Per l'amore di ITALIA: Le Colline delle Toscana

The hills of Tuscany. On March 31st to April 1st, all of us ISU students and students from another program from the United States were treated to a school-sponsored trip to four different Tuscan towns in a little under 48 hours. And when I say treated, we already paid for it with our program, so we might as well have gone. Haha! But it was so pretty so it didn't even matter to me :) Here are the four towns that we were able to visit:

Arezzo:

Our first town, located about 2-3 hours outside of Florence was a very small and quaint little town, much like Florence but much less chaotic and much smaller. When we were visiting, there was an antique market that was being held on almost every main street, so it was very cool to see the different kinds of products and furnishings being sold. Then after a 2 hour walking tour and a lot of churches, we all split up for lunch.

artwork for sale!

we visited sooo many churches!

Our tour guide, Lucca...dougie-ing in Toscana! ...jk

Many, many markets throughout all of Arezzo

Due Piadine....YUMMMMMM

And of course, some pastries for dessert :)

SUCH INCREDIBLE VIEWS!!!

Cortona:

This was the next town we visited, and it was also where we stayed overnight at until Sunday morning. What's so great about Cortona is that the entire town is actually perched on top of a Tuscan hill, which provided us with million dollar views.

We dropped our things off at the Hotel San Luca, and Andrea and I had a balcony of the view of all the surrounding towns at the bottom of the hills. Just incredible. And then our walking tour consisted of a few churches, a stop for some gelato, and a climb to the highest point of the city where we felt like we had a view where we can see for miles. Then at 7:30 we had a 5 course meal planned for us at a restaurant in town and we ate off of a true Tuscan menu.

My realization moment here in Cortona is that I am in love with the Italian countryside. Let me just blow your mind with some pictures.

Mine and Andrea's balcony view of the
countryside :)

Everything was either straight uphill or downhill. No leveled out streets! These people must be all in fantastic shape haha

awwwww a hat and umbrella store!

YUM!

Redbirdzzzzz

ON TOP OF THE WORLDDD.

View again :)

Antipasto con vino rosso!

Yummy yummy cibo!

dinner loves :)

the most ridiculous hotel keys known to man!

Pienza:

The next morning, we all hopped on a bus and drove under an hour to Pienza, the town known best for their cheese!!! So we had a little bit of time to explore the town and then we were given the opportunity to visit a cheese farm. Sounds ridiculous and incredibly clique, but it was pretty awesome!! We had a tour of the process and then had wine cheese bread and olive oil tasting...YUM.

Cheese on cheese on cheese!

Cute old man and his adowable dawwggg :)

Allie and I

Cheese farm!

And of course, the tasting after the tour :)

Montepulciano:

And last but not least, the town that New Moon was filmed in, and the town known for their wine. In fact, it apparently has the oldest wine cellar in the world, and we got to tour it!! Much like Cortona, it was all very hilly, and on top of a Tuscan hill, so we were surrounded again by some green countryside.