Deruta & Assisi

Soo very sorry I haven't written in a while! We really have had nothing but class so there's really nothing much to say but on Friday we woke up at 5:30 and left for Orvieto at 6:30. Either the roads in Italy need to be spruced up a bit or our bus needs new a new antilock break system because I think all of us can back with whiplash! Our driver also drives in the middle of two lanes and tends to cut people off so I've found a new home in the last row of the bus so I don't get anxiety watching his driving in the front row! We arrived at Deruta 2 hours ahead of schedule so we got there pretty early. Most of the shopkeepers knew we were coming though and opened there stores especially for us! Deruta is a tiny town in the region of Umbria that is known for their highly famous ceramics and pottery that ships out their pottery every year to William-Sonoma. The designs on the pottery is just absoloutely amazing and the owners of the shop make all the pottery and designs themselves. I think the best one I saw was a guitar that was ceramic & painted in the most beautiful designs. There's only 5 in the world and the man's son in the picture below designs them and sells them for a hefty amount (12,000 Euro's).

After shopping around on our own, we headed to the most famous factory in Deruta for ceramics and got a personal tour of every step of the ceramic making process. This company was the one that ships to William-Sonoma and we got to see them make the pottery all the way to the 12 people who paint various designs on them. Praises to them for having a steady hand because those designs are so intricate! We found out they go to a 5 year school to learn how to do all the areas of pottery & design. School definitely pays off because those designs were just the most amazing sights ever! I wanted to buy some pottery for our house but they came, once again, at a pretty hefty price, 300 Euros for something really simple as a bowl. So sorry mom, no Italian pottery is going to be arriving at our house this summer! (FYI...I'm going to add more pictures of it to my albums because it takes a long time to load pictures on here!)

So then we continuted on our journey and got back on the bus to head for Assisi. We had a lunch break once we got there and all of us girls who packed our own lunch sat in a litle ally way with the prettiest flowers & ivy

We walked around for about 2 hours and St. Francis must have blessed us because he lead us to the most AMAZING olive wood store! Just walking in, you could smell the aroma of olives and it was obvious this was the real thing! Who would've thought 6 girls in their 20's could spend over an hour in a wood store! I was very picky when it came to picking out if I wanted anything because I don't like when the wood has a lot of imperfections so I ended up picking out a wooden bangle, a olive oil wood ring, and olive oil chapstick all for under 10 euros! Finally, one shopping trip that was in my budget...Thanks St. Francis!! We then headed down to meet our group at the cathedral dedicated to St. Francis. He was a very intersting Saint who gave up his life of wealth and taking over the famiy business to rebuild the church after having a vision from Jesus. He brought back the basics of the church and compltely rebuilt the church by God's vision in just 20 years! It doesn't even look real and I have to admit I laughed the first time I saw my tour guide just because I've never seen a monk before and all over the town the men were dressed in their brown robes with the ropes tied around their waist...it just looked so much like a costume to me! Anyways, he described in details all the fresco's on the walls and lead us down to the tomb of St. Francis where people were all gathered around, saying rosaries and leaving pictures of their love ones who have died. It was all very touching, and I even got to dedicate a candle to my Uncle Charlie who died who's favorite saint was St. Francis. After the tomb, he lead us up to upper church, past the lower cathedral we were in before. The lower one symbolizes St. Francis's life on earth and the upper church with all it's bright colors and heavenly fresco's symbolzes St. Francis's holy characteristics and his life in heaven. The colors were just so beautiful with blues and greens and I'm so sad we didn't get to take any pictures, they were really strict about it and I was too scared to even sneak one! Here's a picture of the outside though!

After our tour we all headed back to our Flintstone's style bus and all prepared for a bumpy ride home, but we were just all so ready to head back to the palace and sleep we didn't care what we rode in! But now we have been preparing all weekend for our overnight field trips all next week to Modena, Mantova, Como, Parma & Milan! I'm so excited and when our field trips are over on Thursday I get to fly to San Sebastian & see Justin then spend the next week with my parents in Italy! I couldn't even ask for a better week! I'll make sure to keep everyone updated and hopefully I'll have wi-fi at our hotels! Ciao everyone!