castelli romani

I woke up at 4:30 once again this morning. but I am determined not to nap so that i can a. enjoy the day and 2. sleep a full night tonight. despite the exhaustion, i loved today. we got on a bus today and went on a tour of the hills of albano (nearby arriccia). the first place we went was castel gandolfo, the summer home of the pope. we also went into bernini's church in front of castel gandalfo. very beautiful. next was frescati. frescati is famous for it's white wine. A symbol of the town is a woman with three breasts, 2 that produce milk and one that produces wine (ew.) so there are cookies shaped like women with three breasts. kinda funny.
finally, my favorite, nemi. nemi is a town around a lake. nemi is famous for its fragolini, or tiny strawberries. we ate lunch at a restaurant surrounded with glass doors at the top of the albano hills so there was a beautiful view of the lake. our waiter was an elvis impersonator (yes, they have those in italy, too) and he even had the sideburns. we had homemade tortellini and fettucuine and of course, tiny strawberries with lemon and sugar. definitely the most delicious meal I have had so far.
let me also tell you this.... (this part is mostly for ketty:)) last night, after my 3 hour nap, i went into the internet room to find my friend amanda talking with 2 young italian men. raphael and david. they are very cute. they wanted to learn more english and we wanted to learn more italian so we decided to help each other. amanda, frances and i went on a walk around albano with raphael. he calls himself our teacher and he actually was very helpful. i think he likes amanda so don't get any ideas. i love getting to know the italians. david and raphael are staying at our hotel so we will hopefully see them again. i actually am starting to really enjoy most of the auburn girls. that makes life here more fun. friday is our first trip to rome!
pictures soon, i promise.