Italy in One Week - Globemaster Girl

After graduating college, my gift from my parents was a week long trip to ITALY! My mom and I both got to go and it was seriously a trip of a lifetime and we were able to see SO much in just one week! Here’s how we did it!

My mom and I left on a Sunday night flying out from Atlanta to Venice and got SUPER lucky flying Standby out of there, we even got Business Class! Let’s just say I never want to travel without it again (unless of course I’m the one flying)!

Day One

We arrived in Venice in the morning and automatically went to the hotel (we were exhausted)! My mom and I stayed at the Crown Plaza in Quarto d’Altino outside of the city of Venice, but it was right next to the train station that took us directly into the heart of the city!

We walked everywhere and saw all of the amazing sites there is! Some of these included:

St. Mark’s Square
The Grand Canal

Bridge of Sighs
St. Mark’s Basilica
Liberia Acqua Alta (an awesome bookstore that has these well known book stairs in the back of the store)

Doges Palace
Various Monuments

After walking and seeing all of the sites, we had to get some pizza and of course some gelato (which was everything and more from what people say)! Eventually, we made our way back to the train and back to the hotel, where we were beyond excited to get to sleep!

Day Two

Our second day began with some breakfast in the hotel, then we packed up our stuff and headed to the train station where we caught two trains to take us to Florence!

From the train station in Florence, we just walked to our hotel (you’ll find that most people in Italy just walk everywhere, taxis and such are available, but its so much easier) Alba Palace. Once we got all settled there, it was onwards to seeing all the sights Florence had to offer!

Our first stop was to see Michaelangeo’s David (which was a long line for). He was a lot bigger than I thought and I definitely had people looking at me while I had my mom take this picture! (Sorry, I just had to!)

From there we walked and saw different parts of the city and started heading towards the Ponte Vecchio bridge, got dinner, then climbed SO MANY stairs up to Piazze Michaelangelo! If you ever get a chance to go to Florence, make the hike up to here around sunset, the views are AMAZING!

We stopped at a small convenience store on the way home and got some wine, where we sipped while planning our next day until it was time for bed!

Day Three

Our hotel in Florence also served breakfast, so after eating, just like in Venice, we went and packed up all of our belongings and headed out!

Our train to Naples was about 30 minutes late and since we had e-tickets, we couldn’t get the time changed (you can see my post about traveling by train here). It was kind of sketchy hanging around the train station waiting and you could tell there were plenty of people walking around looking for those tourists to “help.”

Eventually we got on the train to Naples and once arriving there, we realized that we didn’t have the name of the city where our hotel was! It was quite an adventure and we ended up taking a “taxi” (pretty much this dude’s car who had NO idea how to drive) after figuring out where our hotel was located! My mom and I were a little worried, but couldn’t help but laugh at the situation we were in!

We finally made it to Castellammare di Stabia where we stayed at Hotel Miramare Stabia. That night we got dressed up and went to dinner at the hotel (the food was AMAZING) and went and had a drink on the patio (the bartender Salvatore made a really good strawberry drink — but no idea what it was made of)!

It was just nice to be able to relax after that long day and our hotel was right on the beach! The beach wasn’t as clean as I figured it would be, but the sand was black and there was so much sea glass! Its always cool to see something different than the normal!

Day Four

We woke up on our Day 4 feeling tired, but excited to see the sights around Naples. Breakfast was at the hotel (per usual) and from the hotel we walked to the train station and got on quite an interesting/sketchy train. But, it took us to our next spot to see, which was Pompeii!

Pompeii with Mt Vesuvius looming in the background

Pompeii was amazing and the history there made me speechless! We walked around and saw all of the old buildings and statues. There was even an area that had a lot of artifacts covered up, because Pompeii is still an active archaeological digging site! (And i’m pretty sure we saw some people that they had dug up!)

After checking out Pompeii, we took a VERY bumpy truck ride up to Mount Vesuvius! They drop you off near the top and you have to walk the rest of the way to see the volcano, which of course, is still active! My mom was a little worried being up there, but you know, if it decided to blow then and there, I was there with my mom doing something I love! 🙂

After all the hiking and heading back down, we stopped at a small restaurant and got some very delicious pizza and beer (pizza was pretty much the only thing we ate besides maybe once we got to Rome lol).

When we got back to the hotel, we got dressed and I put on my bathing suit, because the hotel was having a pool party. Well…this pool party was a MUCH fancier party than both of us were expecting! So, I just swam for a little bit, then we went back to the room with our drinks and just hung out! Needless to say, we were laughing once again at what we thought a pool party meant!

Day Five

The morning of Day 5 we got up and ate breakfast, then went and walked on the beach and collected our fair share of sea glass.

From there, we took the sketch train with all of our luggage back to Naples to catch a train to ROME! It was funny getting to the train station in Naples, because we saw our “taxi” driver Gerrano (who definitely didn’t remember us, but acted like it)!

Once we arrived in Rome, we went to get some more Euros at the Currency Exchange kiosk, and the people there ended up taking my mom’s card (make sure when you travel…you let your credit card people know lol). Thankfully, we both had other cards we could use!

At the train station, we stood in a LONG line to get a taxi cab! Our driver ended up being super nice and gave us advice on places to see! After he dropped us off, we headed to our apartment that we rented from Eduardo (you can check out his place here — he was really nice and helpful).

That first night we just kind of walked around and saw some of the sites in Rome, such as the Pantheon and Piazza Noavana. My mom and I went to the Monument of Victor Emmanuel II and then into this cute little fruit store, but it was mainly things you could use around your house, just in the shapes of fruit (definitely different, but very cute)!

We got dinner and ended up seeing a small parade of majorettes performing to a song and watched a marching band. It was definitely super random, but great to see a dinner and show!

From dinner, we walked to the Trevi Fountain and of course threw in a coin (legend says if you throw in a coin and make a wish, then you’ll go back to Rome in your lifetime)! On our way home, we stopped at a grocery store to get some food for breakfast in the morning and some more wine (can’t ever have enough in Italy)! From there, we facetimed my dad and some family friends while planning our next day!

Day Six

Day 6 was one of the days that I was the most excited about when planning this trip. We spent most of the day at Vatican City. This was on my bucket list for SO long (you can see my Bucket List post here) and was just so amazing to be there and finally see THE Catholic Church!

It was beyond beautiful! It didn’t cost anything to go into St. Peter’s Basilica (its a MUST)! I even got the chance to do Confession in there, which is a once in a lifetime experience. After checking out the basilica, we went to the shop and got some rosaries and some other momentos. I would have loved to have gotten my rosary blessed by the Pope, but it does cost extra money and you would have to come back the next day or a couple days to pick it up.

We went around the corner in Vatican City to the Sistine Chapel and bought a skip the line ticket for a self-guided tour there. It was awesome to go around all of the amazing artwork, but the crowds were terrible! Once you get into the room with the very well-known ceiling painting by Michaelangelo, it is even more crowded and you’re not allowed to take pictures (they will take your camera if caught and make you delete it). The painting was beautiful, but a lot smaller than I had imagined.

Walking through the Vatican Museum to the Sistine Chapel

From there, we went and got dinner and ended up being in the Piazza that everyone seemed to be watching the Italian Soccer team play in a big game. There were people everywhere lighting off green and red smoke and blowing air horns. It was definitely interesting and really cool to see so many people dedicated to watching their team!

When you go to Italy, you have to try Limencello. We did and I honestly didn’t like it as much, but when in Rome!

We walked around there to the different shops and then just decided to go back home and rest for our big, long walking day that was Day 7.

Day Seven

On our last day of the trip (AND MY MOM’S BIRTHDAY!!) we decided to do a Hop-on-Hop-off Day bus ride. It was the quickest way for us to see everything, but we did also walk a lot (hit about 27,000 steps that day)!

The stops we planned on stopping to see were:

The Colosseum (long line getting into here, so prepare some extra time, but SO worth it!)

Castel Sant’Angelo
Piazza del Popolo
Roman Forum (right next to the Colosseum, so you can walk right into and around it)

Spanish Steps
Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore
Holy Stairs (Scala Santa) – make sure to have yourself covered up, this place is believed to be part of the journey Jesus took on the way to His trial and death
Capitoline Hill

Lateran Palace
Monte Celio
And many more!

We didn’t stop at every single place, but drove by a lot of the ones that you don’t normally hear about. The hop-on-hop-off tour was definitely the best way for us to figure out what we could see! Anything extra that we wanted to see, such as the Holy Stairs, we found a stop that was close enough and walked the rest of the way!

My mom and I were able to see SO much and we ended our last day with some good food (pizza), enjoying our wine, and celebrating her birthday before heading back to the states in the morning.

Day Eight

On Day 8, it was sadly the day we left. We had a taxi pick us up from our apartment and we headed to the airport to fly out of Rome back to Atlanta. My mom and I got lucky a SECOND time with business class on the ride back too!

If you ever fly out of the European area during the day, be sure to check out and watch outside of the windows. You never know what you’re going to see!