Italy

Well, we've returned from Italy.  I have only three letters to describe the whole thing.  WOW!  It was totally amazing.  We all began to suffer from sensory overload.  You couldn't turn around without seeing some incredible antiquity, ancient ruin, or fantastic art masterpiece.  What a place.

We left Shreveport on the 7th of January, flying first to Dallas, then to Frankfurt, Germany, then on to Rome.  It was a long day and we were all beat by the time we arrived at our hotel.  Of course, getting from the airport to the hotel was an adventure in itself.  Apparently the proper way to drive in Rome is to ignore all speed limits, traffic signs, lanes, other cars, etc.  It was something of a nerve-wracking experience to say the least.  But, we arrived at the Cicerone Hotel in one piece.

After some showers and quick naps, it was off to meet our tour guide and group.  We were introduced to Flavia, our tour guide.  She gave us some pointers and tips for the trip, then we all headed out to dinner at one of the local restaurants.  I thought the dinner was quite nice, but Cindy and Melissa had other ideas about that.

The dinner was a good time to start getting to know the people in our travel group.  We ended up having a great group.  Since it was off-season, it was a smaller group, which was great.  We all got along and had a great time together.  Dinner was interesting.  It started off with a champagne toast.  The three of us toasted, but of course didn't drink.  That's Melissa "toasting" with the glass.  It was a large meal of several courses.  The antipasto, I think, was what Cindy and Melissa had the most difficulty with.  Prosciutto, as some of you may know, is raw, cured ham.  It has quite a bite to it.  Not my favorite either, but I was able to eat it OK.  Cindy and Melissa, not so much. 

We had a couple more courses, pasta of course, and then some type of pork covered with a delicious smokey cheese of some sort.  Not what you would get when ordering at Olive Garden I'll tell you that.  After the meal we were off to the hotel for a nice night's sleep.

The next morning we were up early and off and running.  First stop was the Vatican.  What an amazing place.  I mean, besides being the headquarters of the Catholic Church, it is furnished with the most amazing art.  We started with a tour of the Vatican museum.  This is the most incredible art museum I have ever been in.  Granted, that's not saying much, but really, it was beyond awe inspiring.  Art on the walls, art on the ceilings, sculptures, tapestries.  I will just put a few of the pictures I was able to get here.  Actually, before doing that I want to say something about all of these pictures.  Obviously there is no way to use a flash inside a museum, since the light damages the art.  In fact, in the hall of tapestries, the lighting was so dark it was difficult to see sometimes.  So, 99% of all the pictures I took on this trip were without flash.  Take that into account please.  So, here are some pictures of the artwork in the Vatican museum.

  

 

The ceiling in this hallway was simply incredible.

We were able to go inside the Sistine Chapel and see all of Michelangelo's painting on the ceiling.  Unfortunately they wouldn't let us take pictures inside the chapel.  Fortunately, I had snapped a picture or two before I realized we weren't supposed to.  Oops.  Here's the one I got, you might recognize it.

After the museum and the Sistine Chapel, we headed over to St. Peter's Basilica.  Not only is it an amazing church, but Peter is buried there.  What history.

And, of course, it was filled with amazing art.  I can't imagine being able to concentrate on church with this all around me.

Then, in the middle of all this incredible artwork and tombs of Popes and such, there is the tomb of Peter himself.  Huge monument (I guess you'd call it) over the tomb itself.

So, the Vatican was very impressive, as you can see.

The next stop on our tour was, what else, the Colosseum.  It was amazing that something that old was still in such relatively good condition.  I mean, I know we think the Barksdale historic housing is old because it was build in 1932.  But, really, this thing was build in 79 AD.!

And, guess who we bumped into while we were there?

We then saw some of the other sights of the city, including the famed Trevi Fountain, the parliament building, the forum, and an old Italian friend you probably all know.

The next day was our first travel day.  We left Rome early that morning and enjoyed our bus ride through the country.  The bus was a very nice travel coach, quite comfortable particularly since we had a small group.  Everyone had their own row, if they wanted it.  We drove from Rome to Pisa, which I know you are all familiar with.

It is actually pretty incredible that this thing is still standing, particularly after all these years.  Cindy and Melissa just had to do the tourist thing.  They weren't the only ones, I assure you.

After Pisa it was off to the fascinating medieval town of Lucca, where we spent the night.

The next day we were up early again and traveling once more.  This time to another cute little town that we all just loved, San Gimignano.  We did some sight seeing there, then some shopping.  Awesome place.  After that it was off to Sienna.  This put us in the heart of the Chianti wine region.  So, on our way to Florence, we stopped at the Verrazzano castle winery.  Once again, we didn't partake, but really enjoyed their balsamic vinegar.

Tuscany really is a truly beautiful part of the country.

Well, that was a quick overview of the first half of our trip.  I will complete the second half of the trip tomorrow.  As I said, I have 1,100 pictures of this trip.  I will go into more detail on each of the towns and all the sights in subsequent posts.  This is just a quick overview, and I promise I won't put all 1,100 pictures on the blog, just a few to give you a better idea of how incredible this country really is.