Florence, Pisa & Le Cinque Terre, Italy

Florence

August 11-15 2008

Ponte Vecchio bridge at night!

Day 7 cont.
We arrived in Florence at around 11:30am; we took a taxi to our hotel from the train station. Once again we only had a hotel room for two people, so we had to figure out where the third person was going to stay. Our hotel was too expensive per night, so we got a room at the hotel next to ours. We put lee in that room and my sister and I shared the other. After we figured all that out, we headed out to explore the city. We saw a lot of sights but we mainly shopped. Florence has a lot of open air markets with many different trades selling their products. We got some leather journals and scarfs for ourselves and friends. After shopping we needed a little sitting break and a snack. So we bought some of the best gelato that I have ever had, which it better be for 4 Euros per scoop! After our expensive snack and rest we walked back to the hotel for a 2 hour break/nap before dinner. For dinner we found this mom and pop eatery with Panini’s. It was cheap and delicious! After that it was bed time!


Day 8

We decided to take a day trip since we had pretty much seen all of Florence that we wanted. We originally wanted to go to San Marino but it just didn’t seem worth the hassle. So we went to Le Cinque Terre and Pisa instead (see other post). We didn’t arrive back in Florence until 10:30 or so, and we were hungry. We found a not-so-good eatery still open and ate our sandwiches on the steps of the cathedral. After that we went to the famous bridge in Florence. We walked across the bridge towards our hotel. By the time we got to our hotel and fell asleep it was well past 2am.

Day 9

This was one of the first times we actually got to sleep in. We were packed, breakfasted and in our taxi to the train station by 11. We had to wait in another long line at the train station to get our seat reservations. We boarded the train and were on our way to Milan by 12:00.


Florence was a 3.5. I liked it a lot more than Venice!

Pisa

August 12th 2008

The Baptistery of San Giovanni, The Duomo, and La Torre di Pisa.

Day 8 cont.

We took the train from Le Cinque Terre to Pisa. Our goal for Pisa was the Leaning Tower! We got out of the train station and found the bus we were to take to the tower. We passed our stop on the bus and had to get off at the next one and then go back! We took a lot of pictures around the Field of Miracles and hung out there for a while. Then we took a taxi back to the train station, since the bus has stopped running. We made caught our train on time.


Pisa is a 2. The tower is a 3! There isn't much to do in Pisa except visit the tower!

Le Cinque Terre

August 11-13th 2008

Isn't it beautiful?

Day 8 cont..

The train ride to Le Cinque Terre was 2.5 hours, but worth every minute. Le Cinque Terre or the five lands, is a string of coastal cities. The cities are small but very colorful with the best views from the ocean looking toward the shore. We went to the 4th farthest city Venizza, and then took a ferry along the coast to the Riomaggiore. We shopped there for a while until the next train was due to arrive. At the train station we got gelato and then caught our train to Pisa!

Le Cinque Terre is a 4. Very beautiful and picturesque.

Venice & Treviso, Italy

Venice

August 8-11th 2008

Venice was magical and mysterious with so much to offer.

Day 4 cont.

We finally arrived in Venice, found our hotel (Hotel Basilea) and checked in by 5:30pm. We were tired and didn’t want to see too much of the city without my sister, so we watched TV. We went for a walk/dinner hunt at around 7pm. We couldn’t really make up our minds as to which restaurant we wanted to eat at. So we passed a lot of places before settling on a somewhat expensive place. I got tortellini and Lee got Lasagna, they were the smallest portions I have even seen; and the total price was 23 Euros! Can you believe that crap? Anyway, after that annoying first dinner in Italy we decided to go back to the hotel and watch the Olympics. We were watching the Olympics for quite a while before we headed over to the train station to pick up my sister. Once there we learned the train was 45 min late, which was odd considering she transferred at a station that was only 10 minutes away. So she basically sat at Venice Mestre station for 45 minutes on the train, to go 10min! I was surprised that she wasn’t more annoyed, but she was always good at entertaining herself! Plus she got to see me, so of course she was happy!!! It was 2am when we finally got my sister, walked back to the hotel and went to bed!


Day 5
We woke up early, only because we didn’t want to miss breakfast, which was only served until 9:30. I went to eat first because we were sinking my sister into the hotel, and she insisted on eating breakfast! Who can blame her? Anyway, I went in first, ate, and then told them to come in because it seemed no one cared! After they ate breakfast, we all headed out to see Venice! We walked toward San Marco Square. On the walk we stopped in almost every store. My dad was determined to get all of his friends and close family a gift! We reminded him that we had plenty of cities left to see, and that he didn’t have to get them all there! Even after this remainder we still looked in all the shops, it wasn’t entirely his fault; my sister and I were also intrigued to see what Venice had to offer! Venice had a lot of handmade craft stores. There were glass blown objects, wooden toys, various hand sewn cloths, leather bound journals and much, much more! That day I think we each bought something. I got an authentic glass blown quill with ink, and a glass blown small multi-colored bottle. My sister bought a scarf and my dad bought a Venice inscribed apron and baby bib for his sister.

We finally made it to the square, after all the shopping, and took a lot of pictures. It was well past noon at this point and we were hungry. So we walked away from the square (where the food is cheaper) and ate at a nice restaurant. Although the restaurant was nice the service was not! The waitress was a total jerk, but the pizza was freaking good! After lunch we went to a hotel to buy tickets for a concert to be held that night, by the square. We were tired after all this so we decided to go back to the hostel and rest before the concert started at 8pm. When we were fully rested we walked back to the square and made it to the concert on time. We saw Vivaldi’s four seasons. It was lovely, and short, a good combination for my dad and sister! When the concert was finished, an hour later, we hung out in San Marco square. We took some pictures listened to music and walked around. On our way back to our hotel we stopped and had a slice of pizza. At the hotel we watched TV for a while then hit the sack.

Day 6

Since we had seen most of Venice by now, we decided that a day trip to another city was in order. We caught a train around 12:30 to Treviso (see other blog). After eating lunch is Treviso we decided to take the train to Venice Mestre and see what it had to offer. Not much actually. It didn’t help that it was Sunday and everything was closed. The only thing we could really do was sit on a bench and hangout. Needless to say we didn’t do that for long! We headed back to the train station, and were back in Venice St. Lucia by 6pm. We had dinner at a Chinese restaurant, went back to the hotel to pack, and went to bed.

Day 7

We woke up at 7:30am got dressed and went to breakfast. We all ate together this time, not really caring what they would say, since we were checking out. I was done eating first so I went to the train station to get the tickets. I had to wait in a long annoying line that is all too famous in Italy. Forever later, I had the tickets in my hand and was waiting for my sister and dad to arrive. I was a little agitated because the train was leaving soon and they still weren’t here. When they finally arrived we made our way to the track and found our seats on the train. Once we were settled I asked them what took them so long and my sister told me what happened: “When you left the guy at the front desk stopped us. He asked me which room I was staying in, and I told him I didn’t know. Then he told me that I was lying and that I was staying with you too (me and my dad). He yelled and said that I have to pay for breakfast. I said why? He yelled some more and we were going to pay him, but then he said ‘just get out of here’!” I was surprised at this tale and laughed at it, but my dad didn’t really think it was too funny! My sister and I laughed anyway. What did it matter? Everything worked out and we were leaving that place and heading to Florence now anyway!


Venice was a 3. Unique and pretty, but with a sinking future. What a shame.

Treviso

August 10th 2008

Like Venice, Treviso has many water ways. Unlke Venice, Treviso is dead on Sundays.

Day 6 cont.
From Venice St. Lucia we took a 12:30 train to Treviso, which is 45 minutes north of Venice. Upon arrival we looked for a map at the train station but didn’t find one, so we just started walking. We stopped in the first hotel that we saw and got a map there. Then we tried to decided what the point of interests where. There weren’t many. We stopped at McDonalds to share some curly fries and look at the map some more. We decided on a destination and headed there when the fries were gone. The destination was just a statue, which wasn’t very impressive. It was quite and all the stores were closed except food places because it was Sunday, so we ate gelato while sitting on some stairs. After Gelato we went to find lunch (kind of backwards uh)! We had pizza once again! It was pretty good, but it was ruined by all the smokers sitting by us. Yum, pizza and tobacco! Anyway after lunch we headed back to the train station since there really wasn’t anything else left to see. It was a short day trip but it was cheap and we wanted to explore more of Italy.

Treviso was a 2.5. I think if the stores were open and people were out, it would have ranked higher. But since there were neither I have to rank it at a 2.5.

Neuschwanstein, & Munich, Germany

Neuschwanstein, Füssen

August 6th 2008

Every where I go there is always construction on the sights I'm visiting!! Annoying!

Day 2 cont.

After arriving in Füssen, we still had to take a 10min bus to get nearer to the castle. Once at the castle area we had to walk for 5 minutes, so that we could stand in line for 1 hour! People really do spend so much of there lives waiting in lines! Is it all worth it? For Six Flags Magic Mountain rides heck yeah, for a castle? Not so much! Well anyway since we waited in line for so long, we missed the earliest English tour. So we had to take the 4:15pm tour, it was only 1:15pm. We explored a little of the surrounding area, ate lunch, and then decided to head up to the castle. Oh did I forget to mention that the walk up to the castle takes 25 minutes! How lovely! It wasn’t actually that bad, considering we were in no hurry whatsoever! When we made it to the top we still had 2 hours before our tour was due to began. To kill time we took some pictures of the outside of the castle. We also got some ice cream and just sat and waited, and waited and waited. 15 minutes before the tour, we took some pictures of the inner courtyard and view points. Then we went on the tour. On the tour we could see the 2nd, 4th and 5th floors of the castle, ending through the kitchen to the gift shop. The tour lasted a total of 30 minutes! 30 minutes, really? I have been to castles smaller than that, and much less famous, and the tours have lasted longer. What a freaking disappointment. I mean don’t get me wrong, I still had a lot of fun, but it’s a full day trip to see only see the inside for 30 minutes. Anyway, we walked a back route down to the bus, got dropped off at another bus stop, and then waited for that bus to take us to the train station. Then at the train station we had to wait 40 minutes for the train. We finally made it back to Munich at around 9:30pm!!

Neuschwanstein was a 3.5. Amazing but almost not worth the 12 hours that it takes to visit it!

Munich

August 5-8 2008

Map of Munich for the Blind. How they get to it, no one knows!

Day 1

It’s not actually day one of the Family trip! My dad arrived in Germany a day before we arrived in Munich. We took a 12 something train so that we would have to wake up too early. We arrived in Munch at around 3pm and checked into our hostel, 4U Hostel. We had a private room, not dorm style, and it was just like a hotel, except half the price and more teenage backpackers. After we checked in we decided to go explore a little of the city. We walked to Marienplatz, got some bratwurst at a stand and ate on a bench. After eating we walked toward the movie theater. We went to see Mama Mia and I’m glad it was better the second time! While we were there we bought our tickets for a movie in advance, just in case it was sold out! Then we walked back to the hostel and were in for the night. We went to bed early because we wanted to get up to go to Neuschwanstein the next day.

Day 2

Unfortunately we both woke up a lot earlier than we needed too, 7:30am. Our train didn’t leave until after 9, so we ate breakfast slowly and got ready. We headed for the train station at around 9 and caught an earlier train. We had a 30min layover in Buchloe, so we went to explore the city. We really only needed those 30 minutes to see the city. I mean it was cute, but extremely small. I’m betting that only old people live there! Anyway, we went back to the train station and got on our train, where we met up with Victoria (she came from Reutlingen). We arrived in Füssen at 12pm (See Neuschwanstein for the rest of this day in Füssen!) After we spent the whole day visiting the castle, we took a 7pm train back to Munich. We arrived in Munich at 9:30pm and ate dinner at subway, after checking Victoria into her room. We went to bed after midnight.

Day 3
Man, after day three of the “Family trip” I didn’t want to walk anymore; and that was only the beginning! I guess it doesn’t help that we went on a 3 hour walking tour of Munich! We meet the group at star bucks in the train station. Then we walked to the actual tour starting point, by the famous glockenspiel! On our tour we saw: St. Peters church, English Garden, old town hall, new town hall, Hofbrau haus, Max-Joseph-Platz, St. Jacob platz, Mary’s Colum, New Synagogue, the Church of Our Lady, and much, much more. We were beat after seeing so much and we were starving so we went to eat at the Hofbrau haus. We had traditional German food, and it was good. After lunch we went back to the hostel and rested before the movie. We got the movies, bought popcorn and then watched the Mummy 3. It was pretty good! Then we went back to the hostel and went to bed.

Day 4

After yesterday I was excited to be sitting on a train, even though it was for like 6 hours. Once again we woke up at 7:30 so we took our time leaving the hostel. We caught a 9:32 train from Munich to Venice St. Luca. The train ride was very pretty and it was nice to just sit back and relax!!

Munich was a 4.5 the second time around. The walking tour made it all the more better, as did the English OV movies!!

Ventimiglia, Italy

Ventimiglia

July 28th 2008

I took this picture from the car, before we parked! Not bad huh?

Day Trip

This trip was a continuation from the sister visit. We took a little trip over to Italy. We crossed the boarder like it was nothing. There was no boarder patrol, only a sign saying welcome to Italy! We entered Ventimigila, a small city right on the Italian boarder 30 mins from Monaco and about 1 hour from Genova. The city was very busy and it wasn’t easy finding a parking spot. We tried pulling into this one spot for 15 minutes but got laughed at and decided to try one that would actually fit the car. We finally got the car parked and then began walking, checking out stores as we went a long. We after stopping a few books stores and other random shops, we decided to sit in the park and talk for a while. After the park, we decided it was time to head back to the villa. So we took some pictures of the city and ourselves, made our way back to the car and drove toward France along the coastline.





Ventimiglia is a 2.5. Small, quite, and quaint.