Assisi, Spoleto, and back to Rome

Sorry for the lapse yesterday, but our hotel on the slopes of Assisi was without a functional Internet connection - but since it had a pool and a view worth a million Euros, we were happy. Not much time, so the photos are just here, not organized.

Photo: Our group walks down the main street in Assisi

We left Ponte di Piave in the morning and made a longish (6 hour) drive down to Assisi, saw a pottery demonstration (just glazing, really) and then up to the hillside village of Assisi - home of St. Francis. The basilica was beautiful, but we had only 1/2 an hour in the town. Still, a lot of "Pace e Bene" plates were purchased! I found a pair of egg cups that will see lots of use in our house.

The hotel overlooked the valley and the pool was cool - unlike we, who were forced to wear these goofy bathing caps that are now de rigueur throughout Europe. But when everyone's a geek, everyone's equal....

Next day we visited the medieval town of Spoleto, which bears a certain resemblance in spirit, if not architecture, to Ashland, Oregon. It's the home of a summer arts festival that draws people from all over Italy. Then it was back on the bus for an afternoon free in Rome. Some went to the catacombs, which seemed smart when we were in the roasting pan of the Piazza Espagna, but we had a nice walk through the whole Via Veneto neighborhood.

Photo: The Cathedral of St. Francis in Assisi

I spent my evening with the Miata Club of Rome, and will blog more about that later. For now, it's time for the bus. Everyone's well and looking forward to Sorrento and Capri!

Photos: The glazer at the ceramics factory,
an old doorway in Assisi, and the flying buttresses at the other church in Assisi - the one where St. Francis worshipped - not the cathedral dedicated to him after his death.

What's New on the Rialto?

Today was our day in the City of Venice, and we made good use of it.

Photo: View of the Grand Canal from the Rialto bridge

The day started early with a 5:45 wake up call and a bleary-eyed breakfast in the hotel - then on the bus (without my sunglasses, of course) for a 90-minute ride through the Veneto province to the shuttle boat station.

The weather this morning was overcast and about 75 degrees - a light breeze made it nice, but when the breeze died the air was as completely still as 95% humidity could make it. It was a steambath.

The ride out to Venice proper takes only about 15 minutes, and somehow the boat could be traveling about 20 knots and there was still no breeze up on the topdeck. Figure that out and earn yourself a Ph.D.

Photo: our tour guide Marina

Finally, the boat deposits you very close to St. Mark's square at the Gabriella Hotel (look it up - it's apparently very posh). We met our guide and took a short walking tour of St. Mark's square with a primer on Venetian history. Then we went into one of the leading glass houses (stone-throwing and throne-stowing optional) and watched a really cool (well, really quite warm) demonstration of traditional Venetian glass-blowing. The price of admission was a sales pitch about buying these 600 Euro wine service sets, which I politely declined (and you can all hear Jill breathe a heartfelt sigh of relief if you're real quiet right now).

Yet I did find a goodie for myself in Venice today -
substantially cheaper however. A set of proper string-back driving gloves. The funny part is that there are no cars in Venice, of course. I did take a lot of pictures of the amazing wooden boats they have, though.

Photo: Katie Platter, Megan Ferguson, and Megan Schucht

Of course, we all (except Chris Long, who promised his wife) took a gondola ride around the canals, which was a blast and well worth the E20 apiece. The gondoliers are masters of their art, and take the boats within millimeters of walls and other boats without a sound, except the "Ooay" they use to announce their presence around corners.

After our Gondola trip, we all collectively declined the Doge's
palace in favor of "getting lost in Venice" as Sarah put it. So
we noted our time and place of reunion and went off in search of Adventure and Shopping - and found plenty of each.

Kate and I went to a nifty little cafe for lunch and the spaghetti was handmade and cut - with a pomodoro sauce to die for. We took a big chunk out of the Venetian gelato supply as well. When the breeze blew, it was a lovely day. The sun wasn't out all the time and it could be pleasant. When the wind died, it was Sauna city.

Photo: Alexa Rodriguez, Kate Zurschmeide, Aubrey Brown

I was feeling deprived of caffeine (oddly enough, it is possible in Italy) and so I had three cappucinos through the afternoon. I parked Kate in an air-conditioned Burger King (But she had only a diet Coke, honest!) while I did some browsing through the bookstores and other sights of little interest to her.

One of us bought a nice silk tie, and it wasn't me. The mysteries of 14 year old fashion are opaque to me. But for E8, it was a
good deal, and in Fizzball Racing colors to boot!

Later in the afternoon we did succeed in getting totally lost, and almost crossed the Grand
Canal in the wrong direction, which would have imperiled
our meet-up with our group. But that was the goal, and I soon had us straightened out. The view from the Rialto towards St. Marks really is one of the greatest man-made shows on planet Earth.

Photo: Kyle Smith

The architecture of Venice is one of the highlights of the day. In any given square (or Campo, as they say - the only "Piazza" in Venice is that of St. Mark) - anyway, in any given place, you can see byzantine, gothic, baroque, and romanesque architecture, along with newer styles - but nothing is less than a couple hundred years old - or at least, that's the way it looks from the street or canal.

The others on the tour had a fine day as well, with plenty of shopping to go around. Those Venetian masks were a huge hit,
as was the Murano glass. And the gelato - Kate and I were not alone in our massive consumption of cioccolata and melone. I also had Limone and Pesca (Peach - not to be confused with Pesce, which would make pretty awful gelato, I think)

At the end of the day, we took the boat back and enjoyed the AC
in the bus for our ride home. Dinner was Risotto, followed by pork tenderloin and tira misu.
Tonight's blog entry is comparatively short, as I'm headed for my pillow early.
Tomorrow we get on the bus for a long ride to Assisi and a visit to the Basilica of St. Francis. I'm enthused about getting back into the small towns. I like Ponte di Piave, where we're staying.

Then we head south to end our trip around Naples, but stop off in Rome long enough to meet up with the Miata club again. We may be past the halfway mark, but there's plenty of life left in this trip, and everyone is doing well.

Photo: Daniel the glass blower shows off the pitcher he made as our demonstration.

Jill told me that I freaked some folks out mentioning that someone wasn't well - it's one of the folks from Texas, and she seems to have recovered nicely. Apart from some of the girls suffering from bug bites, we're all healthy and happy and having a good time.

Photo: Chris Long relaxes on the boat home after a long day of chasing kids.

Padua Affords Nothing But What Is Kind

"Padua affords nothing but what is kind," said William Shakespeare. Over 400 years later, that's still an accurate statement.

The plan for the day today was simply to drive from Florence to Ponte Di Piave, near Venice. Here we're staying at the Hotel Al Gabbiano (www.algabbiano.it). But it's really not that long of a drive, so we elected to kick in E5 apiece and take a side trip to Padua. Sarah Morris is great about making sure that we get to direct our own trip within the context of available time and distance. It costs E250 to bring a bus of tourists into Padua, but it was the bargain of the century.

(Photo: the main square and the "other" huge and amazingly gorgeous church - not St. Anthony's - in Padua)

Unlike Rome and Florence, Padua at this time of
year is practically deserted. It's a university town, and school's out for summer. There are a great number of pilgrims to St. Anthony's basilica, but other than that, we just about had the town to ourselves. It's a lovely classical Italian town, with narrow streets and interesting shops. I bought Jill a tea towel to ensure that I get a beating when I arrive home.

(Photo: a stream running through Padua)

The basilica is wonderful. They don't allow photography of any kind inside, so I have only the outside to show you. But inside there's art by Donatello and other great renaissance figures, and the combination of influences from the romanesque, gothic, and byzantine styles make it unique and visually striking. Also unlike the "big draw" cathedrals in Rome and Florence, pilgrims outnumbered tourists by a large ratio. It was almost silent inside because instead of chattering tourists, people were getting down to some serious prayer.

As a university town, Padua also has a selection of great bookstores. I didn't buy anything, but I was totally taken with the place. It's like Santa Cruz (where I went to school) as it would have been if the University was 1,000 years old.

Our great lunch food find of the day was the Pizza Cone - which is exactly what it sounds like. You order it like a pizza, and the guy takes a pre-cooked cone of pizza dough and fills it with your stuff - in my case, italian sausage, tomato sauce, and mozzarella cheese, and puts it in a little oven with a bunch of wire cone-holders. They rotate through the oven and in about 90 seconds your pizza cone comes out piping hot. It's the most fabulous way to have a slice of Pizza on the go.

(Photo: Aubrey Brown and Kate Zurschmeide on a tiny street in Padua)

Both groups of people who visited this place came back to the bus and said "We're going to open a franchise back home." Honestly, I think one of these could be a huge success on any college campus in America. I may work up a business plan.

As we collected to get back on the bus, I took more photos of beautiful old town Padua and there was a big fountain. Of course, it's still roasting hot here, and a dog was frolicking in the fountain and barking his fool head off at all the people gathered around, as if to say "Yo, dummies, get your butts in the water! It's lovely in here." So we all doffed our shoes and compromised by cooling our dogs in the fountain for a bit before we got on the bus for the
last ride of the day.

(Photo: Phil Platter)

As I said, we're at the Al Gabbiano in Ponte di Piave (look it up) - and it's a nice hotel. They've got free wireless internet included with your stay, so I'm blogging extra long tonight. They've also got a full bar, so I'm enjoying a Jack Daniels over ice. Some things from home are irreplaceable.

But some things are markedly better here in Italy.

There's a neighborhood grocery here in Ponte di Piave about a block from the hotel. I went there and it's about the size of a Circle K/Plaid Pantry/7-11, right?

So this tiny neighborhood corner grocery has got a
cheese and meat counter that would put the poshest - I mean the really poshest - grocery store in Portland, Seattle,
or the Bay Area to absolute shame. I bought
(for a total of 5 Euro) a couple wedges of the
most amazing locally produced cheeses you
never ate. One of them is called "Drunken" cheese - it's
a parmesan-type crumbly cheese, but more pungent and rich.
It's so-called because it's aged by soaking in the
fermentation sediment of the local wine.

Photo: Sarah Morris enjoys a gelato

Yeah, it's EXACTLY as good as it sounds.
It's unbelieveably rich and decadent.

Then I bought a wedge of this other cheese whose name I cannot remember,
but it's kind of a swiss or ementhaler-type flavor (gym socks) but creamier in texture, almost like a hard gouda. Yummy yummy yummy!

And the meats - they've got a dried smoked beef that's almost black, and lean as jerky. They've got smoked hams and sausage and salami and all kinds of good stuff. All at the ordinary corner grocery.

(Photo - Shawna Hackelman and Kim Essig)

Phil Platter bought some prosciutto and we got some nice crackers (with rosemary in them) and had a little antipasto out on the back deck before dinner.

Dinner was pasta bolognese, then veal in a nice sauce with roast potatoes, salad, and a shortbread with apricot jam on it. So we're all now happily enjoying our drinks of choice, checking our e-mail and getting ready for our 6 AM wake up call for the trip out to Venice tomorrow.

Ciao!

Kate Zurschmeide



Katie Platter and Megan Ferguson




Chris Long

Megan Schucht and Katie Platter

St. Anthony's

St. Anthony's

St. Anthony's and its square as you approach it

Pizza in Pisa

Today we went to the fabulous town of Pisa.
I had planned on spending the day by myself in
Florence, but Kate wanted me to come along,
and I'm sure glad I did! Pisa is a glorious and
fabulous town, and the cathedral there (with
the trademark leaning tower) is about the
nicest example of a cathedral I've ever seen.

Inside, the art is a combination of renaissance
and later works, with a strong eastern influence.
The painting of Christ the King behind the altar
is stunning. And the black/white marble stripes in the
layout are just gorgeous. The baptistry across the yard
is similarly amazing. They have someone who sings in
there and the acoustics are such that she'll sing two
long notes and before the echoes are done, you can
hear a third note created by the harmonics!

Pisa is a small town, so you don't have to walk far
for lunch and shopping. Apart from the 50,000
or so Nigerian guys walking around offering to sell
you a cheap "Rolex" every 2 minutes, it's great.

I think someone needs to give the Pisan and Florentine
street vendors a quick primer on "market saturation" -
I mean, if the vendors of fake rolexes equal the number
of tourists (and it's a pretty close number) and each
hundredth tourist *might* buy a watch, that's a lot
of watches chasing each interested tourist. Not a
great way to make a living, I think.

We had a fabulous lunch (I know, I'm saying that a
lot) and Kate had ricotta and spinach ravioli in
bolognese sauce, while I had Gnocchi quattroformaggio.
Topped that off with limonata and gelato. Yum!

Dinner back in Florence was Italian style pot roast
with mashed potatoes so creamy I thought it was
polenta until I tasted it. Yummy again!

Now we're posting in an internet cafe with soccer
on the TV. It's hot as a sauna in here - apparently
all of Italy is in one of those nasty heat waves where
they tell the elderly to stay inside. One member of our
tour group has stayed in the hotel the last two days
after being overcome by the heat. We're drinking
gallons of water and sweating it all back out again.

Hopefully it'll be cooler in Venice - but we've had a
small change in plans. Because the trip to Venice won't
take all day, but we'd arrive too late to head into the
city center, we've decided to make an unplanned stop
in Padua for most of the day - I'm all for it, as seeing
another great northern Italian city is just icing on the
cake for me.

(Note from Kate: During tonight's dinner, dad said that if we didn't stop in Padua, he'd wear a thong bathing suit in Venice. The mental images are too horrible to describe!)

We'll close the post with several shots from our tour group:

Megan Schucht

Alexa Rodriguez



Alison Hackelman

Aubrey Brown

Day 4 - >Rome to Florence

I woke up early today, so dashed off a few
more photos to the blog, and we got on the
road heading north - to Florence!

We passed through Umbria on the way up,
and it looks a lot like the Medford area -
plenty of old volcanic hills with ancient
towns perched on top. Then we passed into
Tuscany and it's all nice vineyards and
olive groves - and quite hilly.
Beautiful country.

We stopped for a bio break along the way
and the shop had cool italian license
plates - except instead of "Dave" and
"Susan" they said "Enzo" and "Giulia" - so
I bought one that says "Giulia" for my Alfa.
And I bought an 8C Competizione, but sadly,
only in 1/18 scale.

We pulled off again for lunch at an Autoexpress
- one of those rest stop places that spans the
freeway like a bridge. This is the Italian
equivalent of a truck stop with a Dennys - and
indeed there was a Burger King in the facility.
But I didn't come halfway around the world to
eat a frickin' Whopper, so Kate and I went to
the Ciao! restaurant in the skybridge. Ciao!
is like Dennys over here.

And yet, we had a couple helpings of the
Risotto with black olive paste and artichokes,
and for E4,30 apiece, it was as good as *any*
Risotto I've had in the nicest Italian restaurants
in Portland. And for another E3, I had a tennis
ball-sized hunk of fresh bufalo mozzarella,
straight out of the juice. So, yeah, it's true,
these people really do eat better than we do.

Then we got to Florence and walked our feet off.
We saw all the major piazzas and went in the Duomo.
We didn't go in the Uffizi gallery, which bums me
out, because tomorrow we're going to Pisa so we
won't get into the U this trip. But we had some
gelato and sweated our way through another day.
Dinner was Pesto on rigatoni and then a chicken
cacciatore with a spicy spinach side. Dessert
was a lovely tira misu.

Today happens to be the Feast of St. John the
Baptist, who is the patron saint of Florence.
So they had a big soccer match, people getting
all crazy all over town, and then a fireworks
show in the evening. We sat out on the roof
of our hotel and watched. It's absolutely
magical to watch the fireworks and then
look over and see the cathedral dome.

Kate is enthused about going to Pisa, and
asked me to come along. I didn't plan to
go, but she asked so I'm going. It's also
great to spend the time with her. I bought
her a little fan in the main square of Florence today.

So, next post will surely include about
a million photos of various members of
our tour group holding up the leaning
tower, so be prepared.

More photos

It's Tuesday morning, and I'm posting a few more photos before they open for breakfast and we get on the road for Florence.

It's nice between 6 and 7 AM - cool and dry and quiet.

MG F sports car

My new Miata friends (Tommi, Francesco, Marco, Mary & Roberta)



Castell San Angelo

Photos from Our Tour Group

Here are some photos of our tour group in Rome on Monday....Katie Platter

Alexa RodriguezKyle and Susan Smith

Megan Ferguson
Sarah Morris

Coliseum

La Citta Eterna

On my first trip to Europe, Rome was the first place we went. Imagine being 16 and turned loose in Rome as your first taste of Europe. I'm happy to say that Rome has lost none of its charm in the intervening 28 years. It's still warm, friendly, and completely inviting.

We got on the bus this morning and rode into town, seeing again some of the sights from the bus window that we saw the night before. But this time we started with a visit to the coliseum and took a bunch of pictures of our tour group there. The light is nice in the galleries and it was already getting hot before 10 AM.

After wandering Titus' halls for a bit, we went on to the Trevi Fountain. We rode the bus there, but then walked from the Trevi (and yes, the whole coin thing was done in high style) to the Pantheon. The last time I was here, the Pantheon was undergoing some restoration, and so wasn't up to its usual snuff. It's much more impressive this time.

After the Pantheon, they turned us loose for lunch. I took Kate and Chris Long over a block to Piazza Sant Eustachio for some of the world-famous cappucino at this place. Along the way, in sight of the Pantheon, there was a sidewalk restaurant with a specialty of risotto. We had asparagus risotto, more gelato, and another cappucino for lunch, then it was off to the Vatican City.

The Vatican is well worth seeing regardless of your religious persuasion. The museums and grounds are spectacular, and the art collection is second to none. I mean, for crying out loud, it includes the Pieta - and you'll never see a finer piece of sculpture in my opinion. Unfortunately, low light and the protective glass kept my pics from coming out, but I got others.

The Sistine Chapel is funny. No photography is allowed inside it, and they actually had the carabinieri haul off a guy who whipped out his insta-matic for a few flash shots of Michelangelo's work. It's also supposed to be silent, but 500 people whispering in unison makes quite a load of white noise. It's loud in there, and would be ear-splitting if the guards weren't constantly shooshing everyone.

After the Vatican, I took my leave of the group and grabbed a cab (Opel - fast and nice!) down to Piazza Ugo La Malfa to meet the Miata club. Five people (Marco, Tommi, Francesco, Mary, and Roberta) in four Miatas made the rendezvous. We hung out for a bit, then took a drive through Rome - first to the Arch and Coliseum, then to a pyramid tomb elsewhere in the city. I took about 450 pictures in this time for a feature in Forever MX-5 this fall. Turns out the next time we return to Rome, it's the night of their monthly meeting, so I'm scheduled to go out with them again next week.

After our hang-out, Tommi (who's a journalist covering Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian President) drove me back out to the hotel. I had dinner here (nice! and only 15 Euros) and now I'm writing this while sitting under the canopy outside the bar. It's about 75 degrees with a light breeze, and I'm learning to like Campari and soda.

Tomorrow - we head north to Tuscany and Florence. Word has it our hotel is Right Downtown across the street from the Arno River. Che Bello!