A Relaxing Weekend in Elba

It's been about a week since my last blog, which only means that I'm so busy that I don't have time to talk about every individual day. That's good.
This past weekend my roomate Shelly and I went to Elba! I know what you're thinking, where the hellba is elba?? Well, Elba is a small island off the western coast of Tuscany and it's beautiful! We went for the entire weekend. I had class on Thursday until 2 45 so I rushed to the train station to catch a 3 27 train. We ended up sprinting with our huge backpacks to catch the train, which was of course at the furthest possible track, and once we made the train, it left about 15 min late. Perfect. Sweaty and out of breath, we sat down in our seat for a breather. About halfway from Florence to Pisa (a stop on the way), I realized that we forgot to vallidate our tickets. Even more perfect. Not validating tickets (getting them stamped by machines) can result in fines, which for poor college students, is no good. So, as soon as the train stopped in Pisa, I sprinted off the train, dodging dozens of travelers to validate the ticket. As soon as I stamped them, I jumped on the nearest car, seconds before the train started to move. Shelly was a bit worried since I wasn't in the right car but I popped through the doors in a minute or so and she was very releaved that I made it!
From Pisa we changed the train in Livorno (which we only figured out once we were the last people on the train) and then took a bus from the last train station to the ferry terminal 20 min away. Of course, our bus arrived 5 min before the 7 o'clock ferry was scheduled to leave so again, we sprinted to buy the tickets and then ran across a massive carpark towards the boat. Yet again, we made it in the nick of time only to have the ferry leave late. Nice. We were very happy to have caught the earlier ferry because otherwise we would have had to wait until 10!
When we arrived in Portoferraio, Elba, we found a nice restaurant and had dinner. We befriended the waiter and he was nice enough to give us a half bottle of wine on the house. He understood that we were college students :) After dinner we had our first experience with the marvelous expense of Elba. Our cab from Portoferraio to our hotel (about 15 min away) was 28 euros! We finally got to our hotel and it was quite the pleasant suprise. Very modern with a nice bathroom, balcony and kitchen...it had an oven! Quite the luxury for us Florentines.
Friday was a stressful day. We decided to rent bikes for the day for 5 euros and go to the beach. Of course with the bikes we got the back breaks didn't work, the seats were far too low and we had no helmets. Thus a horrible combination. The beach that was suppose to be 3km away downhill ended up being uphill/downhill for quite awhile. We decided to lock our bikes at the beach and call the hotel to pick them up. Once at the beach we went to a hotel to have breakfast/brunch (10 euro buffet). What we didn't realize was that the hotel was a hot hang out for bees. Let's just say eating toast with jam and honey was not a repelent for the bees. We ended up spending the majority of our breakfast lurring the bees with honey and trapping them under various plates.

After breakfast came our lovely experiment with local transportation. Finding the bus stop proved to be impossible so we ended up giving in and jumping in a taxi to go the beach. 40 euros! That was a splurge. We finally got to the beach and spent the entire rest of the day there. It was beautiful and such a good end to the very hectic day. Since we had spent so much money we decided to cook dinner that night and so we went to the grocery store to get supplies, as well as food for breakfast and lunch the next day. Three meals from the grocery: 17 euros. Saved us a lot.

Saturday was a much more successful day. Armed with a correct bus schedule, our tomato and mozzerella sandwiches and the determination to have a great day, we set off for Portoferraio. We decided to go to the tourism office and get some advice and the nicest woman was there full of information. She basically planned our entire day out for us! At 10:30 we caught a boat that took us on a tour of the northern section of Elba, including a underwater look at the marine life (very cool). Unfortunately the two hour boat ride resulted in mild to extreme-ish seasickness and we were quite happy to get back to land. We had our sandwiches after lunch and then caught the bus to a beach called Procchio. Typical Shelly and Sophie, we missed our stop on the bus and ended up having to catch another back to the Procchio stop. Minor hiccup which lead to a beautiful afternoon spent on the beach. Procchio was amazing. Pictures hardly do justice. I went swimming in the ocean and it was INCREDIBLE. Crystal clear water, soft soft sand and no creepy marine life. It was perfect. For our last dinner in Elba we went back to the first restaurant we went to. Our friends from the first night were there and they were very happy to see us back. At the end of the meal, when we asked for our bill, our new friend/waiter Stefano told us that it was taken care of. As in, our 40 euro meal was free. On the house. Let's just say we were far from upset. Great end to the weekend.
Sunday morning we got up, paid our bill and went to the Napoleon Villa. Apparently Napoleon was exiled there. I'm not very caught up with French history...I actually don't know anything about French history, sad I know. But he had a pretty sweet set up in Elba. Nice mansion on the cliff, with an ocean view. Not really the exile most people would expect. It was a nice, realxing morning with zero problems with public transportaion. Of course the last day we're there, we finally figure it all out. We grabbed a quick lunch in Portoferraio and then, again, had to spring to the ferry at 12:40. We literally got there five seconds before the boat closed up. VERY close call. The boat ride was relaxing, we played cards and from there the travel home was a cinch. No suprises and no rushing.
All in all it was great weekend. Shelly and I travel very well together so it was perfect. I'm happy to be back in Florence and excited for all the other travels...I need to work out where to go! Next weekend Bologna?? (pronounced Ba-lon-ya...not Ba-loney)