Bella Vista

 The last two weeks has felt like a bit of heaven compare to the last farm. We have a spacious room with a walk out balcony that looks out over the Amalfi coast. It has all the Italian charm. The attitude towards work here is work if you feel like it, when you feel like and how long you feel like. I must say it’s been difficult for me being a person who likes structure. I like to know I start work at 9 and finish at 4 everyday.  I learned quickly I wasn’t going to get that here.



Lucas enjoying the view. I'm up on our balcony taking the photo.

We spent the whole first week of work harvesting olives from their 30 olive trees. This is a family event so Alessandra’s Brother, Mother and Aunt all came to help. Her Mother and Aunt were super friendly. They spoke about the same amount of English as we do Italian. It was entertaining trying to figure out what each other was trying to communicate. There was a lot of hand gestures and acting, followed by a lot of laughs. Once we had all the olives harvested they took them to a plant that processes them into olive oil. We got to ride along and watch the olives we picked washed and go through the process of turning into oil. The deal is the person that brings in the olives gets the first 30% of cold pressed oil. This is enough oil to supply the whole family for the year (and they like their oil). There is no money exchanged, just olives for oil. I’m super bummed because I forgot to bring my camera to the processing plant. I could have shown everyone how it works from tree to table.

 

 

We used this special ramp to pick all the leaves and things out of the olives.

This is about half the olives we picked.

Our second week of work was the most unorganized. We spent a lot of time waiting around to be told or shown what work needs to be done. We planted some things, mowed lawn, harvested fruit, and created a new garden by tilling the ground and creating rows for planting. They are very fortunate here to have a year round growing season!


The garden we tilled and made these rows using muscle power.

 Although the views are beautiful and the work is easy and minimal it’s been difficult “fitting in” with the family. I’ve felt awkward and left out more here than anywhere so far on our trip. They don’t really acknowledge us or include us in anything. We’re just these people floating around that they have to feed. That being said I’m excided to move on to our next farm in a few days. It will be nice to have a change of scenery.



The yummy dinner we bought because our farm host told us at 8pm they wern't feeding us dinner after we spent the whole day working on their garden.

Boot Camp

 

 

I’ve decided not to write much about the farm in Southern Italy we went to immediately after Rome. It was a very busy & traumatic week for both Lucas and I.  Looking back now I feel taken advantage of and disappointed at the same time. Luckily we were able to get out of there early on the farm owners request. We would have stuck out our two week sentence if not given the opportunity to leave after just one week. Although I’ve chosen to block most of the experience from memory there was great views and I would like to share some pictures.



A view of the farm

We experienced our first Lizards. They were everywhere!

Most of the time we were above or in the clouds



Paris & Rome



On top the Eiffel Tower

The last few weeks have been complete chaos. I find it hard to go back and blog about things that happened a long time back. I know, two weeks isn’t very long but the amount of things we’ve experienced makes it hard to sum them up.  Having said that I’ve decided to give a brief description about Paris and Rome and share a few of my favorite pictures.

Paris was short and sweet! We spent only two nights in Paris leaving us not much time for touring. Our top two things to do were The Eiffel Tower and The Louvre Museum. If time permitted Lucas wanted to see the Arc de Triumph, which we did get to see the night we arrived. The next morning we went to the top of the Eiffel Tower which was remarkable. I do have to say I did not find it romantic one bit! It was the best view of Paris we could ask for, but not romantic. After our climb to the top we immediately headed to the Louvre. Top on our list was to see the Mona Lisa painting. Both Lucas and I were not impressed with the painting. We’ve seen so many amazing pieces of art that make the Mona Lisa look plain and boring. The bullet proof glass, ropes to keep you at a distance and mobs of people around didn’t help much. However, we were impressed with the Louvre. You could get lost in the museum it’s so huge! We spent a few hours there and didn’t see close to everything they have. That evening when it was dark outside we headed back to the Eiffel Tower to see it all lit up. That I would put in the romantic category. It’s so huge and they do a great job lighting it up, it really is beautiful. Throw in a couple meals, a lot of walking and that about wraps up our Paris trip.

 

 

Outside the Louvre Museum. Immediately after taking this picture we got drenched by a heavy rain fall

 

Rome is another story! We spent 8 long & expensive nights in Rome. Most of you know we had plans all along to meet my family in Rome for my cousin Michael’s Ordination as a Deacon. One of the best parts of Rome was having someone else do all the planning. My aunt Theresa put in a lot of work to make our week in Rome an experience we’ll never forget. We saw many churches, art work, the Pope, Coliseum, and of course the Ordination! Theresa also had a few day trips planned where we got to see things outside of Rome. We ended our busy week with a relaxing trip to the ocean on our last day. We sat on the beach and soaked up as many rays as possible on the beautiful sunny 85 degree day.

 

Saying goodbye to my family was a bit emotional knowing it’s going to be a while before we see them again. Although after such a busy schedule of touring we were ready to get to the next farm in the relaxing country side of Italy. What we didn’t realize was all that touring would make us soft for our most labor intensive, slave driving farm to come.

Lucas & I at Michaeal's Ordination in St. Peter's Basilica

Lunch in Assisi with the Fam



Walking the cobble stone streets in Assisi