Italy Trip Day 8 - Venice and Lake Como

Before we could leave Venice, I needed to do one thing – take a ride in a gondola. I know it is incredibly clichéd and touristy, but I still wanted to do it. So, after breakfast we wandered around looking for a desperate gondolier who would be willing to give us a good deal. We didn’t find any, so we ended up paying nearly full price for a 30 minute cruise around the canals of Venice. I’m happy to report that it was worth it, as it is definitely a different way to see the city. Now, if our gondolier could have spent a little less time on his mobile phone, that might have set a little better mood, but oh well. He even kept talking on the phone while we were getting our picture taken (see the cropped and uncropped version in Shutterfly). Mason also enjoyed the gondola ride, and was very excited to see we would be cruising on a “black boat.”
After the gondola ride, we told Mason we needed to go back to the hotel to get our bags. He replied, “Go backa hotel, get bags and go to Paris?” Maybe this is a sign that we are traveling a bit too much with our two year-old.
We said our goodbyes to Venice and got back in the car to drive to Lake Como, and the small resort town of Varenna for the final night of our trip. Varenna is a very pretty, quiet town on the east shore of Lake Como, looking directly across at the much more glitzy resort town of Bellagio. After the craziness in Venice, Varenna was a great place to relax a little and end up the trip. The hotel we wanted to stay at was booked, but instead they gave us an apartment in the town, which was very nice, and allowed us to put Mason in his own room. The hotel owner is also a very good chef, and we had a fantastic final dinner at the hotel restaurant, looking over the lake and savoring our last few hours of vacation.
The next day we decided to take the ferry across the lake to Bellagio and spend a few hours walking around the town. After our return to Varenna, we all had our last bit of gelato, then piled in the car for the 4 hour drive back to Lausanne.
I think Nicole and I both agree that this has been the best vacation we have had (at least since the honeymoon). The weather was perfect every day. We didn't see one drop of rain, or even a threatening cloud for the entire week. As always, travelling with a 2 year old has its ups and downs, and we would like to go back to some of these places without kids at some point. But, we wouldn't change this trip one bit - Mason and all.

Italy Trip Day 7 - Venice

We left Tuscany this morning and drove across the country to Venice. As you may remember, Nicole and Mason have already visited Venice last fall, but since I hadn’t been able to go, I still really wanted to see it. The beautiful weather from Tuscany followed us, and it was sunny and 80 during the late afternoon. After our arrival in Venice, Nicole and Mason crashed in the hotel room, and I headed out to check out the town for a few hours. After just a few minutes of walking around, I was very glad we decided to make this a stop on our trip. There has been no other city we have visited that quite compares with it – the whole city is just a slowly decaying and sinking piece of art. I probably took 200 pictures in the two hours I was walking around by myself.
In the evening, we took Mason to his favorite place in Venice – San Marco Square and the throngs of pigeons. Nicole can barely stomach to walk around the place, as tourists voluntarily let pigeons land on them and eat bird seed (wisely spiked with pigeon birth control) out of their hands. To Mason, however, the fun never ends in San Marco Square. He could stay in the square chasing and feeding pigeons all day if we let him. At one point, while he was feeding the pigeons, a pigeon flew up and landed on his shoulder. You should have heard the squeal of terror from Nicole, “Brian, get them off of him!!!” It was hilarious.
We found a nice place for dinner, and then as always had to track down a gelato place afterwards so Mason could have his “special treat.” We found a gelateria, but unfortunately the gelato tasted like shaved ice with food coloring added (not that Mason minded) and was still incredibly expensive. Not a perfect ending to the day, but still a pretty good day nonetheless.

Italy Trip Day 6 - Laundromat di Italia

Today we ended up making a quick return trip to San Gimignano in the morning, because it was definitely our favorite place in Tuscany. We had intentionally planned at least one day in our trip to do nothing, and if needed try to go into a town and do some laundry to get us through the rest of the trip. As it turns out, laundry was needed, and unbelievably, going to the laundromat was probably the highlight of the trip for Mason so far. Due to some translation issues, we ended up needing to do two drying cycles for our load, which meant we spent almost 3 hours at the laundromat. During this time, Mason was about as happy and well-behaved as he could be – of course. He loved pushing the laundry carts around the room and then staring at the laundry spinning round and round. The only problem was that Mason was so excited at the laundromat that he didn’t nap at all that afternoon.
We capped off our final night at the farmhouse by putting Mason to bed early, and sneaking out of the room to have our dinner with just the two of us. Of course, they had set the table with Mason’s little cup and plate, so we immediately felt guilty for leaving the little man in the room. The guilt lasted about 10 seconds and then we enjoyed our one quiet, relaxing meal of the whole week.

Italy Trip Day 5 - Florence

The day that Nicole had been dreading all trip has finally arrived. I really wanted to at least visit Florence for a day, primarily to see some of the famous art museums, and in particular, see Michelangelo’s David sculpture. Of course, that kind of day is not exactly easy with a two-year old, so Nicole was not super-thrilled with the idea, but she went along like the trooper that she is. In order to get into Accademia (the museum housing David) without waiting in line for hours, you need to make a reservation in advance. I had taken care of this detail weeks before our trip, and we had a reservation time of 11:30, which I thought gave us plenty of time to make it to Florence, park and get to the museum. This of course assumes that you get out of bed on time, get Mason dressed and fed quickly, and don’t forget anything important (like reservation number or your Italy guidebook). Unfortunately, we did not accomplish any of those things, and as a result we were scrambling to get into Florence, park and then search desperately for a cab to take us to the museum. We did finally make it to Accademia (literally at 11:30), only to stand in line (with the other people with "reservations") for another 30 minutes enjoying the work of art that Mason must have created in his pants during the cab ride. Once we got in, however, we quickly found that David was worth all the hassle.
Unlike the Mona Lisa, which tends to be a little underwhelming when you first see it, David is completely awe-inspiring in our opinion. Even Mason seemed to be impressed, not taking his eyes off the statue for the whole 10 minutes we stood looking at it. Taking in Michelangelo’s nude masterpiece, Mason was inspired to exclaim, “Mama, Daddy, he goes pee-pee in the potty!” Hopefully this visit inspires Mason to do the same sometime soon.
I hadn’t broken the news to Nicole yet, but I had also made a reservation in the late afternoon for the Uffizi Museum, which is supposed to house the greatest collection of Italian paintings anywhere. Needless to say, when I did break the news to Nicole, she let me know that we would be breaking the reservation and heading back to the farmhouse before Mason completely melted down into a total wreck. Oh well, nothing ventured, nothing gained, I guess. However, before we left, we sampled some of the famous Florentine gelato, which also proved to be worth the hype.

Italy Trip Day 4 - Siena

After spending the morning sleeping in and relaxing a bit, we headed to Siena for the afternoon and evening. We were pretty excited about seeing Siena, but found ourselves a little disappointed by the city. The city’s Duomo (cathedral) was very impressive, as was the city hall tower and main square, but the city was so dirty it was kind of hard to enjoy walking around in it. We think maybe the city was a little bit dirty from the big Easter weekend. The Italians really get into their Easter celebration. Despite the filth, the big savior for the city, in our opinion, was the restaurant where we ate dinner. Once again, our travel guide author, Rick Steves, came through in a big way. The restaurant we ate at was very cool - built in a grotto-like wine cellar, with a fantastic (and huge) menu. Everything we ordered was excellent, including the desserts.
Mason is definitely getting into the swing of things here in Italy. Today after we were leaving a shop where we stopped to buy Mason some fruit, Mason gave the store clerk a wave of his hand and said, “Ciao, ciao!”

Italy Trip Day 3 - San Gimignano and Volterra

Today we began exploring the many hill towns of Tuscany, starting with San Gimignano, located just about 10 kilometers away from our farmhouse. Today was also the day that Mason officially hit the wall. I think three straight nights of staying up past 10 o’clock and taking limited naps had finally taken its toll on the little man, and he let us know it. San Gimignano was a very impressive town – at least what we were able to see while chasing Mason around all the piazzas and down the narrow streets. It is a nearly perfectly preserved medieval town, with a very distinctive skyline of sorts, consisting of 14 tall, narrow stone towers. You can actually see the town’s towers from about 20 miles away, which is pretty impressive considering it was all built 400 to 500 years ago.
After a much needed nap (for everyone) we visited another hill-town called Volterra. While Volterra was not quite as impressive as San Gimignano, Mason was in a much better mood, making the visit a bit more enjoyable. Volterra has been around since before the Roman-era in Italy, and its famous Etruscan gate made of massive stones (dating around 400 BC) still stands as the entrance to the city. Mason has his “I’m an American tourist” act down pretty well we discovered, as he likes to go stand in front of objects (like the Etruscan gate) and scream “Cheese! Cheese!” at the top of his lungs. Through this behavior, he has made it onto the film strips of many Italian tourists so far this trip. While this seems to be a good thing for Mason’s ego, we’re not so sure this is a good thing for the American image in general.
After the day was done, we ate another fantastic dinner at the farmhouse tonight. Homemade lasagna, a soup from a family recipe, barbeque chicken and an antipasta plate filled out the night’s fare. At dinner, I realized how accepting the Italians are of children, compared with some of the other European cultures. After Mason’s loud performance the first night at dinner, most Swiss would be giving us the evil eye if we brought him in for dinner the second night. Not in Italy, however. In fact, one table of older Italians actually bought Mason a small wind-up toy and brought it to him at dinner. He has turned into quite the conversation piece around the farmhouse, and he has begun really hamming it up with all the other people staying at the farm. We will see if his charm wears off after a few more dinners.

Italy Trip Day 2 - Lucca and onto Tuscany

Our second full-day was a travel day of sorts, in between Cinque Terre and our next stop in Tuscany. We filled the day by taking a side-trip along the way to a town called Lucca. Lucca is known for its old medieval town, which is surrounded by massive walls built to protect the town from its former rival cities of Florence and Pisa. The walls were so well built that they are still in perfect shape today, and they have built a bike and walking path along the top of the walls. We decided to stop here for lunch, and rent bikes ourselves to check out the town.
After Lucca, we continued our journey into the Tuscan hillside. We will be spending the next 5 nights in what is called an agriturismo. Essentially, this means we are staying on a real farm in Tuscany that has created a sort of bed and breakfast for guests. On the way to the agriturismo, Nicole asked me if I had seen any reviews of the place. I said no, that I had found the place on the internet and had no idea what it would be like. For some reason she seemed worried. After we arrived at the road to the agriturismo, and saw the make-shift, wooden sign marking directions to the farm, I think Nicole pretty much wanted to turn around and go back to Cinque Terre. Then, we drove over a dirt road for about 10 kilometers back into the hills, and I started getting a little nervous as well. It seemed like I might have just reserved a room for 5 nights at the Italian version of the movie Deliverance. Finally, we arrived at the farmhouse, and all of our fears were put to rest. The old farmhouse is nicely renovated, but still has all the character of a 19th century Tuscan villa. Our room is actually quite large, with a separate room for Mason, and has its own fireplace. If it wasn’t for that 2-year old we brought with us, this might be the most romantic place Nicole and I have ever stayed.
Tonight we ate dinner at the farmhouse, a meal they prepared with all ingredients or meat grown or raised on the farm. It was definitely the best meal we have had in Italy. OK, so things are looking better for the next five days. Mason even found a new friend, a little Italian boy named Francesco who will be here the next 3 days. Mason has picked up a few Italian words, and now tries to converse with Francesco by saying only “Grazie” and “Ciao.” After all, what else do you really need to say?

Italy Trip Day 1 - Cinque Terre

On Thursday evening before Good Friday, we packed up the car and drove out of Switzerland for a 8-day adventure through Italy. This is our last big hurrah before #2 arrives and we become officially immobile for awhile. The drive on Thursday took about 5 hours, winding through the Alps, and then along the Italian Riviera. After about 1 hour in the car, Mason began asking “Go back to Mason’s house?” I’m not sure that was a good omen for the trip.
The first stop on our tour is Cinque Terre. The name in Italian means literally 5 lands, and is named for the five small villages built into the rugged Mediterranean coastline. Vineyards and lemon groves line the mountains leading down to the villages, and the area is known for its great system of hiking trails between the villages.
We aren’t entirely certain what drew us (5-month pregnant wife and 2-year old) to a place known for hiking, but after spending the day here, we are very glad we came. The whole area is incredibly beautiful, with each of the five villages built into rocky cliffs. We lucked out on the weather today, with perfectly clear skies and temps in the low 70’s. We started out looking for an “easy hike” and ended up taking a 2-hour trail that was a bit more rugged than we were expecting. As we later learned while reading our guidebook, it was supposed to be one of the most difficult trails in the area. Whoops! Luckily for me, Mason still fits in his backpack, and Nicole is such a trooper and still intends to keep our marriage going. Actually, though, the views from the trail we took were incredible, and we were very happy we did it.
Mason was great today, which was a nice start to the trip. I think he only bothered Nicole a few times, when he keeps telling her, as he looks at her pregnant belly, “Mama so big! Mason so little.” He is a charmer!