RAymz

As the clock winds down on our trip, we turn our attention to Pompeii, the village that was utterly destroyed by the volcanic eruption of Mount Vesuvius. The eruption, while terribly destructive at the time, has provided us in the modern world with a frozen glimpse of what life was like back the times of the Romans. To get there, we took the express train from Rome to Naples. It traveled at over 300km per hour and got us all the way down to Naples in just over 1 hour. Of course, being in Naples we had to have pizza as this was the birthplace of the now famous dish. We went to this little place called Michele's which has been serving pizza since the 1870s. Both of us got our own pizzas - one each ... read more

I used to think that the drivers in Jamaica were crazy! Then I came to Italy and we have not met a cab driver that would disappoint the contestants on the Amazing Race! Pedestrians do not assume the right of way but there is a mutual respect between the drivers and the pedestrians that seems to work here in Rome. I would not dare to test this at home. Rudi and I have spent the past 2 days exploring Rome. We have toured the Colliseum and imagined what life was like back then when killing people in an arena was a sport that everyone enjoyed. It sounds like it was alot like you see on the movies and being there was very surreal. The ruins in the forum were incredible and right next to a very ... read more

So it appears the rain has finally found us! After a trip of great weather every day, today the rain came and poured down with a vengeance in the early morning. We stayed in bed until it subsided and finally made our way into Monterosso at around noon. We've had lunch at a nice little restaurant and now Amy is off doing some shopping while I'm quickly writing this blog. Tomorrow morning we check out of our hotel and leave for Rome. The sites we really want to see are the Pantheon, Vatican City and, of course, the Colosseum. We're hopeful that we'll also have the time to take the day trip to Pompeii, but we'll see what time permits us to do. The first step will be to find out where our hotel is situated, ... read more

We have taken so many photos, all of which we can't wait to share with you all. The problem is that these photos won't give the beauty of this place the justice that it deserves. The other part that is missing from the photos is the scent in the air - it's nothing like Florence here. Frequently while we are walking we are surrounded by this lovely fragrance coming from the beautiful flowers. Flowers are everywhere here so you can imagine how lovely it smells. Our B&B that Rudi described earlier has the most beautiful flowers and gardens and 2 terrace to relax and enjoy the view. Our room has a beautiful view of the sea below and breathtaking views of the mountainside. Rudi's right, our hotel is not right on the water but rather a ... read more

We arrived here from Florence, with a quick stop in Pisa to see the leaning tower. Yes, it's leaning and no, it doesn't look like it will fall anytime soon. Our train from Florence went straight to Pisa and, after exiting the train station, we jointly took a cab with a couple of Canadian girls so that we didn't have to do the long walk to the tower. We took our pics (will be uploaded to Facebook soon we hope) and then headed back to the train station to catch the train to Cinque Terre. Our hotel in Cinque Terre is really nice, though it is up the mountainside a few kilometres. It's called Il Parco B&B and really is a lovely little B&B nestled in the foothills of this beautiful town. We took a walk ... read more

Ciao!! Since Rudi wrote the last few blogs I thought I would steal these minutes to give you my take on Venice and Florence. Thankfully we learned that we have free wi-fi at our hotel in Florence and the air conditioned lobby enticed me enough to take a break from pounding the pavement. Where do I start about Venice? I will try to upload pictures but even pictures don't give the beauty of Venice the justice it deserves. It is truly amazing that these buildings line the water although not surprising that most of the first floors are vacant because they are always wet. Since Venice is sinking a little every century they are doing what they can to preserve the buildings and it only makes sense to sacrifice the first floor. We spent 2 days ... read more

Well, this morning we bid adieu to Venice and made our way aboard the train to Florence. It was sad to leave Venice and realize that today marks the halfway point of our trip, but the optimistic side of that is that we still have one full week left on this vacation. The train ride was great and took only two hours (sure made the GO look awful). We're staying at Hotel Rex and, though we've barely been in the room itself, it seems like a good choice. Our hotel is situated right in the heart of Florence, allowing us to walk to the Uffizi (sp?) Museum and all of the other sites. We're also right around the corner from a beautiful church and maze of markets, most of which sell the same things (how much ... read more

Spent our second day in Venice today after watching The Tourist last night (for those who don't know, it's filmed in Paris and Venice). We continued exploring, getting not as lost as yesterday but certainly just wandering about without a clue as to the direction in which we were heading... Our goal today was to head to Murano to see the glass blowing and hand crafted glass pieces. We arrived there in the early afternoon and really just enjoyed ourselves walking through the many stores and galleries. By accident, we even went into an area full of glass works meant for rich people... Up a stairwell and we entered a room of outstanding pieces, both from an artistic perspective as well as price. Most pieces had tags on them for around 15000 euros, with some listed ... read more

Well, after leaving France we've made it to Italy! It was definitely an interesting morning aboard the no frills Ryanair and finally arriving in Treviso airport. The bus ride from there to Mestre (the little town 10 mins from Venice proper) wasn't too long but finding our way to the hotel certainly took its toll. It seems that 800 meters from the train station is open to interpretation after all... 30 mins walking later we reached Park Hotel Ai Pini, our home base for the next three days. It's a gorgeous 4star hotel and the room is about five times the size of our little Paris cubbyhole ... So about the size of a normal room back home. It does have beautiful gardens and all of the flowers seem to be in full bloom (very fragrant!). ... read more

Rudi and I have really enjoyed Paris and it's hard to believe that this first part of our vacation is ending. There is so much that this city has to offer its guests and it is impossible to see it all in 3 days. But we knew that going in so we hit the ground running (almost literally) to make our way around the city to the sites most important to us. Anyone who has visited Paris will agree that its street plan, or map, makes it very easy to get lost, which we did but only a few times and it added to our adventure. The streets are not in any logical order and the opposite to anything that resembles a grid. Most times we had no idea which direction we were even headed!! Thankfully ... read more