Day 13 - Milan to home - Friday, June 12th

We'll rise early. I will get you on the bus to the airport in time for your flight home.

We will leave with many hugs and smiles!

Your coursework will be completed during the summer in WebCT.

Day 12 - Milan - Thursday, June 11

We'll eat breakfast at the hotel and take the Metro from the train station to

National Museum of Science and Technology (Museu Nazionale della Scienza e della Technica. Leonardo da Vinci was not just a great artist, but a great technologist as well. In the Leonardo Gallery, check out the models made from his drawings of the cannons, war machine, glider, parachute, self-propelled car, revolving crane, drilling machine,etc.

Santa Maria delle Grazie, Leonardo da Vinci's, Last Supper. When the painting was completed in 1497, it was famous then, and still is today.

Dinner will be on our own. Then back to the hotel to pack to go home.

Day 11 - Milan - Wednesday, June 10th

Today we arise early, eat breakfast in our hotel, and take the Eurostar to Milan.

We'll unpack at our hotel right across from the train station and hop on the Metro to go down town. We'll tour the Duomo, the Galleria, and La Scala.

Day 10 - June 9 - Tuesday - Venice/ Murano

We'll get up early, eat at our hotel, catch the train to Venice. From the station we will catch a vaporetto to Murano to see how glass is blown. We will see amazing glass art.

The afternoon will be spent in Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari examining the magnificent painted alterpieces of Titian.

Day 9 - Travel to Mestre/Venice - Monday

With great sadness, we will leave Florence after breakfast in our hotel. We'll hop the Eurostar to Mestre where we will unpack and jump back on a train to Venice (only 10 minutes away).

We'll buy you a bus pass for Monday and Tuesday that will allow you to ride any Vaporetto. Gondola rides are optional. It is about 100 Euro for 40 minutes. But up to six may share the price.

We'll wander around Piazza San Marco, take you to see the Bridge of Sighs, tour St. Mark's Cathedral, and walk to through the "Gaunlet of Gold" to the Rialto Bridge.

Day 8 - Florence - Sunday

We'll get you to church in the morning. Just let us know which one you would like to attend earlier in the week and we'll get you on the bus.

After lunch, we'll explore the Baptistry (including Ghibertti's "Doors of Paradise", Santa Maria del Fiore, Il Campanille, and Palazzo Vecchio. Then enjoy sunset on Ponte Vecchio.

Dinner will be on your own.

Day 7 - Florence - Sat. June 6th

This is a day for optional side trips. Would you like to do a day of cooking school? Would you prefer seeing the hills of Tuscany including the Towers of San Gimigniano and Siena? Escape to Pisa and il Campo di Miracoli and the Leaning Tower? Go to the Museo del Duomo? Hike to the top of the Duomo or Bell Tower? Wander the city by yourself or with a friend? Or stay home and wash your clothes?

Day 6 - Florence

We'll arise early, eat breakfast at our hotel. Then off to visit the Academy to see Michealangelo's "David" and then "The Uffizzi".

We'll take bus 17 up the mountain to spend the afternoon in Fiesole.

Back in time for dinner on our own in Florence.

Day 5 - Travel to Florence

Will rise early, eat breakfast, and walk to Roma Termini, the central train station. Hopefully, you pack yesterday evening. We'll ride the Eurostar to Florence. We will multi-task by observing as we walk to our hotel. We'll walk from the train station, Santa Maria Novella past the Cappelle Medici, where 300 years of Medici are buried beneath several tombs by Michealangelo.

Once unpacked we''ll walk down to the Arno and go through the Science Museum, then out to the Leather School at Santa Croce. We'll hop on Bus 6 and get off at Piazza Michealangelo and stroll up to San Miniato al Monte.

Dinner will be on your own.

Day 4 - Ostia Antica

when Romans want to get away for a day, one of the places they go is the ancient port city of Ostia Antica, among Italy's best preserved ruins.

Day 3 - June 2nd

We breakfast early at our hotel and then jump the Metro to the Vatican Museums. We will enter the museums under the statues of Michealangelo and Rafael. These were two of the greatest artists for the popes during the renaissance. You will have unparalleled views of Michaelangelo's cupola del duomo di San Pietro. This tour includes the Vatican tapestries and map room of Italy. You will get to visit the Sistine Chapel. The tour concludes in St. Peter's Basilica.





Back on to the Metro and we'll zip across town to the Coliseum. We can eat lunch near the Vatican or near the Coliseum. This is one of the "not to be missed" sights of ancient Rome. It is an engineering feat of extraordinary sophistication and as beautiful ans anything to be seen in the city. Yet the horrors it witnessed and the cruelty it accommodated make it a confusing place to visit. A few statistics to bear in mind while enjoying the remarkable views through its graceful arches and marveling at its survival over the centuries.: the original circumference measured a third of a mile, it's four-story mass supported by a ring of concrete 43 feet high, sunk into a marshy bed of a lake reclaimed from Nero's garden. Streaming through 76 numbered entrances, 50,000 spectators could make their way to their seats in 10 minutes. Built by Jewish slaves in the wake of a failed revolt, the stadium was inaugurated for the people's pleasure with a daylong slaughter of 5,000 animalas, one dispatched every ten seconds, and made pleasant by means of retractable awnings, unfurled by sailors fro the Imperial navy, who also manned the galley's in mock sea battles.Women were restricted to the uppermost levels, except the Vestal Virgins,who held places of honor close tot he Emperor and were helped to passageways know as vomitoria as needed.

The Palatine Hill

Day 2 - June 1st

We'll get up early and eat breakfast at the hotel. This morning walk to the Pantheon. We will start at the Renaissance fountain in front of it. The inscription over its portico - M. AGRIPPA. L.F.COS TERTIUM FECIT (Marcus Agrippa, son of Lucius, Consul for the third time, built this) - incorrectly credits the Pantheon to Agrippa. It is to Hadrian we owe the present Pantheon, which dates back to 125 A.D., and to its 7th century consecration as the church of St. Mary and all saints are credited its survival. It was cannibalized over the years-it's dome stripped bare in 655, the bronze of the portico's beams carted off the be melted down.

From the Pantheon, we will walk to the Piazza di Pietra, named for the Temple of Hadrian, whose 2,000 year old stone columns dominate the Piazza. We will peek over the guardrail to appreciate how "tall" Rome has grown in the millenia since. This is one of the more graphic examples of the many layers of the city.


From the Piazza di Pietra, we will walk to the Trevi Fountain. There are dozens of inexpensive shops around the fountain.

We will walk from the Trevi Fountain, through Piazza Mignanelli. There if you like, we can stop at Cafe Leonardo for a panino, drink, and check your email (30 min. for 3 Euros).



We will climb the Rampa Mignanelli to the top of the Spanish steps for a spectacular view across Rome and a visit to the Church of the Trinita dei Monti. with a brief detour up to the Villa Medici.

Villa Medici's wide mouth fountain sports a curious spout-a relic of Christina, Queen of Sweden's lucky cannonball shot from the ramparts of Castel S. Angelo.

We will walk back down and rest with the tourists on the Spanish Steps.

We'll hop the Metro and go to the Teatro del Marcello, a remarkably well preserved structure began by Caesar and subject to 2,000 years of Roman recycling. We'll walk around to the Portico d'Ottavia erected in the second century B.C. to enclose twin temples to Juno and Jupiter. For centuries, this was Rome's fish market, and later it marked the borders of the Ghetto, where Rome's 5000 Jews were confined by Paul IV in 1555 after a long period of toleration and prosperity. Obliged to wear distinctive garb, forbidden to practice a profession or own land, Jews made their living buying and selling used goods until the walls of the ghetto were torn down in 1870 at the Italian Unification. We will walk by the Synagogue and the frescoed church opposite it that was on of the several places where Jews were obliged to attend Mass, the tiny Tempiettto di Carmelo.

In the late afternoon/early evening we'll explore the Piazza Navona. From 9 am until midnight, the 900 foot long Piazza, which follows the outline of the Circus Agonalis built by Domitian was flooded into the 19th century is thronged with vendors, portrait artists, and tourists who crowd to see the main attraction, Bernini's Fountain of the Four Rivers.

Dinner every evening will be on your own. Often several participants will stop in a supermarket and buy some Italian food. Then share in a picnic in a local park or back at the hotel!

Itinerary - Day 1 - May 31, 2009

You will make your own airlines reservations and buy your own tickets to the Leonardo Da Vinci Airport in Rome. Make sure you have obtained your passport. Send me a copy of your itinerary and I will be waiting for you outside of customs in the airport. I will walk you across the street, buy your ticket, and get you on the train the main train station in Rome, Roma Termini. Either Lisa, or my son, Matt will meet you at Track 24 when you arrive. S/he will take you to the tourist office in the train station to buy you a Roma Pass. That pass will get you into the Coliseum and on all the Metro and bus lines during our stay in Rome. S/he will then walk you to our hotel.

You can rest or wander around the neighborhood until everyone arrives and we can reconnoiter regarding our stay in Rome.

Welcome!

Thanks for checking out our Blog! Here we will tell you about everything that we will do as a part of our course, EDUC 6440 Creativity in Education - Following in the Footsteps of the Master's in Italy of June 2009.

If you have not been to our main website, please go to http://www.suu.edu/scps/studyabroad/Education09.html

For additional tips and hints regarding travel in Italy, please check out Lisa's Blog at http://italiantipsandtricks.blogspot.com/

Please email me at pellegrini@suu.edu with all of your questions. Nothing is too small!