Adventures in Italy!!

For my spring break, my family came out to France for a week and then we all traveled to Italy together. It was quite a trip, and I have many, many pictures. Here is a recount of our trip (to the best of my memory) in two parts, and some of the awesome pictures I took.

CENTRAL ITALY: PARMA, FIRENZE, VINCI

We first flew into the Milan airport, where flights are much cheaper, and rented a car for our travels. We had decided that it would be more efficient to drive from city to city rather than rely on the trains. In the end, I think this did work better because driving allowed us to stop and take out time in all the tiny towns that the trains bypass. We circled around Milan, not even daring to drive into the city. Instead, we made a beeline for Tuscany, about 3 or 4 hours south of Milan. The Italian traffic is terrible though, and we spent a good part of that day sitting in the car looking at the hills around us. We did have a lunch break in Parma, an adorable little town kind of in the middle of nowhere. The people were so friendly to us, even though they didn't understand a lick of English, and our Italian was atrocious. We also got our first gelato there - and it was amazing. Parma was also our first encounter with Italian drivers/streets/signage, where we realized that driving would not be as simple as we had thought...

We made it to Florence kind of late, which was not good since the city is already badly marked (as far as signs go) and trying to find our hotel was almost impossible. It doesn't help that car lanes are not marked, and suddenly all 4 lanes converge into one massive free-for-all. We drove in a few circles, and then looked up and realized we were on the right street. We're still not sure how that happened.

The next morning we started out bright and early for the city, walking along the Arno River for a good length, until we reached Ponte Vecchio. This is the oldest bridge in Florence (the only one that wasn't bombed in the war) and is covered with jewelry stores, souvenir stands, and lots of tourists. It was cool walking along the street and seeing all the little jewlers selling their wares. Then we wandered back into the city and walked up and down the streets, somehow making another circle and coming back around to Piazza Vecchio. This is a big square outside of the Uffizi Museum, also the location for a bunch of statues, a fountain, touists, and a church. There is a replica of Michelangelo's "David" in this square, but we wanted to see the real one. So we made our way uptown to the Accademia Museum, the location of some very old art and some of Michelangelo's sculptures. David himself was pretty magnificent. We snuck a picture, even though the museum guards kept yelling "No Photo!!"

Some other highlights of the trip include the Uffizi Musuem, where we saw lots of Italian Renaissance art by Boticelli, da Vinci, Lippi, etc etc, and the famous Venus on a Halfshell. It was kind of an overload of art, but interesting all the same. Very cool to see so many old and influencial paintings. Afterward, we tried to find Galileo's house (it was marked on a little map we had) but somehow got lost and ended up going on a superlong tour of the outskirts of Florence. It was a pretty walk, along a walled road that wove along villas and vinyards and groves. We ended up at Piazzale Michelangelo, where we saw a spectacular view of the city. Look at my pictures!

We also went to many, many churches in Florence.. Some of them were beautiful, some of them were just pretty. I can't remember the names of most of them.. Santa Croce was another cool church, or pantheon really. That is where the remains of Florence's Greats are kept. We saw the tombs of Galileo, Dante, Machiavelli, and others. This church, like many of the others, had some amazing architecture too. It's crazy to imagine how they built such grand buildings in their time. And nowadays, even though we have the technology, the only buildings we construct are ugly skyscrapers.

On the way out of Florence, we stopped in Vinci, hometown of the Great Leonardo. It was such a tiny town! They had, maybe 2 main streets, surrounded by mountains and olive groves. We followed signs for the "Casa di Leonardo" and found a reconstruction of what his birthhouse probably looked like. It was neat, not so much what the house looked like, but to be on the same location as where he grew up, and see the landscape that surrounded him in his childhood. After leaving Vinci, we headed north for Veneto.

You can view Central Italy (Parma, Florence, Vinci) pictures here:

Central Italy: Parma, Florence, Vinci, and countryside

NORTHERN ITALY: VICENZA, VENEZIA, VERONA

It was a long drive up to Veneto, the Venice-area. On the drive up, we took some scenic routes and went through many little towns and rolling hillsides. We finally made it to Vicenza, which is a small town about an hour away from Venice, and the location of our B&B for the time there.

Vicenza is a cool town in its own right, very up-and-coming and classy. We wandered into downtown on our first night there, and saw lots of people out and about. Everyone was shopping, or chatting, or getting a drink at an outdoor cafe. We saw the huge church in the middle of the town, and the square around it with a market and lots of people. We also found the Teatro Olimpico, which is supposedly the oldest indoor theater. Vicenza has lots of history because the Romans had bases there and built up much of the city. So walking along the street, we saw remnants of ruins, or Roman-inspired archways and buildings.

We also made a day-trip to Verona - location of Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet (duh!) (and also location of the less popular Two Gentlemen of Verona). Verona was a beautiful little town - we all agreed that it had a great feel to it, very homey and nice. The architecture was beautiful too, also very Roman. Verona was a major road-crossing during the Roman empire because it linked major cities from the north, south, east, and west. It is also home to the third largest Roman arena, called The Arena. Back in the day they used to hold gladiator fights there, but now it's used for concerts and opera performances. It was cool, and a lot of the original building was still intact. In Verona we also saw the "Casa di Giullietta" or, Juliet's house! Although there is no historical evidence that Juliet or Romeo actually existed, their family names correspond to real families that were powerful in Verona in the past. We saw the "Cappello" house, the name of which was the inspiration for the "Capulet" family. At the time there was also a "Monteccio" family, from which Shakespeare got "Montague." The front of the Capulet house even had a balcony on one side.. It was actually a pretty cool balcony - the plaque said that there's evidence it was once part of an ancient sarcophogus (ironic maybe?). Look at my pictures.

And finally, there's Venice. What a beautiful city. We spent most of our two days there just walking and walking and walking.. (usually, it was because we were lost - the street signage is terrible!!). It really is amazing to see a city filled with canals everywhere! And the bridges! We kept trying to figure out how this place was built. And sometimes, as were were walking along a little alleyway, trying without success to get across the island, our street would suddenly dead-end into a canal! The streets will just drop off into the water. We had fun manipulating our way through the streets.

We also went into the amazing San Marco cathedral. So beautiful. We read somewhere that no visitor is left unmoved when they go inside, and I think that this was pretty accurate. The entire floor, ceiling, and most walls are covered in marble mosaics! Shades and shades of beautiful marble everywhere! And the mosaics were so elaborate and intense that I can't even begin to think what it was like to make them. We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, so unfortunately I cannot direct you to my photos.. but I'm sure google has a copy of it or something.

We didn't go to any museums in Venice because we were on art-overload, and we were getting tired of seeing churches and duomos, so we spent most of our Venice time wandering the streets. We had LOTS of gelato. We looked at all of the cool glass stores that are everywhere. Also, I was fascinated with the Carnivale masks that all the storekeepers sell. Every year in the 10 days leading up to Ash Wednesday, there is a huge festival on the island and everyone wears these Commedia del Arte inspired masks. It looks like a blast.

Venice was beautiful, and we had a lot of fun walking around doing nothing in particular. We ate pizza on some church steps, and crossed some bridges, and searched for the cheapest gelato (only 1 euro). Overall, Italy was very nice. The people in the touristy areas tended to be very rude to us, but we found that the folks in smaller towns (the people who knew no English at all) were always much kinder to us. And we found lots of good food, good wine, good gelato. We saw so many beautiful views, sights, buildings, etc, that I think we are all maxed out on beauty for a while! It was a nice trip, but all of us agreed that there's no place like Paris.

You can view Northern Italy (Venice, Vicenza, Verona) pictures here:

Northern Italy, Veneto: Vicenza, Venezia, Verona, Padova