Italia: Day Six

Since we stayed out so late, I decided not to get up and run in the morning, which may not have been the best choice, but I do need to try and sleep when I can. I got up at nine and packed my bag because today was our last day in Torino. The group met and walked to a local market together to look at their produce. After admiring the large amounts of fresh fruit, Pam, Chelsea, and I met up with Patti (Loredana’s Italian friend) and wandered around the clothing side of the market. I purchased a corset and tank top that were pretty cheap in price. I also found a bottle of white nail polish that I wanted to get because the color is in style. All of the people I interacted with in the market were very nice, although we were warned ahead of time to be wary of pickpockets. It was somewhat difficult to communicate that I wanted to try things on though.

We spent the rest of the day wandering in and out of stores on the Garibaldi strip, a large collection of fashion stores. Everything was pretty expensive though, so we just looked and tried things on. In a cheaper clothing store, we all tried on matching dresses in different colors and took some pictures. Then we went to an underwear store where we tried on fruit-decorated boxer briefs and took more pictures.

Trying on our fruity underwear

After buying postcards from a small, touristy shop, we sat down at a restaurant called Happy Days for lunch. We all got the pasta and it was amazing – possibly the best that I've had so far on this trip. It’s funny though because it was really just shelled noodles in a tomato sauce. The bread at the restaurant was really good too.

We met up with Becky and Loredana after lunch and stopped into a bar to get some drinks and sit on the patio. I got some weird strawberry and vodka concoction that was very strong and tolerable, but not my favorite. It was a little too fruity for me. Pam got a Amaretto and Coke that was really good though, so I vowed that I would try it at our next stop.

We kept walking toward the river and went back to the park in the center of the city that we keep visiting to rent a four-person bike/car (I don’t know what the technical name for them is but they're covered vehicles powered with your legs, like a bicycle, but that look like an old-fashioned car). We had trouble on some of the hills, but we managed by putting our brute strength into it. It helped that four of us were peddling. At one point, we picked up some random guy who spoke very little English and dropped him off at his bus stop like we were a taxi service. We also steered down this massive hill though and spent the whole way down screaming and having the Italians stare at us. At the bottom of the hill there was even an amusement park-style bump that Becky lost her bag on.

Our rental bike/car

 We wanted to go ziplining after we returned the bike, but the stand by the river was closed so we didn’t end up getting the chance. It’s a shame though because the experience would have only been seven euros.

On our way back to meet the group, we stopped for another drink at a different bar. This time I got the Amaretto and coke. I decided I didn’t like it very much toward the end of the drink because the Amaretto is really sweet tasting and not my style at all. I sucked it down though and proceeded to feel a little bit tipsy for the rest of the afternoon. I’m just glad the glasses we got at the second bar were two euros cheaper and double the size of the first.

We met the rest of the group at a chain ice cream shop, GROM, near our hotel and picked up our luggage before boarding a bus to the airport. I’m really surprised by how big the Torino Airport is. I was expecting a dinky little three-terminal airport, but it’s actually quite nice and decent sized. Even our plane is bigger than I expected. We did have to take a little bus out on the tarmac to board though, which reminds me of 
travelling to Ireland.

Boarding the plane to leave Torino