oh the coast! the Adriatic Coast!

We left Naples in the morning and headed for the east coast of Italy... Bari, Italy... since it was highway driving, I drove (I was a weeny with in-town driving... that stick shift thing)... The drive was somewhat nondescript... well at least from my pictures... Since I was the driver I don't have too many...

Mary is watching for the first sign of water and got really excited when she saw it... well, she thought she saw it... it's amazing when one's imagination kicks into gear... needless to say, it was a good 1/2 hour before we actually saw the water...

When I made the reservations online, well lets say it was a little misleading... The first "white lie" was that it was in Bari, Italy... the map was very misleading... they called it Bari/Barletta... I read that as a community close by... well I guess in Italy "close" is a relative term (or is that Expedia's fault... hmmmm) Anyway Barletta was 39 kilometers a way... but it was on the coast... after roaming around the town we finally found the hotel... with the Adriatic Sea as it's front yard... We were so excited... (this is the hotel that advertised a private beach) As we were checking in, we found out that it was going to cost us 10 euros extra (of course it's going to cost extra) we told them we wanted to go look at it first before deciding...

so we took our stuff up to our room and then headed for the beach...

Now what would you imagine if a hotel advertised a "private beach"? I envisioned a small beach with a few people... HA HA HA What we found was a community beach that cost you $$ to get in... that it was used by ALL the hotels plus the town of Barletta plus whoever else wanted to come... there were hundreds and hundreds of people... Our hotel had a whopping 10 unbrellas reserved out of a couple of hundred... Mary and I split a gut laughing over that one... but, a beach is a beach... so we paid for one day of "umbrella and lounge chairs" for the next day... In the mean time, we decided to swim next door in a free area... what a blast and how refreshing!!! then we showered and headed to Bari for dinner... Well Bari wasn't what Mary had expected either... but we found a side-walk cafe that was serving dinner before 8pm and we shared Spaghetti Carbonara... oh my word!!! it was marvelous! I'm hooked!!! Coming home was a whole different story... ok, we found Barletta ok... but finding our hotel was a whole different story... One of the things we discovered about Italy in August... everyone (and I do mean everyone) comes out around 8-9pm... it's like a community party every night... bbqs going... card tables with card games going on... people strolling... kids running and laughing... it looked like so much fun to participate in but definitely not to drive through... the signage was awful... after many question asking with Italians knowing "a little english" but not knowing much,... 3 hours later we found our hotel... neither of us ready to do anything but sleep...
Sorry, not much in the way of pictures to start here... but the next day we headed across the street to our "private" umbrella (oh, did I tell you the next umbrella was about 15 feet away from ours?) but we had a blast anyway!
after a grand day of splashing in the water... taking a nap... splashing some more we were refreshed and ready to clean up for dinner...

aha... that was another mistake we made... it was 5:30pm when we were ready for dinner and no one was open until 8pm... oh my, now what do we do? So we start walking... and asking... and walking... finally we found this place that sold pizza by the slice and other bready pizza type things... food was ok... best of all it was filling...

As we strolled back to the hotel we decided to splurge and get a gelato... the man behind the counter asked us if we were American... when we said yes, he responded with "I love Americans! I love Obama!" he had scooped the two flavors Mary had asked for then picked up a little scoop and started adding different flavors while continueing to say "I love Americans! I love Obama!" after the two cone masterpieces done, he waive away our money saying "I love Americans!" It was hilarious! and we got a free cone for being Americans... me thinks not too many Americans come to Barletta!

The next morning we were sad to leave but needed to head up the coast to Venice... We decided to take the coastal route and oh what views we saw... we had decided we wanted to get close to the water, we followed one road which ended at a resturant/bar with a name that made us step back and want to leave (I can't remember the name but it made me think maybe a topless or something like that - a place two Christian ladies would be caught dead in)... we were trying to turn around when this guy stopped us... welcomed us to come to the beach... oh my word... but surprise - the place was ok and the beach, though quiet was quite exquisite! water a littler rougher than the day before...

we continued on our drive... getting glimpes along the way... I'll post those images in the next blog...

Where are we? Naples?

So getting out of Rome was much easier than getting in... except that we're trying to get out during rush hour... well, look on the bright side, we have plenty of time to read the signs!!!
Naples is about an hour or so from Rome, going south and towards the water... there's Mt Vesuvius!

I'm the navigator - with the map... "stay on the highwway"... "don't take any exits, just stay on the highway"... uh oh... we took an exit... we have no idea where we are going... we'll drive towards the water... it's looks rather slum-like... we get to the water, uh oh... this isn't were we want to be... but over there... no road... just a mountain between us and the marina...
Mary's driving... takes a road that we hope will get us where we want to be... road gets narrower, housing gets worse... keep turning... a tunnel (we love tunnels, it means no going over the mountain!) we come through to the other side... a new world... nice buildings... a marina... oh big wonderful hotels... a castle, in front of a hotel... dusk... ok, lets bite the bullet and pay the price... WOW!!

views from our hotel room:


It was amazing... we loved the sunset... We went to dinner - the view looking over the water and the castle.. then we walked along the boardwalk, down the road towards the castle... sidewalk cafes everywhere... look, a bride and groom! oh, a fiddler... found out we lived in America so he broke out in "Dixie" of course we weren't from the south, but it was so nice of him to play...

tomorrow we head for the east coast and Bari...

Sizzling Rome...

Well we hit Rome about sundown... the road signs were badly marked... I'm sure we went past that building a couple of times already... Oh no, we're in the taxi/bus lane only... round and round we go... are we there yet?

This wasn't a good way to start our visit in Rome... we stopped people on the street... no one knew anything... then we stopped one family, they were from Britian, They spoke English!! they had a GPS!!! wow! we got our selves turned around... then stumped again... we finally hired a taxi to take us - well we followed him... he tried to convince us it wasn't far, but you know when you've reached the end of your rope... we followed in around the block and there was the hotel... well the building that housed the hotel... seems our hotel was the 4th floor of a 6 or 7 floor building... with a very old, very small elevator... with the 2 of us, 2 back packs and one small suitcase we were packed in there... then we had the close the "gate"and then the doors... then it grunted and grinded... we were in hysterics when we reached the 4th floor... it definitely helped us get over the hair-raising drive through Rome...

The next morning we put on our walking shoes and headed for the Colosseum.. we saw wonderful sites along the way...

fountains on the corner... quards standing around.... ancient ruins... we were walking on ancient cobblestones that you could see the wear... how many people had walked on this road... it gave me chills to think of the history...

the ruins were mixed inbetween the newer buildings... we were by ourselves, no other tourists... the forgotten streets...

We kept trudging along... it kept getting hotter, and hotter... one more block and around the corner and WOW! there was the Colosseum!

by the time we reach here it was so hot! (we found out later it was over 100 degrees!!!). I started going from shade spot to shade spot...

Finally I had to find a shade spot and a gallon of water... I felt like I was going to collapse. I had to bail and let Mary finish visiting the other sites (Pantheon & the Forum)... finally we headed back to the hotel... cold shower to cool down, dinner and crash for the night...

The next day we decided no walking and took the double decker bus around Rome... saw some of the sites seen before and then some new...


too many pics and then for some reason not enough pics (I thought I took more)... hot day... let's head for the cool coast of Naples!

lazy days...

Well this last weekend I had great intentions to post the rest of my Italy trip... but I think the adrenaline of flying home and going back to work the next morning died down... well laziness (jet lag probably sounds better) hit me on Saturday - lots of naps in the cameron household!... I pretty much didn't get anything done except cooking and preping for meals this week (I need to keep the weight loss momentum going). speaking for meals, I brought some seasonings home from slovakia [Vitana Steak chili & sipek]... it really zips up the flavor of chicken - Mary introduced it to me (ok, probably not meant for chicken, but that's what Mary was using it for)... I'm going to have to analyze what's in it and see if there's something comprable in the US... one surprise is red pepper flakes... and I don't like "hot" foods but really like the flavor...

I promise to post the rest of the pictures this week... for now, it's time to get ready for work (ugh, Monday mornings!!!!)

Tunnels on the coast...

I really didn't tell you about the tunnels... yes, there were quite a few... instead of going over the mountain, we would go through... I tried to take several pictures... sorry if there are duplicates here...

there were some really long tunnels on the west coast... At one time we had to sit at a traffic light until all traffic had come through the tunnel before we could start... (one way traffic only - too narrow for both directions). Here is a video, this is the shorter tunnel - there were actuall 3 with the first one being the longest (I just didn't think to record it)... you can see between the two tunnels, the traffic light holding the north bound traffic until we got through... what an adventure!!!

Day 3 - Tuscany (Siena)

Tuscany is beautiful! the camera just can't capture the beauty of the rolling hills... I tried to take a few pics...



I so thought I took more pictures of the landscape than that... but I can't seem to find them... darn!

Siena was very much like Florence, only on a smaller scale...


quaint store fronts, narrow streets - it transported you back in time...

it was sooooo hot... had to stop for some gelato... yum....

and then the center square...

oh, and did I tell you it was hot? here's the picture of the year:
Kim with the "under the Tuscan Sun" burn... :-)

and then it was off to Rome... I'll post more later...