Blogs from San Marino, Europe - page 2

Hello my fellow travellers! This morning Peppe brought me to a kiosk where I could pick up a couple of tickets for the bus going between Morciano di Romagna and Rimini. It was cheaper to by them there and to buy more at the same time. Peppe helped me last night to check the timetable for both the bus to Rimini and then the bus to San Marino as well as the return bus from there. We will meet up tonight to go and eat an evening meal together to celebrate my last evening in Italy. The bus was nice and comfortable and I was dropped off at the combined bus and train station in Rimini and here it was very easy to pick up tickets to San Marino and I also got a tourist map ... read more

San Marino is another of the world’s micro-states. Like Liechtenstein, Andorra, the Vatican and Monaco, it exists in a bizarre state of independence, issuing its own stamps, having its own government and even possessing its own army, even though in all but name it is part of another country – in this case, Italy. San Marino is surrounded by Italy, and the people who live there speak Italian, spend the same currency (the euro) and travel between both nations as if no border exists. According to legend, a Croatian stonemason called Marinus founded San Marino in the year 301. Marinus was a committed Christian who, to escape persecution in his homeland, sailed to Italy and settled in the Italian town of Rimini. There he downed his hammers and chisels and became a priest, rising to the ... read more

We left City Camping Milanoyesterday and having considered the routes we went for the option of three and a half hours on the toll roads instead of the seven and a half hours on the smaller roads, no contest with the temperature gauge in the 30’s. Woolly says – it was a boring day, the journey seemed endless, Zoe slept, I dosed, Jo sat in a trancelike state and Ian drove, Ollie loved every mile and spent the hours happily purring away as he took mile after mile of tarmac. Eventually our end destination was in sight and we were more than delighted to book onto Camping Centro Vacanze San Marino for the night at 31 Euro’s (approximately £26.70 GBP) for us all. it wasn’t the cheapest but it was the closest to the city. The ... read more

Todays gelato flavour - Biscotti We had needed to get back to the east coast again, after visiting Lucca,so that we could make our run up the coast towards Venice and then on around to Croatia over the next 7 to 10 days.Rivabella,a beach resort town near Rimini was gearing itself up for the coming summer season and we got a good deal at the Marylise Hotel and as it turned out a room with a sea view.The only thing that didn't quite work out for us was the size of the room and we found we were tripping over each other and our suitcases as we tried to get by in the 3mt x 4mt space.We did joke though that this could be our lot when its time to leave our home for a rest ... read more

The Old Town and not much more The main reason for this trip to Italy was to visit San Marino. San Marino is one of the smallest independent countries in the world. According to CIA World Fact Book San Marino is the fourth smallest country in the world. Only Holy See, Monaco, Tuvalu and Nauru are smaller. San Marino is surrounded by Italy in all directions and could never find a way of telling an Italian from a Sammarinese. They look the same and speak the same language. There might be a cultural difference but I couldn't find any. Considering that the Italians have elected url=http://en.wikipedia.org... read more