2nd Trip to Perugia

Today we went on our official trip to Perugia with the whole group. The plan was to take the bus there at 9:50am but we waited and waited and it didn't come so Jason decided that we would just drive to the next town and take the bus from there. Of course before piling into the vans, the bus drives by. (Pics`= Bus ticket and expensive *ss paint)

When we arrived we walked around for a bit and bought more art supplies. I ended up just buying paint this time. Turns out that one of my tubes of paint was 12 euros, but I ended up getting it anyway because the store owner said it was a really good brand. We'll see. At that price it ought to make my paintings look like instant masterpieces….(update, it didn't :)

Then we had lunch at one of Jason's favorite pizza places called Pizzeria Etrusca. I had a calazone which was okay, but the beer I had was AMAZING. Called La Biere du Demon. Oye, was it tasty and 12 % alcohol. Double oye!

After lunch some of us went on a walking tour with Jason and he told us about some of the history of the city. We walked through the Arch of August which is one of the entrances to the city built during III century B.C. and restored by the Romans. You can see the restoration (in better photos) via the change in rocks used on the bottom versus the top.

He showed us aqua ducts that had been turned into walkways and showed us the underground city that had been built on top of by the Romans.

We also went to the Etruscan Well of Piazza Piccinino which is from IV -III century B.C. and can hold over 450,000 litres of water. (Pics = Skylight through to the underground city, which is now mainly galleries etc and some of us in the well.)
Perugia was beautiful but so very hot. By 3pm I was just exhausted which made looking through the Galleria Nazionale dell'Umbria very hard. I literally just walked through in a daze without being able to take in much.

The art was nice, but after awhile it all was a blur. The same thing was true when I went into the Duomo. I was just too tired. Not to mention that this Duomo looks like so many other ones that I have seen AND half of it was covered in scaffolding.

I`really enjoyed the many opportunities I had to practice my Italian in Perugia (and everywhere so far)….with the woman at the art store (for the 2^nd time), at the pizzeria, in the museum, at the restaurant where we ate for dinner etc. (Pic = Yummy proscuito and mozzarella sandwich and wine at our dinner in Perugia.)

Back at the "villaet" a group of us went for a night swim. The sky is just beautiful here at night.