Last European stop - Italy (again)

Well, this is my last post from Europe. I have spent the past week back in Italy catching up on the sites I missed the first time, and avoiding the Greek election.

First stop was Venice. Very pretty little city, but man is it hard to navigate. The fact that I didn't get horribly lost and have to send up smoke signals is a testament to my mad map reading skills. I loved all of the glass work. I managed to convince myself not to buy anything on the basis that it was just something I would have to dust.

A note to the tourists in St Mark's square though - stop feeding the pigeons! Rats of the sky!

In the morning it was off to Verona. Verona of course is famous for two things. The lovely ancient amphitheater where they still have outdoor operas (each summer they do Aida) and of course Juliette's Balcony (as in Romeo and Juliette).

Much like at Cinnque Terre, people come with a lock, write their names on it, and secure it to Juliette's balcony. This I had no problem with, the locks were bright and colorful and there were so many that they looked amazing in the courtyard.

What I had a problem with was the very gross trend of putting your chewing gum on the wall and writing your names on it!!!!! Ewwwwww....

In the afternoon it was off to visit the lakes district. For the life of me I cannot recall the same of the first lake we went to. It does however border Switzerland (could google it I guess...). This was where (for those on FB) I ate the smurf gelato. Smurf in Italian is Puffo. It was however a good day for gelato.

Then it was off to Como for the night. We took a short cruise around part of the lake trying to stake out George Clooney's house. I personally took a liking to this little residence.

In the morning it was a short trip to Milan. Once again I stupidly went into a cathedral on a Sunday morning, so once again I accidentally went to church (gotta stop doing that, but in my defense I have lost all bearings when it comes to days of the week).

We then headed to San Marino for the evening, which of course is dealt with in it's own post. In the morning we were headed for Rome. My god it is hot in Rome. I cannot blame the kids who were trying to jump into the Trevi fountain. I battled the heat by going on an all gelato diet (and I mean all gelato, so hot I even had to give up the cone and have it out of a cup as it was melting faster than I could eat it). Yes, I threw a coin into the fountain.

I wandered aimlessly trying to find the Colosseum. For the record, it was not the weather for wandering aimlessly. I do love that the are ancient ruins in the center of the city, surrounded by modern buildings.

I got to a point, when heat stroke was about to kick in, where I gave up and decided a return to the hotel was required. I turned back towards what I thought was the hotel, and instead had this view...

Found it! Only problem was this meant I had no idea how to get back to the hotel...

I made it back to the hotel eventually. Next morning I had a ticket to the Vatican. Decided to give up on the walking in 40 degree heat business and forked out the money for the hop on hop off bus (best €20 I have spent - temp made it to 42c!).

Once inside it became clear why Turkey and Greece have all the headless statutes. All the good ones, with heads, are in the Vatican.

Place was packed with people, and of course all anyone was doing was looking up...

Made it to the Spanish Steps as well, though decided the view from the bottom was fine by me.

Yesterday I headed to Naples and Pompeii. The lemons in that part of the world were huge. So glad P-Willy never threw one of these at me.

Pompeii is massive. The ash also did a spectacular job in preserving the site.

This building had the longest line to get in. The guide that was taking us through the site announced that this was one of 20 something brothels that they had in Pompeii. What was interesting was that the walls of the brothel were covered in frescoes and artwork depicting...umm...the activities of the building, and all were extremely well preserved. People took pictures, lots of them, of the art work. Hence the line.

Of course, in those days you could not have a sign saying 'brothel' hanging outside your establishment, so they had to find other ways to mark the building for the customers. The guide told us all to look down at the street. This was the marker.

That in the background is Vesuvius. As you can see it is quite some ways from Pompeii. The wonders of wind blowing ash in the wrong direction...

Apparently the reason they have so many bodies is because of a technique from the early part of last century where they poured liquid plaster into the crevices where the bodies were before the deteriorated. They then dug them out when they dried, hence why you can see the detail of expressions and things so many centuries later, and not just bones.

In fact the site was so well preserved there was even a cafe ;)

This is a view of the site looking back towards Naples. You can see just how much of it there is.

Oh, and this is a new candidate for best snow globe of the trip :)

About to hop a flight to Madrid where I will spend the night, and in the morning it is farewell to Europe and hello to the Americas!

San Marino - not just bad pop music

I've been in Italy for the past few days, and I've got some lovely pics to share and stories to tell, but I am going to save Italy until after I finish up in Rome and instead tell you about the place I am staying tonight. The Republic of San Marino.

For those that don't know, San Marino is one of the oldest and smallest Republics in the world. The country dates back to 300 and something BC and has only 30,000 residents. It is also the country that bought us Valentina and her awful ode to social networks and cyber sex at Eurovision this year.

Here is what we were told in the bus in the way here. We were told it was a very pretty country on the top of a hill, and that it was duty free, and thus many Italians come he to purchase alcohol and cigarettes. So I was prepared for bottle-o's and tobacconists. I wasn't prepared for all the weapons and pro-Hitler items. By the time I got back to my hotel I was feeling a little like this guy... (it is actually a statue in memorial of Chernobyl).

The good stuff first. It is a very pretty little place.

The buildings and the streets are all the same stone. You can even go and watch the changing of the guard (singular) here.

The view is also pretty amazing as you look back down at Italy.

This is the view at the back of the hotel...

And this is the view from my balcony...

I decided to spend my afternoon being Italian, and shopping in San Marino. I bought the customary snow globe, and some postcards, and then some jewelry stores caught my eye. I'd been told silver was cheap, and as many of you know, I am now in the market for earrings. Now this is where my photos start getting dodgy (they don't like piccies in some stores). I went to the window to look and the earrings and discovered that whilst they sold jewelry in the window, inside the store was every kind of rifle, handgun, high powered weapon, knuckle dusters, knife, sword, mace, Kevlar and balaclavas that you can imagine (have a look to the left if the picture inside the jewelry store). This wasn't the only store that had this theme (jewelry in the window, weapons inside). This was part of a strip of about 6 stores with the same theme.

Other stores were a little more singular in their focus.

Not only where there more gun shops than you could poke a stick at, but the placement of them was so...unusual. The one above (the first I came to) was next to a store that sold nothing but Christmas decorations, a bar and a toy store.

I was only feeling slightly off put at this point, and I went to purchase some postcards, which as it turned out were being sold in the bottle shop. As I was leaving after paying I saw a French couple (who don't speak English) from my tour group. They looked horrified. They saw me and started pointing furiously at the wine and beer. There was one entire wall of alcoholic beverages with these labels...

At this point I was feeling more than a little off put and decided I might spend the rest of the afternoon hanging out at the hotel.

Something tells me one trip to San Marino in my life might be enough for me.

Room(s) with a view

Greetings from Greece. I'd say hello in Greek, but I have no idea how to do that on the keyboard...

It's been a whirlwind week of ruins and heat! Today we made it to 39c. I thought I was going to wilt. So what have we been seeing? Well we started in Athens on Sunday morning bright and early (we all thought our guide was crazy with the early starts, but now that we realise that we may die of heat exhaustion at 10 am we are suddenly pretty happy with getting out of bed at 6am!).

First stop in Athens was the first Olympic arena of the modern era. I say modern, but it is still pretty old (1800 and something it was built...). It was used at the 2004 Olympics for archery and the marathon. It is also where they have the handover ceremonies for the flame. Believe it or not it seats something like 50,000.

After visiting some other sites across the city, and watching the guards outside of Parliament (they wear pom poms on their shoes) we headed up to the Acropolis.

It is only once you get up there that you can appreciate how massive the site is. The view back down at Athens, with the ruins in the foreground is pretty spectacular.

The most amusing part of this was hearing the other side of the stories I had heard in Turkey about the Greeks! Suddenly all I was hearing about was how Greece's ruins would be better had it not been for the Turkish occupation. The were still pretty impressive. The Greeks have patented a technique for cleaning ancient marble, so the ruins scrub up well.

We moved on to Mycenae in the afternoon and saw one of the best examples of a Greek theater. We had a lesson in acoustics. It is amazing, there is a point in the center where you can stand and even the slightest noise, even just breathing, can be heard by everyone in the theater like you are kitted out with 100 microphones.

They still use it in summer to do performances of Greek tragedies and the like. Apparently the biggest challenge to the modern theater actor performing in this arena is learning to breathe quietly, particularly when concluding a monologue, as the sound travels far more than in a modern theater.

That evening we stayed in Nafplion, which is a quaint little village (and also the very first capital of an independent Greece). It looked just like I had imagined a Greek town would.

Out hotel was up on the hill and we have a lovely view at sunset whilst we enjoyed our beers.

From Nafplion we headed to Olympia. The archaeological site was HUGE. This was the birthplace of the Olympic games. The first games were had here in 776BC. The site had a gymnasium, "hotels" for the athletes, even a " VIP" hotel reportedly built by Nero for his own comfort when participating in the games.

Back in those days, distance was measured by "Olympic stadiums". This was the original track where athletic events were held. Everyone was having a go to run it (though in 40 degree heat I decided a walk would be better). In those days it was a straight track and events were called things like the 6 Olympic stadium race (so 6 laps of the track).

Just one little problem with this site. CRUISE SHIP PASSENGERS! My god. They descended like ants on an unguarded picnic. There was a costa boat in port (still floating, go figure) and each group was numbered, the highest number we saw was 75. This was what it was like as we were leaving (crowds reminded me of the actual Olympics in Sydney).

You know how every two years you see on the news the girls lighting the torch at Olympia? Well this is where they do it.

Interesting fact - the idea behind the Olympic torch was bought in for the 1936 Olympics. Whose idea was it? The same man who lit the torch for the first time. Believe it or not - it was Hitler. Not sure I will ever look at the torch the same again...

There have been museums, and Greece has the same problem as Turkey. Headless statues. I hate them.

I think I have worked out why they are broke. I passed a road works sign that said the work was costing €800 million. This bridge cost €750 million...

We had some more hardship views. I had coffee looking at this...

And then when we got to Delphi that night I had this view from my hotel room...

Delphi is of course home to Apollo and the oracle (sorry Mummy, oracle didn't have the lotto numbers - I did ask!). Apollo believed it to be the center of the universe. It was full of treasuries of gifts that people bought Apollo in the hope that the oracle would give them a favorable fortune. The view up at the site was also pretty impressive.

This is the treasury of the Athenians (most of the stuff in there had been pilfered from the Persians and given to Apollo).

There was lots of climbing involved here too...

But so worth it when you got up there to the top. Have I mentioned how blue the sky is here????

T
onight we are in Kalambaka. The hotel room here has yet another hardship view. Took this earlier this evening from my balcony... This place is one of the most active fault lines in the world. Have felt a few little tremors just sitting here writing this. Little disconcerting.

Still trying to get my head around whose who in the mythology zoo, particularly given that the Romans and the Greeks have different names for the same person (eg. Venus and Aphrodite are one and the same). Thanks to the wonders of my Kindle I have downloaded a 700 page compendium on Greek mythology and am making up for taking modern and not ancient history at school.

Tomorrow it is back to Athens, and then on Friday I am making my escape from Greece before they have their election this weekend (would rather be in Italy for that and watch it safely on CNN).