It might still be four months away, but I'm starting to get really excited about my trip to Italy.
I've got most of it booked and all I have left to do is find myself a hotel in Rome for one night (near the railway station), arrange my travel insurance, and decide which museums in Florence I want to pre-book ( to miss the queues). Oh... and pay for it.
I wish that the money haemorrhage would stop though. Nick is looking at needing some Root Canal work and ...get this, I copped another fine from my trip to Melbourne!
My speed camera violation (not to be confused with the parking ticket that I managed to get waived) attracted a fee from the hire car company itself - an admin cost FOR the same speeding ticket.
The speeding fine and admin fee work out ot be about twice what the parking fine was and earned me three demerit points against my licence too! Aaaagh!
But I'm not going to dwell on that. I want to share my holiday itinerary so far. Feel free to turn green with envy.
I'm leaving on Grand Final Eve ( that's for Aussie Rules followers) 24th Sept at around 10 pm. I plan to take some heavy duty drugs and sleep for the first leg of the flight which is about 13 hours. The second leg is only 6 hours and gets us into Malpensa (Milan) in the early afternoon.
I'm hoping that I get through customs etc quickly and that I'm in a fit state to travel, because I plan to get the train into Milan Central station and straight out again to Venice. I'm told that arriving there by rail is quite spectacular. I only hope I'm awake enough to appreciate it.
I've booked and paid for two nights accommodation right in the centre of Venice. The best travel advice I've been given is to do a quick tour of the must sees in Venice: San Marco Piazza, the Doge's palace, the Bridge of Sighs, the Jewish quarter etc - but then get out of the main tourist areas and to simply start wandering. To get lost, in fact. Yay! Something I know I can do. The next day might involve a trip over to Murano island - to check out the glass making- and perhaps buy something pretty.
I have to be back in Milan on the 27th Sept, so that I can get myself out to the airport to meet up with Martha and Sue and Dave) and the rest of the party traveling with from the US with Fr Villa. He is a priest who has worked in the Vatican and regularly runs these tours from the US for his parishioners. I reckon he will know some great places to visit. I've made contact with his local agent already and she's given me her mobile phone number so we can meet up at the airport before they touch down.
I will be spending the next 9 days with this group. There will be somewhere between 30 and 40 people in it. I should mention that I'm neither Catholic nor particularly religious, but I figure it's hard to be in Italy and avoid either, and if I'm going to attend at least one Mass in my life, why not make it at the Vatican?
This part of the trip has been arranged already and we will be staying in some very nice four star hotels and traveling around by bus. Most of the meals and entrance fees etc have been arranged. We are hoping to see 'The Last Supper' while we're in Milan, as well as Milan's Il Duomo and La Scala! I'm sure my head will be spinning with so much culture and history.
We'll be spending a few days in the Italian Lakes district and our hotel rooms will either overlook Lake Maggiore or the Swiss/Italian alps! I hope I don't have to choose! How could you? They both sound divine.
We'll take a few days traveling to Rome via Romaggio, Portofino and Pisa. Rome will include visiting the Catacombs, the Vatican and eating in a restaurant on the old Appian Way. Sue and Martha are very keen to take a day trip to Florence from Rome - more for the leather shopping than for the art galleries, but that's ok with me.
I'm kind of tempted to hire a Segway scooter thingy there, but I might chicken out on that - and concentrate on the shopping instead.
We will be parting ways on the 6th Oct. Martha, Sue and the rest will return to the US and I've arranged a two day/one night bus tour to Naples/Sorrento and Capri for myself. That will be as far south as I go, but I'm really looking forward to seeing the Amalfi coast, Vesuvius and Pompeii. I mean, you can't go to Italy and not go to Pompeii!
We will be quite late getting back to Rome that second day - This is the night I need to book still. Since I want to take the train to Florence early the next day, somewhere near the railway station might be smart. I'll be in Florence for a three day/ two night stay, where I want to go to the Duomo and its bell tower - and climb them - all 400 steps each, the Uffizi gallery for Botticelli's the Birth of Venus, the Galleria della Arte for Michelangelo's David, the Medici tombs AND take a half day Tuscan cooking class.
I only hope I can do them all - or at least some of them.
I've actually booked the cooking class and I suspect it might end up being the highlight of the whole trip. Imagine learning to cook a four course Italian meal in an 800 year old Tuscan farmhouse, eat it outside overlooking the fields and olive groves and drinking chianti...and not having to worry about getting yourself home again, since the transport is provided.
Bliss.
My last port of call will be in the tiny town of Vernazza in the Cinque Terre and I have booked myself a single room overlooking the sea. I'll be spending two nights there and plan to walk the tracks between the five villages - or take the little train that tootles between them - or eat lots of gelato and drink too much coffee - and take a squillion photos of the gorgeous coloured houses clinging to the cliffs.
More Bliss.
That will be my last night in Italy. I will take the train back to Milan in time to catch my flight home via Sydney. Like the other flight, it will leave late at night and there will only be the one stop. We fly into Sydney at pretty much sparrow's fart (approx 7:30 am) but I won't get home-home until mid afternoon on the Friday 15th October.
In spite of the messy return trip, it sounds pretty good doesn't it?
As well as saving up frantically for the trip, I've been making other preparations. I've got my luggage/equipment sorted out and I've been listening to a CD that is teaching me some simple Italian vocab. I've also signed up for ten week Adult Education class called Italian for Travelers that starts in three weeks and will finish two weeks before I go. How cool is that?
I can't believe how well it's all coming together.
As I said at the beginning, I'm really starting to get excited about it. This is my first solo holiday for a very long time. In fact, I met the ex on my last one. That was on a South Pacific Cruise in 1980. lol
Hmmm. Once bitten ....
