Still enjoying your report, but trust you had a cornetto for breakfast rather than cornutto . . . though I could be wrong.

OMG, I actually wrote that! Zat's why I need to proofread. That could open up a whole other box of worms. Ew. yes, a cornetto.

I am blushing furiously.

Sheepie, I just today saw your thread and thanks to your wonderful style of writing and your delightful sense of humor..I have read the entire thread and now am behind on my "To Do" list, lol.

Your students must so enjoy having you as their teacher.

Trip reports like yours is why I stopped all subscriptions to travel magazines. Professional travel writers cannot hold a candle to the informative and so amusing report you have generously shared with us. Thank you!

Please forgive any spelling errors. I just realized I can't spell my favorite type of pasta but am too lazy and tired to go get my dictionary and figure it out. Enjoy!

Saturday, 26 April

I have to admit, that with the loss of my pen I must have lost many neural connections as well. I remember trying the line for the Accademia again (no luck; there’s always next time!) and having a really neat lunch. I finally found a cool sandwich place, but the best part was: it was actually a tiny enoteca, so you could get a wee glass of wine with your sandwich for a great price. This trip report makes it sound like I am a total lush, but I never got drunk and would always order the smallest amount of wine they had. Outside on the wall of the building were two little sets of shelves, marked with numbers. They were for your wine glasses, so you wouldn’t accidentally drink someone else’s chianti. This is much simpler and more chic than those strange “wine charms” that some Martha Stewart reject came up with. Oftentimes I find myself enjoying a hearty lunch with a bunch of old men—I must be a crusty old guy at heart. So out in the street it was me and bands of old Italian chaps enjoying their monster panini and glasses of wine.

The couple from BC were raving about the view from up on this hill in the Oltrarno, Piazza Michelangelo or something. That evening I walked over the river and up the hill. Hiking with my dad in Rocky Mountain National Park really pays off, because I was up the hill ahead of most of the huffing and puffing crowd. The stupid sunglasses guys were up there two, practically throwing ugly paintings at your feet, but that didn’t distract from the view. Okay, side note on the sunglasses guys. One of them came up to an Italian family who were admiring the sunset and the “vendor” proceeded to harangue the father saying something was wrong with his (the father’s) daughter’s sunglasses so she needed a new pair. The worst part is: he actually bought them in order to make the guy go away! I don’t know much about assault laws in Italy, but if he were that persistently annoying with me, I don’t think I could have restrained myself to a ladylike “No, thank you.” When I got mobbed by the “good-luck string bracelet” guys at the foot of Montmartre and one of them got too close I rammed my elbow into his gut. He left me alone after that. ☺

Do you remember how in Jurassic Park they talked about mosquitoes being fossilized in amber? Well, at sunset, it looks like all of Florence is suspended inside a block of amber, because the honey-colored light seeps around the corners of the buildings and glitters on the surface of the water. Up there, well, that would be my ideal “room with a view.” Without the street vendors, of course.

That night, I ate near my hotel again, in a place called Trattoria Antica Noé, which is situated in this little underpass where all these drunken dudes hang out just off the cute piazza near my hotel. It’s not a bad area by any means and they don’t bother anyone, but I really have no idea why they hang out there, of all places. This restaurant was actually one of my favorites I ate in while in Italy. The service was jovial, the atmosphere amazingly cozy yet not kitsch, and the food—well, ha. Divine. I mean, in a place where the owner and the waiter pour each other glasses of wine in between runs between tables and the kitchen, how can you go wrong? I also had the pleasure of seeing a very loud American man whose vocabulary consisted mostly of the f-word embarrass himself by asking the waiter, VERY LOUDLY, how much to tip. The waiter explained that tips weren’t really necessary; they were included in the service and cover charges. The man then proceeded to leave a seven-euro tip. SEVEN EUROS!!! Dude, this is not the land of the twenty-percent tip. I think the most I’ve ever tipped anyone is a euro for a great meal and to sort of apologize for being loud with my friends. The waiter looked sort of shocked too. Do you know how much gelato I could buy with seven euros? How many caffé lungos? Mamma mia. So, anyway, it was fabulous and since I will be back in Florence in a few weeks, guess where I’m going for dinner?

Sunday 27 April, 2008

Since today is the day of rest, I slept in until nine o’clock. This was very strange, since in Italy I would wake up at eight like clockwork (ha ha , no pun intended) without that horrid groggy, I-think-I’d-rather-die-than-get-up feeling that I have everyday in Paris. Being Sunday, my favorite bakery was closed so I wandered around trying to find a bar that wasn’t too expensive yet still served paste. I made it all the way to Piazza della Reppublica where I amazingly found a decent place, wedged in between two touristy restaurants. I wouldn’t go back, but it wasn’t awful. Sunday was my last day in Florence, and I decided to hit the Palazzo Pitti.

Now, you’d think that our French friend Nicolas Fouquet could have learned a thing or two from Signore Pitti. Fouquet was the chap who built Vaux-le-Vicomte, which was nicer and more extravagant in every way than what the king (our friend Louis XIV) had, and to underline this stupidity, Fouquet threw a big party and invited, yes, the king. Umm, he didn’t get to keep his castle for much longer. Evidently the same thing happened with Pitti and the Medici.

I had quite the adventure buying tickets for the Pitti. I saw the long line out front and it didn’t look too bad yet, so I jumped in. Just before getting to the entrance I realized I was the only person in my area of the line who didn’t have a ticket, and it was only then that I saw the second line for tickets. So I got out of the entrance line and into the ticket line, where, at the window, I ordered both tickets, but only got one. Unfortunately, when I realized she had only sold me the ticket to the gardens and not the palace itself, I was already walking away from the window, so I had to get back in line and reorder the 1st ticket. Then I marched back down to the line, waited a while, and finally entered. I must say that I’m not sure whether I was over or underwhelmed by the palace and the art. It was … nice, very large, but it was almost like there was so much to look at that my brain just stopped functioning. Plus the signs were very small so to find out what something was, you had to walk the delicate line between approaching the sign and getting too close to the painting, upon which you will be attacked by rabid dogs. What I enjoyed most, actually, were the frescoed ceilings, mostly because it had to do with mythology and in middle school I was nuts for Greek mythology. I understood much more of that than I did all of the Madonnas and saints and angels.

After this I marched out into the Boboli gardens, which I had never heard of before but I have eaten Boboli brand pizza crust, which was a Big Deal when I was little and now I feel really guilty because I always begged my parents for it and now I realize we didn’t have any money for that. Oops. Anyway, I didn’t realize at first how BIG the gardens are. You could easily get lost in there and they’d find your skeleton fifty years later, fervently clutching the guidebook to your chest. I went all the way up to the top, near where the Porcelain museum is (mostly looking for a loo, but finding none) and then wandered back down. I’m rather on the fence about the Italian-style garden, with its manicured hedges and little paths and fountains with ladies spraying water out of, well, you know. It’s very pretty in a very left-brained way, I suppose. I prefer the woods, plain and simple, or a huge field of flowers. Walking where there are no gravelly paths or handrails is so much more mysterious, and, in a strange way, more real.

I finally found my way back out (it’s not that easy!) and headed off in search of something to eat and a toilet. I got a sandwich (check) and found a public bathroom where the attendant so graciously allowed me to use the handicapped stall, which is nice because you get your own sink. I also dropped into a fruit and vegetables store and bought some plums to snack on. They were so juicy it looked like I was drooling all over as I walked down the street. I had plum juice everywhere.

I had heard much about Florentine leather but was rather intimidated about buying anything. It either seemed tacky and fake or way too expensive. But in the Oltrarno I found a really nice shop where I could have pretty much bought everything and made away with a fabulous purse for a fabulous price. My other quest, the Dante books, had to be fulfilled as well. I went over to Feltrinelli and after much searching, found what I wanted and grabbed Pride and Prejudice in Italian just for good luck. I’ve been reading it and have found that this translation is much more faithful to the original than the French. This is sad that I know this, because I didn’t bring the English edition with me, so I’m doing this from memory. On the way back to my hotel I found a tiny little paper and leather shop where I bought a recycled leather journal with the Florentine Lily on it at a great price. He also made really lovely journals where you just replaced the inside, but I felt like I was atoning for having bought so much animal skin in the form of a purse that I might as well get a recycled journal. Prickings of green-ness. That night, old Noah was closed, so I went back to the Cat and the Fox for another large meal (and another free limoncello!). This time I had taglietelle (spelling?) and the grilled veggie platter. Oh, and bruschetta. Yum yum yum. Once back at the hotel, I realized I really wanted some dessert, so I ran out at around ten thirty to a gelateria and moseyed on back, enjoying my gigantic cone of goodness. A sweet ending to Florence. Next: On to Venezia, and right back out again!

Hilarious! Love your sense of humor. Thanks.

This is so much fun. I can't wait for more. Do you talk to yourself in your head? I thought I was the only one to do that.

bfrac, alas, yes, I do. But it's mostly mental preparation for the Italian that will soon be coming out of my mouth. Like at the pastry shop, I would always repeat "cornetto, cornetto, cornetto" in my head to avoid the blunder I made here when I wrote it down. You'd think I'd know the difference between a croissant and a cuckhold, having read some Boccaccio and one of my favorite plays ever, Il Mandragore by Machiavelli (yes, THAT Machiavelli) where most of the men are cornuti.

Ah well. In my head I was saying: "FieSOle" instead of "FiEsole." That's sort of what I meant. Good thing the bus recording said it before I did

Oh yes, I always practice what I'm going to say in Italian and hope the other person knows their lines so I can respond again in Italian. My hardest word to get from head to mouth was "prenotazione" but I finally conquered it. We stayed in "FiEsole" so that was one I mispronounced here at home and a good friend (from Italy) corrected me.

I can't wait to hear the rest of your story, especially Venice. I hope you liked it, it has a very special place in my heart.

I have been enjoying reading your 'trip report' so much. Your candor, your sense of humor, your prospective are all so refreshing, I've laughed out loud several times which isn't something I want to do too much as I'm at work. I don't work in a stuffy office but I really don't want the folks around me to know how much I'm not getting done, if you know what I mean. Anyway, this is the kind of report I love to sink my teeth into. I'm eagerly awaiting the next installment. Right now I'm jumping back and forth between you and TeacherCananda. I'm hooked on both ongoing reports.

I am really enjoying your report, love your writing style. Memorizing Jane Austen hasn't hurt you any.

Sheepie...

What a delightful report! Anxiously anticipating the next installment!

Thank you so much to everyone for liking it! Like I said, once I finish the photos I'll post up the link. There's pictures I took while in France and Germany, too.

Sorry I've been a little slow in finishing up--I've been packing for Italy and for going back home, and then my apartment was burgled and they took my backpack and one of my suitcases. Since only clothes and shoes and a few books were inside, they left everything all around the apt. complex. OF COURSE this happens less than one month before I leave Paris. So have been busy with that, and final exams for my students.

Sorry to hear of your trouble. Fortunately, you are safe. Good luck with finishing up your exams, etc.

We will be looking forward to your return trip to Italy as well. I hope you have made a reservation for David!

Hi everyone! I realize most everyone is pretty involved in a certain heated discussion on another thread, but if you're interested, here is the website with my pictures from Italy. I am finishing typing up my report--it'll be pretty short, so I might post it later today. Hope you like it and thanks again for all the great advice I received on this forum!

Argh, I always do that. The link is:

http://web.mac.com/buzzhead61

THE END:
Monday 28 April, 2008

The trip to the train station was rather uneventful. It’s funny how your impression of a city can change over a period of time; now I understand why people enjoy this slow travel concept. When I arrived in Florence, I felt disappointed and rather depressed, because it wasn’t like Rome. Obviously this makes no sense, but who says emotions make sense? I settled in quite quickly, and felt like I was leaving home. My feelings on Venice were mixed even before I left; I had heard some people say they hated it and others say it is not to be missed. The train ride was pretty uneventful, but riding over the bridge and seeing this city floating on the water was a sight I will not soon forget. Alas, that was probably the best thing I could say about Venice.

We piled out of the train and lined up to get tickets for the vaporetti. There was a guy standing next to the booth hawking maps of Venice and other ephemera, like the all-important gondolier hat that says VENEZIA on the ribbon. I couldn’t believe how many people fairly threw themselves at this old guy, buying maps like they were going out of style. I suppose they had heard that Venice is hard to navigate, but really, don’t you think this guy marked up his merch just a tiny bit? I argued with the ticket lady for a while: she took some convincing that I was eligible for the Rolling Venice card, which was actually the best deal I got in Venice. I found my vaporetto without too much trouble, but it was so slow! I understand that you can’t just zoom around the Grand Canal, but still. I felt like I was on a little kiddie’s ride. The way they “stopped” the boats made me a bit nervous as well. The driver maneuvers the “boat,” which is basically just a large floating platform with a roof and seats, toward the floating dock, and then another worker throws a rope around a metal pole on the dock and loops the ends around another thing that’s on the boat. So basically the tension of the rope stops the boat. As you can imagine, it isn’t a “soft-dock” or anything; sometimes if the driver doesn’t slow down enough, you really whack into the dock and everyone on the boat wobbles. So after motoring around for what seemed like an hour, we finally got to my stop, Sant’Elena. I disembarked and suddenly realized I had no idea where the B&B was! For the other hotels, they gave precise instructions on how to get there, but this sheet just said, “We are a quick two-minute walk from the vaporetto stop, in a yellow building.” When I had to choose whether to go right or left on a street, I went right. Of course the B&B was actually to the left, around the corner. It was nice enough, run by a little elderly couple. I had a huge room with my own bathroom (finally!) but I still felt uneasy. I just couldn’t shake the feeling that I had been dropped in a new Disney concept park. We didn’t have Cinderella’s castle, but maybe San Marco took its place. Everything had an aura of unreality, or perhaps hyper-reality would be a better word. It was all IN YOUR FACE. The vaporetti and gondolas were the rides, and there were little stands everywhere selling the kind of overpriced junk they sell at theme parks. But really, the worst were the prices. My mom’s mom used to work at a Six Flags park and she said that all the food was marked up 1000%. In Venice I’m sure the markup was higher than that. Understandably, since the lagoon separates the city proper from the mainland, they have to ship in everything, but really. Three euros for a coffee standing up at a dinky corner bar? I don’t think so, especially when I could have enjoyed the same thing in Rome for 0,60 centimes. For lunch I ended up at a little bar where it seemed half the gondoliers in Rome ate; that was pretty cool, actually. The sandwich was decent, but again, far too expensive for what I had. By this time I decided that I just couldn’t handle three days in Venice, like I had planned. I was tired, I wished I had stayed longer in Rome, and I was getting a little homesick. Even if I would leave the next day, I decided that I should still something in Venice, so I went to the Basilica di San Marco. By this time I was so sick of churches I wanted to cry, but I did it anyway because it’s famous, etc. Admittedly, the mosaics were stunning, but since I couldn’t take any pictures I felt cheated and angry. Afterwards, I marched out across the campo, angry at the stupid pigeons, angry at the strange people who actually invited these infected beasts to come sit on them (ew!), angry at the tour groups, angry at the stupid cafés who basically deprived me of the elixir of life because I cannot afford paying 3 euros for an espresso. Grump grump grumpy. I wandered around, trying to figure out what to do. I ended up paying a ridiculous amount of money for thirty minutes in an Internet café, and figured out I could leave Italy without being out of a lot of money. I went back and told the B&B I could only stay one night, and they pouted and moaned, but obviously I’m going to leave if I have to leave. That night I paid as much for a pizza in Castello than I did for entire meals in Rome and Florence. Humph.

Tuesday 29 April, 2008

Rainy morning. I rumbled off to the vaporetto stop and waited ages for one going in the right direction. At the train station, it was nearing time for our Eurostar to leave, but nothing had been posted on the boards yet. Finally, we all just headed for a Eurostar that had just pulled in. It turned out that that was the correct one; someone was just too lazy to inform people that their train had arrived. It was practically empty, and the trip to Bologna was pretty quick. I actually made my hotel reservation on the train; that was the first time I’d ever done something like that on the fly. Plus I did it in Italian, which was terrifying, because, you know, I could have booked something crazy like a 4-person room or the Honeymoon Suite. Har har. I got sort of lost coming out of the train station, and because I was pretty poor at this point, I didn’t buy a bus ticket. I figured it would be a quick walk. Um, no. Please take the bus from the station to the city center! Basically, I got there without incident because I followed the bus I would have taken. This city was another new experience. The main roads were wide, flanked by the long colonnades. It’s a university city, so I felt more comfortable with the type of folks I was seeing. Seeing flocks of kids in dreads and baggy pants, with cigarettes in hand made me feel like I was back at Censier in Paris. These people are way less intimidating than those who take their fashion lessons from, say, Karl Lagerfeld or Victoria Beckham (who decided SHE should be a style icon???). I finally found my hotel, which was on the third (American fourth) floor and of course the lift was out of order! The lady at the reception was nice but seemed kind of kooky. My room was huge because it was a double, but still, I’ve been in Paris doubles that were like closets! It had high ceilings and a TV. Luxury, people. I grabbed lunch at a little café, just a sandwich. Then I toured the archaeological museum (which I found dull to the max, simply because it wasn’t really edited. It was historical overload). I then hit up a gelato joint for a rich, creamy cone to munch on as I walked to the pinacoteca, which is supposedly quite good.
Now, if you go to the pinacoteca in Bologna, it’s helpful to know that the whole museum is not open at the same time. While one wing is open, the other is closed. This was frustrating as I was running on a strict time budget. I got to see their Renaissance collection, which wasn’t bad, but monotonous in subject. After that, I headed back and went to the main church, which shocked me with its austerity. To think that they once aspired to rival Saint Peter’s in Rome … you would never guess by the inside of the church. It does, however, possess the world’s largest zodiac sundial. Whoo-hoo. It also has a small pendulum à la Foucault, but the one at the Panthéon in Paris is, admittedly, much more impressive. Finally, it was time for dinner, so I checked out a few of the recommended places, decided they seemed creepy, and ate near my hotel in the old town. The waiter was awesome and chatted with me, because he thought I was French! Well, the French would be shocked to hear that! When I ordered a limoncello for a digestif, he gave it to me free, but he gave me a huge amount! It was frightening. The food was excellent as well: I had my standard grilled veggies and some tortelli with asparagus—amazing. It was a really fun place, a restaurant-cum-bar. I was really confused about the appetizer buffets set out in the bars. Do you just order a drink and then eat as much as you want? I didn’t know what I was doing, but if anyone does know, let me know! It was really a lovely dinner to top off my Italy trip.

Tuesday 30 April, 2008

Last day in Italy! I took the Aerobus to Marconi airport, which was quick and cheap. The airport itself was quite nice: clean and rather modern. I easily found my check=in, had a coffee and bought some water for the flight, and settled in to wait for my flight. Being completely anal-retentive, I was there two and a half hours early, which ended up being worse than it seems, since the flight was really late. I flew MyAir, which I would not recommend to anyone. For some reason our plane got held back in Bucharest, and when it finally did arrive, we had to get bussed out onto the tarmac, and when we actually got in the plane, they sat there with the air off for about twenty minutes while running through the safety procedures. We were all dying of the heat when finally we took off. The flight was rather uneventful, and despite a mildly terrifying landing where we skidded slightly and you could feel the pilot jerk the plane back to the right, we got back safely. Same routine to get into CDG: wait for bus, pile in bus, and roll across tarmac. We landed at T3, so after the luggage came out, I popped over to T2 and took the RER back into Paris. And … that’s it. But not for long, because I’ll be back in less than a week!

Really enjoyed your pictures and their captions

How fortunate you are to be returning so soon!

Thanks for a very entertaining trip report.

After reading through my report, I realized that it may not seem like I think Italy is a sort of paradise. I can be very critical and sarcastic, but often I think I do this most with the things I love most. Plus, I cannot write in a very sentimental style. My description skill is nill. I'll leave that to Zola.

Sheepie,

I've only gotten up to day 1 of your trip report and I can't count how much times I've died laughing at your descriptions! Wonderful travel report! It will probably take me a while to get through all of it(since it's already 8pm here), but I can already tell I'm in for a great read.

I loved your description of the bus system, especially when you read that it was so easy. On our first trip to Europe, DS and I had never...never used public transportation in cities before, and whenever we asked people, they always said the metros were a breeze - ha! Our first city was Paris, and as soon as we entered our first metro station, he hung around for about 10 seconds and just about ran due to sheer terror and frustration!

I don't think I would have been able to navigate the bus system on my own - can't believe there are actual cardboard signs at the bus stops! I'm sure all of it is hilarious now, but must have seemed so overwhelming in the moment.

Is it bad that I died laughing over your set-up story in the restaurant? Talk about a great story to tell when you get home - cannot believe the guy continued to "woo" you even after he realized why the two of you were put at the same table...was he at least cute?