The first stop today was a visit to the L.Da Vinci Technical College that Piero is Bursar for. We were met by a bright and bubbly English speaking teacher who had organised 6 of the best boys/young men to show us around. We were given the "Royal Tour". The boys were shy at first and not game to try their English but they soon loosened up with some questioning about their work and projects at the school. The school provides technical subjects such as Electronics, Electrical Engineering, Design, Environmental Engineering, Programming, building circuits, mechanical engineering and building. When we first met the boys they introduced themselves and then showed us their Backup Power: Photovoltaic Cart they had made from scratch. It was brilliant and was essentially a cart with detachable solar panels that could produce energy ... read more

Left early for a 2 hour trip on the Autostrada to Vicenzca, turning off at Saove and heading into the hills to Bolca at 850m. It takes a bit of getting used to driving at 130-140kph but everyone is moving along nicely so it doesn't seem to be an issue flying along at that speed. Bolca is a small village in the hills near Soave known as the Pesciara (meaning the fish bowl) famous for perfectly preserved Eocene (49MY) fish and other marine and plant fossils. Needless to say, I was in 7th heaven as the one thing missing from my collection is a fish fossil and these are beautiful and perfect. The fossils were laid down in a shallow water lagoon environment not unlike the Waimea Estuary I would imagine. A volcano erupted shutting off ... read more

A lot was planned for today so we were up at 6.30am to get the 7.35 train to Venice which is a one hour journey. On arrrival we bought a one day ticket for the ferries for the day. Since we weren't there to visit Venice, the first ferry we got was to the island of Murano to see glassware and glass blowing which the island is famous for. Needless to say 4 out of 5 shops has glassware. Some was good, some very good and some just tacky. Diego is keen on a chandalier for his house and there's plenty to choose from but the problem is to keep from being tacky, overdone or too gothic. Simple is better. We visited a glass blowing factory and had to wait in a queue in the sun ... read more

Thursday is Market Day in Portogruaro main street and piazza. We had an interesting and entertaining time people watching. We noticed how much more people dressed up for the occasion with an opportunity to wear fashionable clothes. This is in direct contrast with the way in which Kiwis go out in public. The market sold vast amounts of clothing, bags and underwear with some food items such as cheese, fish and fruit and vegetables. After the market Pierina and Diego picked us up to go to Cintello to pick up our bikes from the previous evening and bike back to Portogruaro. We took the scenic route and visited Cordovado, an old fortified town, to Venchiaredo Spring (roman times), the Stalis Mills (pictured in yesterday's blog), through Gruaro, to Portovecchio (for lemonade - mineral water, sugar and ... read more

Diego, Lindsay and I headed off to Trieste on the autostrada going 120 - 130kph. Imagine being allowed to do that in NZ? It isn't the speed so much that is the issue but the sheer number of trucks. We don't get 30+ in a row so we shouldn't complain too much about trucks on our roads. But, at least you can pass these ones. Our first stop was Duino to walk the path along the cliff top and visit the castle there. Unfortunately, on Tuesday's the castle is closed so we did the walkway instead. There are superb views out over Adriatic, back toward the castle and through to Trieste in the distance. It is all limestone and reminded us of the Takaka Hill rocks. From here we went to Miramare to look at an ... read more