Italia !

-by Cristiano

We're back ! Where to begin? Italy was spectacular!
(feel free to click on the pics to see them in their original size)

Veni, Vidi Vici !

We came we saw we conquered !

We spent 7 days in Rome, 3 in Venice and 3 Florence..plus half days traveling in between

(St Peters Basilica, The Vatican, Rome)
We saw so many places, there are sure to be many blog posts to come...

Italy is as charming as you would expect, much different than many places we have been, yet somehow familiar.

(Campo de Furi morning market, Rome)
We spent every morning after breakfast seeing the sights, trying to see as much as possible before lunch. Lunch was always an event in itself..what can I say about the food in Italy...amazing !

K&C at the Trevi fountain, Rome

I think I have mastered my sister Alli's skill of taking our picture myself, as you will see.

One night we ate dinner at Piazza de Rotunda, overlooking the Pantheon. Dinner was always a 2-3 hour event with multiple courses of food and lots of wine. Oh so good.

Here we are at the Colosseum. This particular day we toured the Colosseum, the Roman Forum and the Palatine Hill...talk about history !

One of the more lively Piazzas, Piazza Navona. We stumbled across some sort of festival that happened to be going on. A very popular place in the evening for strolling and people watching.

At every major site you have the choice of renting an audio guide. Sometimes we did, sometimes we didn't. Here, at the Baths of Caracalla, it wasn't necessary, so we shared one.

The largest baths in Rome. It could hold up to 1600 people at a time in its baths, saunas, massage rooms etc...gigantic. See Kelly on the bench?

We traveled by High Speed train everywhere we went as opposed to the banged up regional trains....it cost a little more but it was well worth it.


old and busted
new hotness

We were supposed to go to Naples after Rome, but we got there during the current garbage strike...so we turned around and got right back on the train to Rome.

Napoli:
We Came. We saw. We left.


After Rome, we went to Venice...ahhh Venice

I think Venice was our favorite part of the trip, it is a really great place to visit. It is Europe's largest car free zone. 117 islands connected by 400+ bridges. You can wander around it's streets and alleys all day. That's exactly what we did...fantastic. It was nice and quite at night. Venice is a very safe and clean city.

(Rialto Bridge, Venice)
The weather was great for most of the trip. temperatures were in the 40-50 degree F range and some days it rained but it was no problem.

We did not take a gondola ride. The weather wasn't really ideal for that, but we did take the vaporetto (water bus) along the Grand Canal.

After Venice, Florence ! Us at the Ponte Vecchio

Florence was great too...more museums & churches. I think we saw 1000 or so churches on our trip. We toured the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, the worlds largest and most complete collection of Florentine & Renaissance art.

More posts to come, stay tuned!