Lake Garda

Ciao ragazzi!
Good news, I did very well on all of my mid-terms....and now that they're over, I can go back to doing 0 work during the week. Classes here are still pretty much non-existent. Teachers don't really care, so those of us that do put in the effort end up doing really well. Needless to say, I'm having a very easy semester.
Bad news, I'm sick. The flu's going around and pretty much everyone at school has a variation of it. Hopefully, it will go away soon...
This weekend was awesome. My friend Sarah and I went up north to the Lake region. I know everyone has heard of Lake Como, but I found a different place. We went to Lake Garda, which is the largest lake in Italy and is surrounded by the Dolomite Mountain Range. The cliffs come right down to the green, clear water. It is a stunning landscape. I loved being back in the mountains. It took awhile to get there, as all the good places are far away, but we arrived in a little town called Riva del Garda. The towns around the lake are focused on water sports, parasailing, windsurfing, scuba diving, sailing, etc. Riva is one of the biggest towns, with a large port and long beaches. It was pretty deserted, since the winter season has officially started. Sarah and I checked into our hotel(very very nice upgrade from the hostels) and walked around town. We spent most of our time down by the water, taking pictures and relaxing. The mountains were just so dramatic and the snow topped peaks made me smile. We went out for a very long dinner Friday night. It was delicious as usual.
On Saturday, we roamed the town and parks in the morning, then took a boat ride to the town of Limone. While the town obviously does grown lemons, it was actually named after a Latin word meaning 'border'. Don't worry, I won't bore you with that now. Limone was a very cute little town. Stone walkways and pink flowers everywhere. We wandered through the town, had a picnic lunch in an olive grove, and took more pictures. The boat ride was definitely worth it, seeing the mountains from the water was spectacular. Saturday afternoon, we strolled around Riva some more. Really just taking it in and enjoying the peacefulness. Unfortunately, I was still feeling sick, so we went in a little early.
On Sunday, we started the journey home, which should have been fairly short, but....leave it to the Italians to go on strike. We ended up stuck in Verona for 4 hours, trying to find any train that could bring us home. We finally took a train towards Venice, stopped in Padova, then took a train to Bologna, then home(14 hours later). It was stressful, but I guess just one more thing that you have to get used to in this beautiful country :-)
I am definitely returning to Lake Garda in the summer. I would love to go sailing and windsurfing, not to mention hike in this beautiful landscape. I feel like every weekend I return to Rome knowing that someday I have to return to the place I explored that weekend. It's never enough time to see it all. Everywhere I've gone has amazed me. There is so much beauty.
This was my last weekend trip on my own. Next weekend is Florence with school, then my parents for 2 weekends, then I'm saying goodbye to Rome for the last 2 weekends. One of my goals for this trip was to see as many different regions of Italy as I could. Out of the 14 regions(including Sicily), I have been to 10. I'm pretty pleased with that, but you can trust I'll be back someday to finish it off....
Ti voglio bene(I love you)