Merry Christmas!

Dear friends,

I'm sorry for the silence of the last time.
Last October I started studying Business Engineering at the University of Karlsruhe in Germany. I love this study experience because I'm given the chance to develop myself according to my inclinations. Particularly, at the moment I advance in social network analysis.
At the same time I work in a junior business consultancy, where as student consultants, we deal with business projects, which we are assigned by German and foreign companies. I love working at solving cases or just at improving our service inside the consultancy.

Erin, I read your e-mail: it was simply great, thank you so much!
2007 was a wonderful year for me as well! I accomplished my internship in Turin (Italy)-where I met some awesome people- and got graduated in March, which was a kind of dream for me. Afterwards, I could finally travel a little bit around and visit some friends in Europe, whom I hadn't seen for a long time.

After some years I could spend a longer time at my parents' and enjoy fully the seaside till the beginning of June. Then my Wyoming experience began... it was such a great time at NOLS!
I came to know wonderful people in an amazing place doing a cool job! It was so special to have given the chance to interact with you guys, who were so different from the people I've always hanged out with, but indeed so lovable and cool!
I really hope to be able to see you soon again!

After that I went back to Italy to enjoy the end of the summer and then moved to Germany, where I'll be studying for the next 2 years.
At the moment I'm in Italy, in the heel of the boot, where fortunately the temperature is not that bad as in Karlsruhe.



The pics are about the time between October and now. I'm sorry because I cannot fix the problem with their size, that's why you guys get such miniatures...:( Anyway, I've just created a picture collection online, just click on the link at the bottom of this page.

Some of them were taken in Karlsruhe, where I study and some others are in Bolzano, where I got my degree 2 weeks ago. The freshest ones are from the wedding of my friend, Francesca.

I wish you all a merry Christmas and a wonderful New Year!

a big hug which takes all of you guys from USA to Europe

take care,
Antonella

Dec 24th

In this second collection you can find all pictures of the previous editions of my blog!

Es rockt...

Life goes on...

Here I am: back in Karlsruhe. Last month there was something going on... I went back home on Sep 10th, then Elias came visiting me at my parents´after a couple of days; afterwards, we got together to Rome where we met my best friends, Marco and Wasana, and then flew over to Karlsruhe. After 2 days I left to Bolzano to celebrate two friends - Gianluca and Patrick- graduating last Monday.
After all that, I realize, the number of my blog readers is in direct ratio to my travels!

Between beach and mountains I enjoyed Italy as for the first time in my life... a little bit like Elizabeth Gilbert describes in "Eat pray love", a wonderful book Jane gave me in the last period of my Wyoming experience. The food, the landskape, the architecture, the history, the cornetti! I had pretty forgotten how much cornetti alla crema (s. picture) are delicious!

I visited Martina Franca near Lizzano with its pretty old town and fine restaurants. Pizza is amazingly tasty and cheap in Salento-the area where I come from: you pay 2.50 € for the best Margherita! For our short Rome vacation Elias and I got a focaccia (imagine some plain bread) with onions, olives, tomatoes... which my sweet housekeeper Caterina made for us and then some crostata (butter dough with jam and nuts on the top). Then we also went for dinner at Marco and Wasana´s , who made for us some orecchiette al sugo (small ears with tomato sauce), some typical pasta for Apulia, which I´ve recently learned to do!

In Karlsruhe, thanks to Elias, I collected my new furniture, which we had to bring for 3 floors! It was such a pain to move specially the table and the bed WITH mattress!
On Sunday I left to Bolzano, the town where I used to study. It was nice to be there again, to see my old friends, to share experiences and to think together about our histories... thank you guys for everything! Meeting new people was also fun.
My last day in Bolzano was just the icing on the cake for one big reason who could lead me back to this town in the future...

Now I´m ready to start studying... mmm perhaps there´s still some time for another short journey (?)

take care,
Antonella

Here it's summer!

Yesterday evening I came back to Lizzano (in the heel of the boot) and was quite excited realizing that it's still summer here! To make you envious: today I've even gone swimming :P
Last Friday I left from Karlsruhe and got to Turin, where I spent 4 months last winter working as intern in an automotive company. The first evening I hung out with Paolo, Donato, Martina and Zaira at a very chic bar (Cogi) on the Po river (unfortunately I had no camera with me). On the way to Paul's we stopped at a bakery to get some delicious brioche... it was about 2 a.m.
I spent the following day with my cousins': I had my hair cut, we visited the medieval village near the Po river, which was simply gorgeous, and I got a nice painting of my talented 12-year-old cousin, Anna and finally we waited for my parents to have dinner all together.
On Sunday my parents and I got to Milan, where my sister lives. After a few hours and an excellent typical Milan lunch with the whole family (2sisters+2parents) it was time for the next drive: direction Rome. I love driving so I was glad to undertake it for most of last weekend.
On Monday in Rome we went and visit Sofia, the baby of my cousin who was born during my stay in Wyoming. She's such a cute!

Afterwards, we moved 70 Km away from Rome into a medieval town: Anagni (s. pics) from where we left later in the afternoon to get home yesterday night.

About my next future plans: on next 27th Sep Elias and I are leaving back to Karlsruhe.

I've just come back from a fitness center and now I'm watching a movie about "Brigate Rosse", a kind of political mafia of some years ago.

bai bai :)

Antonella

From Karlsruhe, Germany

Hello my dearest!

I know: this time it took some time before I write. It's just that I'm in Germany without my computer and that's also the reason why unfortunately I'm not gonna show you any new pictures this time (sorry!!!)
I got a new apartment with other 2 guys right downtown in Karlsruhe (near Lidellplatz for the ones that know what I'm talking about). Next to it there is a small cafeteria, where -I was told- you can get the best coffee in town.
The only 2 drawbacks of my new home is that the toilet floor is parquet and both toilet and bathroom have no heating device... I know, I can use an electric device for the bathroom...but for the toilet??:(

I really enjoyed my birthday starting from breakfast with Daniel, Tillmann (the roommates of Elias)and Elias who backed a delicious cheesecake for me:) Among the other very nice presents, I got 2 Hefeweizen (one Hoepfner and one Münchner) and a Hefe glas (you're not supposed to drink Weizen from other glasses nor from the bottle!!)

In the evening I made a "tortino di zucchini" with rice, cheese, bacon and zucchini of course, and peppers au gratin.
I've just heard that most likely I really have to make a language exam next 10th of September (till now I just hoped they recognize my bilingual certificate), so I'd better start learning German:P

Since I'm not longer abroad (I mean out of Europe), I'll write more occasionally on the blog, since I assume it's gonna be easier for everybody to keep in touch over the phone or per e-mail.

Thank you everybody for birthday greetings and comments and e-mails!

nice greetings

Antonella

Mamma mia!

It feels good to be back home. After 4 flights I finally got to Lizzano last Wednesday afternoon. On the same evening we had a party at my place based on PUCCE (a typical bread which you can get at pizzerias) and on my big family. In summer, relatives from other parts of Italy (and even from USA) join in Lizzano to enjoy the beautiful shores and company. And the delicious food, since meals are always a good occasion to gather.
As you can infer from the pictures, these days I've been mostly on the beach enjoying the hot weather, the raft and the sailboat (thanks Luca!) and trying to get tanned as soon as possible:)
This evening I'm leaving to Rome by train and tomorrow I'm 'na get [this is dedicated to Jane and Claudia] a flight to Karlsruhe City. I'll be there a little bit longer than planned because I have to pass a language exam on the 10th of September in order to enrol at the university.

I really appreciate your comments and e-mails. Thank you so much! Sorry if it takes a little bit longer to reply:(

sunny greetings from Lizzano!

Antonella

Goodbye Wyoming!

Thank you for such a great summer! Thank you for sharing with me so many awesome experiences, conversations, glances, laughs and... synchronization errors!
Now it's pretty late and tomorrow it's already (??!!) time to go.

You guys, thank you for every moment!

I'll follow some advice of you and will keep on writing on this blog also after I go back to Europe.
By the way, I got accepted for the master program in Industrial Engineering at the University of Karlsruhe (!!!)

see you later guys!

I had a blast!

Hi there!

My last week in Wyoming has just begun and I'm very excited to go back home (well, let's say Europe:)).
Last week was pretty eventfull: on Monday afternoon Sarah and I drove about 2 hours to reach the NOLS ranch. After dinner we packed our lunch for the following day and we went quickly to bed because our alarm was set at 5 am. The following day we were expected to bring the re-rations to the field where a course was waiting for us. At 6.30 the wranglers had caught 11 horses from the arena (there are 67 horses in the ranch) and all boxes were ready on the horse trucks.
Sarah, the manager of the ranch Pee Bee, and I were packing one big horse when he jumped over getting loose from the truck and falling on his back like completely fool. We were all a kind of scared about that but PeeBee took immediately the situation under control and everything was safe again.
11 horses, 5 people. 4 horses were for us,wranglers, and the rest of them were loaded carefully so that the weight is well balanced.
We rode through the mountains on very narrow paths, rocky sections, rivers, and also a kind of jungle where you have to pay attention to plants and branches. As I got more confident with my horse, Tex, I started trotting along in the easier sections and I could prevent him strongly to use "the salad bar" (as the ranch people call the grass) on our way.
It took us about 7 hours ride to go in and out of the field. In the picture below you can see how the guys split the re-ration and issued it to the cookgroups.
The ride back was so much fun. We had to stop a couple of times because Sarah's horse kept on loosing his shoe and for the horses to drink from the rivers. The lesson of the day was much more than a riding one: if there's an obstacle on your way, you are expected to look forward; always try keeping the balance on your horse and show him who has the power as he tries to do something he's not supposed to. The view was great specially having a higher perspective from the back of a horse!
Sarah and I were very tired after our ride. PeeBee offered us a delicious milkshake (my first one) who woke us up, so that after helping with the unloading of the trucks at the ranch, we were able to get back home. The last part of the drive was pretty difficult for us as dears and antelopes kept on crossing the highway... but we did it! If you wanna read more about that/look at more pictures, check out the blog of NOLS: the title of the post is "Three Peaks Ranch Re-rations ROC 7-26!" and the address is: http://nols.blogs.com/nols_news/

On Thursday Claudia, Jane, Matt and myself had a wellness day. Basically, in winter and in summer every department has the possibility to have a day off paid by the company. In the morning we were hiking in the mountains and in the afternoon, after a delicious bagel (that's some American food that I really like) we were on the road to Pinedale. Taking a cut off we ended up in an impressive area where we could even see a nest of ospreys. For dinner we got to Atlantic City: entering the town the sign says "population: about 57"! In fact, the only beeings we met getting to the restaurant were cows!
The cowboy restaurant was pretty full, though. I had a great well done steak with onion rings, a salad and a beans soup and a Corona. Man, it was delicious!
After that I was done for the day:)

On Friday night we had the biggest and greatest NOLS Rocky Mountain Barbecue at Glenda's, who is the main manager of the Rocky Mountain's department. There was a band playing, a lottery, and good food and wine. I also tried to teach line dance to Matt, Dave and Mitch! It was cool!

On Saturday night Walt, Martin and 2 friends of Florian came here and thanks to Walt's dad, who's a hunter, we had elk for dinner and we watched a very good movie called "Zodiac"about a serial killer.
On Sunday after the Mass I started cooking for about 15 people for the Italian dinner which we had at Claudia's house. I cooked white lasagne and parmigiana di melanzane which is made of layers of fried eggplants, cheese and tomato sauce .
Florian let me drive the huge truck of his company to get there which was another kind of Wyoming experience considering that here everybody drives those busses.
I was very happy to see Erin coming from the ranch where she's been working since she's left from Lander. It was our last occasion to say to eachother goodbye...:)

... And this brings me to good night greetings. Next Monday is my last day in Lander, hence I'm 'na write my last post from USA...

have a great one!

Antonella

Yellowstone National Park

Good morning my dearest!
Last week-end I was with Walt, Adam and Mei in the Yellowstone National Park which is famous for its wildlife (buffalos, elks, mooses, birds of every size and colours, coyotes, squirrels and of course BEARS). We left on Friday night and decided to camp in the National Forest because in Summer the campgrounds inside the Park use to be full. On Saturday morning we had a tour of some of the most known places in the Park which surface is almost bis as Switzerland. We stopped often on the road to admire the terrific views.
Yellowstone is a "supervolcano": the surface of the Park is above a huge caldera which activity is pretty inpredictable: if the volcano exploded -I was told- half of USA would be definitely canceled.
Without any place in a campground we had to hike 8 Km and go camping in the backcountry which means at a certain distance from other people where the danger of bears is more relevant. In fact, you have to get a permission to go camping into the backcountry and you are obliged to watch a video before that which mainly explains how to react in case you see a bear or better a bear sees you, but also how to prevent a bear attack. For example you are supposed to talk during your hiking in order not to surprise the bear arriving, your food is gonna be hung at a certain height on a tree and far from your tent to avoid to attract any bears/to feed them. Fortunately, we couldn't see any bears even if I would have been happy to see one from our car. The only animals teasing during our hiking were mean mosquitos. Before getting to "our" campside we passed a nice lake and some swans and finally we went through a river and arrived... at someone else campside. Walt and Adam went looking for some wooden for the fire while Mei and I worked on assembling our tents. For dinner: cheese tortillas.
At night we were so tired that in spite of the rocks underneath my pad I could sleep pretty good. Today after brushing our teeth in front of an awesome view we hiked back to our cars and we got to the canyons: I cannot remember any more amazing view in my life as the one of the big falls in the Canyons (where I met for the first time since I've been in WY some Italians). It's incredible to see from the top of the fall how the water flows and goes off from a huge rock...
Driving back we had some other great panoramas included wildlife and boiling calderas.
After such a unique experience it feels strange to be here writing about that...
Tomorrow I'm living to the NOLS ranch since we're gonna issue a re-ration to a field (horsebackpacking) on Tuesday morning: it's gonna be the subject of my next post.

Now I'm dead tired:)
I wish you all a great beginning in your week!


see ya!

Antonella

An Italian in Wyoming

Signore e Signori,
meine Damen und Herren,
Ladies and Gentlemen!
It's with great pleasure that I announce the birth of Sofia, the first baby of the next generation in my big family! This post is entirely and warmly dedicated to Sofia! Benvenuta tra di noi Sofia! Non vedo l'ora di vederti. Auguri Anna e Luca!

It was an intense week. On Monday (and on Thursday) we had to issue 4 courses which means prepare on one day about 1.75 pound food for about 70 students + instructors for 30 days = 1665 Kg to be issued on one day. The challenge is to move many people including instructors and students very quickly and efficiently so that they can leave the Rocky Mountain Base as soon as possible and get by bus out into the field by the same evening. The Rations Department is pretty much well organized; there's always space for improvement, though and I regret being here in a so busy time, where you don't even have the time to think time is going by... that Justine comes and says "can you believe it's Friday again? I mean, we had Friday last week!" She's so funny. I was driving with her from Riverton back to Lander on Friday night as we saw a huge orange and blue fireball going through the sky. I was scared for a second as I thought it was a burning plane being almost as big as the moon and, in addition, it seemed to us to be very closed to the meteor. Awesome scene! We were coming back from a car show where you could see old cars "Happy Days style" and experience some good intentionally and proudly and legally polluted air: the "burning tyres competition" is a serious staff. More you burn your tyres stepping on the accelerator, more chances you get to be the winner. Families with their young children were standing and following carefully this stinky show. No comment!
Walter showed us the journal office where he works and then we got to his place to get a good view from his terrace. To get there we needed to climb up through a small window of the kitchen. It was actually the best show of the evening after the meteor!
But this was also the week of my first horse ride through the desert thanks to Jane, my co-worker, and her husband, Steve, who rode with me. It was so great that I accepted to do a longer ride instead of going back directly at home in spite of my strong snakes phobia. Afterwards, we had a super-delicious hamburger at Jane's.
On Saturday morning I woke up at 7 am, reached the Open Door Coffee Shop where Justine works, had breakfast (I love having breakfast in places which look like the TV series "Friends") and went to work. In the afternoon Matt, Justine and I got to an Indian powwow, which is a traditional dance taking place in one of the many Indian reservations in Wyoming. Everything starts with 2 marines holding 2 American flags and 2 other people holding 2 other flags. After that they went in procession to remember an Indian marine dead in Iraq as I could understand from the picture of the soldier with an American flag background.
After that different groups start singing and playing drums which are made with a tree log whose diameter is about 1 m and alk skin. Everybody wears feathers with some differences: the boss has bigger ones and a menacing stick in his hands. Normally you are not allowed to bring any camera as they believe you would steel them their soul by taking pictures. They are very serious... however, Justine and I could take a picture from the backside. (I'll publish it as soon as Justine sends it to me).
Talking to different people here in different places I realize most of them have never met an Italian which is a kind of weird and interesting stuff for me.
Today I got up pretty early to ride my bike to the only catholic church in Lander (there are 12 different churches of other religions, though). At noon it was again climbing time! I've been enjoying it a lot here even if I'm not so good as the others;P
Tomorrow I'm starting at 7 am so that I can take next Friday off to get to Yellowstone Park! I'm looking forward to it! But now it's time to go to bed.

Buona notte a tutti!
CU next week!

Antonella

Cheyenne not Casper is the capital of Wyoming !

My goodness! Last week-end I went to Casper: I was pretty much convinced I was going to the capital of Wyoming. I had to get there to learn from Mei I was just in the second biggest town of Wyoming ('cause the first one is the capital, Cheyenne).
It can happen to make confusion with geography... if you're in Wyoming:P
Anyway, dear readers: welcome back to ANTONELLAMIX blog! I should probably explain the reason why I chose this name: in the Rations Department, also known as "Gulch", there are plenty of trail mixes which you can have during your hiking/climbing/mountaneering or whatever if you're hungry. They give you much energy, are not heavy both for your pack and for your stomach and represent a good solution for people who have no time to stop and cook at noon.
Back to last Saturday: after a strong coffee Walter and I were on the road to Casper, where Mei, Adam and Dustin live (they're the same guys who I was camping at the Snowy Range with). Before arriving at Casper Walter showed me a cool rock formation below the road where Indians were supposed to attract bulls (or cows?) to kill them. We took some awesome pictures of that but I erased them by accident:(
... Walt and I got to Mei's and Adam's. (They both live in the same dorms). It was nice to see Mei again (ok also Adam and Dustin:P); Mei had birthday on Thursday, so I brought her some homemade brownies. We played frisbee at the swimming pool, as the picture of Adam jumping in the pool witnesses, and afterwards we went to a typical American restaurant to have dinner.
I was starving as I got there so I could quite enjoy the big weird mixture that was in my plate: like beef+peppers+mushrooms+mashed potatoes+cheese+whatever.
After that, Mei and Adam showed me the TV station where they work respectively as anchorwoman and metereologist (s. better picture below). It was cool to visit around an American TV station: well, actually, I've never been neither at an Italian TV station. The evening continued at one of the most famous cowboy bar in Wyoming, the Beacon bar. Can you imagine a place where men dress those cowboys hats and those belts with those boots...? Here we go: that's the place! If I wouldn't have seen it, I would have thought it can just happen in old movies. People of every age and size dance with anybody. The music is a mixture of "normal" American music and line dances: I found it particularly fun to learn a line dance which I definitely should show you when I come back. It was fun!
On Sunday we slept in and then we went tubing along the Platte River. You are supposed to have just your backside and feet in the water. As you lay down in your tube the current is gonna bring you quite quickly forward. We tried to float together either putting our feet on the same flat raft or binding ourselves with eachother and then to the big raft. The most enjoying part of our floating were definitely the rapids which are a steep part of the river where there's turbulence. You have your lifevest on going through them because even if you are a good sea swimmer the current of the river is very strong and you're gonna drink water... someone of our group could experience that lifevest doesn't protect you from drinking a lot of water, though, neither from burping after that!:)
Our adventure finished after 4 rapids. The hardest stuff to do was stopping to get out of the river as the current was incredibly strong for a person who was in a river for the first time. I had to brace my feet against the stony ground and thanks to Mei I got out of it.
It was 4.15 pm: we were starving. The decision had been made while still in the river: mexican food. It's there that my Casper week-end finished. I had "Lacosta tacos": after that I decided I don't like any cornmeal tacos. But please Mei don't feel guilty about my choice!
I fell asleep for a while as Walt and I were driving back to Lander. As I woke up I put on a cd of U2: it was good.
Have a great day!
- Thank you guys for another great weekend!

Antonella

PS: I forgot to tell you about one picture showing Macbeth. I went to the City Park last Wednesday being quite excited about that but I couldn't get anything of it - I hope just because of the old English... anyway, this picture is a special one for the most famous sister that I've ever had!

1st Party at Lucky Lane

Somebody could think that this blog is about my job or that I work in the wildernis. Actually, it's all about my evenings and week-ends in Wyoming and in the surrounding areas.
Referring to your requests I'll tell more about my job and house in my next post.
About my last week-end: Friday was the last work day of Erin. She is the one who remembers me Ansa -my German room mate who left after 3 months- and like Ansa, Erin's gonna leave after a few time I met her.
On Friday night Erin and I organized a great goodbye-party at Florian's and my place at Lucky Lane. During the lunch break of the same day I made the dough for 10 pizzas which resulted in what you can see in the pictures below. Everybody was delighted... Probably I don't need to explain the difference between an American and an Italian pizza. The first one is thicker and fatter (they put every ingredient in great quantity on it). The second one is simply the best:)
In the evening about 30 people reached our place -most of them working at NOLS. The party was very funny; I guess because of the will to have fun, the Italian food, the beer and last but not least the cool people! We even danced in our living room which was something I've never experienced at parties since I'm here.
"Great Party! Awesome pizza!" said people leaving. Thank you everybody for coming guys! After the party it was sad to tell Erin goodbye but I'm very happy and lucky to have met her.

The following day Florian, Walter, Adam and myself left for another adventure: Green River Lakes, WY. It's an area about 3-4 hours North-West from Lander which is special for the amazing lake and rivers. About 18 miles before coming to destination there were warnings about grizzly bears which are enormous animals particularly known for their greediness. On the way you see antelopes, cows, bulls, eagles, squirrels, llamas, horses, goslings... (Un)fortunately I could see no bears, though.
As we came to the campground it was totally warm so we decided to go swimming in the lake. As I put my feet in the water I realized the temperature is not exactly the same of a Baggersee near Karlsruhe: it was ice cold! I felt like my blood circulation could stop. Adam was the only one who could dive for a second! Afterwards we went hiking on a trail around the lake and then up to the mountain to a natural stone bridge. About 16 Km of a heaven looking landscape which was all worth of it.
Back to our campsite the guys cooked some hotdogs and I dealt with rigatoni with tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese (which is not the same as the Italian mozzarella of course). They were delicious:P As dessert we had "smore's" which is very typical if you are in front of a campfire here. It's a snack that you obtain putting a marshmallow and a piece of chocolate between 2 thin honey cakes.
... and since Latins said "Dulcis in Fundo" I'm gonna come to the end for today.

Before that I would like to thank the ones for e-mails and comments and encourage the others to let me hear about themselves.

Good night,

Antonella

The 4th of July

Here we go dear readers!

The Independence Day is a very very special
day in the Lander year. For the occasion you are allowed to do several things which are normally not allowed such as walking with an opened alcohol container or driving your car even if you're a little bit drunk (= opened alcohol containers are normally not allowed in the street).
The party starts the night between 3rd and 4th when Dr. Bills, a rich dentist of Lander, offers the town some magnificent fireworks which are accompanied with music, while a voice tells the story of the independence over the radio. What's more the smokes coming out of the fireworks remember the war.
Florian and I looked at fireworks from a patch together with Florian's boss and her big family. We were offered beer and a very good margarita (probably a little bit too strong...). Afterwards I went sleeping (!)
The morning of the 4th I went to the parade with many other people of NOLS. We were all very excited looking at the trucks parading in front of our eyes. People from trucks kept on throwing candies and other stuff in our direction. As I believed I could finally catch something, it was a water balloon!! I got totally wet and everybody laughed out loud! (in the picture you see Matt, the intern working in our department, and other NOLS people).
After the parade we went to the City Park for the Buffalo Barbecue. We paid 6,50 $ for what you see in the picture below + lemonade. The meat is definitely tasty here! After lunch we chilled out on the grass before trying some balance exercise on a rope. It was funny and I wish I could do better as they say it's helpful for climbing learners.
It was about 3 p.m. as we decided to leave to Lucky Lane -where I live- as some neighbours were having a party. The evening before I had prepared 2 cakes: one for my neighbours' barbecue and the other one for the next barbecue at Marianne's place, my colleague where I could ride my first horse. Basically, on Independence Day I had been eating through the whole day.
Marianne lives in a ranch a couple of miles away from the town. I got there with Erin and Claudia, my boss. The place is marvellous; you see a picture of the view of her property where they use to have cows and horses. There we had the most tasty meal of the day. They cooked hamburgers, pasta, beans and some other good stuff which I really appreciated. (I took a picture in the kitchen of Marianne as we were helping her getting ready; see below).
After that Claudia, Erin and I went to the rodeo, which was the most sensational experience of the day. There were cowboys capturing horses, cows, bulls, steers with their ropes. Some other cowboys (and also some cowgirls) rode crazy dangerous horses and bulls. Then some other tried to take the steer from the horns to push it on the ground. It was simply amazing!
We left after more than 2 hours to get to my boss' place from where we looked at the last fireworks of the Independence Day. Essentially everybody makes fireworks: I could count till 12 different firework sources but they were many more (in a town of less than 7000 Inhabitants!).
It was a great day as I could experience so authentically the Western spirit even if some American people coming from other states of USA found it a little bit "American" exaggerated.
Thank you all for your e-mails and comments. Keep on writing, I'm looking forward to hearing about you!

cheers,
Antonella

The Independence Day

Hi there!
USA celebrate the Independence Day today and Lander becomes particularly funny for the occasion. I've a lot to write about: city parade, several barbecues and last the amazing rodeo show!
I've just put some new pictures, enjoy them. I just wanted to share with you the impression of the day since it was terrific!

I'm gonna write more about it all soon.

Take care,

Antonella

Ready to rock?

It's what my manager says when we have to start a new re-ration: afterwards everybody moves as fast as possible bagging food, weighing boxes and making sure they don't weigh more than 25 pounds because they have to be carried on board of a horse (well of more than one horse) which needs to be balanced. Actually yesterday I spoke to a woman who came and picked up a re-ration of about 12 boxes. Ashley said she had to drive about 3 hours to reach her ranch and then to ride one day and a half to arrive at the "field".
Speaking about horses yesterday I rode one for the 1st time! "Miss Cavallo is gonna be a horse lady!" I was told: it was so exciting also because I was in a ranch in the middle of an amazing landscape. Marianne, a nice and friendly colleague of mine gave Erin (another beautiful girl working with me) and me a lesson. I started trot along but it was very hard also because I had the impression to slide down as I jumped a lot up and down up and down. It was amazing! Marianne invited us for dinner but Erin and I had other plans: we got home and had my first in Lander made-pizza! It was very good even if there's space for improvement (as always:))

A couple of words about my last week-end: I was camping in the Snowy Range with Walter (journalist), Adam (weather expert on Wyoming tv), May(anchorwoman of the same tv), Dustin and Joe. In the campground the only toilet was a WC connected directly with the ground and we washed ourselves along the river. Trash containers were blocked with carbines because of bears coming down and looking for food. For the same reason we had to put our food in the cars away from our tents since bears can smell food from a distance of 20 miles and once they do, they become very aggressive. My fellow travellers had always a big knife or an axe with them to guard us from a possible attack. (N.B. these bears are not the grizzly ones=> a knife wouldn't work with them). We cooked our dinner(sausages, hamburger, chicken, peppers, tomatoes, snacks) and breakfast (coffee, eggs, sausages, avocado, tortilla) on the fire. People were definitely the icing on the cake. Well... on top of that was the glacier. We didn't expect to find so much snow on our path. This made our hiking a little bit uncomfortable since we got quite soon wet feet + pants. This also because it happened to slide or to sink in the snow. It was very funny, though. During the day it was pretty hot but at night the temperature went down to 32 F = 0 C!!! Thanks to the winter sleeping bag I could sleep good, though.

Besides that, I've seen a typical "farwest" restaurant, had an ice cream in St. Daniel being the first Italian there and dressed up to take part in the Summer Solstice Party with cool people in a campground near Lander. Every day is a special one.

I'm looking forward to the Independence Day next July 4th since a lot of events are gonna take place in the town such as rodeos.

I'm -8 hours ahead of Italian/German time so I shall say "have a great day guys!"

Antonella

Welcome!

This blog was created exclusively for Antonella's friends in order to keep them always informed about what happens and overall where in the world!
I'll write in English as I hope this blog's gonna be visited by all of my friends.
I'm currently in Wyoming (USA) which is one of the most authentic places where you can find Indian reservations as well as "Old west" stuff. On top of that there is so much nature to be explored and experienced! Climbing, hiking, horse riding are the activities on which I decided to stay till now.
I work for NOLS (National Outdoor Leadership School) as assistant of the rations manager. Essentially, we issue food rations for students and instructors leaving for oudoor courses. Behind outdoor and environmental skills NOLS' mission is about leadership. That's why the courses are very demanding in terms of phisical activities but also of living conditions. The students do not get any toilet paper, just get a small soap which has to be used during an average period of 30 days. Food rations are to be determined very strictly as students won't be bringing too heavy packs while hiking. We are also responsible for re-rations which are prepared and shipped through horse-packing.
Everything's totally new for me. The team (about 8 people) which I work with is awesome. They are always good-humoured and generally have a positive attitude towards life.
The whole company pays much attention to human resources and self satisfaction of employees as I can see. (They don't accept any overtime for example).
Every once and a while I'll try to add pictures and comments. Have fun, take care!

Antonella