My last, and best, week in Italy

After I left Ca' del Buco, I slowly made my way to Pisa (after a long lunch break in Bologna, checking into Florence, and yet another train ride) where I met Bosse who was flying in that night from Spain to meet me for a week-long trip.  Both of us had already visited many of the place we had on our itinerary (mostly being selected because we couldn't afford going North, or to the sea, so back south it was!), but who could complain about seeing some of the most beautiful (and may I say, romantic) cities and sights in the world, again.  I certainly wasn't about to.

So happy to be back at
the Firenze Duomo!

Our first stop was Florence.  We were both so happy that we made a last minute change to our itinerary to include an extra night in Florence.  In our time there, we witnessed a brilliant thunderstorm, indulged in fabulous gelato (fig and ricotta/gorgonzola and walnut flavors - surprisingly delicious!) and piadinos filled with nutella and marscapone, and then we [attempted] to walk it all off by climbing the 400+ stairs of the Duomo tower and the rest of the streets around town.  Although it wasn't my first time in Florence (and hopefully not my last either, as I ensured with another rubbing of the wild boar's nose), I enjoyed it all the same (if not more), experiencing it with someone new.

We left Florence and headed to Naples.  Our trip there was a bit tumultuous having included a mix up with tickets (or rather, non-tickets), escaping a large fine by running off a train at the next stop, waiting two hours in a town called Arezzo (but not being able to do anything because of our big bags and a big hill), finally making it to Naples 3 hours later (and our pocketbooks a bit lighter) than anticipated and after the metro had stopped running, which resulted in us getting ripped off by a dishonest cabbie after also getting spooked by Naples at night.

Um, are we still in Italy?

But, we were there.  Our first day we had plans to go to Pompeii which were derailed (no pun intended) because of a transit workers strike which cancelled all trains running to the site.  So, we made the most of the day by wandering through the centro storico (which felt a bit more like Morocco than Italy), the port of Napoli, gaping at all the piles of trash overflowing into the streets and sidewalks, and making time for an authentic pizza napolitana as well as a cool, creamy gelato.

Yay!  Pompeii!

Our second day we woke up to rain, so we delayed Pompeii and did "Underground Napoli" which was a tour of the aqueducts under the city which were used as shelters during World War II.  By the time we finished the tour, the rain had stopped and we grabbed a pizza to go (we were sadly unsuccessful at the most famous pizzeria in Naples because of the massive crowd and had to settle for another) and made our way to Pompeii.  The site was much larger than we had anticipated, was fairly impressive for what it had, but was also sad because of the disrepair that it had fallen into (not including the actual archeological parts, of course).

The next day we forfeited the ultra-cheap train headed to Rome so that we could take an earlier train that would allow us an afternoon in our last city.  We were still an hour late arriving (apparently, Mussolini did NOT make the trains run on time in Italy), but after making our own pasta lunch in the B&B, we hit up all the Roman sites: the Colosseum, Forum, Pantheon, Trevi Fountain, the Holy See, Spanish Steps, a stroll around Trastevere and even got in a gelato before calling it a full day.  The next day we had early tickets to the Vatican Museum.  Bosse got us a museum book so we could read about all the old stuff as we saw it, but more importantly, the Sistine Chapel.  We took our time and took lots of mental pictures (since the real ones weren't allowed).  After sneaking out the back way into St. Peter's and then leaving the Vatican, we grabbed some amazing pay-by-the-weight pizza from a hole in the wall that I managed to find from the year before.  Still not completely satisfied with our finger-lickin'-good pizza, we bought ourselves the most amazing gelatos that were as big as our faces (even though it was the "small" size).  We sat for awhile in a plaza to digest and write our postcards.  For our last evening out, we managed to find a less-than-remarkable restaurant in a charming street (not sure the atmosphere made up for the lack of taste, but the evening was still memorable) and slowly made our way back taking in one last look at beautiful Rome.

On our way out, we took a direct train to Pisa (first one to arrive on time!) and caught a little bit of the sights there (sights = the tower and... ) before we left for the airport.  For me, it was the end of 7 weeks in Italy.  I can't say that my farm experience was all that I hoped it would be, and I can't say that I wish I had it all to do over again.  As for my two trips while in Italy with an incredible guy as my travel companion: I couldn't have wished for anything better.

Bosse and I in front of St. Peter's Basilica

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