Blogs from Padua, Veneto, Italy, Europe - page 2

Geo: 45.4096, 11.87662nd February 2016 PADOVA Padua is such a beautiful city with so much history. My son is living here so I have come for a visit.His apartment is tiny but family is family.There is always room for family. The cobble stone streets just scream out History with every step. I have this strange connection with this city. One of the shops a that sold stationary is called Prosdocimi. Almost my surname. Then in the church there was a statue of St. Prosdocimo. One night as we where driving through the old streets of Padua, I spotted a street sigh. "Ah," I screamed. Everyone in the car jumped out of their seats and got a fright. "What's wrong? What's happening?" They all asked. "The street is called San Prosdocimo!" "Is that all?" They all sighed. ... read more

PADUA Just a stopover we thought. A place west of Venice – just looking for a camp for a night. Sounds like a back water. Let’s get in – rest – re water and get going. Finding a camp was not so hard. Got one right in what seems like the middle of town. Although it’s a spread out town - how would you know with these masters of chaos, random and pandemonium where the city boundaries are, let alone the city centre. So we park up and notice a lot of churches and historic looking stuff. Across from where we park for the night is a big grassed piazza with a moat around it. It’s about 150m in diameter and roughly circular. Around the perimeter are statues of every mythological hero known to man – ... read more

The trip over was expectedly long. I wish I had been able to sleep more than a few hours, but there were two movies I’d been wanting to see for quite some time so I watched “Still Alice” before my nap and “ Selma“ after my nap. Because of my Mom, “Still Alice” was far more memorable and Julianne Moore’s portrayal of a woman with Alzheimer’s was frighteningly realistic.We arrived in Milan primed to be in Italy where life is good, inefficient, but good. The lines for passport control were incredibly long. The only place we’ve been in longer lines in in the Bahamas where laid back is the name of the game. I had made train reservations from Milan’s central train station for about 3 hours after we landed since I knew it was nearly ... read more

We arrived to Padua under cloudy skies and cool temperatures. We were able to find our way to Casa Battisti without any problem after about a 20 minute walk. As we were early arriving, we weren't sure we could get in but thankfully the cleaning lady buzzed us up and we got our room right away. Our place is very nice and there is a communal kitchen where we plan to cook dinner on both nights. We met with Suzy, the owner, and she is a wonderfully, warm lady from Syria. She was very bubbly and helpful, especially when we asked her to help us find the bus station we would be leaving from on April 6 that, according to the address and Google Earth, was outside of Padua in an industrial park! We then headed ... read more

Ok... it wasn't really a surprise trip. I just didn't know we were going until maybe an hour before we left. I think I didn't know because, well, I don't speak Italian that well... or they just didn't tell me. Nonetheless, I was glad to have the chance to go! We saw some pretty awesome things there... but we'll get to that in.. oh, a paragraph. Regular morning/early-afternoon routine: nothing much. TV, House, The Jungle, Super Smash Brothers with Claudia, shower, etc.... However, I did do one new thing today- It's my sister Brianna's birthday today, so I sent her a message to wish her a good one! (I hope she got it...). So Happy Birthday/Buon Compleanne Brino! Paolo and Nico had to go to the bank so Paolo could get his credit card for when ... read more