We've got our visas, the movers are coming today, and we've got the relocation. It's really happening. I guess I felt like it was all a theoretical exercise up to this point, but now it's real. There's a bit of anxiety with the idea, but that comes and goes. I just hope I start sleeping better after today. Wife hopes so too since I toss and turn and keep her awake. For some reason I've been really nervous about getting ready for the movers.
I'll post more about the move later after it's happened.
Frog
Friday, May 26, 2006
Monday, May 22, 2006
Lugging
Dictionary.com defines luggage as “containers for a traveler’s belongings.” I find this definition severely lacking in that nowhere does it mention anything about lugging. To me this is a major oversight. I say this because despite the fact that three fourths of a mile doesn’t seem that long when all you have to propel is yourself, it takes on a much greater significance when you are also propelling your luggage.
Wife and I discovered this very early on in our walk to the hotel in Siena from the train station. We had managed alright with getting the bags on and off four different trains on our way to Siena (helpful hint: take a bus), but we managed to somehow forget that every town in Tuscany is on a hill. Combine that with the fact that the train stations aren’t ever on top of the hill and you get the picture of what our trek from the train station was like.
Somewhere along this journey Wife was actually advocating traveling naked. While I could see the convenience of this arrangement, I assured her that the local police would probably not be as accepting of the idea.
On arrival at the hotel we were a little disappointed. The room was clean and it wasn’t small, but the luxurious accommodations we had in Manarola had spoiled us. The floor tile pattern recalled the time of the Nazi occupation. At least we’re pretty sure it did since the pattern where the corners of the tiles came together were swastikas. We ignored that as best we could and headed out to explore Siena.
First we headed for the main piazza which is dominated by the town hall. It consists of a large, block style building with a tall clock tower that overlooks the semicircular piazza. The building is actually fairly ugly, but we sat down and engaged in some people watching. One thing that surprised us was that it seemed that public displays of affection are illegal. A couple not far from us was engaged in some affectionate mauling which caught the attention of a police officer who proceeded to give them a stern talking to. So much for amore.
Not too long after that we continued our meander around the piazza, stopping in the small shops and taking the view of the restaurants and bars that rim the open area. Leaving the piazza we found our way to the duomo which was of course under heavy restoration. The entire front of the cathedral was covered in scaffolding. Whoever was doing the restoring was kind enough to have draped the front of the scaffolding with a picture of what the duomo would look like could you actually see it. Something definitely got lost in the translation.
For dinner we went to a little restaurant around the corner and down the street from our hotel. All the lugging and a small lunch combined to make us absolutely ravenous. We had seen this restaurant in our Lonely Planet Italy guide and since it was convenient to our hotel we decided to give it a try. It definitely got us started off on the right foot with Tuscan cuisine. I had spaghetti with ragu sauce (no, not the stuff in a jar) and roast veal. The broth left after I ate the veal was so good I soaked every last drop of it up with bread.
We dined with two Danish men who were on holiday. They had been to Florence for a few days and maybe Venice, but I’m not too sure now. After they had finished their dinner we had a nice chat about traveling in general and how nice it would be for Wife and me to be so close to Europe after we moved. They recommended traveling to Copenhagen, which wife immediately added to her list of destinations.
Frog
Wife and I discovered this very early on in our walk to the hotel in Siena from the train station. We had managed alright with getting the bags on and off four different trains on our way to Siena (helpful hint: take a bus), but we managed to somehow forget that every town in Tuscany is on a hill. Combine that with the fact that the train stations aren’t ever on top of the hill and you get the picture of what our trek from the train station was like.
Somewhere along this journey Wife was actually advocating traveling naked. While I could see the convenience of this arrangement, I assured her that the local police would probably not be as accepting of the idea.
On arrival at the hotel we were a little disappointed. The room was clean and it wasn’t small, but the luxurious accommodations we had in Manarola had spoiled us. The floor tile pattern recalled the time of the Nazi occupation. At least we’re pretty sure it did since the pattern where the corners of the tiles came together were swastikas. We ignored that as best we could and headed out to explore Siena.
First we headed for the main piazza which is dominated by the town hall. It consists of a large, block style building with a tall clock tower that overlooks the semicircular piazza. The building is actually fairly ugly, but we sat down and engaged in some people watching. One thing that surprised us was that it seemed that public displays of affection are illegal. A couple not far from us was engaged in some affectionate mauling which caught the attention of a police officer who proceeded to give them a stern talking to. So much for amore.
Not too long after that we continued our meander around the piazza, stopping in the small shops and taking the view of the restaurants and bars that rim the open area. Leaving the piazza we found our way to the duomo which was of course under heavy restoration. The entire front of the cathedral was covered in scaffolding. Whoever was doing the restoring was kind enough to have draped the front of the scaffolding with a picture of what the duomo would look like could you actually see it. Something definitely got lost in the translation.
For dinner we went to a little restaurant around the corner and down the street from our hotel. All the lugging and a small lunch combined to make us absolutely ravenous. We had seen this restaurant in our Lonely Planet Italy guide and since it was convenient to our hotel we decided to give it a try. It definitely got us started off on the right foot with Tuscan cuisine. I had spaghetti with ragu sauce (no, not the stuff in a jar) and roast veal. The broth left after I ate the veal was so good I soaked every last drop of it up with bread.
We dined with two Danish men who were on holiday. They had been to Florence for a few days and maybe Venice, but I’m not too sure now. After they had finished their dinner we had a nice chat about traveling in general and how nice it would be for Wife and me to be so close to Europe after we moved. They recommended traveling to Copenhagen, which wife immediately added to her list of destinations.
Frog
Quick move update...
Just a short update on the move this post. Wife and I accepted an offer on our house last weekend, so the last hurdle left to jump is getting our visas. As soon as the rest of the documents arrive at work I’ll be sending the applications off. I’ve been assured that the process only takes a few days. It better show up since we’re leaving two weeks from tomorrow and we don’t have permission to enter the UK yet.
The movers are coming on Friday so the big push this week is to get everything together that we need to have packed. Luckily they’ll do all the packing, but we still have to sort through everything and decide what we’ll need while we’re there. Going from a house to a small apartment could make for some interesting decisions on what goes and what stays.
Things seem to be barreling along at full speed and the two week number is a little daunting, but we’ll power through. The bit of nervous excitement just adds to the stress, but it also makes it worth bearing.
More stories of the honeymoon to come when I get time.
Frog
The movers are coming on Friday so the big push this week is to get everything together that we need to have packed. Luckily they’ll do all the packing, but we still have to sort through everything and decide what we’ll need while we’re there. Going from a house to a small apartment could make for some interesting decisions on what goes and what stays.
Things seem to be barreling along at full speed and the two week number is a little daunting, but we’ll power through. The bit of nervous excitement just adds to the stress, but it also makes it worth bearing.
More stories of the honeymoon to come when I get time.
Frog
Wednesday, May 17, 2006
Night of the Living Tour Groups
Tour groups are an interesting phenomenon. If ever there was a herd mentality in humans, a tourist destination is the place to witness it. Large groups of people in goofy looking hats all following one person with some sort of flag. It doesn’t surprise me that tour guides in Italy have to be licensed by the city. The way people blindly follow the guides would make it quite easy for the guide to lead his or her witless followers to an abandoned 19th century warehouse, telling them that the place is where Nero kept the wardrobe for his harem all while the guide’s cohorts pick everyone’s pockets.
And heaven help you if you ever are stuck in the middle of a couple of tour groups or if a tour group needs to pass through the line you’re standing in. The mindless pursuit of the flag will make all other considerations for the humanity around the group cease. Wife seems to be a magnet for this sort of behavior, especially when Japanese tour groups are involved. We have no way to explain it, but it happens.
Now back to our regularly schedule narration. Our last day in the Cinque Terre was set aside for exploring the towns. This was a good thing since our legs hadn’t quite recovered from the day before. Utilizing the trains and strolling through towns was just the kind of recuperation we needed. After a leisurely walk to Riomaggiore, we boarded the ferry to Monterosso.
Monterosso is the most obvious tourist town of the five, especially in the new section, but the old section still holds a lot of charm. If you get a little away from the beach you’re able to avoid the tourist trap stores and find some really nice little shops and restaurants. We were still a little full from the previous evening’s meal so we stopped for a pizza and some beer. Despite our supposed non-hunger we devoured most of a large pizza with ham, mushrooms and cheese.
After lunch we did a little shopping for some souvenirs (food related of course) and then found our way to the beach. Since all the rock in the area is volcanic, the sand was very course and there was actually quite a bit of rock. Once we got far enough down the beach to walk in the water some it wasn’t bad, but our feet took a beating getting there.
When we had satisfied our desire to walk along the beach, we sat and watched some Italian teenagers who had come to the beach. This led me to observe two things: teenagers are squirrelly no matter where in the world you are and that I will never understand why Italians of all body types feel the need to where Speedos.
Since we had exhausted our interest in Monterosso and felt that it had been too long since we had gelato, we headed for the train station to move on to Vernazza. Vernazza was much more enjoyable this day than the previous one due to the Italian holiday having past and the town calming down quite a bit. The funny thing was that almost over night most of the other tourists were German. It was like all the Germans coming to Cinque Terre descended on the towns in the same day. Very interesting, but a little eerie at the same time.
Having strolled through Vernazza, satisfied our gelato craving, and sated Wife’s desire to shop, we headed back to the train station. We considered heading to Corniglia, but we both decided we were too tired to hike up the steps to the town. Settling on a return to Manarola and a well deserved rest, we found a bar in Manarola by the harbor that would make us a sandwich for supper. Taking the sandwiches and a bottle of wine we retired to the hotel with a plan to enjoy the beautiful view from the hotel’s terrace and generally be bums for the rest of the night.
This was not to be. Our ever present FMS combined with the fortifying effect of the sandwiches and a good bottle of red wine made us think we should go for a short walk. Manarola is small enough that just about anywhere you want to go is within a short walk and before long we found that we had looped down to the main street right by the tunnel to the rail station. Having come this far and feeling slightly parched, we headed for the bar that had provided us with the sandwiches earlier. It only took us a couple of lagers and a very strong cocktail called a negroni (very tasty) to decide that it might be time to head back to the hotel to rest up for the train ride to Siena.
Frog
And heaven help you if you ever are stuck in the middle of a couple of tour groups or if a tour group needs to pass through the line you’re standing in. The mindless pursuit of the flag will make all other considerations for the humanity around the group cease. Wife seems to be a magnet for this sort of behavior, especially when Japanese tour groups are involved. We have no way to explain it, but it happens.
Now back to our regularly schedule narration. Our last day in the Cinque Terre was set aside for exploring the towns. This was a good thing since our legs hadn’t quite recovered from the day before. Utilizing the trains and strolling through towns was just the kind of recuperation we needed. After a leisurely walk to Riomaggiore, we boarded the ferry to Monterosso.
Monterosso is the most obvious tourist town of the five, especially in the new section, but the old section still holds a lot of charm. If you get a little away from the beach you’re able to avoid the tourist trap stores and find some really nice little shops and restaurants. We were still a little full from the previous evening’s meal so we stopped for a pizza and some beer. Despite our supposed non-hunger we devoured most of a large pizza with ham, mushrooms and cheese.
After lunch we did a little shopping for some souvenirs (food related of course) and then found our way to the beach. Since all the rock in the area is volcanic, the sand was very course and there was actually quite a bit of rock. Once we got far enough down the beach to walk in the water some it wasn’t bad, but our feet took a beating getting there.
When we had satisfied our desire to walk along the beach, we sat and watched some Italian teenagers who had come to the beach. This led me to observe two things: teenagers are squirrelly no matter where in the world you are and that I will never understand why Italians of all body types feel the need to where Speedos.
Since we had exhausted our interest in Monterosso and felt that it had been too long since we had gelato, we headed for the train station to move on to Vernazza. Vernazza was much more enjoyable this day than the previous one due to the Italian holiday having past and the town calming down quite a bit. The funny thing was that almost over night most of the other tourists were German. It was like all the Germans coming to Cinque Terre descended on the towns in the same day. Very interesting, but a little eerie at the same time.
Having strolled through Vernazza, satisfied our gelato craving, and sated Wife’s desire to shop, we headed back to the train station. We considered heading to Corniglia, but we both decided we were too tired to hike up the steps to the town. Settling on a return to Manarola and a well deserved rest, we found a bar in Manarola by the harbor that would make us a sandwich for supper. Taking the sandwiches and a bottle of wine we retired to the hotel with a plan to enjoy the beautiful view from the hotel’s terrace and generally be bums for the rest of the night.
This was not to be. Our ever present FMS combined with the fortifying effect of the sandwiches and a good bottle of red wine made us think we should go for a short walk. Manarola is small enough that just about anywhere you want to go is within a short walk and before long we found that we had looped down to the main street right by the tunnel to the rail station. Having come this far and feeling slightly parched, we headed for the bar that had provided us with the sandwiches earlier. It only took us a couple of lagers and a very strong cocktail called a negroni (very tasty) to decide that it might be time to head back to the hotel to rest up for the train ride to Siena.
Frog
Thursday, May 11, 2006
Over hill, over dale as we hit the dusty trail…
After a short rest and a shower our FMS (Fear of Missing Something) kicked in and we were off to see the little town of Manarola. We made our way back toward the train station to entrance to the Via del Amore. We’re not exactly sure why this path that follows the cliff along the sea between Manarola and Riomaggiore is named after love since there’s not that many places to sit and really no places you can sneak off for a quiet moment just for the two of you. However, after the Atlanta airport it was heavenly.
We walked along the path for a while, but stopped short of Riomaggiore due to tiredness and a strong desire for a glass of wine at the bar that we had passed along the path. There were several tables that overlooked the sea, so we took one, ordered some local white wine and settled back to enjoy the vivid Tyrrhenian sunset.
While I could have been quite content to sit and enjoy the view for a few hours, the proprietor of the bar and Wife’s and my stomachs were not amicable to that idea. Thus, reluctantly, we found our way back to Manarola to search for a good place to eat.
Given my affinity for all things of culinary affiliation, it speaks volumes that as I write this I can’t remember anything at all memorable about that first dinner other than that management of the place we chose had changed since I was last there a couple years before. This change did not seem to be for the better. We were actually very fortunate to just get a table. An Italian holiday was the next day so the towns were very full of Italians taking advantage of the holiday for an extended weekend.
The following day was set aside for hiking to explore the Cinque Terre national park. Since I had been before I knew what to expect, but though I had mentioned that we would be hiking to Wife, she was not prepared for the intensity of the hiking.
We started off by first hiking the trail from Manarola to Corniglia. The trail starts off very sedate and paved and even in its roughest parts was not a challenging hike. The worst bit was the hike up the steps into Corniglia. Corniglia is the only one of the five towns that does not have much of a harbor and with good reason. It is perched at the top of a very steep hill. As we emerged into town we were panting and hot from the hike and climb. After we had refreshed ourselves with some water and a rest in the shade we went in search of an alimentary to get food for a picnic.
I really enjoy small grocery stores in Italy. They normally only occupy one or two small rooms, but the variety of meats, cheeses, and produce that are available in such a small store is very impressive. Another great thing is that the meat and cheese counter will make you a sandwich of almost anything in their case. While I was ordering prosciutto crudo Panini for Wife and I another customer ordered a pesto and pomodoro (tomatoes, in this case sun dried with oil) that made me wish I could change my order. I also took a chance and asked for a small piece of semi-hard cheese for Wife and me to share.
In France I don’t know that I would have taken this chance. The French predisposition to cheese that smells like a junior high boy’s gym locker would make me too nervous that I would receive a glob of goo that would make me reek inside and out. Luckily for us we received a very nice white cheese that had a milder, nutty flavor and very nice texture.
After making our purchases and refilling our water bottle we set off on a path up the hill behind Corniglia. This is where Wife started protesting my plan for the day. I guess I had not adequately prepared her expectations of what my plan was because after climbing up for about half an hour she began to question my sanity. To avoid getting hauled off at her request I acquiesced and proceeded a short way down our previous path and found a nice shady spot to picnic.
I love my native Kansas dearly, but I don’t believe that I could find a scene as picturesque as the one that joined us for our picnic. Steep hills, small villages, and the sea all combined to give the feel of something out of a movie. After eating and a short motivational speech by me to convince Wife that it really was worth continuing our hike, we set off to return to Corniglia and then on to Vernazza.
The trail to Vernazza was much longer and much more challenging than our earlier hike to Corniglia. It was also much more picturesque. As we left Corniglia we walked through olive groves that for all we knew may have been there hundreds of years. The path followed the coast for the most part except in a few places where streams had cut the hills back on their trek to the sea thus forcing the path more inland to follow the contour of the hill.
Despite the steepness of some of the climbs and the much more crowded path, the views when we would emerge from the vegetation lining the path never failed to disappoint. As beautiful as it was I wasn’t disappointed when we started descending into Vernazza. My legs were worn out and I was hot and tired. Besides, gelato waited at the end of the hike.
After spending some time soaking our feet at the small harbor, we headed up the street to get some gelato and wander around the shops a little bit. This didn’t last long though as we were both tired and wanted to rest before heading out for dinner later. We boarded a train for Manarola despite my mentioning that we could walk back (this earned me a raised eyebrow look and a roll of the eyes from Wife).
One thing that is always interesting to wife and me when we’re in a different country is the TV programming. We may not understand the dialogue, but it’s interesting to see the types of shows people watch. To satisfy our curiosity in this regard we flipped on the TV while we were resting and saw one of the most interesting shows. It was a cartoon with the Dukes of Hazard characters, but set in Italy. The dialogue was Italian so we had no clue what was going on, but you couldn’t mistake the General Lee, Daisy, Boss Hog and all the others. It may have been the weirdest fusion of pop culture I’ve ever seen.
Despite being mildly disturbed by our run in with the Dukes, we returned to Vernazza for a well earned dinner. After standing in the middle of the piazza by the harbor looking every bit the lost American tourist we settled on a seafood restaurant on the south side of the piazza. Little did we realize how glad we’d be that we decided to fight through the fatigue and come back to Vernazza.
Warning: The following section of this blog may contain content describing food of a highly delicious nature. Side effects may be extreme hunger pains and an overreaction of salivary glands. Readers continue at their own risk.
We started the meal with a dish of anchovies with lemon. I was a little leery of this dish because all my previous experience with anchovies involved the salt packed, overly fishy kind. Wife is much more a seafood connoisseur than me and enjoys a stronger tasting fish than I do. When the dish arrived it was more than I could have hoped for. Several fresh anchovy filets were lined up on the plate with small drops of incredibly viscous balsamic vinegar dotted around the plate. Lemon juice was sprinkled on the filets. The lemon gave the fish an extremely fresh taste while the vinegar gave the dish a nice touch of sweet richness.
For the second course Wife had mixed fish ravioli and I had fresh pasta with pesto. Pesto was invented in the region of Italy that we were in (Liguria) so I was looking forward to this dish a lot. It didn’t disappoint. The pasta was small, slightly worm shaped strands. A small dollop of pesto topped the pasta and complemented it perfectly. Wife’s ravioli were nothing if not sublime.
There were too many choices for the third course so we decided to go simple. A heaping mound of steamed mussels greeted us next and Wife did her best to stick to her assertion that when it comes to mussels she “can eat me under the table any time”. She did a pretty good job of trying too.
With our stomachs filled to bursting we found our way up the main street back toward the train station and back to our hotel. It was a great start to our honeymoon but it sure wore us out.
We walked along the path for a while, but stopped short of Riomaggiore due to tiredness and a strong desire for a glass of wine at the bar that we had passed along the path. There were several tables that overlooked the sea, so we took one, ordered some local white wine and settled back to enjoy the vivid Tyrrhenian sunset.
While I could have been quite content to sit and enjoy the view for a few hours, the proprietor of the bar and Wife’s and my stomachs were not amicable to that idea. Thus, reluctantly, we found our way back to Manarola to search for a good place to eat.
Given my affinity for all things of culinary affiliation, it speaks volumes that as I write this I can’t remember anything at all memorable about that first dinner other than that management of the place we chose had changed since I was last there a couple years before. This change did not seem to be for the better. We were actually very fortunate to just get a table. An Italian holiday was the next day so the towns were very full of Italians taking advantage of the holiday for an extended weekend.
The following day was set aside for hiking to explore the Cinque Terre national park. Since I had been before I knew what to expect, but though I had mentioned that we would be hiking to Wife, she was not prepared for the intensity of the hiking.
We started off by first hiking the trail from Manarola to Corniglia. The trail starts off very sedate and paved and even in its roughest parts was not a challenging hike. The worst bit was the hike up the steps into Corniglia. Corniglia is the only one of the five towns that does not have much of a harbor and with good reason. It is perched at the top of a very steep hill. As we emerged into town we were panting and hot from the hike and climb. After we had refreshed ourselves with some water and a rest in the shade we went in search of an alimentary to get food for a picnic.
I really enjoy small grocery stores in Italy. They normally only occupy one or two small rooms, but the variety of meats, cheeses, and produce that are available in such a small store is very impressive. Another great thing is that the meat and cheese counter will make you a sandwich of almost anything in their case. While I was ordering prosciutto crudo Panini for Wife and I another customer ordered a pesto and pomodoro (tomatoes, in this case sun dried with oil) that made me wish I could change my order. I also took a chance and asked for a small piece of semi-hard cheese for Wife and me to share.
In France I don’t know that I would have taken this chance. The French predisposition to cheese that smells like a junior high boy’s gym locker would make me too nervous that I would receive a glob of goo that would make me reek inside and out. Luckily for us we received a very nice white cheese that had a milder, nutty flavor and very nice texture.
After making our purchases and refilling our water bottle we set off on a path up the hill behind Corniglia. This is where Wife started protesting my plan for the day. I guess I had not adequately prepared her expectations of what my plan was because after climbing up for about half an hour she began to question my sanity. To avoid getting hauled off at her request I acquiesced and proceeded a short way down our previous path and found a nice shady spot to picnic.
I love my native Kansas dearly, but I don’t believe that I could find a scene as picturesque as the one that joined us for our picnic. Steep hills, small villages, and the sea all combined to give the feel of something out of a movie. After eating and a short motivational speech by me to convince Wife that it really was worth continuing our hike, we set off to return to Corniglia and then on to Vernazza.
The trail to Vernazza was much longer and much more challenging than our earlier hike to Corniglia. It was also much more picturesque. As we left Corniglia we walked through olive groves that for all we knew may have been there hundreds of years. The path followed the coast for the most part except in a few places where streams had cut the hills back on their trek to the sea thus forcing the path more inland to follow the contour of the hill.
Despite the steepness of some of the climbs and the much more crowded path, the views when we would emerge from the vegetation lining the path never failed to disappoint. As beautiful as it was I wasn’t disappointed when we started descending into Vernazza. My legs were worn out and I was hot and tired. Besides, gelato waited at the end of the hike.
After spending some time soaking our feet at the small harbor, we headed up the street to get some gelato and wander around the shops a little bit. This didn’t last long though as we were both tired and wanted to rest before heading out for dinner later. We boarded a train for Manarola despite my mentioning that we could walk back (this earned me a raised eyebrow look and a roll of the eyes from Wife).
One thing that is always interesting to wife and me when we’re in a different country is the TV programming. We may not understand the dialogue, but it’s interesting to see the types of shows people watch. To satisfy our curiosity in this regard we flipped on the TV while we were resting and saw one of the most interesting shows. It was a cartoon with the Dukes of Hazard characters, but set in Italy. The dialogue was Italian so we had no clue what was going on, but you couldn’t mistake the General Lee, Daisy, Boss Hog and all the others. It may have been the weirdest fusion of pop culture I’ve ever seen.
Despite being mildly disturbed by our run in with the Dukes, we returned to Vernazza for a well earned dinner. After standing in the middle of the piazza by the harbor looking every bit the lost American tourist we settled on a seafood restaurant on the south side of the piazza. Little did we realize how glad we’d be that we decided to fight through the fatigue and come back to Vernazza.
Warning: The following section of this blog may contain content describing food of a highly delicious nature. Side effects may be extreme hunger pains and an overreaction of salivary glands. Readers continue at their own risk.
We started the meal with a dish of anchovies with lemon. I was a little leery of this dish because all my previous experience with anchovies involved the salt packed, overly fishy kind. Wife is much more a seafood connoisseur than me and enjoys a stronger tasting fish than I do. When the dish arrived it was more than I could have hoped for. Several fresh anchovy filets were lined up on the plate with small drops of incredibly viscous balsamic vinegar dotted around the plate. Lemon juice was sprinkled on the filets. The lemon gave the fish an extremely fresh taste while the vinegar gave the dish a nice touch of sweet richness.
For the second course Wife had mixed fish ravioli and I had fresh pasta with pesto. Pesto was invented in the region of Italy that we were in (Liguria) so I was looking forward to this dish a lot. It didn’t disappoint. The pasta was small, slightly worm shaped strands. A small dollop of pesto topped the pasta and complemented it perfectly. Wife’s ravioli were nothing if not sublime.
There were too many choices for the third course so we decided to go simple. A heaping mound of steamed mussels greeted us next and Wife did her best to stick to her assertion that when it comes to mussels she “can eat me under the table any time”. She did a pretty good job of trying too.
With our stomachs filled to bursting we found our way up the main street back toward the train station and back to our hotel. It was a great start to our honeymoon but it sure wore us out.
Tuesday, May 09, 2006
Italia! Well, eventually...
As my previous posted stated, the wedding actually happened. It went really well other than me giving Wife my right hand during the ceremony (realized it in time to fix it) and Wife being nervous with everybody looking at her. She's the only woman I can think of that doesn't want to be the center of attention on her wedding day. But we both survived and it seemed like everybody had a great time at the reception.
So after a long day for the wedding, Wife and I were ready to get going on the honeymoon. Two weeks in Italy was going to be just the trick to help us relax and recuperate from the stress of the wedding. However, we weren't going to get on our trip just yet. After stopping by Wife's parents for brunch with her extended family, we headed for the airport.
With the troubles I'd been having with flights lately I made sure we were there in plenty of time and we had plenty of time before all our connections on the way to Milan. Unfortunately Delta's plane maintenance didn't want to cooperate. As we were checking in we found out our flight to Cincinnati was going to be delayed long enough that we'd miss our connection to Newark and then miss the flight to Milan. Although we were disappointed, the agent was so nice and helpful that we really couldn't be upset. She worked on our itinerary for almost two hours to get us to Milan as soon as she could. We ended up flying to Atlanta and then catching a flight to Milan the next day. Spending the first night of our honeymoon in the Holiday Inn by Atlanta's airport wasn't exactly what we had in mind, but at least we were on our way.
After killing the Sunday in Atlanta, we finally got to Milan on Monday morning. Since we were behind a day we skipped our day in Milan and went straight to the train station to catch a train for the Cinque Terre.
Even though we were really tired, there was a good omen for the rest of the trip. We had an easy train ride and, unlike in the US, we were able to get a really good prosciutto crudo sandwich at the train station. Maybe it is just the idea of being in Italy that makes simple things like a sandwich better, but I think it's that Italians know good ingredients.
Riding the train west from Milan we passed through a relatively flat area of farmland that reminded me somewhat of home. The fields were smaller and of more irregular shapes, but the crops were familiar. The biggest difference was the wonderfully tall, straight trees that dotted the landscape. If my jet lagged mind would have been working better I might have recognized that the only way trees can grow that straight in the open is if there isn't much wind. I mention this because I kept noticing the lack of a breeze throughout our trip. More on this later.
As we got closer to Genoa the terrain turned more mountainous and we were able to see less and less of the landscape because of tunnels and railway cuttings. Well, I was able to see less. Wife had been sleeping for a good portion of the trip already so hadn't seen much but the back of her eyelids. After passing through Genoa there were a few stops before our stop in Monterosso where we needed to transfer to a local train to take us on to Manarola.
Our timing on this transfer was rather unfortunate. All the tourists, who were mostly Italian due to an Italian holiday the following Tuesday, thought it would be the perfect time to return to their hotels in La Spezia to rest before supper. The platform was absolutely packed and rather stifling, which is not the feeling you want when you're already covered in funkiness from a long plane ride. We were able to cram ourselves and our bags on the next train as close to the door as we could. Everything was fine and then we saw the first "stroller".
I use quotes because while you would probably never see a Hummer in Italy, you'll definitely see the SUV strollers that parents with too much money to spend seem to favor in the US lately. As if that wasn't enough, the stroller people didn't see the benefit in removing their child from the stroller so they could fold it up before boarding the train. I was certainly bumped and Wife may have been almost run over. Needless to say it was a relief when we could get off the train in Manarola.
Unfortunately we still had a half mile walk up a steep hill, but we managed to survive the hike to make it to our bed and breakfast. It was a very satisfied pair of travelers that dropped their bags and laid on the cool tile floor to cool down that afternoon.
In the next installment, we'll explore the Cinque Terre.
Ciao,
Frog
So after a long day for the wedding, Wife and I were ready to get going on the honeymoon. Two weeks in Italy was going to be just the trick to help us relax and recuperate from the stress of the wedding. However, we weren't going to get on our trip just yet. After stopping by Wife's parents for brunch with her extended family, we headed for the airport.
With the troubles I'd been having with flights lately I made sure we were there in plenty of time and we had plenty of time before all our connections on the way to Milan. Unfortunately Delta's plane maintenance didn't want to cooperate. As we were checking in we found out our flight to Cincinnati was going to be delayed long enough that we'd miss our connection to Newark and then miss the flight to Milan. Although we were disappointed, the agent was so nice and helpful that we really couldn't be upset. She worked on our itinerary for almost two hours to get us to Milan as soon as she could. We ended up flying to Atlanta and then catching a flight to Milan the next day. Spending the first night of our honeymoon in the Holiday Inn by Atlanta's airport wasn't exactly what we had in mind, but at least we were on our way.
After killing the Sunday in Atlanta, we finally got to Milan on Monday morning. Since we were behind a day we skipped our day in Milan and went straight to the train station to catch a train for the Cinque Terre.
Even though we were really tired, there was a good omen for the rest of the trip. We had an easy train ride and, unlike in the US, we were able to get a really good prosciutto crudo sandwich at the train station. Maybe it is just the idea of being in Italy that makes simple things like a sandwich better, but I think it's that Italians know good ingredients.
Riding the train west from Milan we passed through a relatively flat area of farmland that reminded me somewhat of home. The fields were smaller and of more irregular shapes, but the crops were familiar. The biggest difference was the wonderfully tall, straight trees that dotted the landscape. If my jet lagged mind would have been working better I might have recognized that the only way trees can grow that straight in the open is if there isn't much wind. I mention this because I kept noticing the lack of a breeze throughout our trip. More on this later.
As we got closer to Genoa the terrain turned more mountainous and we were able to see less and less of the landscape because of tunnels and railway cuttings. Well, I was able to see less. Wife had been sleeping for a good portion of the trip already so hadn't seen much but the back of her eyelids. After passing through Genoa there were a few stops before our stop in Monterosso where we needed to transfer to a local train to take us on to Manarola.
Our timing on this transfer was rather unfortunate. All the tourists, who were mostly Italian due to an Italian holiday the following Tuesday, thought it would be the perfect time to return to their hotels in La Spezia to rest before supper. The platform was absolutely packed and rather stifling, which is not the feeling you want when you're already covered in funkiness from a long plane ride. We were able to cram ourselves and our bags on the next train as close to the door as we could. Everything was fine and then we saw the first "stroller".
I use quotes because while you would probably never see a Hummer in Italy, you'll definitely see the SUV strollers that parents with too much money to spend seem to favor in the US lately. As if that wasn't enough, the stroller people didn't see the benefit in removing their child from the stroller so they could fold it up before boarding the train. I was certainly bumped and Wife may have been almost run over. Needless to say it was a relief when we could get off the train in Manarola.
Unfortunately we still had a half mile walk up a steep hill, but we managed to survive the hike to make it to our bed and breakfast. It was a very satisfied pair of travelers that dropped their bags and laid on the cool tile floor to cool down that afternoon.
In the next installment, we'll explore the Cinque Terre.
Ciao,
Frog
Monday, May 08, 2006
Quick update
Just a short post at the moment with the big news. Fiance has now become Wife. Pretty exciting, huh? I'll post more later with stories of the wedding, incredible Italian food, artwork, and crazy taxi drivers in the coming days. There's too much to tell in one post. Plus there's all the moving plans that can now go full steam ahead. Hmmm, why do I get the feeling that life will never slow down again? And on that note, I'm heading home to tackle the jungle that is my lawn.
Frog
Frog
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