Family Visits!
I’ve been kind of behind on blogging lately, but with very good reason. My mom was here two weeks ago, and then my dad and Julie were here this past week. They were supposed to all come together, but Julie won districts in tennis (Yay!) and went to state.
So first, Mom’s visit: Thursday after class I rushed to Venice as fast as possible, and Mom and I had dinner and hung out. Friday we walked around pretty much every part of Venice partly because we wanted to see everything and partly because we got lost a lot (all leading up to the day we spend about two hours wandering around in the rain looking for Dad and Julie’s hotel, Hotel Priuli, only to realize that it wasn’t on the tiny, impossible to find Priuli street, but a block from our hotel on a street we had walked by about 20 times). Saturday we met two of my mom’s friends from Austria and spent the day with them. Sunday we woke up early and took the train back to Padova to meet Novella and drive to Davide’s vineyard, where he was having a big lunch party for all the agricultural students who picked the olives and their families. We got to help pick the olives, ate lunch, and then just walked around and enjoyed the view. When we got back to Padova we basically just hung out and ate delicious meals and window-shopped. It was excellent.
Dad and Julie’s visit: After my mom left, I had half a week at home, and then Saturday I went to Venice to meet Dad and Julie. We spent a day sightseeing in Venice and then headed back to Padova Sunday morning. Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday we did a lot of wandering around, sightseeing, shopping, eating, and watching old episodes of Friends in the hotel. It was fun to be able to take them to my favorite restaurants and stores in Padova. Wednesday morning I had to go to the doctor, just to get a prescription, which should have taken 30 seconds, so we went at 15 minutes before walk-in hours started hoping to be in and out quickly. Instead, we waited three and a half hours (more about this later). So Wednesday was kind of a bummer, untiiil we went to the best dinner ever. This restaurant has definitely become my favorite in Padova. It’s called Alchimia (Alchemy), and it’s mostly a wine bar, there’s never anyone there eating, but it’s so good and not ridiculously expensive. We had pumpkin and chestnut risotto, gnocchi with wild boar ragu, tiramisu, panna cotta with berry sauce, and chocolate mousse. It was an excellent ending to their visit. Thursday morning they left and I had to go back to normal (though not at all normal) life…sad.
Pictures to be added later (when julie puts them on facebook).
