Day 13

Today was a mostly relaxing day. We slept in and decided to save money on bussing back to Venice, paying attraction fees and transportation cost. Since we had already seen what there was to see yesterday, instead we stayed in and had a relaxing day. We made instant noodles, sorted through pictures and put them all in folders based on place, I caught up on the blog and posting some pictures –which took forever since the internet is horribly slow, but I wanted to get it in while it was free. I also organized my luggage which at this point, was in pretty bad shape. We did some laundry and hung it outside to dry. We got some dinner at the supermarket. Selection was very limited so we ended up with burgers to cook stovetop, spaghetti noodles and swiss cheese to up in the spaghetti noodles to give it flavour. It turned out the cheese didn’t actually have much taste to it, but it was edible. 

Afterwards was a masquerade ball. I wore a nice black flowing skirt, a fancy top and the mask I got in Venice. Matt wore his kilt and Guy Fawkes mask. Everyone absolutely loved it! He got to do his V for Vendetta speech a couple of times for different groups of people. We sat around in front of one of the chalets, had some drinks and just sat hanging out for most of the night. Eventually we got to the bar for the masquerade, but it was set up as more of a club. There were flashing lights all over the place, younger groups barely of drinking age and modern music rather than masquerade music and theme. I didn’t like it at all and it was getting late, so we just went back home to get some rest.

Day 10

Yesterday was our day in Pompeii.  Pompeii was a larger Roman city near mount Varsuvius which unknown to the inhabitants of the time was a rather large volcano.  It decided to blow and the city was buried by the thrown material from the blast.  In addition the ash mixed with rain managed to effectively cement over the city including the inhabitants which helped preserve the city and even turn some of the inhabitants into effectively stone statues.  After a few hundred years of excavating people now have the opportunity to explore about the best representation of Roman city life today.

So how was Pompeii?  Nothing short of amazing!  We saw an area gladiators received their training in.  We saw a wonderful theatre with much of the original marble steps still intact with seat numbers inscribed.  We even saw what were takeaway food shops with marble counters complete with ceramic vessels food would be kept warm or cold in.  The chance to walk down the roads of this city truly showed the sophistication of the Roman Empire.  The plumbing, construction of homes complete with central rain water collection basins, steam rooms and even stone blocks for pedestrians to cross the road without getting their feet wet when roads were being cleaned with flowing water.  Absolutely amazing!  

Pompeii was a port city but after the eruption the coastline was extended a great distance past it.  As a port city though Pompeii was frequented by foreign travellers and to avoid language barriers they used pictures to guide visitors selecting certain services.  The representation of this shown to us was at one of the many brothels the city has.  Painted as frescos the images above each bedchamber vividly showed what service each prostitute was skilled in.   Before going in our tour guide had described this “menu” with the analog of a McDonalds menu with all the options here being “happy meals”.  A short while after leaving the tour guide pointed out a phallice carved into the road pointing directly to this “red light district”.  Some random guy passed by and suggested it was good luck to step on the balls.  We didn’t.

We got back to the campsite later and the people sharing the chalet with us had prepared dinner.  We feasted on mashed potatoes, sausages and caeser salad.  Tracey stated it was the best dinner we had had so far in Italy and I agree.  So far the pizza has not lived up to my expectations or standards of home but I’m holding out hope.  The campsite had pool open until 11pm so I checked it out while Tracey showered.  It was rather shallow but for not being a heated pool the water was fantastic even at 9:30pm!  Having more recently swam at two beaches I rather enjoyed the break from intense saltwater.  Tomorrow we see the Vatican City and will likely explore the Collosseum.

Day 11

Today was our day to see the Vatican as well as our free day in Rome. We were up bright and early because our group had tickets that let us in before the Vatican actually opened to the public. We got there by a bus and 2 tubes and a very short walk. Our guide met us outside and had headsets for everyone (since there were about 45 of us). The tour started off on the right foot and then moved on to the left. Only kidding. It did start off right though because our tour guide was a really funny guy, cracking jokes before we even arrived at the Vatican. We had the place to ourselves for the first half hour or so, with plenty of space to enjoy all the paintings, tapestries, sculptures etc.

Matt taking over... indeed the corridor leading up to the Sistine Chapel was very impressive.  Neither Tracey or I are ones to spend hours speculating on art but everything was quite impressive and seeing the change in artist styles during the Renaissance was very interesting.  It was at this time the painters started adding 3 dimensions to their paintings and more perspective.  On one tapestry how one character was standing on a stone slab changed when viewed from the left then from the right.  As stated quite impressive but the Sistine Chapel was next.  This chapel is famous for the painted ceiling done by Michaelangio (the sculpter/painter...not the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle).  Aside from the enormous scale of the painting which shows God’s creation of the planets down to the last judgement the real impressive point of it all was that this was Michaelangio’s very first fresco painting.  The art of fresco painting is that the section of wall is freshly plastered and is painted while the plaster is still wet which makes the painting essentially part of the wall and VERY long lasting (aka the fresco paintings in Pompeii).  It’s a shame we weren’t allowed to take pictures in the chapel but flash from cameras can damage fresco paintings and they don’t take chances.

From there we entered the Vatican itself.  The Vatican is the largest church in the world and also has the largest marble floor in the world.  Ornate, huge and awe inspiring are effective descriptive terms but one really has to see it.  The Vatican is also adorned with several fantastic paintings but when you approach them you realize they are actually mosaics not paintings.  This church was built to last.  Definitely check out some of the pictures I took of the inside but it definitely gets my recommendation should you ever venture to Rome.  Apparently the marble just outside of the Vatican was recycled from the Collosseum.

Next up was lunch.  I love lunch and in London I was recommended a place just around the corner from the Collosseum we would not spend a fortune at.  Turned out a number of our group had the same recommendation as we stumbled upon them leaving the metro station and headed there together.  Tracey had some tasty ravoli and I had the first genuinely delicious pizza in Italy cooked in a wood fired oven.  Still doesn’t quite match up to Windsor but damned close.

From lunch we ventured to the Collosseum.  Both Tracey and I were surprised by how much of it was intact.  There is a small section of marble seating remaining but most impressive was the network of construction underneath the arena floor.  The floor itself does not remain but under it was corridors and rooms that I’m sure the animals were stored and moved through.  Very modern in design in many respects and imagining oneself being on the battlefield there was a very humbling experience.

At this point we were pretty tired and had seen alot of the main sights on our walking tour two days before so we briefly walked down the road for some photo opportunities and then made our way back to the campsite.  I made us some chicken tikka masala for dinner with rice and we both consumed a large tub of icecream for dessert (icecream in Italy is fantastic!).  Tomorrow we head to Venice!

Day 12

Yesterday was a drive day again. We travelled from our campsite in Rome to Venice, which took from about 7am until about 3:30. Afterwards, we had the chance to take an hour to get our bags into our rooms, rest and relax a short while before going on a walking tour of Venice. 

Before we met our tour guide, we stopped at a pizza place recommended by Ali, our Expat leader. We got a huge piece of pizza, a big pop (some got beer) and a generous portion of icecream for 5 euros. It was delicious and quite honestly the best icecream I’ve ever had. Unfortunately I have no idea what it was because the name was in Italian. It did have a lot of flavour to it though, including sweet tiny little orange squares.

The walking tour of Venice was hilarious. We had an older tour guide that looked like a nurse. She was very interested in Latin and the Italian language and enjoyed explaining what all the street names meant in English. She stopped and said “And here we have a tree!!!” and went on to tell us how it was a rare type of tree for Venice. I thought it was hilarious how much passion she had for the area and how much joy she had in explaining all the little things. Some of the group were not quite as entertained.

Venice itself was beautiful! Canals and boats everywhere including water taxi's! There were amazing structures, but the thing I liked most about it was the tiny little corridors in between buildings and the fact that a lot of the traveling from one place to the next was done by boat.

After the walking tour, most of the group went back to the campsite because there was a big pool party and drinking thing going on. Matt and I decided to hang back in Venice and meet back at the campsite later. We spent forever looking for a street market (we didn’t know the name of the market or where we were on the map) but eventually came across it. Matt got a Guy Fawkes mask and I got a fancy black and white mask with music notes on it for our masquerade ball later today. We enjoyed seeing what Venice looked like at night and just wandering around really. 

Eventually we got back to the bus stop. We hopped on the same bus we used to get there, looked at the front of the bus and realized that the stops weren’t actually listed electronically or on the bus stops outside like they were in London. It was alright though. Matt talked to the driver while I was chatting with one of the locals from Venice and we got it figured out. We eventually made it home around 11pm, realized that the pool was already closed, showered and got some sleep.

Day 9

Today was a combination of driving and walking tours. We drove from Tuscany to Rome, stopping first at Florence to see the Duomo, Diazza della Signoria, statue of David, Ponte Vecchio and Santa Croce Basilica. I am not sure which structures all of these are unfortunately, because our tour group is too big for us all to be near enough to our tour guide to hear what we are looking at. This was also our lunch stop, so in our spare 15 minutes we found a fast food pizza shop, had our food and ran off to the bus. Actually this was the best Italian pizza yet.

The 2^nd walking tour was a couple hours long. It passed by the famous Spanish Steps, the Trevi Fountain, the Pantheon (which wasn’t open to the public at the time), Piazza Navona, the Roman Forum and the Colosseum. It was a fast paced tour, which really just gave us an idea of what we want to see in more detail when we go back. We will have time to go back and see everything again because tomorrow we have a tour of Pompei and then the next day is a free day to go back and explore Rome.

Anyways, after both the walking tours we ended up back in our new campsite for dinner around 9pm. Dinner was chicken with salad and a few fries, which strangely enough beat the pizza, pasta and bread. Afterwards, we took a brief look at the local supermarket and came back home for showers and very soon, sleep.

Day 8

Yesterday was mostly a drive day again. We were up nice and early to be on the road. Aside from toilet breaks, we had 1 stop on our way to our campsite in Tuscany. That stop just so happened to be the leaning tower of Pisa.

The first thing we did in the area was grab something for lunch. Our plan was to order a pizza, stack it up into a leaning tower and eat it in front of the leaning tower of Pisa. Unfortunately when we tried to stack it up, all the toppings started sliding right off the pizza and we decided we would enjoy it more if we just ate it the way it was. Matt and I both decided that it was ok, but we preferred Windsor pizza, and even grocery store pizza. Ours was burned on the bottom and not well cooked on the top.

The tower was great though! We wandered around it taking funny pictures. While most people were taking pictures of themselves with their hand in the position to “hold the tower up”, I decided it would be funnier to create a photo effect of myself knocking down the tower. Matt agreed that way was better, so we were the only people in Pisa with our hands in the opposite direction of the crowd.

We eventually got to the hostel for dinner – bread, pasta and pizza. It was so strange. The bread was hard, the pasta was undercooked and the pizza was better than the last one, but still not like home. I found it funny that the things Italy was known for were just mediocre in comparison to back at home.

After dinner, Matt and I asked information if there was a fire pit at the camp site. We really confused the guy- apparently only farmers burn things in a fire. Our campsite was bungalows (tiny little cabins) and we spent the remainder of the evening sipping wine from the vineyard in France and laughing about past memories.

Day 7

Today was our free day in Nice, although speaking to the others in the group; people didn’t really spend all that much time here.

Matt and I were up at 8:45 for getting ready to leave and having some breakfast. We headed out by shuttle bus to catch the tram to catch the train to a beach near Monaco. The shuttle and tram ran frequently enough to zip around without too much trouble, but the train was delayed about 50 minutes. When it finally started moving, it was incredible crowded! The last 2 people on really should have waited for the next train, because no one could move a muscle. Matt was nailed against a wall, using all his strength not to be pushed over on top of a young kid in a seat. We did manage to get there with enough time to check out the beach.

This was a pebble beach rather than a sandy one. Walking around we saw fast moving water crashing against the rocks, fancy restaurants and drinks and not all that many people. Eventually we came across the beach section which was marked by barriers and had a few more people (still not a crowd). We jumped right in and spent a good couple hours swimming, floating and just relaxing.

Our next stop was back to the train to Monaco. After walking 15-20 min, we caught the train and within 10 minutes, we were there. We wandered over to the Jarden Exotique and then half way back where we came from to get a better priced lunch of cold pizza. Over lunch, we looked over the schedule again and realized that if we wanted to get to the medieval village in Nice before busses finished running, we didn’t really have time for the garden. We took 2 more busses and went for the village instead. The structures were unchanged for a very long time, only the vendors made it look modern. I was tired and had burned under-eyes, burned shoulders and just felt like sleeping. Matt decided he would really like to climb up this gigantic hill with a fortress on the top, so we went for it. (How often are we going to be in Monaco? May as well see it all). The top was gorgeous. We had a view of the water, the whole city and there was also an exotic garden at the top. It was almost all we had intended to see at the other garden (just missing a cave). Eventually we made our way slowly down the hill in order to catch our bus to the hostel. The bus had 3 different schedules, and the one we needed didn’t show up in accordance to any of them. It was alright though because a different bus that eventually came by went to the same place anyways. We again took the tram to the shuttle area, waited for the shuttle about 10 minutes and decided that it may have stopped running and instead walked over the hostel.

We had dinner at the hostel, chicken curry with rice and had our showers. Right now we are waiting to see if we will have a couple drinks with anyone tonight (yesterday we ended up just going to sleep instead) or if we will just get some sleep again. It’s already 11:12pm so we will see.