Michelle and I have just returned from 10 days in Italy, plus about a day and a half of travel. I write this still feeling the effects.
I was pretty wiped out from playing two of the three nights prior to leaving, so I was a bit wonky waking up Monday morning. But the first thing I did was check the flight departure times at the Austin airport. And I was shocked to see that our flight was listed as leaving a full hour earlier (11:35 am) than we were originally scheduled (12:35 pm)! I told Michelle we'd have to hustle it, and I rescheduled our Uber ride to the airport as I ran around getting things together. Our driver got to our house on time, and off we went, a bit shaken but somewhat together. We got to the ticket counter at the airport, and while checking our bags, the gentleman said something to the effect of "you've got 'til noon" about leaving. I thought that was a bit weird, but we went off to security and after that, the departures screen showed that our flight was indeed leaving at 12:35. Whaaa??? All that rushing for nothing. Wow. For some reason, the ABIA website had the time wrong. But at least we were there with plenty of time.
The first flight, Austin to Atlanta, was fairly rough, but we had some weather to get through. It was pretty nasty in Austin when we left. The flight was delayed about 15 minutes, and we only had about an hour-forty to get to our connecting flight to Paris. We didn't have to recheck our luggage, so it wasn't a problem; we went straight to the gate and boarded the plane pretty much straight away. For this flight, I had had the prior opportunity to upgrade a bit to a row with only two seats, so it would be Michelle and me only. It wasn't much, and I'm glad I took the upgrade. We were able to sleep a bit during the eight-hour flight to Paris, although bits of that flight were rough as well. We had another hour-forty to get to our final flight to Naples, and we had another security check along the way. We got to the gate with plenty of time to spare. This flight was smoother than the other two, and we were in Naples at 11:35 am. After a quick cab ride to the hotel, the Stelle Hotel, we got checked in, despite being there so early. We had lunch at the adjoining restaurant and then began to investigate Naples a little, although we were dog-tired. We ended up taking it easy toward the evening; Michelle even crashed early. I went out on my own a bit, and ended up having a pastry at a shop a couple of blocks away, but that was about the extent of Tuesday.
Wednesday morning, we had the National Archeological Museum booked, so after the hotel breakfast, we booked it over there in a cab. Michelle booked all our tours, museums and otherwise, for this trip. She has an art and archeology passion, and I think she's pushing it on me, too. This museum had lots of statuary from Italian history, and we had audio guides to help. Michelle saw a couple of pieces she remembered seeing as a kid - that's the sort of mind she has for this stuff. The museum was pretty huge and contained frescoes rescued from Pompeii, among other artifacts. We were in there about three hours. After emerging, we walked around a bit and looked in shops, etc. There was nothing else booked for the day, so we took a cab back to the hotel, and then headed to a place called "Ieri, Oggi, Domani" for lunch. It was a nicer place, decorated with Sophia Loren memorabilia. I would say the food was good, but this is Italy. Much like 7 is a prime number, take the "good food" as a given. After a nap, we headed out a bit more, walking around and look in shops, etc. Michelle was in need of sunglasses, and I was in need of readers. We finally procured those and ended up back at the hotel to wrap it up. The next day was Pompeii/Herculaneum for most of it, so we wanted to be rested.
Thursday, and it was off to Pompeii on a tour bus. We had to be at a neighboring Holiday Inn by 8:00 in the morning, so we cabbed it over there and waited. Someone came to pick us up and take us to the actual bus. It was a fairly full bus. Before long, we were in Pompeii at the fairly large tourist hub. Our tour guide was very animated and passionate about the subject matter (all the tour guides were, for the record). The weather got pretty warm, and I was glad we were wearing hats. There was an occasional respite from the roasting, but I tried to stay focused on the sights. One of the most interesting aspects to the tour was the Pompeii streets themselves. Many places had large blocks crossing the street, apparently for skipping across the street if there was a lot of standing water. You could also see carriage wheel marks where they had been embedded in the street post-Vesuvius. We were taken by the Lupamare, the brothel area, where even some "menus" still exist. Pictorial menus, at that. And we saw one cast of a person....not sure where the others were.
Following the tour, we went to another area for our lunch. It was a fairly long lunch, including two courses and dessert. I watched some guys eat margherita pizzas behind our table, and I'm still amazed how fast Neapolitans gobble those things up.
The second part of the tour was Herculaneum, a more-recently excavated town closer to Naples. As good as the Pompeii tour was, I think Michelle and I enjoyed the Herculaneum part more. Herculaneum was where the rich folk vacationed near the water, north of Pompeii, and as such, there were more elaborate dwellings to view. We headed back to Naples and were dropped off near what I thought was our hotel (they kept saying "Stars Hotel"). Turned out it wasn't, the Stars Hotel was not the same as the Stelle ("stars" in Italian) Hotel. No biggie, though; we were only a couple of blocks away.
We rested a bit and then walked around our neighborhood a bit that evening, although we didn't really go that far. When we got back to the hotel, we stopped by the restaurant next to the hotel to purchase a couple of bottled waters and got serious attitude from the cashier there. I had gotten similar treatment that morning from the counter person trying to get a to-go coffee. Some Neapolitans may not like tourists - that's my takeaway. Or maybe something about that restaurant makes some of them grumpy. Hard to tell.
Friday morning, we checked out and were off to Rome. You could walk through a corridor behind the hotel and straight to the train station, which was very convenient. We had an Italo train at about 9:30, putting us in Rome at 10:30 or so. Looking at our voucher, I only saw what coach we were in and that we had a window seat and an aisle seat. When I jumped on the train and got into our coach, the first two seats were available, so I snagged those for us. Later I realized that those were our assigned seats, after all. This trip was a continual learning process.
We got out of the train station and grabbed a cab to our hotel. Our luggage was just big enough that taking the Metro to the hotel wasn't an easy option. Our hotel was the Hotel Villafranca and turned out to be a couple of blocks away from another Metro station, and that turned out to be extremely handy while we were there. We got checked into the hotel by 11:30 (lucky again!) and decided to head to the Trevi Fountain first, which we got a cab to, not really knowing routing in the city yet. To anyone visiting Rome for the first time, I'd say hit a more defined landmark near a Metro station first. As we had no phone service and were relying on physical maps, all the little streets around the Trevi Fountain got me confused instantly. Still, we enjoyed wandering around, taking in Rome, and ended up having monumental gelato creations at one point. The Trevi Fountain made my jaw drop when I first saw it. I guess just seeing something that monumental (no pun intended) around a corner got to me a bit. (Ever see "The Stendhal Syndrome?") We also saw The Pantheon, inside and out.
After getting back to the hotel, we rested a bit before tackling the Vatican Museums, which we were signed up for that night. We ate dinner a couple of blocks away from the tour office and then headed back to await our tour group. The tour itself was great, very informative and full of all kinds of visual wonderment, but by the end, I was completely exhausted. The Sistine Chapel was the last part, and by that time, I was wearily looking up thinking, "yep, that's it." Still, a great tour. We left the others behind as we made our way out, that's how tired we were. Later that night, we still made it out for a little dessert to a restaurant a couple of blocks away.
One thing I'll mention here: our hotel room was one of those European hotel rooms without much regard for guests needing electricity. There were exactly three outlets in the room, one in the bathroom, one behind the desk (into which was plugged the TV, refrigerator, and a desk lamp), and one, oddly, right by the front door, just above the floor. What this meant was, "hey Lance, you're smart to bring your new CPAP battery! Going to pay off here." Yes, I ran the CPAP off the battery all four nights we stayed in Rome. Worked like a champ.
Saturday, after a quick hotel breakfast, it was off to the Colosseum for a morning tour. The Metro had a "Colosseo" stop right in front of the structure, which was convenient. Upon leaving the station, we were immediately accosted by a Slovenian gentleman collecting money for anti-drug programs, but since he was helpful about how we'd find our tour group, etc. I pitched in for his cause. This tour featured my most difficult moment of being a tourist: getting past the security checkpoint entering the Colosseum. All the museums and sites we visited had security checkpoints, but almost all were a breeze to get through. Put your camera and change in the tray, walk through the metal detector, and you're in. Not this one. I could not get past the detector without being told to go back. I thought I was going to have to strip nude. Finally, it was determined my knee brace (which is only stiff fabric) was the culprit, and the guy let me through. Once rejoining our tour group, I joked to them I had to have sex with the security guy, mainly because I was embarrassed to hold up the group. They all laughed heartily, and I felt better.
The Colosseum tour included the Colosseum and a large part of the Forum. It did not include the "underground" part of the Colosseum, which is now visible from overhead, nor did it include Circus Maximus, which was nearby. Still, it was about a three-hour tour and covered a lot. Once done with the tour, we had lunch and headed back to the hotel.
Next up was my only planned destination of the entire vacation: the Profondo Rosso shop. The shop was opened by Dario Argento and Luigi Cozzi in 1989, and it's a combination Italian horror store and smallish basement museum, featuring artifacts from Argento-related films. We took the train to the Lepanto stop (north of the Vatican) and walked the few blocks to the shop. I was in heaven, although the shop is not for the claustrophobic. Very small, and packed with merchandise. We paid our five Euro admission to the basement and took that in. It had around ten scenes from movies, such as "The Black Cat" (from "Two Evil Eyes") and "Demons," each scene featuring actual props from the movie. We went back upstairs, and I tried not to buy out the store. I picked up a couple of books, two t-shirts, one t-shirt for Michelle, and got ideas for other things I could perhaps order elsewhere. The books are produced in-house and have the "Profondo Rosso" stamp on them. I was surprised that Luigi Cozzi had written many books, as I really only knew of him as a film director.
Back to the hotel we went. I was starting to get this "travel on the Metro" thing down.
Sunday, we had one thing scheduled: the Borghese museum in the early afternoon. And as to the location, Google let us down on this front. I'd mapped the Borghese museum, and Google insisted it was at Piazza Borghese, on Via Borghese, in a central area of Rome. We went over there fairly early, to take a look at some sites before hitting the tour. As I was looking for the museum, it was starting to become obvious that we were not in the right place. I asked at a restaurant where the museum was, and after getting conflicting responses from employees there (one said "it's closed!"; I later realized he was talking about the building next door), someone finally told me it was a few kilometers away. We quickly hailed a cab and got to where we were supposed to be in plenty of time. I still need to contact Google about that; I'm sure we're not the only folks this has happened to.
The Borghese Museum had some parts roped off, as a Pablo Picasso exhibition was close to opening. We still got to see all the important stuff, such as the Paola Borghese Venus statue. (I got seriously "arted" this trip.) After the tour, we waited awhile at a taxi stand for a cab with no luck. Others were waiting with us, but no taxis wanted to stop. A tour guide, obviously British, took us under her wing and said we should just walk to the Metro station, as no cabs were going to stop there. So, off we went, on a walk to the nearest Metro stop....I forget which one it was. Quite a walk, but we were back to the hotel within an hour. Not having phone service was indeed a pain, in terms of finding our way around, but it wasn't as terrible a problem as I thought it might be. Physical maps and helpful tour guides were our saviors.
That night, we had dinner across the street from the hotel at the Tre Archi. We had a nice dinner while a torrential rain began outside. At least we were directly across the street from the hotel, if it didn't let up. It did, though, not long after we finished our meal. There was an awful lot falling into place on thi trip. We were lucky, I kept thinking. As it turned out, that was the only real rainfall of the entire trip. Rome got inundated the week after we were there.
On Sunday, the only scheduled event we had was the Capitoline museums at around 3:00. So, now that we had the hang of travelling around the city, we took the train to the Colosseum stop and started walking. After some viewing and shopping (Michelle picked up a coat and hat combo, but in two separate visits two separate days), we made our way to the area where our Capitoline tour was supposed to start. When we got to the plaza separating the two museums, there was a demonstration beginning. It had something to do with abortion, but I wasn't sure what it was about. The police were out as a just in case. Nothing much seemed to happen as we waited and watched. Some speaking through a megaphone, but it seemed like the whole demonstration was over in under an hour.
But something was up concerning this tour. We couldn't find any sign of a tour group. I asked two separate people about where the tour would start, correlating what they said with our rather specific directions. I was pointed each time to the same place: at the foot of some stairs leading to a cathedral. It seemed like the logical place to start, so wait, we did. At one point, we thought perhaps the tour might start at the top of some other stairs leading to the front of the cathedral, but that was about 1/4 mile of stairs. We looked up there, walked maybe halfway. No tour up there. Hmmh. So, we went back to the original place we'd been waiting. Finally, as we realized there was either no tour or we somehow weren't in the right place (and we had no way to contact them), we just bought tickets and went in. The line wasn't long, so we got to see what we wanted. There weren't that many people in the museums, and we never ran into what would have been our tour group.
[After we returned, Michelle contacted the company she bought the tour tickets from. They insisted the tour had taken place, and that we were listed as "no-shows." I find this hard to believe. We didn't have any problem with any other tours. It's pretty obvious where and when tour groups are coming together, and we saw some in the plaza, just not ours. Also, our directions were pretty specific about where we were meeting. Plus, I think we would have run into the tour sporting the "Mea" flag at some point while we were in the museums, and that didn't happen. I suspect some bad communication here somewhere, but at least Michelle got her money back, after some waffling on their part.]
For our last night in Rome, we went back to the restaurant we had the desserts at Friday night. I was going to miss this food.
Tuesday morning, it was up and out and to the train station. We took a cab the short distance to the Termini station, as our suitcases were a pain on these sidewalks. Off to Florence it was....arrivederci, Roma. I like.
We arrived in Firenze around 11:45 and got to the De Rose Palace hotel shortly after that. We were able to check in right away. We were three for three on that. No stashing our luggage while we wandered around. Nice. I think I liked this hotel room the most of all. Probably the oldest of the three, but very nice. And there were more electrical outlets in it! It had kind of an odd layout, with there being sort of a separate entrance chamber, with the bathroom to the left, and a coat closet to the right. Oh, Lance, don't leave your jacket in there when checking out!
Florence is more of a "walking town" than either Rome or Naples. The biggest challenge to that was that our hotel was set off a bit from the city center, so it was a case of walking some to get to anything of import, but once you were there, everything else was relatively close. I later learned that our hotel's area was a popular place for tourists to stay. My knee brace was treating my right leg great, but our feets was a-achin' at the end of every day.
We took a stroll toward the city center after checking into the hotel. We went to the Santa Maria Novella, which was near the train station we'd just come into. From there, it was a relatively easy walk to the Duomo and other sites. We had lunch at a great sidewalk cafe (but really, did we have bad food in Italy?). Michelle wanted to find something called The Pharmacy, which was the oldest pharmacy (in the world?); she'd found it on Atlas Obscura. After purchasing my buddy Charles' requisite town magnet, I inquired about this "Pharmacy." The proprietor of the magnet place told me where it was, but I wasn't sure she had understood what I was talking about. We headed her directions' way, but I lost faith a little too quickly. More on that later.
That night, we had a Bistecca Firenze, or a Florence steak, which is a big deal there. It was on odd experience, as the steak was flayed open, mostly in halves, and my half was quite delicious. For some strange reason, Michelle's half was much fattier and tougher than mine. There was not a steak equilibrium. Sort of disconcerting, but we met a nice, older American couple. The woman needed a nail fixed and discussed that issue with Michelle.
The next day was a more structured day. The only tour Michelle had scheduled in Florence was at the Accademia and the Uffizi Gallery, and it was a two-part tour. The Accademia, which is largely centered around Michelangelo's David statue, was in the morning, and we were done with that one fairly quickly. We did another walk around the town, waiting for the second part of the tour to begin. One thing became apparent after a couple of days in the town: there was a level of aggression amongst people selling things on the street that was not present in the mostly-immigrant street salespeople in Rome. If one of these folks focused on you, they weren't taking "no" for an answer for a good while. I was pretty amazed at it, frankly. It only happened four or five times, but each time was like dodging a spider shooting web material out to snare you.
But we did go back to find The Pharmacy and found it on the same street we'd walked down the first time...we just hadn't walked far enough. Nice place, full of perfumes and remedies, and nice statuary and paintings as well. A bit "perfumy," if you're the sort who starts sneezing when you're around too much of that penetrating smell, but still nice. It had a cafe in it as well, but we didn't partake of it.
The Uffizi Gallery was.....the Uffizi Gallery. Exquisite paintings and statuary (I'm liking that word) everywhere. One highlight was the Caravaggio Medusa painting, which is on what looks to be a concave-shaped disc, and the whole thing is encased in a glass cube. I was a little surprised at how small it was; for some reason, I thought it was larger. Still mind-bogglingly impressive. After all these tours over many days, I felt completely full in the "art" department. A good kind of full.
Thursday included more walking around the town, and there was another trip to The Pharmacy (Michelle had still been planning her purchases). We went north in the town toward the old town's fort and found some really cool shops. One was a mask shop that had some interesting doodads I purchased. The people who ran the shop were sitting there making masks as we shopped. Later, when we were heading to find a restaurant for dinner, we ran into the older couple from Monday evening, and the woman showed Michelle her new nails. Her husband was getting around in an electric chair, and apparently doing pretty well. I was impressed that he was maneuvering those uneven, cobblestone streets.
It feels like the Florence days blur together (I'm writing this too late, I'm afraid) more so than the Rome or Naples ones. We visited and re-visited a lot of the same shops in downtown Florence. The whole area is not that large, and as we only had the Uffizi Gallery to visit tour-wise, our three days there felt freer than the others.
Friday, it was "waaaaah," time to leave. We had a really early flight out of Florence, leaving at 6:30 am. After a particularly speedy cab ride to the airport, we got to the ticket counter and noticed only one person working and some people in line. After a few minutes of no movement, a rather nervous guy walked up and informed us all that there was a strike (of some workers, but I was never sure whom), but that help was on the way. As we had to get to our connecting flight in Amsterdam rather quickly, I was concerned. But after ten minutes or so, some folks showed up, took positions at the counter, and began checking us in and our bags, etc.
On through security and to the gate. After getting to the gate, the aforementioned nervous guy appeared at the door to the gate and stated that there was a strike (of....somebody, or somebodies), but that they would get us to the plane as quickly as they good. I was still concerned. In a few minutes, though, they started processing boarding passes and letting us on the tram to get to the plane. We got to the plane and began our flight maybe ten minutes late at most. I never knew what all the "strike" hubbub was about.
We got to Amsterdam on time and got onto the next flight without incident, but with the usual long line for international flights. This time we were seated in the middle of one of those large plane middle rows. I only had one person to the right of me, though, and so getting up occasionally wasn't a problem. Smooth flight.
We landed in Detroit and had to claim our baggage to recheck for the flight to Austin. When I got my suitcase, it looked like someone had deliberately smashed it into a rock, or something really heavy had fallen on it. There was a hole in one side, the wire frame was protruding, bent in an especially crazy fashion. Nothing was missing from the suitcase; the way it was torn precluded things from falling out easily, thankfully. I had a little more time in Detroit to try to fix the problem. After asking a Delta representative for some sort of temporary solution, he handed me a roll of clear tape without any look of concern at all. Annoying. But I taped up the hole by wrapping the suitcase a few times and leaving it at that. The baggage handler who was taking care of rechecks was especially helpful and told me I could file a claim when I got to Austin. Even though I had a little time, I wasn't sure what else we'd have to do to get to our gate. So I thanked him, sent the taped bag on its way and moved on. Probably a good thing I waited to file the claim, as security took longer than normal. And off we went.
We landed in Austin around 7 in the evening, I filed that baggage claim, and then we grabbed an Uber home. I'm finishing this blog post two months after we left for Italy, and I miss it every day. So there's that. Buona notte.
(Note: Delta sent me $100 to cover the cost of a new suitcase, asking almost no questions. I bought a new one for $70. Not too shabby.)
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