I Took A Trip!: Ho Fatto un Viaggio!

Salve! For me, personally, some alone time is always needed once I get overwhelmed or overstimulated— which can happen pretty easily in this giant city of Rome! So to give my brain some time to slow down and distance myself from the horns and sirens and smells of Rome, I hopped on a train bound for Spoleto.

Spoleto, a town of about 30 thousand in the region of Umbria, was exactly what I needed to get my head right and give myself some time to breath. This small town, situated on a hillside, practically prides itself on its detachment from tourists. Despite the fact that really no towns in Italy seem devoid of tourists completely, Spoleto makes it a point to note that their economy doesn’t depend on tourists for it to exist and for that I was t h a n k f u l.

I was able to spend the majority of my weekend walking around this quiet town, exploring the twists and turns in the cobblestone alleys, eating amazing local food and drinking Umbrian wine. One of my most favorite things about little Spoleto was how deadly quiet it was, I could hear birds chirping and fallen leaves swirling in the wind — a luxury I definitely do not get in Rome — and for once I could hear myself think inside my own head and be completely aline with myself. This really let me absorb every piece of my surroundings in this town and be entirely content for the first time in a while.

This solo trip, while good for my soul, felt really good for my ego, too. I think the ability to comfortably spend time with yourself is important and it felt good to know that I could do that in a small town, where English was not spoken much, five thousand miles away from my family. It felt like a big notch in my growth as a person that I could feel this way and for that, I am thankful.

Now that I’ve been bitten by the travel bug, I’m already searching for my next adventure!

+ Alina