Yesterday we had a bit of rain--but carried on and went to the beautiful town of Siena-- to see the famous church the 'Duomo'-- it was spectacular-- and surpringly uncrowded- due to the time of year-- and the rain. We had lunch in the square-- I had a wonderful tuscan bread soup and some Vino! -- Today the ladies went to the designer outlets-- and I had big plans to purchase gifts there-- but even the outlet prices were ridiclously expensive-- so I picked up a pair of walking shoes....and am hoping for gifts tomorrow. We are going on a guided [View Full Entry]

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Ciao friends and family- Today we travelled about 1/2 hour by car to the beautiful walled hill town of San Gimignano! The weather was beautiful-- not too hot and not too cold......we ate at a lovely outdoor cafe--and walked all arund the town. We ate gelato (orange chocolate--coffee and carmel)-- at a place that won the best gelato in Italy in 2006! We also went to the Museum of Medivel Torture-- a good place to visit if you want to lse your appetite! I uploaded a small selection of the wonderful pictures that Jimmmy took while we were there!! Here is [View Full Entry]

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Bari- to Polignao a Mare-- Backroads of Pulgia- In typical fashion, Ellen tried Gin and Tonic, Wine and then her first glass of Grappa, I then spent a good portion of the early morning hours becoming intimately famaliar with the bagno (particularly the toilet)- as I got rid of my poor choices for about 6 hours from both ends of my body! For those that have travelled with me, I seem to have this experience at least once every time I travel. I will say no more about that for now……………Bari is a Port City in the South of Italy. We [View Full Entry]

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Buona sera from Umbria Italy! I have not had much luck accessing the internet in the last week. In Rome- I was too sleep deprived- or too busy seeing the Vatican. In Bari, where we stayed the night before we began our bike trip, I did not try, and at the 3 “hotels” we stayed at during our bike trip, only one “truly” had an Internet connection—and that one had the one computer—for all of the guests at the hotel! We are having a great time in Italy. We are travelling with our long time friends Jim and Lacey Marchetti. Jim [View Full Entry]

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Ciao! We made it to Pulgia Italy--and are about to start our day 3 of bike riding! So far no saddle sores! Internet access has been challenging...as the definition of internet access is one computer per hotel! Plane flight from SFO to Dulles went great! I sat next to a well behaved--and thin young lawyer in coach and jim stretched out his legs in business class. At Dulles- we got lucky and upgraded me to business class- as they still had seats available! We had a great flight to Rome....and with the help of medication--I do feel like I actually slept [View Full Entry]

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Today we are making final arrangements to leave EARLY Thursday morning, October 16th- we will be leaving from San Francisco Airport and headed for Rome, via Newark, New Jersay. I am hoping to make some entries in this blog as we travel along- and share them with friends and family!! ~elle -- ellen@iarchitects.com [View Full Entry]

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