Roman Holiday

So far, we have enjoyed Rome quite a bit but we are on a tight budget as my mom, Ervin, Pic and Diane can attest. Since our room eats up over 70% of our budget (ouch!), we don't have a lot of walking around money. But this has not stopped us from seeing things - today we spent only 13 euros but managed to see Santa Maria della Vitterio, St Peters including the Pieta, the Pantheon, and St Ignacio - all famous (well sort of famous) things. Plus we learned a lot by snooping in on tour groups.....when in Rome.

In fact, we walked into Santa Maria unintentionally. We couldn't find the national museum of Rome (free), but we saw this and said let's walk in. Turned out to be one of the highlights of the day. The church was Michaelangelo's last architectural work which was built on the Roman Dioclesians baths (our loyal readers know how much we love baths).

You gotta love Rome.

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All roads lead to Rome (including ours)

So after talking to many people during our travels about going to Italy, but not to Rome, and them all thinking that was totally crazy to do Italy but not do Rome, we decided to add Rome to our travels.
We arrived in Rome today (after bidding my Mom and Dad farewell in the Rome train station. Really had a fun visit with them in Italy and proud of them for making their first trans-Atlantic voyage. Also proud of Michael and I as we just finished up 15 days straight traveling with 2 sets of our parents and are still talking! :)
We secured a nice little hostel in Rome and have already seen some amazing sites- Michalangelo's "Moses" and the Colosseum. Pretty amazing to actually see the Colosseum in person.
Tomorrow we plan to do the Pantheon and St. Peter's Basilica.
P.S. We saw the news on Thailand and will be keeping a watch on it.
P.P.S We finally found some peanut butter in Rome!
P.P.P.S Thanks again for all the comments, we really love getting them! And it makes me feel "in touch" with my girls and my fam!

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Florence

On Sunday, we day tripped it into Florence to catch the birthplace of the renaissance. It was quite a sight, we checked out the Douma and the Academia with the highlight being David. David truly was a sight to behold, I understand why many scholars call it the greatest sculpture ever. The Douma was just ok.

Ashley and I decided to check out some monks chanting, which Dianne's guidebook (Frommer's) indicated started at 4:30. Pic and Dianne opted for some window shopping due to the steep climb up to the church. Well, once we climbed up to the top (it was quite a climb), we discovered that it was actually at a different time. Naturally we were disappointed and it cemented the fact in our mind that Frommer's guidebooks suck. Anyway, we headed back to Lucca where we had a great dinner at a local trattoria.

Overall, all of us (including Pic and Dianne) have really loved Italy....mainly for the following reasons
- Wine. You can get quality wine at low prices (<$3.50), its better than many a $10 bottle I have drunk in Denver. Also, house wines at restaurants are very tasty.
- People. The people of Italy have quite a bit of character - we have really enjoyed interacting with them as they are friendly.
- Food. Its really good, especially the pizza and the salami.

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Drinking in Lucca

Drinking in Lucca
Originally uploaded by Flightplan.

Pic and Dianne in Treviso

Pic and Dianne in Treviso
Originally uploaded by Flightplan.

Tools of the Trade

It has come to my attention that some people are under the impression that we are just posting these blog entries from internet cafes. This is not the case.....every blog post was written on a PDA (HP Ipaq 1955) and posted to the blog via a wireless connection. We have a mini fold out keyboard that we type our blog posts on, then we walk around looking for wifi (wireless) signals in various towns. And thus this is how pictures and blog entries are loaded on the web.

We are not spending this much time in internet cafes, we normally write them on our PDA at night and then find a wifi hotspot the next day. So far we have been able to find a wife signal almost everywhere we have been.

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Treviso

On Weds after another long travel day, we arrived in Treviso and met up with the Rubes. Its a little town about 20 miles from Venice. A friend from my work is from Treviso and arranged some nice accommodation with a family friend. We day tripped it into Venice (see flickr for pics) yesterday and today we just enjoyed Treviso.....as its been raining a lot!

I have to say that its been very nice to be Italy. Its like we have been hanging out in another world in eastern Europe and to get to the west is a relief. Its nice to see a complete modern infrastructure plus western style conveniences. Yeah, Italy is old but its closer to the style of living we are accustomed to (or were???). 

Note - for some reason our uploading photos from Flickr to the blog is NOT working. Very annoying, so here it is without the picture of the rubes enjoying a glass of wine.

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