David's Italy Post: Day Eight

Day 8:

All packed up and making our final trip to Rome ... we had to get a hotel here in order to catch our flight and avoid sleeping in the airport... the other down side of staying so far away from civilization. :-(

I had mentioned this a couple times throughout the trip, but I was surprised how few VW Beetles we had seen this trip, even though they're made in Germany (practically right next door). We had seen lots of Fiats, VW Golfs, Smart Cars, Mini Coopers, and other assorted micro-cars, but only 1 Beetle in town. So on the train ride this morning, Carmen points and smacks me in the arm twice (rather hard), THEN says "a yellow one and a green one" with the biggest grin on her face. Of all the luck...

David's Italy Post: Day Seven

Day 7:

Back to Rome. We got up early to our alarm (which we double checked a couple times the night before) and left on time. We've been looking through a lot of archaeological sites, churches, and other stuff that's been uncovered and restored from 2-3,000 years ago. I like this whole archiology thing ... except for that whole digging in dusty and dirty places and lots of waiting. I think I've just seen too much of Indiana Jones and National Treasure. ;-) LOL!

Another day with lots of walking and we were both physically and mentally exhausted... I think we were ready to be home in Fargo at that point.

David's Italy Post: Day Six

Day 6:

The plan was to go to Rome again to see more stuff, but we didn't realize we didn't turn the phone volume back up after leaving the churches (where the signs had the "no" sign over the image of a cell phone) so the "alarm" was only a visual one... no beeps and not even a vibration so we didn't wake up until over an hour after it was set for. We tried calling the taxi company, but the phone wouldn't get an outside line for some reason and we still couldn't get cell phone signal... after we talked it over, we realized there wouldn't be enough time to do anything if we got a later train so we decided to finish what we didn't do yesterday. We looked around campus, but the pool and courts were apparently closed for the season (which made perfect sense), but they would have cost money anyway so we just went for a walk, sat on the deck, read our books, and enjoyed relaxing for a change.

David's Italy Post: Day Five

Day 5:Finally, a day of rest! We slept in until we woke up, which was VERY refreshing, but I woke up around 7:30 (which is odd for me). When you figure that I went to bed shortly after 9, it makes more sense, but still. ;-)
We went to lunch at the restaurant that we tried to get to our first night and found it a couple curves down the road further than we went the first night. Oopsie! Once we were there, we looked through the menu and Carmen decided on pasta while I was debating between the pork loin, sausage, lamb, or beef steak. I decided on the steak and MAN was I glad I did! I'd have to say it was THE best steak I've ever had (or at least an immediate second)! I normally like my steaks medium rare, but the language barrier didn't translate and they cooked it fully, but it looked light (almost the color of pork), it was juicy, and was one of the most flavorful pieces of meat I had ever eaten. I asked Carmen if I should give my complements to the chef or the farmer and she said neither because they wouldn't speak English. True. LOL!
We walked the 800 meters back up the winding hill, during which time I recalled from high school track that 800 meters is 1/2 a mile... although I could never run that far back then, which explains why I didn't remember. LOL!
Carmen went back to reading her book, and I set back to captioning the pictures of the first 3 days of our trip, which ended up taking most of the day (and to note, it took another day to caption the next couple days of our trip after we got home). I had a little panic about the plug when the battery got low because the power converter we had to buy was a 2-prong plug while my laptop plug is a 3-prong. :-s On the plus side, the front desk had a 3-prong converter that they let me borrow and I was able to caption all of the photos up until then and sort out the ones that didn't work well (removing the blurry and superfluous ones). I was surprised when it took 2 full charges of the laptop to finish them all.
By the time we noticed how late it was, we realized that our plans to tour the grounds of the resort were basically done as the sun was setting so I cooked a spaghetti supper with the groceries we had gotten and served it up with the few utensils that were offered in our unit. We had a calm and relaxing day so I was more than happy with that. ;-)

David's Italy Post: Day Four

Day 4, Halloween:

We had our first non-crazy driver bring us to the train station. He was following speed limits, going a decent speed, using turn signals, and slowing down plenty for corners. To put it in perspective, the taxi that brought us to the resort the first night/morning and the one driving the shuttle into town were driven similar to some of the James Bond scenes... zigging and zagging around the mountain (literally... we were on the other side of the mountain as the town), zooming around cars that were going the speed limit, and flying around curves that left me with a death grip on the seat. It was oddly refreshing.

SUPER hectic day in Rome today! We took the train and a subway (my first) to St. Peter's Square, waited in line 15-20 minutes to take about an hour walk through the Bascillica including going through the dome. That was such a steep climb up, the ride down would be one FREAKY ride at Disneyland. ;-) That's one that you may want to check the pictures... it's mind boggling to think about the people building and designing this thing.

From there, we almost ran over 3/4 of a mile (it took us 13 minutes to get there at a jog/run) to the Vatican museum (the last half a mile being the line of people to buy tickets... thankfully, Carmen already bought ours online). I know Carmen hasn't moved like that since the 5k and I think she even performed better in this run than the 5k... but we were both sweaty and exhausted because the tickets had a time listed on them that we had to be there for. Needless to say, it took a few minutes to compose ourselves (with the guard telling Carmen to put her shawl back on when she took it off to fan herself)... I'm glad she didn't bite his head off after the run we did to get there in time. ;-) After 90 minutes of walking, Carmen mentioned how hard this would have been if she had been pregnant... blessing in disguise? ;-)

When we finally got to the Sistine Chapel, it said we couldn't take pictures... bummer. I would have LOVED to get some shots of the ceiling and some of the artwork in this room, but I can understand with how many pictures and puzzles of it they had in the lobby and throughout the walking path. :-s Now I knew Michelangelo did the ceiling, but I had NO IDEA that this room was like 4 stories high and painted beautifully floor to ceiling! I was awe inspiring and would have given me a Crick in the neck had we stayed there longer. I was also really surprised at how many paintings of topless women were in this church! I'm not sure if it was the culture, if people just didn't wear as much back then, or if they were just more pervy back then, but I was taken aback none the less. :-s

A good lunch in the cafeteria with several eating options available. They had Italian food (mostly pasta), American food (burger or a corn dog), German food (which I didn't recognize enough to take a chance with), and even pizza. During the lunch, I had a super top-secret mission that I had to do without Carmen knowing... now that I've already given her the Christmas gift I bought, I can say that I snuck back into the gift shop (while "going to the bathroom") to buy her a rosary for her collection. She had no idea that I got it and I (half panicked) told her I would get certain items out of the backpack where I hid them so she wouldn't find it... all worth it on our personal Christmas when she got a tear in her eye after opening it. ;-) Am I slick or what? ;-) LOL!

LOTS of great pictures from this day so I won't go into details about those, but I saw my first pay toilet and surprisingly little of any indications of Halloween the entire day... just one little girl with a pair of fairy wings on in St. Peter's Square, a small group in costume (which looked like advertising for a store, not for fun), and a small carved pumpkin on a stoop in the resort. It was All Saint's Eve/Day so it was PACKED in a few places because of that, but the difference in culture was pretty apparent with this.

On our way back to the train to Assisi, we stopped in a small market (think the size of a corner grocery store in the U.S. as there were no "supermarkets" that I could find anywhere) to get some groceries and snacks. Not surprisingly, some pasta was super cheap... but Ramen noodles that normally sell for under 20 cents in the U.S. were marked at €1.49 (around $2) EACH!! Apparently the "college food" around there would be the typical Italian pasta. :-s

David's Italy Post: Day Three

Day 3 (that felt like day 2):

The next day, we woke up to an alarm once again... trying to adjust our bodies to a 7 hour difference is not easy. ;-) We decided to plan this day for going into Assisi proper for some sight seeing as the resort was a good 15 minute drive away. Thankfully, we were awake enough to think to look for the store as we passed it.

The shuttle dropped us off at the bus station and said he would pick us up at the same place that evening. No problem... except that we had no idea where to go and we were still starving. Carmen wanted to call her mom because she promised she'd call when we got to the resort, but there was no cell signal in the resort because there is part of a mountain between us and the nearest cell tower, apparently. :-s

We made our way towards the bus station's service window where someone else was being helped... no clue what they were saying as it was all Italian (and saying that makes me wish we had gone to Greece so I could say "it was Greek to me"). LOL! So while we were waiting and wondering if the person spoke English, Carmen saw a vending machine that offered a map of town for €2 (almost $3). Rather pricey, but one of the best purchases we made that day. Once we figured out where we were and saw where stuff was, we started walking and figured that we could follow the signs to the McDonalds as the worst case scenario ("5 minutes away" is what we figured it said... clearly by car). We snapped some pictures of a church on our way down, but were REALLY excited when we turned around... FOOD!!

There was a cute little cafe in the wall with a sign out front offering the sandwiches they had... in Italian, of course. I recognized a couple of the words from eating Italian sandwiches in various restaurants, most without realizing they were Italian. LOL! I picked one that said it was big and Carmen picked out hers. You can see them at http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=2157330821433&set=a.2157304380772.2101948.1491362892&type=3 although I couldn't tell you what they were named... I didn't care enough to write them down as I was too hungry to care. It was so beautiful to have our first real Italian meal (after almost 30 hours from the breakfast on the plane) but near the end of the meal, we questioned what the custom for paying was as they said we pay after when I tried to hand them my card.

The crazy thing was some of the prices on U.S. imports... a 250 ml (roughly 10 oz) can of pop was €2.50 (almost $4) and a 500 ml (almost 17 oz) bottle was €4 (around $5.50... the same size being just over $1 in the U.S.). I told Carmen that I think those 2 were the last of her pop for this trip (although she had a few more). ;-)

There's a lot of gambling here, too. Around half the stores sold scratch-off cards and a few had slot machines. One had one called "Far West" and showed cowboys shooting it out... in other words, what we call the Old West. It makes sense, but it's still weird to see. ;-)

The rest of the day was mostly sight-seeing, taking pictures of ancient churches, beautiful countryside, and the old fashioned buildings that reminded me quite a bit of the days of King Arthur. ;-) Even more interesting were some of the updated store fronts, some with all sorts of electronics, internet, drywall, and very modern looks inside while the outside looked like they were in a castle wall. One of the funnier (and cooler) things that I didn't get a shot of was when a Ferrari (the only one we saw the whole trip) was driving down these very tight streets within Assisi... it was cuter when a little girl gasped as she saw it pass and almost shouted, "Ferrari!!" to her parents. LOL!

I finally let Carmen call her mom around lunch time in Italy (which was around 7 or 8 AM in North Dakota) as I didn't think Elsie would appreciate us waking her up in the middle of the night... she was relived that we called and was glad we waited. I called my mom next and told her we were there and couldn't call out from the resort so both moms could pass along that we were there and safe.

And now... a message from David

So I told Carmen I would write a blog post about our trip to Italy a couple months ago... and yes, it's taken this long to remember to do it, find time to do it, and find the right motivation to do it. Procrastination may not be my best friend, but I've known him a VERY long time. ;-)

This will be the bulk of the story of our trip that isn't already outlined in pictures... some is a bit longer than others, but I'll ignore the details that the pictures show. You can see the pictures at http://www.facebook.com/burleigh2/photos (in the 4 albums that mention Italy or Rome). This is my first blog so be kind. ;-)

On to the blog!

Day 1... and 2, really:

What a looooong day! Got up at 6 AM Fargo time, landed in Italy around 2 AM Fargo time (9 AM in Italy), then had a 3 hour train ride (plus layover times)... we were awake for about 26 hours before we got to the suite (with maybe a few minutes of nodding off during the flight). We got 2 meals on the flight... a decent chicken dinner (although the sauce on the chicken was NASTY), a breakfast sandwich as the sun came up over the Alps, and a snack or two in between. Speaking of the Alps, it was a beautiful view that was grossly obstructed by the plane wing since we were in the exit row... but the extra leg room was a nice blessing. ;-)

We touch down in Italy and followed what signs we could read (as well as the crowds that seemed to know where to go) and made a few wrong turns on the way to the train station, but we finally found it. Now, there were no fast food restaurants on every corner like there were in the U.S. and no options to buy pre-made food much of anywhere we passed in the train stations. Needless to say, we were SO hungry by the time we got to the suite because of how little we had to eat... understandable. We went to the main office and asked where we could get some food and they offered that they had a limited selection of perishable food: break, jam, ice cream... the basics. They also said there was a small store about 800 meters to the right down the road. As with many Americans, it's been a LONG time since we've had to convert meters into feet/miles so we walked down to the entrance as they said and looked around.

There was a cute little building to the left that looked like a house that was made into a cafe or maybe a B&B so we walked over there and saw all the lights out and the place looked closed. The sign listed the hours and it was the local "Siesta" time where everyone took a break, it seemed. Okay, fine. We were starving and exhausted so we went back to the suite, ate some peanut butter crackers that we brought for snacking (the only food we had at the time), set an alarm, and passed out for 2 or 3 hours. When we got up, it was dark again so we walked down towards the cafe... but the lights were still out. Throughout the whole trip, we could only guess that the family was on their vacation and didn't think to put up a sign... but all the plates and glasses were set so it didn't make sense either way. Weird.

So we're back where we started, but it's dark out... bummer. We started thinking about the directions they had given us and started walking to the right of the entrance as opposed to the left, which was right when you were entering the property... remember, we were very tired at the time. ;-) After we had walked for almost 10 minutes in almost no light (the only street lights being at houses and businesses that were rare) down a winding road with no shoulder (so we're walking in dirt and weeds half the time when we're not on the road) and with cars flying by at way above the speed limit, Carmen got nervous enough and we still couldn't see any lights for the store so we decided to turn back and go to bed.