Florence, Milan, Lugano in December

Although a few weeks late, I thought I should write about my holiday adventures. After the Christmas party on the 25th, Heidi, Amanda, Cody, and I got up early early early on the 27th to fly down to Florence, Italy. After reaching Italy unscathed, we walked to our hostel which was a few blocks away from the train station. Well, after finding where the hostel was, we searched all over for the reception desk to check in. It was about 10 a.m. and we had read on the website that we could check in at all hours. Unfortunately, the reception desk was nowhere to be found. We called and called the hostel many times within the next two hours while trying to find someone who knew of this hostel and could tell us something about what the heck was going on. Several hours later, someone finally answered the phone and informed us that the check-in desk was on the other side of the street and down a ways from where we were told to go. Naturally, we were pretty annoyed that we had to walk around for several hours with all of our stuff and in freeeeeeeeeezing weather just because someone was not answering their phone and the directions to the check in were incorrect. We politely made our frustrations clear to the hostel worker and we ended up with an free upgrade! The upgrade was really nice because the room was basically an apartment with kitchen and bathroom and sitting room. So in the end, it was worth waiting around for a few hours. We were in Florence for two nights. We had lots of pizza and ravioli and wine! The 28th was Heidi's birthday so after celebrating at a restaurant we ended up going back to our apartment. It was so cold so it was really uncomfortable to stay out and there weren't a lot of places to hang out at anyways. But during the days, we walked all over the city. We found some amazing views of Florence that were really gorgeous. We walked over the Golden Bridge, and visited the Duomo and several other beautiful old churches. We actually went to mass in the Duomo that night and ended up being asked to do the collection. This was funny since Heidi is not even Catholic but she was a sport and helped, too. The priest who asked us was older and did not really speak English but he was quite a character. The next day, Amanda and Heidi went to the serial killer museum while Cody and I walked around the city some more. It was a little nicer weather that day and we looked at all the fancy Italian shops. A few hours later we were on a plane to Zurich where we hopped on a train to Lugano, Switzerland. Lugano is basically on the border of CH and Italy and is set next to a beautiful lake and mountains. It was one of the prettiest places in Switzerland I've seen so far and that's saying a lot! We got into Lugano really late at night and had to take a taxi to our hotel, which was just on the other side of the border of CH and Italy. We walked across the border the next day which was fun. Although Lugano was gorgeous, we took a train the next day to Milan, Italy. In Milan, we walked around the city a bit and visited the Duomo there. I actually thought the Milan Duomo was prettier than Florence's. I think that I liked Milan better in general, but it was pretty touristy. After a night in Milan we headed back up to Zurich on the train. Since the train was full, we ended up having to buy first-class tickets, or else we wouldn't get back into Zurich until really late that night, and since it was New Year's we wanted to be there. First-class on trains by the way is a rip-off. It's almost the exact same as 2nd class but more expensive. Anyways, after the train ride which was about 3 or 4 hours long, Cody and I went back to my house. Cody really liked playing with the kids and the kids were enthralled with Cody. They told me often to go to Korea and Cody could stay here with them.
We had dinner with the Bergers and Christian's parents. Cody was able to speak to them in German a little and so it was fun to interact a little more extensively with the grandparents than what I'm usually capable of. The kids had a couple of "tisch boms" which are "table bombs". Basically, one lights the fuse at the end of a cylindrical shape (about a foot long and half a foot in diameter) and out flies random little party favors and toys and streamers. The kids had lots of fun with these. About 11 p.m. Cody and I decide to go into Zurich to meet Heidi and Amanda. Apparently Zurich's main street has a bunch of outside bars and tents set up all over and there is a huge fireworks display over the lake after midnight. It started snowing like crazy a few hours before midnight so the walk to the bus stop was really pretty. However, we ended up sitting at the bus stop for over half an hour waiting for our bus that never came. That's right, we were in a little plastic bus stop at the New Year. Apparently there were lots of transportation problems that night because of the snow and lack of people to clear the roads. But it was still pretty nice because the church bells were ringing for half an hour or so and there were lots of fireworks going up around the lake by my house.
The next day, Cody and I just hung out around the house relaxing after our long trips and playing with the kids. The day after that though, I had to work. Cody helped me out a lot, the boys really listen to him. And then the next day was the last day for Cody in Switzerland. I took him to the airport around 14:00 because he said his flight left at 4 o'clock. Well, Cody misinterpreted the time since it is always in military time here and he is not used to it.... the flight didn't leave til after 18:00! So we were four hours early at the airport. Ah well. It had been a great week so I couldn't complain too much.
Below are another slideshow of our trip! Click on them to enlarge the pictures....