Off to Orvieto

Today was a looooong travel day - 8 am departure, 10 am potty/espresso stop, 12:30 lunch stop 2:45 arrival in Orvieto! However, the students have fallen in love with another city in Italy.  Orvieto is a hill town - strategically placed on top of a plateau.  We parked the big buses below and hiked it up the broken(!) escalators to our 2 quaint hotels where the luggage was portered later. Students had a chance to explore the scenic, historic village, eat some gelato, and find the famous cathedral before we met for our 6 pm performance.

We took a group photo prior to the performance on the steps of the cathedral and then began our performance  in the Piazza Duomo (Cathedral Square).  We then reformed, marched 100 yards into an narrow street, stopped again to perform and continued to meet the local marching band from Orvieto where we alternated songs.  The performance finished with both bands playing the Italian national anthem together -  a real sign of how music can bring worlds together.

Following the performance, we changed, and met up for a short walk to the only restaurant in town large enough to hold us all!  After a delightful dinner (and a third rendition of happy birthday this week!), students had a chance to burn off some energy in a nearby piazza with some sprint races, dance offs(!) and some light frisbee work.

Here's a taste of our day - with many, many more to follow!

Espresso break on the road (even though I'm pretty sure this was actually hot chocolate!)

Off the buses ready to climb to Orvieto (in the background)

Climbing up

Chatting up the nuns from Louisiana!  :-)

The Cathedral in Orvieto

View from the city of Orvieto looking out over the countryside

Another angle

Group picture in front of the cathedral

Us still in front of the cathedral - a perspective of the size of the cathedral!

Marched across the piazza to perform in front of the Orvieto City Museum

Re-grouping for a march down the streets of Orvieto

A stop along the way

The local band from Orvieto waiting for us in the next square

Meeting and chatting up the details

A few of us get a quick picture together

Lined up for the joint performance

Tomorrow - Rome!  We drive straight to the Coliseum and a tour of Imperial Rome, lunch, check-in, change and perform one more time in the late afternoon at the Piazza Minerva - not far from the Pantheon.

Buona notte!