How We Know It's Time to Go Home, and a Brief Summary

We've had a fabulous trip, but it's time for us to go home. We leave first thing tomorrow morning. Here's how we know we're ready to go.

• We've run out of most of our toiletries.
• We're tired of our clothes.
• I'm getting ready to start breaking selfie sticks.

Here I am on a gondola! Here I am on a gondola! Look at me!

• We've been traveling together for 5 weeks and still love each other. But we don't want to push it.
• We've run out of money.
• We miss our family and friends at home.
• All the pigeons in Italy have figured out that Greg carries bread in his pocket, and they follow him everywhere.

Greg with his friends.

• Our toilet still isn't right.
• Greg has read all the books on his Kindle. 
• We're sick of gelato. Ha! THAT will never happen.
• We miss our dog.
• Greg has a blister on his foot. (thankfully, no picture here)

A Summary of our 35 Days

• 35 days with no interruptions due to rain
• 30 days with cappucino
• 35 days with at least one extraordinary food experience
• 35 days where we walked a grand total of 210.2 miles on 4 tired feet
• 14 days of driving through rural Italy and we returned the car (and us) in one piece
• 4 days in Venice and still no gondola ride
• 35 days of trying to blend in but still being greeted in English
• 29 days with gelato
• 35 days of trying not to read about the US political news
• 11 nights where we went to the local markets and brought our dinner home
• 35 days with at least one of us saying "Wow! Look at that!"
• 34 days with a glass of wine

Thanks to all of you who followed along on part or all of this journey. I've loved your comments.

I'll close with a few pictures Greg took last night. The evenings in Venice are the most beautiful, I think.

Cicchetti, Opera, and Lots of Wandering

In Venice, many of the bars serve the usual things like coffee, pastries, and drinks. But they also serve cicchetti. These are small snacks (kind of like tapas) that are pre-made and displayed in cases. You just point to what you want and it goes on your plate. It's a great lunch, and for the past two days, this has been what we've done. Most of the cicchetti are on bread but you can also get small servings of pasta, grilled veggies, or meatballs.

Yesterday's lunch

And today's.

It's reasonable too - most of the options are just 2 or 3 Euro each. Very fun way to have a quick, easy snack or lunch.

This morning we left the apartment early to make way for the plumbing crew. We took the vaporetto to the Rialto Market which is a huge, outdoor market with lots of fruits and vegetables plus a large fish market. There were lots of people there, most of them were like us and were there to see it but not to buy anything. The seafood is displayed beautifully - and the colors seem more vivid than in the States.

Next was a stop at the Opera House, La Fenice. This beautiful structure has been rebuilt twice due to fires, most recently reopening in 2003. Even though we knew it was new, it was a nice tour (with audioguides) of a stunning theater.

The rest of the day was simply spent wandering the city looking for interesting shops or fun photos to take. Here are a few...

Venice: A City of Surprises, a Clock Tower, and Beauty Everywhere!

The final stop of the Wilde Grand Tour of Italy is Venice, and we arrived yesterday after a quick train ride from Florence. On our previous trip here, we just didn't have enough time to see it all so we're happy to be back.

We were met at the train station by Margaret, the woman who would take us to our apartment for the next 4 night. We bought a 3-day vaporetto ticket at the station and were ready to go. Margaret is a Canadian but has lived in Italy most of her adult life. Like many women we have met, she came to Italy as a young woman, fell in love with an Italian man, and never left. Such an interesting life change.

The apartment is perfect for us. It is located on a small canal and has a little garden out back where we can sit and watch the boats go by. It's newly remodeled and seems to have everything we need. It seemed like this was going to be a great place to stay.

Our apartment is where you see the 3 windows on the ground floor.

Now cue the scary, foreboding music.

But before we get into that .... we spent the afternoon getting some groceries and learning our neighborhood. We are in the Dorsoduro sestiere (part of the city) and since we spent no time here on our last trip, it was all new to us. We'd made dinner reservations at La Zucca (The Pumpkin) which specializes in creative ways to make veggies but they also have meat. Their specialty is a pumpkin flan which we thought was wonderful! We also ordered the cipollini onions that were incredible sweet.

The outside of La Zucca

Pumpkin flan

Onions

I had duck breast, Greg had pork, and then we had some wonderful panna cotta with honey and almonds.

Panna Cotta

I'd highly recommend La Zucca, but be sure to make a reservation. We watched lots of people try to get a table and none were successful.

OK. Now back to the apartment.

When you reserve an apartment, you always can expect that it won't be perfect, and we're willing to live with most little flaws..... a flat pillow, a clock that doesn't work, a lack of kitchen cooking utensils, a burned out light bulb. But there are just some things that you must have.

Last night when we were getting ready for bed, the toilet wouldn't flush. OK, I thought maybe we just need to let it rest (you'll remember this has worked several times already on this trip with other problems). So this morning, it flushed once and then...... it just wasn't going to flush again. And then we discovered that we didn't have any hot water! After sending some frantic text messages, we met with the housekeeper mid-day and she was able to get the hot water going. But no luck with the toilet. So although we have managed to get out and do some things today, we needed to keep in touch with the status of our plumbing situation. As of this moment, they have a plumber who is coming out tomorrow and will need to remove the fixture and do something wonderful to make it work again. It kinda sorta works now, but we aren't real confident with it. Such a fun little travel highlight! Don't worry. I won't post a picture here to illustrate this part of the story.

We try not to spend a lot of time in Piazza San Marco because that is where all the tourists and cruise passengers go. But it is a very cool area so we did go there this morning before the mobs hit. We bought tickets to go up in the clock tower in the piazza, and it was definitely worth the effort and price. We met our guide at 2:00 and she walked us up the tower describing the history of the clock and the story behind each section of the tower. So glad we did this!

Outside of clock tower

Clock works

Bells at the top of the tower

View of San Marco from the top of the tower

Dinner tonight was at Enoteca Ai Artisti which is another very tiny and popular place we'd read about. The food was great but the service was pretty chilly. Best part was the scallop starter. Better than a scallop roll from Maine!

Greg took a million pictures today, some as we drove down the Grand Canal and saw something interesting. But here are just a few that he took last night after dinner.

A Day in the Gardens

Months ago, Greg and I watched a show on the Food Network with Guy Fieri where he was in Florence. Of course, we took notes. One of the places he raved about was a pizza place called GustaPizza which is on the other side of the Arno. It's a tiny place and by the time we got there yesterday a little past noon, the place was crammed with people. They have only 6 or 7 options for what you can order so we wedged our way up to the counter. Somehow they managed to find a table in a small back room for us to sit; perhaps they took pity on us because we were easily the oldest people there. We were seated with two young American college girls who had just arrived in Florence and needed advice as to what they should do. And don't you know that I always have advice to give! The pizza was very good but I prefer some of the ones we've had where the crust is crisp. This had a pretty soggy bottom but the taste was excellent.

Like a pizza with a salad on top!

Yesterday our plan was to spend the day at Boboli Gardens and Bardini Gardens. We'd seen Boboli Gardens before but had heard Bardini was even nicer, and since one ticket gets you into both, we thought we'd wander around the two of them. Biboli Gardens is huge and both of them are on steep hills so if you go, be prepared for lots of up and down walking. But there are many benches around to sit and rest.

Some shrubs and trees are now blooming which made all the walking worthwhile. Here are some of Greg's pictures from Boboli Gardens.

Greg's second favorite building in Florence.

The easiest way to get from Boboli Gardens to Bardini Gardens is to exit the gardens by the old fort. You will see signs that guide you the few blocks to Bardini. Because the Bardini Gardens are on a steep hill, it's best to walk a short ways up to the top where there's a nice cafe and then work your way down the slope.

As much as we love Boboli Gardens, we preferred Bardini yesterday. It was beautiful and there were very few people there! And the views looking out over the city of Florence are spectacular! More photos from Greg.

Last night we had dinner at a small, family owned restaurant called Cafaggi. It's only a few blocks from our apartment, and although it gets great reviews on TripAdvisor, there were no tourists there. The food was wonderful and so was the service, but the atmosphere is pretty bland. My grilled squid was the winner of the night. So much flavor!

Greg's osso bucco with artichokes was also very well done and tasted a lot better than it looks.

One of the many things we've observed in our trips to Italy is the creativity of the drivers and the way they park. We can't figure out if parking tickets don't exist here but it's fun to see how and where they park. I captured a few to give you an example but you see this everywhere in the cities and in rural areas. Those crazy Italians!!

Just a little bit on the sidewalk

And a little more on the sidewalk

And more

And totally on the sidewalk!

And my favorite - in the crosswalks on a corner.

Today we will do laundry and wrap things up here in Florence. Tomorrow we take the fast train to Venice!

Orphans, Another Church, and a Few Goofy Pictures

It sometimes seems that one of the largest groups of people in Florence are American college students who are here attending classes. We see them on the streets together, in the cafes, and in the bars. Yesterday, we discovered one of their major hangouts, La Managere. Most bars in Italy are small with nothing more than the bar and maybe a few stools and sometimes a small table. La Managere is more like an American coffee shop with comfortable couches and lots of places to sit. It's only a few blocks north of the Duomo, so we've walked by several times and admired the look of the place, and yesterday we finally stopped to sit inside for a few minutes. They do serve food, but it looked like it was mostly filled with American students with their MacBooks and their iPhones drinking coffee.

La Managere

Inside of La Managere

Perhaps it just feels like home to them.

Yesterday morning we went to The Innocenti Museum. This is a newer museum but it is in a building that has served as an orphanage and home for children for over six centuries. There are many pictures displayed which were probably taken over the past 100 years or so, but they also have terminals set up where you can look up children who were dropped off in the 1500's. Babies were placed in a window and sometimes were left with charms or trinkets that were kept with them. You can also see many of these tiny items along with pieces of fabric that I assume were part of their clothing. We visited a home similar to this when we were in London, The Foundling Museum, but the one here has been around longer and has been to the home to even more children. Fascinating but also rather depressing.

Most of the space is now taken up with art displays rather than seeing the actual quarters where the children lived. The building is on a small piazza and over the columns you can see ceramic babies. The originals were replaced, but you can see two of the original pieces in the museum.

And we couldn't let a day go by without visiting another church. This time is was the inside of Santa Maria Novella. Greg had photographed the outside the other night, but we'd heard the inside was worth seeing. Of course, we thought it paled in comparison to some of the other magnificent Duomos we have seen, but it was a pretty church.

Santa Maria Novella

Interesting ceiling - we always look up!

Heaven

And hell.

Kind of makes me want to be sure I end up in the right place! There were some very beautiful frescoes in some of the smaller chapels around the church and surrounding the alter.

And then just a few miscellaneous photos. Here is what Greg wants for Christmas if any of you are wondering what to get him. He plans to take it to Door County and use it there.

With all of the Italian pastries available, Greg has discovered a store in the Mercato Centrale that sells apple strudel. He claims it's the best he's ever had, and we've been there 4 times to buy more.

And finally, which came first, the chicken or the egg. Did this guy dye his hair to match his pants and backpack? Or did he buy his clothing to match his hair? I'd say he's into orange.