Viva Italia Day 11 and 12

*All Viva Italia blog entries are re-written from the journal I took with me on our awesome vacation to Italy.*

11/1

On the train ride to Venice, we sat next to some people from Little Rock, AR. They were complaining the whole time about their nannies! (Rich people problems.) :)

More Coke Light!

We were a little confused about how to get a ticket for the water bus when we got off the train in Venice. But we figured it out. It really is crazy to take a boat everywhere instead of a car! After we checked into the hotel, we walked around and found a place for lunch. I had pizza with huge chunks of parm cheese and arugula. (Have I already said in my Italy recap that Italians call arugula rocket? I should totally call it that from now on!) Josh got his spaghetti carbanara…again!


Our hotel was awesome!
(photo source)

 

 

 

 

 

11/2

We had a walking tour schedule for the next morning and it was pretty short. We saw the Doge’s Palace and St. Mark’s Cathedral. They were having mass, but we still got to go in. After that, we went to a fancy little local restaurant where we tried some traditional Venetian seafood dishes. We had an appetizer of salted fish – it had shrimp and sardines – the sardines were actually really good! Then Josh had salted cod with polenta. His dish was sooo yummy! Cooked perfectly and then purred until the fish was nice and creamy. I had rolled sea bass with tomatoes, capers, and arugula. It had a really tasty sauce on it too. For dessert, Josh and I shared a bowl of warm chocolate soup with gelato. Mmmm!

 

 

After that, we walked around and explored for a long time. Josh finally bought his Italia jacket that he was looking for the entire trip. I bought some tiny black and gold Murano glass earrings.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For dinner, we went back to the pizza place we had eaten at the day we arrived in Venice. (It was the most affordable place we could find.) Since it was our last night – we went all out! We got a bottle of merlot and later on, got a ½ bottle of the “vino della cassa.” (The house wine.) I had a capresse salad (mozzarella, tomatoes, and lettuce – not basil like I wanted – boo) and tortellini with ham and mushrooms. Josh had spaghetti “amatriciana” (spicy sauce). And after all of that? We also got a pizza with spicy salami. Hey – it was our last night after all!

Venice was great, but we really were ready to come home by that time. We were so tired and we really took it pretty easy on the last leg of our trip. We still walked around a lot and explored. We ate gelato and watched people riding in the gondolas – although neither of us really had a desire to ride in one, so we skipped out on that.

11/3

To get to the Venice airport, we splurged and rented a private water taxi to take us back to land where we caught a regular car taxi. We figured it would be a fun and smooth, easy way to end the trip instead of trying to figure out the water buses and rail way. And since we didn’t ride a gondola, we figured it would be fun. I felt like a rich person when the taxi floated right up to the front door of our hotel and we stepped in. It had rich mahogany interior (Anchorman anyone?) and blue velvet cushioned seats. Very fancy. :) It was so much fun riding through Venice in such a fancy boat!

So to sum up our Italy vacation…

IT WAS AMAZING!

Everything went surprisingly smoothly. Josh and I handled all of the uncertainties well – and we didn’t argue much (only a few times when we were trying to agree on where to eat). :) Our motto for the trip: “We’ll figure it out!” Any time we got stressed about what we needed to do (how to catch the water bus, how to get to the hotel from the rail station, directions to the meet up locations, etc.) we would just say, “We’ll figure it out!” And we did! I’m such a planner and a control freak, I was very proud of myself. :)

The food was amazing, the history was amazing, the wine was amazing – everything was even better than we expected. I’m so happy that we were able to take such an wonderful trip!

 

Viva Italia Days 9 and 10

*All Viva Italia blog entries are re-written from the journal I took with me on our awesome vacation to Italy.*

10/29
On our first full day in Florence, we had a walking tour of the Duomo and the Accademia.

 

The Duomo

 

The Rape of the Sabine Women

 

We FINALLY saw the statue of David!!! But you aren’t allowed to take pics in the museum. Bummer. (Luckily, there was a replica statue of David and we took lots of pics with him.)

Me and David!

 

Trying to get a pic of me pinching David
but a random lady decided to point right as Josh took the pic.

But later on in the trip - I got him!
Nailed it! :)

After the tour, we walked around and explored, took a quick nap, and then got some dinner.

 

A gelatin David!

Of course we had to get some chocolate from Rivoire!

We stopped in at a café on our way back to the hotel and got some cioccolato – Italian hot chocolate. This stuff was amazing – so thick and sooo delish! I’ve got to learn how to make it!! Also in Florence, we tried a sample of cake called Panforte. (I ended up buying some and finishing it before we even left Italy.) It’s almost like a fruit cake, but way better!

Cioccolato - yum!

10/30
The next day, we had our full-day drive through Tuscany. The people of Tuscany weren’t as nice as the people we were around in the larger cities. But the views were amazing. We visited San Gimignano, Siena and Chianti. In San Gimignano, they had lots of cute shops with affordable gifts. I bought 2 baby bibs – one for my new niece Marielle (who was born right before we left for Italy) and one for my friend Kara’s baby.

I also bought a kitchen towel for my kitchen. When I was looking at the towels, I got yelled at by the old lady shop keeper because I was holding gelato. Oops! :) But really, I didn’t spill anything! Not sure why she had to yell at me...

After that, the best part of the trip - the wine tasting in a real Italian winery in the hills of Tuscany!! So romantic! And the views from the winery were so beautiful! We got to try 4 wines and some extra virgin olive oil. We bought some wine and promised not to drink it until after we’ve had a baby. Josh named it our “baby wine.” :)

Next, we went to Sienna. We split a pizza for lunch and then had a walking tour of the town. We learned all about the Palio di Siena! (A horse race they have in Siena.)

In all, it was a very long day and we slept well on the bus back to Florence. Once we got back, we found a place to eat for dinner – it was a pretty fancy restaurant that had been open since the 1800’s. We got an antipasto platter – no cheese (boo) but a great selection of meat, some bruschetta, and a piece of bread with pâté. The pâté was gross – I couldn’t eat it. I can’t remember what else we had for dinner that night…

One the way back to the hotel, we stopped in a store and Josh got gelato and I got a cannoli – it was soooooooo good! We ate our dessert while sitting on the edge of the Ponte Vecchio. So romantic!

10/31 The last day was our half-day tour of Pisa. Pisa was cool – we got the obligatory picture holding the tower up. I bought my mom a shopping bag in Pisa – they had the best prices on all of the touristy souvenirs.

When we got back, we had lunch at McDonalds! :) I got the Italian Adagio burger. It had eggplant and feta on it. It was alright. The fries were the same old yummy Micky D’s fries. Josh had the McRoyal – basically a quarter pounder. We didn’t get McFlurries, but they had hazelnut and pistachio flavors. I also had a Coke Light – a diet coke in Italy!

After that, we went to the Piggy Market to shop. We learned on our Academy Walking Tour that the Piggy Market is named after a bronze statue of a pig-well, a boar really-that is sitting in a fountain near the market. His nose is the only place that is bright bronze because it is a custom to set a coin in the pigs mouth, rub his nose, and drop the coin into the fountain. Then you will come back to Florence! We bought some leather handbags and wallets for gifts at the market.

 

Also in Florence, there is another custom that if lovers lock a key lock onto the side of the Ponte Vecchio bridge and throw the key into the river, their love will last forever. However, this is illegal so ever month or two, the police come out and cut off all of the locks. So their love lasts for a month or two. :)

After the Piggy Market, we found a place for dinner. We split a bottle of Chianti, then I had “small mouthfuls of beef” cooked in a tomato, pepper, and wine sauce. It was served with potatoes – the entire meal was amazing. Josh got lasagna and we split a plate of grilled veggies. For dessert, we had a Florence specialty – sweet dessert wine with biscotti that you dipped in the wine – it was awesome!

We also saw a few people dressed up for Halloween - not as many as I expected to see though. And whenever we saw a group of scantly dressed girls in Halloween outfits - they turned out to be Americans. Figures. :)

Viva Italia Day 8

*All Viva Italia blog entries are re-written from the journal I took with me on our awesome vacation to Italy.*

I’ve got to mention a few last things about Sorrento before I move on to our first day in Florence!

There were a million British kids in Sorrento. Josh and I figured it must be their fall break.

Riding around Sorrento and Amalfi was SCARY! One lane roads curving up the mountains – yikes! The HUGE tour bus we were on during the Amalfi drive had to back up ¼ of a mile at one point because a delivery truck was driving up the road. At least he was a safe driver – hands on the wheel and never talked on his cell phone.

There was an orange tabby cat at the hotel. He came into the restaurant during breakfast one morning – the waiters didn’t seem to care!

At the fancy restaurant we ate at (where Josh made me take a pic with the guitar player) a dog walked into the outdoor seating area where we were eating. I figured the waiters would shoo him out, but instead a woman brought him out a plate of dog food and fed him right outside. He was so cute – soft and brown with big sad puppy dog eyes. After he ate his plate of food, he came back into the outdoor seating area and lay down and took a nap. It made me miss my puppies SOOO much!

10/28
Florence is great – our favorite city so far! However, it’s expensive – if I have to walk by another Gucci, Louis Vuitton, or Dolce and Gabbana, I’m going to scream!

On our first day, we arrived by train and then walked about a mile to our hotel. Cobblestones and rolly suitcases are not friends. We checked into our hotel and then went back out for our Walking Tour of the Uffizi gallery. We saw so many medieval paintings. Venus of Urbino was our fav – we’ll have to get a copy of that to hang somewhere in our house. Afterwards, we found a place to eat – I had lasagna and Josh got the carbonara…for like the 15th time. We ordered a bottle of chianti – the waiter said it’s not possible to not like chianti. It was delish!

Our hotel in Florence was the most expensive (almost a grand for the 4 nights we were there!!!) but was def the best as far as location. We were right next to the Ponte Vecchio – the oldest bridge in Florence. They call it the golden bridge because there are a bunch of gold jewelry shops along the bridge. Also on the bridge is a walk way that the ruling family (the Medici) built in the middle ages so that they could walk from their palace (the Pitti Palace – which was also the name of our hotel) to the Uffizi where they did their business. The walkway was covered and raised off the bridge so the Medici didn’t have to interact with the peasants.

Our hotel room.

Beautiful!

Besides the location of the hotel, we had an amazing view of Florence from the roof-top dining area. Our room also had a pretty neat view of the main intersection near the Ponte Vecchio – great for people watching!

Graham's Newborn Photos!

HNM Photography did an awesome job with Graham's newborn photos!