Even
though I just finished a blog post about my travels around Germany
and Strasbourg, France just three days after getting back, I was on
my way for more sightseeing.
Some
of the students at my school elected to go on a three day-two night
field trip to Trieste, Italy and the surrounding areas where they
would learn about geology and geography of the region, wind, and
among other things, as well as practice their Italian. One of the
teachers who organized the trip was a French and Italian teacher, and
invited her TAs along. She graciously extended the invitation to me,
which I (of course) accepted.
We
were able to see a LOT. Part of the trip was with the students, and
part was just us three TAs exploring.
About Trieste (briefly):
Getting
to Trieste from Villach took a mere 2 or 2.5 hours by bus. It's a
city in Northern Italy that's also right on the Slovenian border.
When the Hapsburgs were still in power, it was one of the
Austro-Hungarian Empire's only access to the seas and was an
extremely important city (just behind Vienna, Prague, and Budapest).
Dinosaurs!
Our
first stop with the students was to a palentological site in the tiny
village of “Villagio del Pescatore” where “Antonio” the
dinosaur was uncovered. This dinosaur was the largest and most
complete dinosaur skeleton ever found in Europe.
Afterwards
was a trip to the natural history museum in Trieste where the actual
skeleton was housed. Pretty interesting! However the presentation was
pretty much completely in Italian, and my Spanish skills only helped
me enough to discern what the researchers were talking about—not
actually any details.
As
the students got settled in the the school and Italian students they
were working with, the teachers and us TAs wandered around Trieste,
saw some churches, the big piazza, and indulged in good espresso and
later good food.
Day of Exploring Trieste
The
next day, while our students were in school, Marie, Donatella, and I
set off to explore more of the city itself—this time with daylight.
We
saw Roman ruins
More
old churches and a castle
Got
food
Visited
the few open museums
And
went window shopping
One
of the most unexpected parts of this day was in wandering around
Trieste. We ended up running into someone else we knew who lived in
Villach (Daniel). Either the world's too small, I'm somehow a
socialite, or coincidences are eerie and fun.
Day 3—Gorgeous surprises
For
some reason, I didn't know the German word for cave was “die Höhle”
so when I saw that word on the program I thought it meant something
like cliff—or something up high.
When
I realized we were going to caves I was pretty excited. I've been to
very few caves—and certainly none in an area with terrain as varied
as this region.
Second
surprise? The cave system happened to me in Slovenia! I still haven't
been to Slovenia even though I live right on the border. The caves we
visited were the Škocjan
Caves—also a UNESCO world heritage site.
It's
one of the largest underground canyon systems in the world, has
underground rivers, and the region has been inhabited on and off for
thousands of years. Though I took some pictures both outside and
inside, they don't do the site justice. Regardless—here's some to
share.
NOW
I'm ready to just hang in Villach and work on other projects.
Speaking
of, if you are interested, I started another blog about all things
coding and web (which I plan to keep pretty separate from here. Check
it out if you're interested in/ thinking about learning similar things I
decided to work with): http://skeinsofcode.wordpress.com/
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