Venice

Day 8 and 9:

What can I say about Venice that will possibly describe it adequately? I didn't expect to love Venice so much. Everyone loves Venice, everyone says it is the most magical place- so I thought it was all just a lot of hype. How wrong I was. Venice is like a fairytale. Streets made of water, cute and colourful houses, expensive and chic shops and so many boats.

Adam and I filled up every spare minute, in Venice, exploring Venice. We walked from one end to the other, we sat and watched the boats and gondolas, we windowshopped and bought a couple of treaures.

I will let the photos do the rest of the talking:
Adam on the boat ride to our B&B.

The Rialto Bridge: one of only four bridges spanning the Grand Canal.





The streets are made of water and the washing hangs from windows to dry.

The best restaurant! we went here on our second night and the food was reasonably priced and to die for. I had hand made gnocchi Adam had lamb and both just melted in our mouths. I said I will never be able to have gnocchi again because nothing will ever compare. I was talking about it for days and days after! I am watering at the mouth just thinking about it now.

Bologna

Day 7:

Arrived in Bologna (after a small incident, involving a red car, a metal roadwork sign and an embarrassed Denise-but that is all we will say on the subject) a big University city with lots of shops, bars and red bricks.


we only got a little lost


accommodation with a lift! A small miracle in Italy to not have to lug our bags up a bunch of steps. Yippee.


Day 8:

A day trip to Maranello. Adam's long awaited, with bated breath, visit to the Ferrari Museum.



A stop over in Modena;

pasta in the sun for lunch


a walk in the park


sitting on a park bench which had our wedding date graffitied on it with permanent marker. A sign?


Then back to the hotel and some desperate washing. How quickly clean undergarments seem to disappear!

Tuscany

Day 4:

This day basically involved a lot of driving. We (and in we I mean Adam) drove from Rome to Gambassi Terme, in the province of Florence. We stayed at Villa Bianca, which was a beautiful and romantic hotel. Each room was painted by a different artist. We stayed in the sun room.

Day 5:

A very relaxing day. In the morning we visited San Gimignano. A walled in village in which 14 of the original 70 or so medieval towers are still standing. We admired the views. Visited the supermarket to get some lunch. We even swam- or should I say jumped in and out- of the pool. We read, relaxed and caught up on sleep.



Day 6:

A day trip to the capital city of Tuscany, Florence.
Bridge: Ponte Vecchio over the Arno River. Lots of jewellery stores line either side of the bridge. Apparently butchers used to line the bridge until they found that they were causing the river to be polluted by discrading their waste in it. Lucky for us because jewellery stores are much nicer to look at I think.

Church of Santa Croce
The gold door features biblical scences.

Florence also included the Uffizi gallery. In Rome we had a pass that allowed us to get into monuments without lining up. We had no such magical ticket for Florence so there was a line up ( a painful two hour line up!) but the art inside was so worth it. Amazing to actually see art of the masters I have studied: Giotto, Botticelli, Mantegna, Correggio, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, Michelangelo and German, Dutch and Flemish masters. Fantastic and-yes- worth the line up.

Rome: just a little bit more

While we are on the subject of Rome...

We had an excellent bed and breakfast in Rome. The lady spoke very, very little English, so there was a lot of pointing and smiling. We stayed in a room off here apartment with the most fantastic view. We had our own entry from the balcony and our own key so we were still able to be independent.
Our breakfast: just perfect.
The view: we could see from Saint Peter's all the way over to the Tomb of the Unkown Soldier and the Colosseum. Breathtaking. On our last night we even got to sit out here and watch fireworks.


On the very last day of our honeymoon we were back in Rome and decided to visit the Spanish Steps again to buy a piece of art we had seen here last time. This time the view from the top of the Spanish Steps was quite beautiful.


Also- just by chance- we decided to visit the Trevi Fountain again. We arrived just after this prank. Everything was sectioned off and there were a lot of important people standing around looking upset. We stayed around to watch them stop and restart the fountain. We felt quite amazed that we saw the fountain red and blue on one holiday!

Rome: the rest

Be prepared for a long one, we jammed a lot into two days! As Adam said 'the best way to describe Rome is BIG.' Larger then life, huge, ginormous, made for Gods hence there is no way to keep it short.

Rome: Day 2
We started of at the Spanish Steps. I haven't included a photo of the steps because they were rather uninspiring. A lot of tourist and a lot of steps. The angel in the courtyard, however, was rather inspiring.


The Trevi Fountain was next. This involved flipping coins over our shoulders, making wishes, eating Gelati, elbowing other tourists for a spot and being in awe of the very cool fountain.

The Pantheon (I need to mention that we walked from each place to the next- and even walked in the complete wrong direction to the Spanish steps- I have never walked so much in my life!). I saw a real life pick pocket here. He stood right behind the woman and unzipped her bag, he wasn't a very good thief because I saw him and the woman felt him do it. Adam and I stood back and watched him and he smiled at me and then dissapeared.


The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier next. Again very big and impressive.

The Roman Forum. We were very tired by now, it was extremely hot but again it was still just so amazing.


We ended the day with the all important Colosseum. The most amazing thing is imagining all the crazy things they did, imagining it actually flooded and animals coming out of trap doors, just crazy! Then, after all that walking, it was time to head home on the train and collapse in bed.

Rome: Day 3

Our last day in Rome.
A tour of the Vatican City and Saint Peter's Basilica. The wealth and splendour of art was amazing. The ammount of people and line ups were even more awe inspiring!


The Pope's balcony.

This time we tried to not do as much in one day so we went home for a nap and then headed out to the zoo.
Where we were a little worried about the fencing around the tiger enclosure!
We ended the day at the beautiful Villa Borghese looking at outstanding art. It was just before closing time (one hour before) and so peaceful. My travel tip would be, whenever possible, go to things just before closing time. The impact of the villa and the art are incredible when the place is almost empty.

And so ends our adventures in Rome.

Rome

Here goes the first installment of our honeymoon saga. I will try to keep this brief- a few pictures and a few words- but it will be very difficult, It was a fantastic trip. I will do a wedding post later on- after we have our professional shots. But you can see some photos here and here.
Our honeymoon was a great way to start our married life together. We had to work together 24/7 for three weeks. We realised we had never spent such a long time together, just the two of us, without the interruption of work. We learnt about geography, Italian culture and language. I think it is the only way to really learn and understand- actually being in a different country, looking at a map and a guide book everyday. We walked miles, made our bags go four wheel driving ( Italy is not built for travellers with wheelie bags!), tried our hand at speaking a little (very little) Italian, enjoyed each others company and discovering together.

Day 1:
Rome.
Sitting in a park in front of a castle. Adam writing down a phone message word for word in Italian. Feeling very tired and in need of a wash and a teeth brushing. Trying to get checked in to our bed and breakfast accommodation.

With our accommodation finally worked out, our bags safely stowed away and feeling nice and fresh, we headed over to the Castle Sant'Angelo and watched the sunset over the Vatican City and Saint Peter's Basilica (first photo in post below) from the top the castle.
If you look at this photo large you can see the Tomb of the Unkown Soldier and a bit of the Colesseum behind it.