Yeah, I don't remember what that's from. But it's from some movie where a woman goes looking for a man with a certain name in Italy. N-E-wayz...
I'm in Italy. In Rome. But I'm not going to blog about Rome yet. Mainly because I'm not done with Rome yet. We're leaving in a couple days for Siena, which should be loads of fun. We've booked a private room outside of the city, in a farm type area. It should be really beautiful, and we're definitely looking forward to getting away from crowds for a couple of days.
Anyhoos, first on the list of Italy was Cinque Terre. This was a charming area on the coast, with five small villages hidden within the hills there. Hence the name. Cinque meaning five. And terre meaning something. Five somethings. The adorable hostel we stayed in was like a little flat really, with a kitchen, a couple of rooms, a washing machine...and a rope outside of the window. So we got the true Italian experience of doing our laundry and hanging it out the window. As our clothes dried, we enjoyed a spread we had purchased at a few stores in our town, Riomaggiore. The next day we enjoyed the hike through all the towns, got our first taste of Italian pizza and Italian gelato. Now, as charming as this area is, I have to say that the best part was all the cats. I saw over a dozen within twenty-four hours. Whereas Spain was primarily overrun by dogs, Italy seems to be very cat friendly, and I heartily approve.
From Cinque Terre we trained it to Florence, with a brief stop in Pisa to see the tower. What else would we be there for? The poor dears are like Roswell...one claim to fame. Roswell has their aliens, Pisa its tower. But then, at least Pisa has something to show for it. Anyway, we took two kinds of pictures here: those for our Mother, and those for everyone else. If you haven’t heard the story, I give the very short version. As my mother is a perfectionist, when she took pictures of some of her friends there a long time ago, she accidentally straightened the tower with the camera and made her friends crooked. So what kind of daughters would we be if we didn’t do the same?
One of the first things we did in Florence (after our first night there) was the Accademia Gallery, with the statue of David. The line gets really long, but we had heard that if we went earlier in the morning, we’d miss the long lines. They were right...we zipped right in. I took one picture before I found out you aren’t supposed to take pictures in there. So here’s an illegal picture for you viewing pleasure. It’s a very old piano. I hope you’re enjoying it as I’m hauled off to jail. Honestly, I didn’t get the David going in. It’s just a naked man, right? But in all fairness to Michelangelo, it is a pretty magnificent statue, when you see it in real life. They didn’t allow pictures, but there is a plaza farther south in the city with a copy of the David. It’s not nearly as amazing, but we did take some pictures, and I have provided the G-rated version. Later we enjoyed the sunset on the Arno River.
5 comments:
If you find you want to post a picture of something where cameras are not allowed, you could buy the postcard and take a picture of that, probably outside so you don't have flash reflections. Speaking of cats, yours is crowding my lap while I type and competing for attention. She likes Italy too!
sounds amazing.
doesn't "terra" usually mean "earth"?
Where are the pictures of Pisa?
The line about "Itly" is from "Only You" (1994) uttered by Fisher Stevens (Larry) about his wife Bonnie Hunt (Kate). See http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110737/.
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