With friends near Pau

We are now staying with friends of Rachel’s, Gill, Jane, Shane, Sam, Kerry and Beth. They are living the English dream having got a old farm house with a massive barn in a vilage near Pau, within an hour or so of the Pyrennes (including the ski fields). The views of the Pyrennes are beautiful, with the morning sun reflecting off brilliant cloud formations. It is quite a treat to go into a ‘real’ house with crockery, chairs that move and a proper table – the small luxuries in life.

It’s got to be, if not the best, up in top three

Barcelona, what a fantastic city and boy did we not do it justice. Having spent half a day walking down Las Ramblas, seeing the cathedral and the waterfront (see previous entry), we cam in again today (Thursday) and took the option to do an open top bus tour and jump off at a couple of stops.
Barcelona is really a city that seems to have come alive in the lat 19th century, but of course it has a long history. Way back around 700-800 it was repelling the Arab invaders, and before then it was Roman walled city, a few fragments of which still remain. Over the centuries the city swallowed up the surrounding villages and grew well beyond the original walls. You can still detect clear divisions between the original city and the various villages that were consumed. Learning something about Spanish regionalism one would not be surprised if these out regions still retained a local dialect and cuisine!
But back to the 19th century and the genius of Gaudi… unreal! When you think what the Victorian architects were doing, all very ornate and proper, this guy was going nuts with curves, bulges, bright colours and playing with textures from rough volcanic rock to super smooth ceramic tiles. He could have been designing today and it would still look like something from the future. He has turned much of Barcelona into what feels like a playroom. And more recent architects have either carried on the tradition, or designed modern buildings on different lines, but still beautiful and unique. Amongst these fantastic buildings are a dizzying collection of sculptures from Christopher Columbus to the stylised Olympic rings, giant lobsters, Miro-inspired creations… We did not make it into any of the art of museums, having spent too much time around the many spired church of Gaudi’s and a fantastic park with those curvy mosaiced benches, water features and cave-like arches. In the park were a couple of musicians, one singing with a guitar and the other with a pair of drums and a sax playing classic Spanish tunes, really a great experience.
I will try and get some pic’s up in the next few days, but really I think you just have to come and live here for a while (or at least stay for a few weeks).

Contemplative

We are now nearing the end of our adventure and one starts to get rather contemplative at this stage. The things we have done and seen, the things we would like to do differently / again / missed out, what are we going to do next…
It has certainly been an experience for us all. On the one hand there is the thought about when can one do this again, there is still Spain, Eastern Europe, vast swathes of France, Norway we hear is great in a campervan etc. etc. etc. And then on the other hand there is thinking about how we get back into a ‘normal’ life.
You couldn’t do this forever, and in some ways two months stints would work really quite well, the problem what do you do in the in-between times.
A few things we have learnt. A campervan is very good way to see a lot of Europe, but not all – southern Italy would be better in a car that you didn’t care too much about, preferably narrow and pretty short, with an Italian number plate. Caravans would be a nuisance unless you are going to stay in one place for a long time, that might not be such a bad idea in some places. Cars are so passé. You don’t need much stuff and much space, but you did need slightly more space than we have! When the weather is warm, no problem, but when it is cold and wet, you really want slightly more space for four people. The toilets in France on average are much yuckier than anyway else in Europe, the Swiss win the prize on that score, but on other measures France scores high for tripping – cheap camp sites, the best bread in Europe and pretty good street signs. Germany is the friendliest place we have been through. Italy has way too much stuff – culture, food, wine, coffee, history…

We are on holiday!

Having spent the last 10 weeks or thereabouts travelling around we have decided it is time to take a holiday, so are we now firmly ensconced in Sitges, just south of Barcelona.
Sitges is a vacation town with large hotels, golf course and many well equipped camp sites. As we have learnt from Stephen (Rachel’s Dad), many years ago it was just a small village… but with the lovely beaches, sunshine and so close to Barcelona it is not hard to see why it has grown. There is still an old centre and lovely church, but there is now a promenade that must run for about a kilometre or so all along the beach.


The first (or was that the second) night here we went down to the town on our bikes and we treated to a fantastic sunset through the palm trees that line the promenade. The sunsets around here really are brilliant as I had learnt sailing in September (see previous posts).
Yesterday we ventured into Barcelona, about an hour away on the bus. We arrived around lunch time, so after a bit of a walk down Las Ramblas (the main drag) – great market, lovely balconies and side streets, good street entertainment and some rather interesting pets to buy – we headed for a restaurant to try out the local paella, which was very good. Looking around the posters in the restaurant of various beautiful sites around Europe we realised how much we had seen from the coliseum, to the leaning tower of Pisa, Ponte Vecchio in Florence, Rialto in Venice… OK so the restaurant had a bit of an Italian theme, but was easier to find somewhere that served pizza for Bex and Tash’.


From Los Ramblas we continued down to the port and then took a circuitous route around to the Cathedral. The front of the cathedral was swathed in netting as they are doing some major restoration (a common trend across southern Europe, but still the inside was beautiful and the cloisters were truly special (I think the best we have seen, and we have seen a few) with fountains, waterfalls and palm trees.
Today we are staying put, but tomorrow we will do the open top bus tour thing around Barcelona and really see the place. The day thus far has been spent working, washing, reading, juggling, cross-stitching and other such leisure pursuits.

Made in Spain

We have arrived in Spain. Tasha’s destination of choice of the trip.
Tasha and I navigated our way, trying to avoid too many toll motorways.
Point of interest here, I suspect that when Spain switched over to the
Euro they literally changed from Pesos to Euros without any of the
rounding nonsense they suffered in the Netherlands (and elsewhere no
doubt), evidenced by the bizarre toll costs, amounts like €1.01, €0.69
etc, rather unique.

Our camp site for evening is 30+k south of Barcelona, it is warm and
almost summery… we may spend some time here me thinks.

Carcassonne

By the middle of the afternoon we have reached Carcassonne, a plain modern city, but a beautiful medieval walled town that has been turned into a tourist shopping district. Still a lovely place with some great across the grapevines of the Languedoc. For me, the real highlight of the day was the drive through the vineyards on the way to Carcesonne.


Autumn has arrived on the grapevines and, in the afternoon sunshine the light shines through them, lighting them up like stained glass windows in the most decorated cathedrals. They really are a special treat, but more on that tomorrow. That evening we stayed in a car park camp site right next to Carcassonne, so our view for the evening was the lit up walls of the old city, very special. We paid €10 for the privilege, a small price to pay.
The next morning Tasha and I wandered down the hill while Bex and Rach’
slept and found a boulangeire (spelling) with for fresh croissant and a
warm baguette.



We headed south from Carcassonne into the depth of the Corbiers wine appellation. Being Sunday all the vineyards were shut, but the views were fantastic. With the routing we had set Fiona found us some brilliant roads to take through twisting gorges with rivers that were dried up, except for the occasional pool. Endless rows of grapevines, reaching up the hills, in all shades of late autumn. We drove through
lanes of tree tunnels, again resplendent (getting into that word) in autumn shades.



We stopped and walked around Lagrasse, a lovely old village that the tourist trails had not found. A good stop.
I don’t feel I have done justice to the views in the region before we headed back to the main highway to Spain… you’ll have to see it for yourself.

Quick trip across Italy and the south of France

It has been few days since I have written an update and most of that time has been spent racing across Italy in France. Having decided to change our plans we figured the best thing was to try and get a bit of time in Spain and, thus, the motorway companies of Italy and France have profited well!
First stop from Venice was the closest we could get France in a day, and that proved to be about 50k from the border in a fairly unexciting sea side town. A nice camp site run by a very friendly Dutch couple. In hindsight we should have taken the opportunity for a hot shower as the next two nights were to be spent in car parks (well strictly one of them was just on the side of the road having given up searching).
Most of the drive across Italy was shrouded in fog which eventually turned to some rain. When we got to the coast the weather had cleared considerably.
From Italy we headed along the Cote d’Azur. What a fantastic drive, one of the best of the trip. Through tunnels and across bridges with views of rocky coastlines and dramatic cliffs. Before getting to the French border the Italian side was dominated with terraced gardens. Really a brilliant drive, even thought most of it was motorway. Along the way we took a very brief detour in Monaco, not surprisingly a town/city/nation that did not cater well for campervans, unless they had a Porsche logo on the front! Still we managed a glimpse of the casino and a good look at the amazing boats in the marina, recognising a few from the Viaduct basin in Auckland during the America’s Cup.


From Monaco I spotted a sign for Villefranche Sur Mer and could not resist the opportunity, and besides we needed lunch. Funny how old memories create a warped view of a place. I had been here with my mum about 20+ years ago. Steve, I found the Welcome Hotel, it still looks very flash, and the cliffside walk around to the beach, the marina. All rather strange to return to a place after so long and stranger still to only half remember how things were. We managed to get some very nice pain au chocolate and baguettes, France certainly has one thing over Italy!


After our detour off the highway we returned to the main drag and pointed Fiona for Carseccone, but the French motorway traffic beat us and we stopped en route in Frontignan. Selection of town was based on the Camper Stop booking informing us that free camping could be found at the new marina, and do you think we could find it??? No. So we just pulled to the side of the road by the beach and spent the night anticipating a knock on the door from the local police, but did got through the night. The other attraction of Frontignan mentioned in the book is a Saturday morning market, into which we ventured in the morning. Yummy cheese, fresh fruit and veges, a little something for Laila (on request) and various other olives and knick knacks later and we were back on the road.

The prettiest shopping centre on the planet

Perhaps we have been travelling too long, perhaps we have just seen to many beautiful cities, splendid churches and fantastic art, but Venice really did feel like a shopping centre installed in one of the most prettiest locations possible.

St Marks square and chruch being the exception, and, to be honest, once you got to some areas on the outskirts, or went down the end of the long, dead end, alley ways things became more real.

Still, view after view of beuatiful canals, bridges and houses. The arhced windows and the window boxes dripping flowers into the water... really very magical. Because our camp site is directly across the water we were able to catch a boat to Venice, which is of course the right way to arrive. The city appeared through the misty morning, with the domes of the various chruches reaching out through the clouds.

The shops that really got the attention were the glass shops. They sell glass everywhere, including most of the street merchants, but the specialist galss shops with the multi-coloured chandeliers were a real treat to spend time in. If you had money to burn you could really get carried away. The drinking glasses set, all bent and twisted with different colours dripping down their sides.

Today we head East, only two weeks to go now, we are trying to plot the most efficient routes now. Thinking we will get to Bilbao and then catch a ferry from there to Portsmouth. Not sure where to stop between Barcelona and Bilbao so any suggestions would be appreciated.

Ravenna

5th and 6th century churches resplendent with mosaics from the 6th to the 18th century. Have to wait for the pictures… too much Prosecco to say much more.

Laila, I can see why you love this town.
The mosaics are truly magical, and otherwise if felt a bit like Alphen ann den Rijn. More later…

A change of plans

Tonight we camped on the edge of the Venice lagoon, with the lights of the city of Venice across the water sipping a cheapy, but really quite nice, bottle of Prosecco. ‘How did we get here’, I hear you cry, ‘what happened to Sicily, Croatia, all those plans!’ Plans change and ours have on many occasions. We got as far as Amalfi and then kind of realised how far it was to Sicily and how far it was to get back up and a few of our other must have places and thought we will have to alter plans to get done some of these things, and so we find ourselves on the shores of the lagoon gazing towards Venice.

Stepping back a few places, the last time we posted we had spent a day in Naples, and our next stop was Herculaneum. Herculaneum was a great place, smaller and easier to explore than Pompeii, without the crowds of tourists (there was only one bus load while we were there), you could get views of the houses and streets with no people. Once again a fantastic experience. The mosaics, the frescos, the history. It truly is amazing when you can wander around a complete town, many of the buildings in Herculaneum have still got two levels as they were originally built and were not destroyed due to the nature of the stuff from Vesuvius that was dumped on Herculaneum. You can imagine the locals, walking through the forum, popping into the shops, chilling at the local baths and relaxing in their gardens. Herculaneum was a flash seaside town so there are many nice houses which at one stage would have lovely sea views until a load of mud was dumped in the way. Struggling to get your head around that people lived in these places two thousand years ago, it is so organised, sophisticated. I mean, two thousand years ago there were not even people in New Zealand, the Brit’s were living in mud huts. I am sure there were many other advanced civilizations around the same time and before (Greeks, Egyptians), but still. To see it all laid out before you… brilliant.

If you only have a couple of hours, do Herculaneum and you can avoid Pompeii, but if you going to both is well worth the two days.

From Herculaneum we followed another BJ suggestions the Amalfi coast. Well, we discovered our second campervan-not-so-friendly location, but a bit of fun. We couldn’t find in any of books either camping stops or camp sites around the coast but we still headed along the coast figuring there had to be somewhere. But the drive was simply fantastic. The Amlfi coast line is a rugged, cliff lined coast with very few sandy bays. Terraced orange groves sprawl down the hillsides to the coast interspersed with towns cling for their life to the rugged coast line. Churches and castles built right into the rock, sometimes barely recognisable as man-made buildings dot the coast.

We eventually found a place to pull over after bobbing and weaving around tight curves at side of the orange and lemon seller. While Rachel took some pics I bought a bag of oranges, but the lemons, wow! Massive, almost the size of a rugby ball. The stall also sold limencello, the purpose for the humongous lemons.

The sun was setting as we drove which cast beautiful colours, but created havoc when driving around roads that makes the Coromandel coast road (sorry for the non-NZers) feel like a motorway.

As we approached Amalfi a few quite horn blasts were heard and all of sudden we were confronted with a bus. Not a problem if you are on a road with two lanes and straight bits, but on when there is barely road and hair pin turns, well basically you are buggered. Behind us was a stream of traffic with a little three wheeler first up. Some back and forwards, lots of gesticulating and much angst we managed to squeeze through with nanometres to spare.

We did get to Amalfi and decided that what you really want to do is explore the region in either a very small car or a motor bike. The lady in the information centre practically fell off her chair laughing when I asked if there was somewhere we could stay overnight in a campervan… yeah right! This was a piece of out motivation to head north, but plenty more time and places to see.

We headed back down the twisty road and soon spotted a sign for the Autostrada (A3). We didn’t have Fiona turned on but thought it can’t be too far… yeah right! If you glance at a map there is a small mountain range between Amalfi and Naples on the other side of the peninsula. So it is more hair pin turns, up and up. We reach the top round a corner and start to head down and then… wow! We round a corner and are greeted with a reward that made everyone of the tight turns and difficult roads worth it, a view across Naples and Vesuvius. It was dark by now. Hard to describe the view… the lights of a city and rising out them is Vesuvius, like a giant rising up and towering over the town. You will have to wait for the photos taken on a four second exposure from a perfect make-out parking place.

Having decided to leg it north we kept on going into the night, plan to get as far north as we could before it got too late. The most likely spot was a car park to the south of Rome. Not quite the picturesque camp sites we have had in the past, hardly a lake side location with views of a medieval city… but free and safe never-the-less… the night passed listening to the local youths making out in their cars. The next day was a driving day, from a car park outside Rome to a camp site just south of Ravenna. We needed a camp site after 4 days of car parks we were getting a bit on the whiffy side. The drive was really very good. Crossing through the middle of Italy we went up and down mountains, along valleys and along coasts. Autumn leaves, deep valleys and mountain top towns along the way.

In Napoli

We had been advised by the Roman policeman (see previous entry on losing the cell phone) to take nothing with us into Naples. So apart from a couple of umbrellas, 20 Euros and a cash card we followed his advice. Catching the train was pretty straight forward and we drew into the Garibaldi station after passing some colourful graffiti en route. A couple of hundred yards outside the station and we were into the cell phone, stolen laptops and ‘designer’ accessory district. On the way through we were able to get away with buying just a new cell phone having shaken off the dodgy laptop and camera sales men.

Our main destination in Naples was the archaeology museum, not understanding the scale on the map we headed off by foot and quickly descended upon a street market that went on and on and on. Quite a fun experience, the streets laden with stalls of junk stuff, designer copies and clothes, clothes lines hanging at all levels from the buildings (including across the street) and scooters making their way down what really seemed like pedestrian precinct only. The traffic was really quite entertaining throughout the day. The cars, scooters and pedestrians just blurred into one mass, weaving and bobbing. It kind of all works, but you do notice a fair few cars with dinged bumpers and hobbling dogs that have come off the worse for wear.

This really felt like what you expect from an Italian city, a great experience.

For lunch we stopped at a lonely planet recommended restaurant just down from the museum, good food, Rachel made the best choice with a yummy local pasta dish (gnocchi Sorrento – tomato, cheese, ham).

The museum was very good (thanks Barend Jan for the recommendation). All the mosaics, statues and trinkets from the various Vesuvian towns and cities have made their way here over the years. The mosaics are fantastic and the frescoes, well you do have to wonder why they go on about the Renaissance dudes discovering perspective, these Romans etc. knew the vanishing point as well as De Vinci and that crowd. We were pretty blown away with other sophisticated stuff, the glass and silverware could have come straight out of Victorian England and the medical and dentistry instruments would not have been out of place in a hospital today. When you compare this with what the Brit’s were up to in their mud huts up to 1000 years later it is hard to comprehend.

We avoided the bottom floor statues, figured we had seen enough in Rome.

Don’t tell anyone, we went in the secret room (BJ did you go there???). Can’t say what we saw there, might be read by young people… nudge nudge, wink wink say no more. Suffice it to say those fauns and satyrs did more than sing and dance in the forest!

On the way back we managed to get caught in a storm (Tasha’s comment – it was really lightening and everything), but dodged the worst under €1 umbrellas and the canopies in the markets.

Becca bought a hat that doesn’t have a top (bizarre) and a watch. Ivan spent large on an Italy sweatshirt (12Euros but he could have got it for 8!!), Tasha is sporting a flash watch (3Euros) and Rachel got nothing!!

Note: I hope you all appreciate the good spelling and grammar, Rachel has helped with this one.

And so was our day in Napoli.

A wet day in Pompeii

Hard to see what progress was made in 2500 years. As we wandered around the ruins of what was a large complex city essentially built around 600BC with some improvements by the Greeks and Romans over the following centuries, really hard to see the fundamental difference between this and the medieval cities across Europe. Brick and stone walls, clay tiles, rudimentary plumbing… Of course one reads the books and studies the history, in Rome you see some pretty flash places; the forum, the coliseum, but you don’t get a sense of the scale of the cities and technology until you see Pompeii. A city in it’s entirety and that doesn’t even include the suburbs that are understood to have sprawled.


From the frescoes and mosaics to the temples, theatres and guild halls – a truly fantastic piece of the world. Can’t understand why we talk about this period as ancient history as something distinct from history of the first have of the millennium, seems we know as little about each with pictures, myths and interpretation being the main source of information.
Other images – rain drops, mist (couldn’t see Vesuvius, I reckon you hardly ever can), dogs, dogs and more dogs.


The new city of Pompeii is a pretty dull affair. A nice church, but otherwise, well not a lot. And the shops never seem to open, couldn’t quite figure that out

Tasha’s comments on Pompeii and other things.

In Pompeii there are a lot of dogs, we found one and it looked like it was dieing. Becca wanted to give it a blanket and some food, but Mum said no you are not allowed to do that.

Me and Becca found this poetry place and you do plays in the Roman times. We thought it was a gladiator place and we started fighting. Becca bit me hard and it hurt. I had some horrible tomato in my sandwich, I ate it thinking it was phoney baloney in my sandwich, but it was disgusting.

It was raining really hard so we stopped in a café but it started raining even harder. Becca started hitting her head on my elbow thinking she was Bobey from Harry Potter.
The campsite in Rome was brilliant because it had little toddler toilets that were really cute.
Now we are at a camp site and it is kind of weird because you have to get keys to go to the toilet. And it is only a five minute walk down to the old town where all the ruins are that we recently discovered because they were covered in ash that turned to rock.
To get the figures of the people they fill the rock with plaster and then knock off the rock and you get the shape of the person.


We had sweet corn fritters for dinner last night.
We went to see Rome. Rome was pretty. I liked the Coliseum best. It was fun and exciting and I had never been there before. I think it is a great place to visit if you are on holiday in Rome. It was 3.50 for a guided tour inside the coliseum but outside they were trying to sell it for 10 euros and we would have had to pay 22 euros each. Luckily we didn’t get the tour guide outside.
The ice creams were very good in Rome but they were a bit expensive and just the other day we had an ice cream in Pompeii and that was a good big ice cream and it was 2 euros but we still got one.
The dogs are quite frightening, they don’t make any noise but they follow you and scare me.
Yo ho, yo ho, a pirates life for me.

Rachel on Rome day 4.

We had a lovely relaxing day sorting out the receipts and doing the washing. We had intended to go into Rome but the information office changed its opening hours and didn’t open until 4 so we could not buy any bus tickets.
The temperature must have soared to over 20 degrees so it was a welcome change from the day before.

Becca on Rome day 4.

When Ivan went to Amsterdam we went shopping in a market and they had these flip flops that I really liked but they didn’t have them in my size, so I didn’t get them. Then I saw a really nice top, but it was an adult top so I didn’t get that. I got a cool nail filer thing.
We spent the day sorting out, relaxing and washing. It was so hot that we didn’t need dryer tokens and could dry the washing in the sun.
We noticed when Ivan went away that the sun comes out and the weather gets hotter so we have decided that when it gets cold again we will send Ivan away (joke).

Nothing holistic about this

Nothing new here, we have all seen the movies with , heard the legends of or seen with your own eyes the mad Italian drivers, typified by the scooter riders in Rome, but what we came across was classic.
We were on the bus (271) that takes you from a piazza near the Vatican to the Piazza Venezia and beyond crossing the Tiber during the journey. The route takes you down a one way, one lane street down the side of the river, and naturally our bus was headed the right way down said street. Suddenly we come to a halt, blocking our way is another bus, stopped perpendicular to our bus! How it got that way remains a mystery, but when we came across it was wedged on one side by a little blue hatchback parked on the left and on the side by a wall with inches to spare at each end. Being very resourceful in such a situation, our bus driver, along with some passengers from the stuck bus picked up the little car parked on the side of the road and carried it meters down the road to allow the bus driver to do a 10 point turn and manoeuvre himself out of the predicament he had found himself in. One had to imagine the look on the face of the little car owner when they return to find their car 5 meters down the road and now illegally parked across a pedestrian crossing.
If you have read Dirk Gently’s (spelling) Holistic Detective Agency you will remember the episode with the couch stuck in the stairwell which would not move up nor down, well this really was the same thing except it was a 10 tonne bus on a one way street in Rome… very bizarre, and certainly entertaining.

Rome has way too much stuff

Rome has way too much stuff… overriding impression. Walking into the Capitolio Museo on the Piazza Campidoglio (designed by Michelangelo and really very well done if I might say so, including the dude Marcus Aurelius I think on the horse in the middle) you walk through room after room of statues and busts. Most are in perfect condition, they are all worthy of a centre piece just about anywhere in the world, but here they are crammed shoulder to shoulder along the walls. We spent a couple of hours, starting off slowly, reading the plaques and walking around as much as you can, but eventually the pace quickens, the back aches and the coffee beckons. They do have a habit of leaving the best to last, in this case the original of the dude on the horse, weather beaten but truly impressive along with various body parts from what must have been an humongous statue of somebody no doubt. So a quick flick, the girls head for the cafeteria and I am left holding the camera.


Earlier in the day we finished our journey’s through ancient Rome with the Palatino. While there we cam across an NZ tour guide who was offering a free tour, a taster for paid ones later in the evening and tomorrow. He was really very good, entertaining and full of facts? including that Rome, Edinburgh and Sheffield are all built on 7 hills, have to ask Google to check that one.

The girls have been fascinated by the locals, their clothes, of course most immaculately groomed, even designer looking kit on the toddlers, with the exception of the teenage school kids in their regulation baggy jeans falling down around their thighs, heavy belts and various layers of tops. The boys clearly have time to spare, with the tweezers on eyebrows in front of the mirror.



End of the day was a bit of a drama, Ivan the wally managed to get his phone either left behind in the museum metal detector or lost / stolen somewhere later in the evening. This, I know will be a pain in he butt to detail with, save it for Amsterdam for work tomorrow to sort out.

Our third day in Rome has been an immersion in the Roman Catholic church. We dutifully took our place in the queue for the Vatican museum and the Sistine chapel at 8.15 in the morning, a full 30 minutes before the opening time. Despite what might sound like an early arrival we were probably number one zillionith in the queue. We did get to the front at around 9.45, not too bad I think, could have been worse by the some of the rumours we had heard. Thinking we had come a long way for this religious experience I was wondering if we could beat the ticket queue and go for the pilgrim line, but I am not sure we have sufficient blisters for the privilege.
Anyway, so we wandered through room after room of the Vatican, unbelievable, beautiful frescos and mosaiced floors everywhere (see previous comment on Rome has way too much stuff). One of the highlights of the walk through was the map room, a ‘corridor’ extending 120 meters with frescoed maps of Italy all down the walls… fantastic. Another highlight was the Raphael room, he spent 8 years on the frescos in here and one or two other rooms.
And so to the Sistine chapel. Have to admit I (and Rach’) were a bit surprised. We both thought the chapel was round and I thought the picture of Gods and mans figures touching was the central thing and the rest of the ceiling kind of hung off it, but no. The chapel is a rectangle and the fingers are just one of about 10 scenes that Michelangelo painted depicting the creation of the earth and some stuff on Noah. There is also the fresco of the judgement, not quite as gruesome as some we have seen in other churches, but man were did the blokes work out in the old days. Michelangelo manages to get rippling biceps and serious six packs on the lot of them.
After being blown away by the Vatican halls (oh yes we ‘popped’ into the Vatican museum, room after room of art and artefacts from the Egyptians, Etruscans, Greeks etc. etc.) we had a quick coffee fix and headed for the Basillica.
Unreal, words really can not give it justice and neither will the photos. Massive, beautiful, colours, deep, really just have to go there. This is the biggest church in the world and having seen a few amazing cathedrals in the last couple of months (Antwerp, Florence, Pisa, Siena to think of just a few) you get kind of blasé, but no. This is truly the mother of them all.
A couple of small things that grabbed me, the toes of St Peter’s statue worn to nothing from the devotees, Pope Gregorio XIII statue (the one we have to thank for the calendar and the lack of a zero AD), Michelangelo’s St Peter dieing and the central altar made from the bronze that once adorned the Patheon.
And so was our religious experience, and what a mind blowing one at that. Funny thing, with all the nuns and priests wandering around you do feel (well I do at least) a sense of security… bizarre I know.
We have now parted our ways for a day while I go to Amsterdam for some work and Rach, Bex and Tash have another day in the eternal city while I mourn the loss of my cell phone.
A couple of facts along the way:
1. Beer really does cost €5+ a pint as the tour guide said
2. Gelatos progressively get more expensive the further south you go in Italy (.80  2.50)
3. The coffee really is very good everywhere, just don’t ask for a Latte or you will get warm milk. It’s a café latte or really best to opt for a café macchiato and the won’t look down at you.
4. The cops are really short, but have these mean looks either pepping out from beneath the peaks of their caps or through their designer shades.

Rome Day 1…couldn’t find the Vatican

Got off the bus at the Vatican stop, big place you think, important place you think, really really famous, can’t be too hard to find you think… ahhhh but you hadn’t counted out geographically challenged people in an Italian city! After 1+ hours of going many wrong ways we eventually discovered the Vatican, given away by a humongous wall and a very long queue to get into the Basillica. So that put paid to today’s plan and we got on a bus and headed for the Coliseum, found that. We signed up for the tour and spent a couple of hours immersed in the blood and excitement of the Coliseum. The tour lady was very good.


We walked past the Piazza Venezia on the way there, wow, big place, lots of statues etc. After visiting the coliseum there was a protest going on in the Piazza (apparently something to do with labour laws) and so we headed for the metro. I was trying to remember the claim to fame of the Roman metro, can’t remember, it is the most something??? Anyway, we got back to our camp ground after two metros and the bus.
Side note: it has got very cold all of a sudden, not sure how we are going to cope if it doesn’t warm up soon, head south we think, that tends to do the trick.
Ciao

Two more Ubrian towns

Today we found a place I could live, at least for some time. The hill top town (yes another one) of Perugia. We came to Perugia from Gubbio (see previous post).
An interesting little tale about Perugia. Perugia was for many years (way back in the 1000, 1100,1200, 1300) a fiercely independent town. Then the pope came along and decided they should pay their salt tax, well naturally the Perugian were a bit annoyed about this and suggested that they wouldn’t. As you can imagine the Pope said ‘no worries’… yeah right. No, the Pope sends in one of his underlings to take control. Up until then the town was basically run by the aristocracy, having built a series of lovely villas, surrounding pretty Piazza’s with the odd church intermingled amongst them in the better part of town. So, this upstart comes in and decides to build a honking great fortress right where all these villas, piazzas and churches are. You can imagine the locals are well pleased with this plan, so rather than be congenial the religious guy (I can’t remember what he was exactly… a cardinal maybe) realises that the fortress he has planned needs to protect the city from both the outside world and from the city itself. The final fortress was a monstrous building on the edge of the city that consumed all these rich dudes villa’s with a moat all the way around, with the bulk of the protection facing the townsfolk. The story then fast forwards to the 1860’s and, I imagine with the unification of Italy, all this nonsense was well behind them so they decide to bulldoze the fortress and build a new town hall etc.


We came across the fortress having wandered aimlessly around the streets of Perugia with our Museo card promising free entry into a dozen what almost turned out to be fictitious museums. In the end we discover some them, and after winding down the streets for some time came across these escalators heading into the mountains. Great idea these Italians have, build escalators to get you up the steep hills in town, very civilized idea. The escalators ended deep within the underground bowels of the town and the foundations of the fortress (that was how we found it).
Perugia has a fantastic main via which ends in the Cathedral (not one of the best we have seen) and a fountain in the Piazza. In an odd way the whole place worked wonderfully together without any of the individual parts being magnificent in isolation. The side streets are very cute with overhead bridges, planters and twisty little alleys and staircases.
We had spent two days in Perugia, but one day was spent in the campsite just doing nothing… watching movies and working.


After Perugia we headed for Rome, with a stop in the… you guessed it… hill top town of Orvieto. This had once been a very important town on the trading routes out of Rome. We chose Oriveto on the recommendation of the 1000 Place’s book (see previous post) and true to form what a great place. Orvieto grows out of a rock outcrop that springs out the green rolling hills. The rock is formed in sheer red cliffs and, as such, the Italians (maybe learning something from the Swiss) have built a little reticulated train that takes you up the cliff with a few escalators to help you on your way. Other than the location, Orvieto’s other draw card is the Duomo. It has a façade covered in beautiful frescoes, mosaics and base reliefs. Even the spiralling columns have mosaics embedded inside the spirals and in the blue sky and sunshine the whole place glows. We settles down in a wine bar outside the duomo and tried some of the local wines, can’t complain.
And so was Umbria, a place to come back to with time to spare… and on to Rome.

Four towns through Tuscany (well a bit of Umbria too)

Monteriggioni.

A tiny mountain top, walled village. Lovely little feast of salamis, cheese and bread. A great place to visit that the tour buses have not found in great abundance. And, big bonus, you can walk from one side to the other in minutes, well almost seconds actually. The medieval wall still surrounds the entire village and with no new development beneath the walls you really have walked back in time. Rachel discovered a factory shop for a local shoe factory and walked out with some lovely boots.

San Gimignono


I am sure pages have been written about this beautiful town between Siena and Florence. We arrived in the late afternoon, but it was still crowded. You may think, another walled hill top town in Tuscany, seen one you have seen them all, but that is so wrong. Escaping the crowded main street we walked around the outskirts, along the walls. Eventually discovering a little wine bar with tables looking out across the sunset and the Tuscan countryside. A nice local white.
Moving back onto the main drag, the bulk of the tourists had disappeared and we discover a real draw card, the gellataria. We were advised by the NZ family we met in Florence (see previous entry) and, wow, fantastic. Large, (two flavours for the usual price of one), delicious, great texture, good cones… an all round perfect ice cream package. They had won an award of some sort, a poster proclaiming top Gellatria in Italy in 2006. We had a large pizza on the steps of the cathedral after the sun had set. Only a couple of hours in this beautiful town, but a fantastic experience.
We spent the night in a car park campsite having failed to find somewhere in Siena. A friendly attendant who would drive you up to the town whenever you wanted and dropped you right in the middle of a roundabout (the same place he picked up from).

Siena


Bizzare, we arrived in Siena, having been advised by the attendant in San Gimignono that we park by the train station. We look around for the ‘quintessential Tuscan hill town’ (that’s what Lonely Planet says anyway) and see nothing but ugly modern apartments, bridges and train tracks. We head in what we believe is the right direction and catch a glimpse of a red brick town wall. Slowly the town starts to unfold and turns out to be a great experience. The red brick is the Sienese trade mark as we learn from our book and experience for ourselves.


We arrive in the main piazza. An amazing half circular affair that slopes towards the flat side of the half circle. The sun is beating down, and we choose a spot in the piazza for our feast of local salami, cheese and bread. Note on the Tuscan bread, takes some getting used to, Tasha has not managed to get used to it so the search for bread has been a bit of a drama at times.
Bex, Tasha and I climbed the 400 steps up the tower and we are rewarded with a view of Siena that allowed you view the rooftops of the houses and admire twisting streets.


We checked out the museo beside the tower. The Museo is inside the building of the town hall which has the claim of being the oldest building in Europe that has always and is still being used for the purpose for which is was built, dating back to around 1250. The frescos in one of the rooms tell many tales, one of which is about good government ; separation of law making from justice and the feedback loop from the people to the lawmakers. The alternative, bad government portraying dictatorship and justice being tied up and her scales being broken.
Next and last stop in Siena was Il Duomo. The front was covered in building stuff, but the inside had been basically renovated now. The floor, amazing.. The floor was covered in inlaid marble images portraying scenes from Siena’s past, stories of the usual saints and generally stuff about, well, church stuff. But all made with inlaid marble.
Siena is clearly a place that a long experience will be truly rewarded, but we have too many places to go and too much to see.

Gubbio
Following our 1000 Places to See Before You Die book we choose an off the beaten track town about 50k north of Perugia as our next stop.
Unlike the Tuscan towns we visited perched on hill tops, Gubbio appears to grow out of the hill side. Gubio is really very special and a must see, I think in many ways the most amazing town we have visited in Italy. Gubbio really has managed to avoid the tourist buses, which is also a bonus.
This is a medieval town that allows you to step back in time. Climbing the twisty streets up the hill you are surrounded by the sites of the stone houses toppling over each other as if they are scrambling to get the best view down the valley. We scramble to the top of the town and find an enormous piazza / balcony that looks down onto the town below and across the hills of Umbria. A little further around and our walk is rewarded with a little stand selling coffee, tables under the sun and time to relax.
Two of the streets are laid with red carpet, there is some kind of a food festival in town. Large tents at the bottom of town hold the secret. We walk away with cheeses from across Italy, a salami and chocolate bits and pieces. The cheese man, in halting English had us trying everything from truffle cheese, saffron cheese and the yummiest cheese, I think an Umbrian version of pechirino encrusted with grapes… really delicious.
This was truly a magnificent town, well worth the detour from Perugia. We spend the night in another car park… kind of getting used to it now, seems the only option in this part of Italy with most of the campsites closed for the season.
We are now in a real camp site on the outskirts of Perugia, having a day out from touristing as it is a Catholic holiday and everything is shut… and the rain is coming down for the first time in a long time.