Day 4: Hike of a Lifetime

After a fun night out, we all woke up to hike Monte San Salvatore. The group headed out around 10 a.m. Sheley and I started out leading the group, getting to chat with Brinberg on the walk (about a mile) to the beginning of the hike. As we began the hike, Sheley and I made our way slightly further to the back to not feel rushed, and quickly realized what we had gotten ourselves into. The hike continued and groups separated, including Sheley and myself. I was with a group at the very rear for a while, but then ventured off on my own pace, until some of the members in the group behind me caught up to me. I finished the hike with Kate (a girl I met freshman year through a mentor group) and Michael (our sole boy on the trip). While the 3 mile hike up was a struggle, the view at the top was all worth it. Although I thought Lugano was beautiful before, seeing it all from the Swiss Alps was absolutely breathtaking.

After some time, we made our way down, and started with the middle group of hikers. We quickly caught up with the front group, but then realized the back group was nowhere behind us. The entire group took a pit stop in a small city on our hike down to wait for the back end of the group, who were nowhere to be found. After some waiting, Brinberg decided to take us down and hope that the back end found their way. The hike down was a different, much longer route, but beautiful to say the least. We got to see many different small towns and structures, until we finally hit mile number ten: the bus to take us back to the Montarina. Needless to say, we were all exhausted and ready for our beds. We arrived back to the hostile around 5 p.m. (where, no worries, the back end had ended up), showered, and then headed out to dinner with Sheley's roommate (Emily, also) and a group of her friends. We enjoyed yummy pizza and pasta at Tango, located beside Argentino's, where Sheley and I ate lunch the day before.

 After dinner, we came back and relaxed, and then Michael invited Sheley and I to head to a local bar to try and watch the Patriots v. Ravens playoff game. We headed to a recommended Irish Pub just down the road from the college we will be taking classes at called Over the Rainbow. While the bar unfortunately could not stream the game, we got to have a fun, chill night out. This evening I met Loren and Amy, two of Michael's friends on the trip, as well as the owner of the bar. His name was Kadeem and he was born in Africa, but grew up in Switzerland. He has also traveled to America several times, where he picked up his TexMex themed menu that had everything from burritos to what he called the "Obama Burger." We enjoyed some beers, and free shots and nachos from Kadeem, and even got to hear some American music while we were there, my favorite being Wagon Wheel. We then headed home, and got shushed by some nice locals for being a little too loud ;)