was for the one and only David in statue form. We looked at the line and reevaluated the situation….and we just passed on by and went on to whatever the day held next for us. You are probably wondering how we could do such a terrible thing and not see what the city of Florence is most famous for. Well folks, let me just enlighten you of something….The statue of David is of a man with a slingshot, has a rock in his hand, and is naked. Sooo…in my mind, it’s just like every other statue that we’ve seen and I really don’t care to see anymore fake junk in the trunk made out of stone. Just sayin. I can look it up on the internet if I want. Sad, but it’s what our world has come to. Shame on us. Clearly I feel really bad…

With no set agenda for the day we wandered about and found a little café to eat at and scarfed down some grub. Lo and I then ran back to our hostel to grab our Eurrail tickets and then went to the train station to see about getting our train tickets to Cinque Terre tomorrow. We talked to a very large, but nice man about traveling for 15 minutes and then at the counter found out that our train to Cinque Terre was free! That put us in a cheery mood and we skipped off into town not knowing what would come next. By this time it was starting to get incredibly toasty outside, which can only mean one thing…gelato. The next part of the day was absolutely hysterical. This is the part of the day where I got married and Lo became Lady Gaga. No lies, it happened and it was wonderful. Haha. We found the central market area where all the vendors collaborate and play scam the tourist. We each bought some small items and paraded through each vendor looking at the odd items they sold. Eventually we came to another leather jacket store and the man working got our attention real quick. Somehow he convinced us to go into the store and I was lucky enough to get to try on a jacket that he thought was perfect for me. He kept giving me compliments and told me I had an Italian figure….riiiiight. hahaha. And he told Lo that she was Lady Gaga, which I then proceeded to burst out laughing. So here we are, I have a leather jacket on that he won’t let me take off, his arm is around me, Lo is Lady Gaga, and then he tells me that we are getting married and are going to have a happy family and are going to have 5 children. Bahahaha. We went along with his little game for a while, but he would never tell me the price of the jacket and him and his sly self was being a sketchball, so I told him that I was divorcing him and we forced our way out. Even though you aren’t really supposed to go along with their little Italian love games, I’m really glad we spent that 15 minutes with him because it was hilarious and we sang Lady Gaga songs the rest of the day.

By the time we were done with the market we were exhausted and sweaty, so we decided to go back to the hostel to just relax for a little bit. A little bit turned into about 3 hours. Most people would say that we are lame and not experiencing the things we should, but it was a hilarious 3 hours. We watched “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” on my computer, we sang songs, we realized that all of our facebook friends either have serious boyfriends, are engaged, or are married, and that just boosted our confidence…not. And I thought Lo the infamous excited leg kick, which put us in the giggles for a good 10 minutes. You can look for videos of that when we get home. Finally, we freshened up and head back out to find some dinner. We got out into the street and realized that we were matching. Awesome. Then we stumbled upon this cool little pizzeria where we ordered our food and sangria with fruit in it. It was heaven on earth. We also sat next to a husband and wife who were chain smokers (don’t worry though, he was a dentist…), but we talked to them for a good 40 minutes and they were quite entertaining and also filthy rich. They took a limo to the airport and they are staying in a villa in Florence. No big deal. However, they did invite us to join them in their villa if we ever wanted or if our hostel was bad. Everything in me wanted to go ring their door and invite ourselves in. I mean, how cool of a story would have that been? But we resisted and just walked along the streets in Florence and then sat overlooking water for about an hour. While we sat, there was a bike parade and tons of people out and about. It was some celebration day for a Saint I guess and there were fireworks later that night. We decided to turn in at about 9pm and we head to the hostel. The rest of the night was filled with facebook, drawing pictures, playing MASH, showering, re-packing, and watching the Lizzie McGuire Movie to get us psyched up for Rome. Yes, I did just say that. We watched Lizzie McGuire and we loved every second of it and yes, that is the reason I didn’t blog last night. Worthy cause. Don’t judge.

Overall, Florence was a fun city. I still don’t get all the hype about it, but there are some cool parts of it. As I am typing this we are on a train to Cinque Terre and we can’t wait! I also ran into an old friend on the train that I knew freshmen year of college. Small world. So Cinque Terre here we come! Let the adventure begin.

Florence - Day 1

Well hello everyone. Lo here giving Robby a little break from all the typing. It’s wearing her out. So now we are in Florence! After walking the canal to get our fruit breakfast in Venice, we boarded the train and headed off to Florence. It was a surprisingly nice train, and we were able to fall asleep for a bit. We arrived in Florence around noon and found our hostel pretty easily. We then started out in the city. I love this place. It’s so full of history and art (neither of which I know anything about, but it’s still fun). We walked over to the Dumo and actually were able to go in. Robby had to put on this cloak thing because she was wearing a shirt that didn’t cover her shoulders. We took pictures, it was great. Around 2 pm we ate lunch at this place called Yellow. It was amazing! I had a pizza and Robby had spaghetti, which she will say was the best she’s ever had. We then made our way to Santa Croce and gave ourselves a little tour of the inside. Personally, I have no idea about any of these things, but it’s so fun and beautiful and I’m looking forward to learning about them when I get home. We walked over the famous bridge and found a few shops on the other side of the river. This is where things get exciting… Robin goes to buy this really cool Italy shirt while I’m buying a shot glass (which I am collecting from every city) and then we go to this little stand to buy postcards. After I buy mine, Robby goes to pay but has to dig around for the right about of change in her wallet. We leave. We are getting tired and decided to take a break and go back to our hostel. When we get there, Robin cannot find her wallet. In her wallet is everything from cash to her passport to credit cards; so just about everything we need while traveling. We have everything else that was in our bags, just not her wallet. So we literally drop everything and rush out of our hostel back to the stand on the other side of the river. There was a new lady working there and we asked her about it. She happened to be looking at Robin’s passport and just gave the whole wallet back to us. (After she mumbled something in Italian about giving it to the police and stuff.) Well, it turns out not everything was there…all her euros were missing, which sucks, but in the grand scheme of things, a passport and credit cards are much more important. So after all this stress and excitement, we do what anyone else would and get a drink. We find this “American Bar” that we passed earlier and go get a beer and watch England and the US win their soccer games. It was actually pretty fun. We can say we watched futbol in an Italian bar. So by this time we were really tired and went back to take a nap. All this happened before 6 pm, the day is still young. We have heard of this amazing hike that overlooks the entire city of Florence and we decided it would be nice and romantic of us to go at sunset, so that is what we did. The sun sets here at around 9pm, so we hiked up the hill and were able to watch the sun set over the city of Florence. It was a truly beautiful site. I took lots of pictures. That was the end of our day. We made it back to our hostel and watch some of “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia” and are going to bed. I’d say it was a pretty awesome way to start off our adventures in Florence. One week left…we’re making some great memories!

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It’s Robin again. Don’t shake your head at me because I couldn’t help that I’m a blog fanatic. It was killing me not to type a little bit. So here are my spark notes:

1. Lo and I actually disagree on Florence. I gotta say, I don’t get the hype and I think it’s kinda blah. Very American spoiled brat of me to say probably. Sorry to everyone who loves it. Some of the history is nifty and the Duomo is stunning from the outside. I think I could stay in Venice for a long time. Florence…not so much.
2. Today was a frighteningly forgetful day. I lost my favorite sweater on the train. Ugh. And you already heard the wallet story. I hadn’t cussed that much at myself in a while. Luckily Jesus loves me and the wallet was still there…minus the 90 euros inside. Again, could have been much worse.
3. I ate Gelato today and didn’t have digestive issues! Really exciting if you know me. Haha. (which I hope you know me if you’re reading this…)
4. The hostel is great and the manager told us we were his favorite people and gave us free towels. J
5. Pick up line of the day: We are passing by vendor and…

Vendor: Ladies! You dropped something! (we turn around and look)

Vendor: My heart…. (Wah wah wah…)

6. Tomorrow…statue of David and a lotta chill time. Oh! Tomorrow is some special day in Florence and there will be fireworks at 10pm! So fun. Fire always entertains me.
7. I’m ready for some relaxation in Cinque Terre on the beach with a fruity cocktail.

That’s it for now. Just had to put my two cents in. hehe. Word Diggity.

Lost in Venice

BOOBIES EVERYWHERE!!!

haha, thought that would get your attention. I promise that that statement will have more relevance later, but you'll have to keep reading to find out. See, now your hooked. Sucker.

Venice - Is - Amazing. Truly, there is no place like it. The buildings are one of a kind and the water water with the multi-colored reflections all over it is absolutely stunning. We started out the day early and got breakfast at a little cafe where I had the best croissant of life. Then we found a little fruit stand and I got some delicious strawberries and lo got some blackberries. We walked along, ate our fruit, and ventured into the winding, narrow roads of Venice. All the vendors were out and about and oh so enticing. I did finally give it at one vendor and bought a super cool satchel type bag. I looove it. The man working said then took a picture with me (see facebook for that magical moment) and then he told me to come back later and he would give me a present. "Present"...right. That was my thought too. Sketchy. But sure enough, he happened to recognize us on the way back (two blondes, how hard could it be?) and he called us over and he let me choose a super cool ring made of Morano Glass that Venice is known for. He seriously gave it to me for free. Then he shook my hand...I think he wanted a hug. Oops. Anyways, he was precious. Maybe I'll just marry him while I'm here. Good plan Mom?! haha.

We walked on and made our way through the other tourists and into the little streets that curved all about with little side shops and restaurants. I can't even keep track of how many Gelato places there are. Which kinda sucks actually because I can't eat it. What a tease. Lo and I got to one point and just decided to take everyones advice and "get lost" in Venice. We turned down every which and way street, went down streets that looked like they were a dead end and had a sudden turn, and streets that actually were dead ends...oops. I absolutely LOVED this. I could get lost in Venice all day long I think. It's just plain fun. Eventually we found a quaint little pizzeria, sat down, and ate some grub. The pizzas were phenomenal and I was stuffed afterwards. At this point we walked all the way back close to our hostel and the train station and hopped on a water taxi. The view from the water was spectacular. Plus, there is something about being on a boat that just makes me so happy. I think it's cuz it reminds me of my daddy and that's just happy. :-) We got off about 50 minutes later at Lido, which was on an island. We walked about 5 minutes to the public beach that was actually very nice. Totally different than our beaches in San Diego though. Very shelly sand. Lo and I go and sit on the sand to relax for a few minutes and we realized something...there were boobies everywhere! Ok, not everywhere, but even one pair of free boobies out and about is enough for me...and there were more than that. So, that was a little awkward. But apparently they are just that confident in themselves. Also saw plenty, plenty of speedos. Again, the confidence level is astounding.

After the beach we ferried back to our stop and took a break in our hostel for about 30-40 minutes. Call us pansies, but we were sweaty, hot, and stinkin tired! Lo and I then headed back in the direction we went in the morning and found another restaurant to eat at that was also fantastic. I had some good ol fashion spaghetti and Lo had Lasagna. Something I find interesting about Europe in general is that all the dining is super close to one another. So you are sitting next to strangers like you are dining with them...but you're not dining with them at all. Personally I dont like it because I normally want to talk behind those peoples backs and make fun of them. (call me a bad person, but you know you are doing it too.) haha. After dinner we walked around a while, got some dessert, and then back to the hostel it was.

Overall it was a great day. I am amazed by Venice and all of its beauty. The people are all super friendly as well, which is a nice change from Paris. You can check out the photos on facebook if you are bored. Tomorrow morning we head to Florence and everyone is saying that we will love that as well. So hopefully that's true! This trip is half way over already. So nutso. Florence, Cinque Terre, and Rome to go.

Talk to ya from Florence!

travel terror

Amen to being out of Paris. I truly don't mean to talk down about Paris (well, ya I do) but it stunk. Maybe if we had been there for 24 hours it would have been better. But now we have seen it, can appreciate the culture that we did enjoy and know the history behind so many things I slept through in high school.

We both slept soundly through the night for the first time, but I woke up with a sore and swollen throat. Yuck. We then checked out of our hostel and went to a small fruit and veggie market and got some fruit for the road. The next stop was the pharmacy so I can be a drug-induced being. The lady that worked there helped me out in a french/english mix language and gave me some throat medicine. Hallelujah. At this point we had directions to our airport, had food, had drugs...but it was only 11:40am. To put this in perspective, our flight wasn't until 7:20pm. However, we were flying Ryanair and had heard it was kinda sketchy, so we decided we wanted to get there in plenty of time. We had nothing else to do, so we decided to get goin and find our way to the airport. This is where the journey began.

Took metro 4 to metro 1. Lo and I get goin on Metro 1 and about two or three stops in the announcer comes on and says some long drawn out thing that we clearly did not understand. Some people started to get off, but a lot stayed too. So we were at a loss. We asked around to see if anyone spoke English and some man said that it may be better for us to get off and take the bus to where we were trying to go because there was a delay on Metro 1. We got off the metro, but were still unsure, so we ended up hopping back on. The metro gets goin and all of a sudden the driver SLAMS on the breaks and we are holding on for dear life, the lights a flickering, people are disturbed, and we finally came to a halting stop in the middle of some tunnel. Seriously, it was from a movie. I fully expected some mask murderer to come in and kill us all, or maybe Lord Voldemort (yes, another Harry Potter reference. again, you like it). Lo is freaking out, I'm kinda laughing (good balance) and then the metro gets goin again and stops at the next station called Concorde. Finally some lady told us that Concorde was the last stop and that everyone had to get off the metro because it was out of order. Lo and I go up and out and ask information what we should do. Low and behold....they don't speak English! Come on France, get with it. Don't you understand that English dominates all? (oh wait, thats just cuz I speak it. dang.) We then go out to the street and find a taxi station, hoping to find a bus station that can get us to where we need to go. Lindsey is almost in tears and I'm still laughing. haha. Maybe I should worry more...but when things like this happen I find it entertaining, a good challenge to figure it out, and I almost always have confidence that it's all gonna be fine. Plus, we had a gajillion hours before our flight still. Back to the story...by the taxi station there was a money exchange place that we went to to try and get some help and hoorayyy she spoke English. The exchange lady was awesome and told us exactly what to do...plus we exchanged money. :-) Oh, and she gave us a free keychain of the Eiffel Tower that I am thinking about burning when I get home. haha. So here is what did...it turns out that no other Metro goes to the station that we needed to get to. Therefore, we got on Metro 8 and took it to another station where we had to buy legit train tickets and figure out the real trains. After much discussion and toil we figured it all out and had to wait 20 minutes for our train. The trains name was Nora. Seriously though, I'm not just making that up. Her name was Nora. Anyways, the train took about a stop away from where we needed to be. When we got off and to the street we got lost for another 10 minutes until someone directed us and after a short walk we found the smallest bus station. It was closed. Of course it was closed. But...10 minutes later it opened again! It just wanted to scare us. We got our bus ticket and waited in a parking lot with other foreign people unorganized and confused wondering what the hell we were doing. You are probably wondering why we needed to get a bus ticket too. To get to this airport we were going to (the "special airport") you could only take a bus and a taxi would have cost a fortune. After about 30-40 minutes of waiting we got on the bus that we were hoping was right and an hour and a half later we arrived at the airport. That's right kids....hour and a half. Seriously?! I don't want to talk about it. That ended up being a little over 4 hours of travel just to get to the airport. RIDONKULOUS. Now, we got there, but we couldn't check in or check baggage until 2 hours before our flight, so we had 1 hour to kill. Lo got a grilled cheese and I got a disgusting sandwich that I couldn't eat. Europe has really been a struggle considering I can't really eat cheese and dairy. Stupid digestive system. An hour later we checked our baggage. Mine was 1 kg over the weight limit so I had to pay a fee. Great. 1 kg...are you kidding me? Moving on..we made it through security with no problems and sat another hour and 45 minutes until we boarded our plane, which was mass chaos. It was like 200 kids running to the ice cream truck at the same time. There aren't seat assignments on Ryanair, so it's first come first serve and people are selfish, selfish, selfish. Of course, Lo and I got separated by about 3 people and she was able to board and they made me wait another 5 minutes. Then finally I boarded and like a good friend should, she saved my seat. No one ended up sitting in between us, which I think was the first good thing that had happened to us all day. The seats don't recline, are very uncomfortable, no magazine holder, and they tried to sell things to us every 10 minutes. First of all they sell warm food like cheeseburgers, hot dogs, pizza, etc. Weird if you ask me. Then they tried to sell scratch off lottery cards. Then it was smokeless cigarettes. I can't figure out how that works. But this was the best....perfume and aftershave. They tried to sell perfume on an airplane. This is a terrible idea for so many reasons. 1. Who buys perfume on an airplane? 2. Who shaves on an airplane? 3. Why would you buy perfume without testing it first? In which case, you would have to test them on the airplane and those scents would be looming about and mixing with other scents like the cheeseburgers and intertwining with everyone various body odors. Just not a good idea. Anyways, an hour and 15 minutes later we landed a terrible landing and we were Italy!

We got our baggage and went to go buy our bus tickets (yes, another bus). Turns our the bus to Venice was leaving in 5 minutes, so we hurried out, found the right one, and parked our booties down. About 45 minutes later we were in Venice and in the right place for once! The next 20 minutes consisted of us getting lost, but we did find our hostel in the end. The hostel is actually very cool. It's down this little corridor and has a sweet wooden door. I don't know what that matter, but it does. We are in a room with 2 other girls who actually go to school in Canada. And everyone we have met so far speaks English! Ugh, so good. We put our stuff down and went and walked around this absolutely beautiful city. It was stunning and it was dark outside. I can't imagine what tomorrow will be like! We also saw a group of about 8 monks taking pictures on a bridge. I asked to take a picture with them, but they wouldn't let me. Dang it.

Out of Paris and in Venice. It is just so good. I'm hoping that I start to feel better tomorrow and this darn sore throat goes away, but we both already feel better just being here. I feel like a big weight has been lifted off our shoulders. Exploration Venice about to begin!

More to come tomorrow night. I'm looking forward to sharing!

Paris. Last full day. Hallelujah.

Today was actually a pretty good day in Paris world. We got breakfast at the grocery store, headed to the metro, and met up with the Versailles Tour Group. After waiting for a long time we got on a two story train and road about 30 minutes out to the Palace of Versailles. Our tour guide was a little ball of energy and was absolutely hilarious so we got pretty excited real quick. She seriously was singing, dancing, and making inappropriate jokes left and right and I LOVED it. Haha. This part of town was much cleaner than what we were used to, so we were happier.

Versailles was beautiful…a little gaudy for my taste, but pretty incredible to look at and it’s HUGE. You should all go look at the photos I uploaded today and see for yourself. But Versailles is really known for the massive gardens in the back, which our tour guide gave an extensive overview of. Walking through the gardens it felt like a crazy labrynth and I kind of tried to imagine myself as Harry Potter about to win the Goblet of Fire. Yes, I’m a dork. You like it. In all honestly though, learning about the different parts of the garden was very cool, however I don’t understand the excessive need for statues of naked people in awkward positions. I can’t imagine living back in the day and making someone sculpt a statue of someone specific just because I wanted it. Like…what’s the point? Anyways, I don’t get it. The gardens were beautiful and the coolest part was when the fountains turned on and were synchronized to music. It’s funny how so many people are amused by dancing water. After the first “water show” we watched in a small pond thing, everyone clapped for the water afterwards like it was people on a stage dancing. I thought it was weird, but again, that’s just me. Look at our pictures again, you will see what I am talking about. We also had real panini sandwiches and crepes while we were there, which is always exciting. Around 3:45pm, we got back on the train with our tired bodies and head back to our hostel where we have been doing thrilling things like eating subway (sad, I know), looking up information on our other travel plans, and doing laundry. Woo hoo!

The rest of night is going to be relaxing. Probably some card games, some internet surfing, and some sleep. Hopefully lots of sleep. I’ve been feeling kind of sick, but I’m hoping it’s just the dirty French making me feel that way. To be honest, I am very ready to get out of France and am not impressed. But, I always would have wondered what it would have been like, so I’m glad we came.
So over and out for now! Talk to you from Venice!

Saturday

Bonjour! Today was our first full day in Paris, it’s 5pm, and we’re exhausted. Haha. So, needless to say we are back in our hostel, taking a break from the craziness, and typing this to you avid readers. After a restless sleep (car horns, drunk people singing, party in room next door, etc.) we woke up, ate breakfast which consisted of bread and jam. We then went to meet up with the free walking tour of Paris right outside of our hostel, however we had apparently just missed it (of course we did). So we had to catch the Metro to the main meeting spot, where we then got in our groups and the tour began! Luckily, our tour guide was around our age and was from the United States…hallelujah to English! The tour took us everywhereeeee. We saw Notre Dame, where Napoleon was buried, the Latin Quarter, Tuileries Gardens, Assemblee Nationale, Les Invalides, Opera Garnier, Academie Francaise, Place de la Concorde, The Louvre, Palais Royal, the Eiffel Tower, and much much more. It was a three and a half hour tour and at the very end we all went to a small café where we got a drink, meat, and cheese. What was unfortunate is that I don’t like any kind of sausage and I can’t eat cheese. Lame. To be honest, this tour was quite miserable for the first half of it. Being the idiot that I am, I wore shorts and FROZE the whole time, my back hurt like nutso, Lo had a headache and worried about skin diseases, my camera wasn’t working so I couldn’t take pictures, my phone died, and Lo’s camera was about to die. Pretty much everything was going grrrreat. Then finally the sun came out for a bit and our perspective changed a bit and we were a bit happier.

Seeing everything today was cool for sure, but I gotta be honest, I am not impressed with Paris at all. The architecture is neat and hearing the history is interesting, but it is kind of a dirty city and not very welcoming. So, in my book, Paris is overrated…unless you want to buy name brand uber expensive useless items or stay in a $3000 a night hotel. Neither of which I am interested in.

Tonight Lo and I are headed to the really expensive part of town to look at all of it’s fading glory and to eat at the nicest McDonalds in the world…mostly because they sell beer and I am astounded by that. Haha. Don’t judge us. You would go to McDonalds too if they sold beer. Hopefully I can also figure out how to fix my camera tonight. Ugh. Anyways, that’s all for now! Sorry for all the posts at once, but the lack of power converters did us in for a bit. But now we’re rollin!

Stay tuned for more tomorrow! Over and out…

PS – Lo and I are learning more and more new and interesting things about each other and we didn’t know before. For instance, Lo didn’t know that I prefer lime over lemon, I love tan lines, I hate sausage, I hate pickles, and I like mud. I did not know that Lo loves bandaids and Neosporin, she also likes tan lines, she likes lemon over lime, and she doesn’t like white rice. See there…you just learned something too! More to come…

3 days late...but here!!

(We tried to upload this yesterday, but it wouldn’t let us…sorry for the delay)

I know you all have been checking over and over again for the next blog post…well here it is! This will actually cover the past 2 days. Crazy how time flies.

THURSDAY

- In the morning we went to a little coffee shop and got breakfast and sat and read for about an hour. Solid way to start the day.

- We then started walking to the tube when Lo realized that she couldn’t find a 20 pound bill that she had before. We went back to the coffee shop and it was nowhere to be found. We’re thinking that it just fell out of her pocket when she took out something else. Big bummer.

- I think we have the tube down now. We feel like pros!

- Got to Hyde Park, found a luscious grassy area and parked our rears down and did absolutely nothing. Haha. It was GREAT! There was a precious family by us that had 2 little towheaded boys named George and Arthur and every time I heard the mom say their names I giggled inside. Hehe

- There was this great little restaurant on the water at Hyde park, so we decided to walk over there and have a splendid lunch while people watching…which is when we saw the buff black man in a speedo. He was just crusin along like it was no big deal. I guess if I was ripped like he was though, I would walk around in a speedo too. Haha. Bad visual…sorry.

- After lunch we met up with my cousin Katy and her friend Ginny and we sat out on the grass, listened to music, read magazines, and just enjoyed the rays of sunshine beating down on us. We ended up staying there until about 5pm. It was beautiful.

- Lo and I hopped back on the tube, showered and changed at our hostel, and took the tube over to the London Eye again where we sat and ate dinner along the boardwalk and drank wine. Oh, we also got crepes with nutella and strawberries and the heavens parted. I would encourage each of you to make one. The crepe maker (haha, that sounds funny) has hit on Lo twice now. He asked if he could date her the day before and this time he was calling her a princess. So watch out Olson’s! Lo is gonna bring home a crepe maker with dredlocks!

- Katy and Ginny met up with us again and we sat on the grass, drank wine, and played cards. Then this creepy homeless man came over and asked us for money in a very affectionate way and he just decided to sit down with us. Katy gave him some crackers and cheese, but he still wouldn’t go and then he decided to tell me that I was beautiful and he stroked my leg and Katy told him off and he finally went. Seriously, the leg stroking was not okay. Creepy.

- The four of us then went to a pub and hung out and went to one other bar and the rest is history my friends. J

FRIDAY

- Struggling to get out of bed, we got up, packed up, and checked out of good ol’ Piccadilly Hostel. I’d like to tell you that I’m gonna miss it, but I won’t. haha. I’ve looked at the painted rat on our wall long enough.

- We grabbed breakfast at the same coffee shop again and then head to the tube so we could get to the train station where we had to catch our train to Paris.

- Kings Cross/St. Pancras station was incredibly nice. They had everything in there! The two of us just sat and waited for our train and yet again, people watched. I personally like to form stories about the people I see. Quite entertaining.

- Boarded our train and we slept…the entire time.

- Arrived in Paris and realized that I don’t know French. Crap. But after walking in circles, standing at two different lines we didn’t need to be in, asking multiple people for help, and a phone call…we figured it out and got on another Metro that took us close to our hostel. Lo and I got off the Metro and yet again realized that we don’t speak French. Dang it again. Haha. So, we asked one other information desk guy to guide us in the correct direction and we made it about 10 minutes later!

- The hotel is actually really nice! We have our own room and own bathroom, which is amazing. We also have a little TV, so we are currently watching the World Cup. The hostel is great and the guy at the front desk is hilarious.

- I think the struggle since being here is the language barrier and for whatever reason we both want to keep trying to speak Spanish to people. News flash, Spanish doesn’t work in France either. Haha.

- We went to dinner next door to our hostel and both ate delicious salads. Our waiter spoke almost every language so he helped us with some of our French pronunciation and we still felt like idiots. Oh well. Hopefully we’ll get the hang of it.

- And here it is…the big news….WE ATE REAL FRENCH FRIES!!! Real fries, in France. It was the most exciting moment ever.

And that’s that about that! It’s 10pm and still light outside, which I still cannot comprehend how that happens. Tomorrow we are taking a walking tour around Paris and seeing whatever else comes our way! I will try to update this on time tomorrow…I know you will all be waiting eagerly. Haha.

Oui Oui from Paris!

The Big Red Bus and all it's glory

There is nothing worse than waking up early in the morning because you have to pee. Which is exactly what I did this morning. Then after that, I suffered from some acid reflux until 9am when our alarm went off…however neither of us actually got up until 10:30am. Oops! Our day started with a fantastic coffee shop where there was a “litter” can, not a trash can, a litter can. BIG difference. After grabbing some coffee for Lo and tea for me and some muffins, we hopped on over to the Big Red Bus Tour where we proceeded to spend the rest of our day.

We hopped on the bus and immediately went to the top so we could feel the wind rush through our nappy hair like dogs. (Lo drooled too…quite embarrassing) The bus tour took us all around London and there was a tour guide that told us the history behind each historical landmark we passed. Surprisingly enough I really enjoyed learning the history of London. At each stop we had the option of getting off the bus and exploring a bit and then we could catch another bus within minutes to take us on our way again. The first stop we got off at was by the London Eye, which is the huge ferris wheel by the river. The eye is an incredible landmark to see, but we are cheapos and didn’t feel like paying and waiting for that long in line…so after walking around a bit we decided to jump back on the red bus, which then took us all over and we then got off next at Westminster. Here we were able to go into St. Margaret’s Chapel, an absolutely beautiful church. As we walked in an admired the stained glass windows and wooden pews, I saw a plaque on the wall for Equiano and got really excited. Forewarning…I am about to be a TOTAL nerd. The plaque I read said that he was baptized in this church in the 1700’s. After reading that I proceeded to tell the history of what I knew and have studied about Equiano. Equiano was actually an abolitionist who drastically changed the world and helped deplete slavery in our world today. He was an African American who actually was a slave on a ship, but had a great master who treated him well and Equiano thought of him as a father, but he knew that not everyone had the same experience he did. Equiano ended up writing a book that was a best seller and he sold a gajillion copies that helped end slavery. Needless to say, he was an absolutely incredible man. After I told Lo all these facts about Equiano, I realized that for the first time in my entire life I applied something academic to real life…it was a BIG moment. Mom, Dad…be proud. After this life stepping stone we hopped back on the bus, saw Buckingham Palace and plenty of other landmarks.

Then, we proceeded to take the bus all the way around in a circle back to the London Eye, where we got off and decided to have dinner by the river. We found a vendor who sold a Japanese wok style of food and we got some noodles and chicken and WINE! Woo woo! We sat on a bench, ate our food out of a cardboard box, drank wine, and we were merry. Full of food and joy, we decided to walk along the river to see what we could see when we stumbled upon a restaurant that sold bottles of wine for 6-9 pounds…and we jumped on that opportunity. Needless to say we sat outside and downed a bottle of wine together for the next two hours and told life stories. The day was just getting better and better!! We then decided to walk back to our hostel. After asking for directions, getting postcards and shot glasses, we eventually found our way back to good ole Piccadilly Hostel. And now we are typing this!

The night is young and we don’t know what it will hold yet. We might go out…or we might just be lame and sit inside and play cards, which sounds mighty fine as well. Tomorrow is our last full day in London and I think we are going to spend it chillin at Hyde Park and writing postcards…maybe to one of you!

So, Day 2….check! Life is good, wine is better. Cheers!

The World's Longest Day

We made it! But it was no easy shindig…tune in to what exactly went down throughout our travels to London….

From beginning to end:

- Mom’s drop us off at San Diego airport and we realized we should have worn matching outfits. Damn. Problem #1.

- I get stopped at security. Yep, still in San Diego. I proved my unsketchiness and went on

- If I hear the word “parcel” again I’m gonna shoot myself.

- Flight delayed 25 minutes….Flight delayed 50 minutes….

- Boarded the plane…then de-planed and the flight got delayed 2.5 more hours.

- Mom’s snacks she packed for us are already gone.

- We talked to the flight attendant and she told us we would probably miss our connecting flight in Chicago to London, that there weren’t any more flights that night out, and that we were on our own to get a hotel. (remember this for later)

- Mom booked us a hotel in Chicago for the night to cover our bases. We’re pissed and stressed….so naturally we got drinks!

- Suddenly life got more fun and we had no worries! (crazy how that works)

- Finally we boarded again and the pilot told us it would be 20 more minutes at least while they filled up a “couple hundred more pounds of fuel”. Geeeez! And they couldn’t have done this in the waiting period because…?

- Lo and I played MASH and I’m sure the lady next to us thought we were in middle school while we giggled about who we were going to marry and what strange color our wedding dress would be according to this great game.

- Landed in Chicago at 8:20pm. Taxied for 20 minutes. In the meantime, our connecting flight left and we missed it by only a few minutes.

- Oh, we ran to the gate BTW…I was then sweaty. Good.

- We talked to an attendant at the gate and she told us that there WAS another flight tonight and she put us on standby, that if we did have to stay the night that the airport would either get us a hotel voucher or we could sleep on cots, and you don’t even want to know we were lied to about our luggage. So. Many. Liiiiies.

- We ran to the next flight available and waited on stanby. Low and behold, Jesus DOES love us and we were the last two people on the flight!

- We had the coolest and most flaming flight attendant ever. He was awesome.

- Lo and I were able to get it figured out so we could sit by each other. However, when I went to put my seat back a bit (8 hour flight), the guy behind me hit my seat super hard and told me it hit his knees….um, okay…what am I supposed to do?! Eventually we compromised and I was able to put it back a little bit.

- To make up for everything though…we each had TV’s and they had games on them! One word….Tetris. Life’s complete.

- Landed and all of our praying that our baggage would make it worked! So off we went and we eventually made it to our hostel no prob bob.

Oh…about London! We spent the day walking through Hyde Park and met up with my cousin Katy and her friend. The park is beautiful and there are all sorts of unnecessary statues, such as Achilles. Oh, and don’t get me started on the million blinged out elephant statues that all look like they’re high. Creepy. After walking around for hours we decided to find our way to a restaurant that’s like a pub version of Chili’s and ate some deliciousness. Lo and I then came back to our hostel, fell asleep for 20 minutes, showered, and now we are typing this. The hostel is pretty nice I guess. The website says that all the rooms are hand-painted differently to create a nice atmosphere….ours has a painting of an oversized mouse in it’s hole. Seriously…the mouse is my size. Not okay. Who thinks it’s a good idea to paint a mouse in a hostel? That’s right..no one. Cuz it’s not!

Anyways, I really wouldn’t expect our trip to be going any differently and so far so good and full of adventure! Who knows what tomorrow will bring! Stay tuned for the adventures of Lo and Robin! Cheers!

PS- we haven’t slept in 29 hours and counting…

Target is a skeeze.

This has been the loooongest day ever. Why is it that the day before something amazing is going to happen, that each hour has to pass by ever so slowly? It's not like the minutes actually do get longer. So here is how my last day in the United States (until July 1st) went:

8:00am - really weird dreams

10:00am - Iron & Wine alarm clock went off and I pressed snooze....twice.

10:20am - Mom jumps on me and tickles me. Not cool.

10:30am - Mom her unwelcome tickle fest up and made delicious pancakes!

10:45am - Dad was outside by the pool so I went out there and told him that I saw something in the pool and he had to go look at it...then I attempted to push dad in the pool which turned into a wrestling match and I just ended up on the grass laughing really hard. haha. Dad and I then proceeded to throw the tennis ball back and forth while the dog chased it over and over again. Stupid dog. Doesn't he get we're not going to give it to him? Then dad had a bad throw...which i didn't realize was a diversion...he ran around the other side of the pool...but I'm quick and caught him on the other side and it turned into another wrestle match which I yet again lost. Dang! But I think the funniest part was that Dad was uncontrollably laughing and he snorted. haha. Why is a snort so funny? Then dad wouldn't leave where he was until I was way inside the house not even remotely close to the door. What, like I'm untrustworthy or something???

11:00am - Shower/Start packing....got overwhelmed

12:00pm - Went to a ghetto Target. Let's stop and chat about Target for a second. Target is the one place for everything kind of store, but it is so overwhelming at times! I had about 10 little things to get for my trip: headphones, soap, poncho, various bathroom needs, and of course the one and only Pepto Bismol (my second savior). Somehow these little things ended up being a lot of things and cost me around $100! Typical of Target. You know you are all guilty of the same thing. You go in with a short list of items and suddenly you need to upgrade to a cart instead of the basket you are carrying. You know the reason the $1.00 section always has great items? It's because you buy more of them and suddenly it's the $20.00 section! It's ridiculous. Then I left feeling broke, used, and dirty. The slogan for Target should be "Target. The store that's like your ex-boyfriend".

2:30pm - Finally got back home. (yes, somehow Target took me an hour and a half) Ate a delicious wrap that mother made and a really dry peach that was gross.

3:00pm - Finally got serious about packing. Started laying everything out. Then I put everything in my backpack and it fit! With extra room! However, Lindsey told me her pack only weighed 18lbs...mine weighed 32. Damn. Think again, try again Rob. I took everything back out. Got rid of about 5 or 6 things and replaced them with comfy, casual dresses instead (because everyone told me to) and packed again. Still fit! Hallelujah. Don't really think I took any weight out, but I felt better still. And DONE! All I gotta do now is grab a few things in the morning and I'm set!

6:00pm - Played on facebook for a while.

7:00pm - Ate din din with the mama and watched the NBA finals. WOO WOO for the Celtics! I know I'm from CA and I'm supposed to root for the Lakers, but 1. I'm really sick of them winning. And 2. I can't stand Kobe Bryant and would like to punch him in the face. He really irks me for some reason. Sure, he can play the game...but he's selfish if you ask me and really not that fun to watch. But thats just me! Most people disagree with my theories.

8:00pm - Started writing this blog. Skyped with my bro and his little nuggett baby Riley. and now I'm back writing this again.

8:54pm - Thats right now. I'm writing. Duh.

And who knows for the rest of the night! All I know is that I leave tomorrow and I'm stoked! Let the adventure begin!

What makes an airplane worth the stench?

Europe in 2.5 days!!! I am absolutely pee-your-pants excited! Lindsey Olson and I head to the aiport Monday morning and will be in Europe 2 hours later! Oh wait...we'll be there the next day, just kidding. I think thats the part that sucks about traveling...no one wants to sit on a plane for that long, it's just miserable and has the awkward "airplane smell". Don't pretend like you don't know what I'm talking about, it's true! The "airplane smell" consists of old fabric infested with bacteria, disease, and substances I don't want to know, it contains baby diaper smell from the one newborn crying right behind your seat, it has the smell of roast beef sandwiches that no one actually likes, and lastly, the stench of the overweight harry man sitting next to you. But despite all these negative aspects of a plane ride, you know what makes it all worth it?....

Ginger Ale.

I mean, when else do we really drink ginger ale? Maybe in the occasional mixed cocktail (maybe that's just me), but really, lets face it...Ginger Ale is an airplane drink and is probably only still made because of the various airlines that use it.

Moving on...Europe...so soon! Off to France, Paris, Venice, Florence, Cinque Terre, and Rome. All in 17 days. I seriously cannot wait for the adventure that lies ahead. I'm stoked to meet new people, embrace new cultures, take a million pictures, attempt to speak Italian, drink delicious wine, and fall in love with a British boy. Good plan right?! Everything is in order. Maybe I should start packing....

I am now craving Ginger Ale.

sunscreen.

Suncreen. I have fought that dreaded oily substance all my life. It's greasy, leaves you looking shiny (not normal), and I always miss a spot on my body and get burned in an awkward place. Clearly it's just unreliable. I'm the kid that goes to Walgreens, goes to the spray on "no-rub" section of suncreen, finds the smallest SPF possible, and heads to the check out line satisfied. Today was a big day in my world...I figured out why the sales clerk at Walgreens looks at me funny when I check out with my SPF -7 sunscreen. (Last time he told me I was too late and that I was already burned...)

Mom forced me into going to the dermatologist this morning to just get a once over look and make sure I don't have any strange abnormalities. So, off I go to the doctor and fill out the million and half pieces of paper that ask me whether or not I have diseases that I've never heard of and have nothing to do with skin. I'm finally escorted to a quaint little room at the back of the hallway and proceeded to wait for another 20 minutes. I'm pretty sure I have the posters on the wall memorized now. For the record, it's really awkward being in a hospital gown and just waiting...actually it's just awkward all the time. There is a nice breeze in the back though, so thats a plus. Anyways, the doc comes in (precious lady) and she had a HUGE zit ready for the poppin on her forehead!!! Ok, no, I'm just kidding, but that would have been really ironic and hysterical and I kinda wish it could have happened that way. Here's how the next conversation happened:

Doc: How are you with sunscreen?

Me: Uh...I put it on sometimes. Not regularly.

Doc: You don't have a moisturizer with SPF?

Me: Um...yea, but I don't regularly use it.

Doc: Well, we're gonna change that. You're about as fair skinned as they get.

And there we have it folks. Apparently I am the whitest of whites. What a sobering day it was. I was thinking that I was actually pretty tan at the moment too. Confidence down 7 points. Then I somehow went home with an SPF 46 face moisturizer and an SPF 50 regular sunscreen for everyday use. SPF 50 is more SPF than I would use in a week normally. Probably 2 weeks. She thinks I'm white now?! I'm gonna be a ghost next time I visit the ol' dermatologist.

So there we have it. I'm white. I have more freckles that I know what to do with. I have a sunspot permanently on my nose. And I like it. Bring it on sun! Try to ultra- violent ray this!!

here i am

Today was a great day....let me tell you about it. My alarm went off with a great tune from Iron & Wine at 7:07am and I proceeded to press snooze until 8:57am. I knew I needed to get some exercise in this morning, but something besides running, so I decided to go for bike ride. I haven't seriously ridden by bike since high school, so I put on my biking shorts with the padded butt, grabbed a biking jersey, threw on my helmet, got a water bottle, strapped on my biking shoes, and headed out of the neighborhood. I decided a good goal for me was to ride my bike the back way through the ranch to Lomas Santa Fe Country Club where my mom was playing tennis at the time, which is about 10 miles away. This was a terrible decision and I am going to hate myself in the morning now. I guess I didn't really think through that this entire ride is mostly up hill and really windy with tiny bike lanes. Go me! I'm sure I got laughed at by cars passing by because I was going so. stinkin. slow. up the hills! However, after 2 stops on a steep hill to get water, I eventually made it to the Club drenched in beaded sweat. Then mom took me home. haha.

The rest of the day was full of errands, lunch, and hangin with the mama. What's exciting is my night. I went in to San Diego Sol Basketball Club to work for the first time tonight. I played for Sol when I was in High School and it is truly an honor to be back working for the club now. The management and coaches are absolutely phenomenal and truly make me be a better person. I learn so much from them! I helped work drills and scrimmaged and was able to even put my two cents in a times and teach some things. And let me tell you...it never felt more right. God has given me this desire to work with high schoolers, teach them, coach them, and inspire them hopefully. Sure, I'm teaching basketball, but I hope more than anything that I can teach more than that. I hope that these girls see that it's not about basketball, but it's about becoming a better person through this amazing game. And once you get the meaning behind why you play, you're going to be successful. You don't have the be the biggest, the fastest, the best shot...but be the hardest worker and the rest will fall in your hands. I cannot wait to get to know these girls and hopefully teach them something valuable. This experience is going to be incredible and hopefully beneficial to my future as a teacher and coach. I am looking forward to learning from the other coaches that I am under and I would bet that I learn a ton from the girls as well. Because that's how it always works. God is good and He's got an incredible plan. For the first time since I've been back in San Diego, I feel like I have a distinct purpose and I am doing what I am supposed to be doing. It feels good. I don't want to lose that fire. It's amazing how things happen and also don't work out for a reason. I don't know what I'm doing each day and I like it that way. Living life this way forces me to look beyond myself and live each second to the fullest. Here I am trusting. Here I am learning. Here I am frustrated. Here I am thrilled. Here I am confused. Here I am joyful. Here I am in purpose. Here I am feeling a million things at once. But in the end, Here I am.