Barcelona, Spain (April 29 - May 12)

Barcelona seen through a window from Gaudis Sangrada Familia

Barcelona
Lianna

Venice to Barcelona. Only 1 ½ hours away by plane, we took Ryan Air which I strongly suggest not taking (lots of hidden costs raising your very low priced ticket to a very high priced ticket), we are suddenly in a completely different city and country.

Our arrival into Barcelona was at midnight, another Ryan Air bonus, so we had pre-booked a hotel through the Ryan Air website, need I say more. The taxi driver dropped us at the bottom of an empty alley indicating that the hotel was at the other end. What choice did we have? The hotel was small, the rooms very small, the kids did not even have a space to put their bags as the two single beds took up all the space, however we were tired so we crashed and decided to deal with it in the morning.

The next morning after leaving the hotel and exploring for a bit we realized that we were in a fantastic area. All the shops, restaurants, nightlife, main attractions were nearby. The hotel was located about 10 minutes walk to La Ramba and Plaza Catalunya, main city and tourist locations. Mark and I had a fun night the next evening exploring through the narrow streets of restaurants and bars in the Gothic area of town where people are out until all hours and there are so many places open, just opening in the wee hours, you can barely decide where to land. We ended up trying out two different spots, both buzzing with nighlife.

Statue Man sitting on the famous La Rambla in Barcelona

Statue Man in the Old Gothic part of town

Gorgeous artwork you find all over Barcelona

We had tracked down an apartment between the two nights in the tiny hotel and on that Monday morning we moved, a little father away from the main city area, Plaza Espanya but in a great place near the Olympic Park where there are all sorts of facilities and running tracks spread out on a large green space overlooking the city.

We settled into this lovely apartment of 3 bedrooms for the next 11 days.

Apartment Elevator

Ow Mark hurt his foot again

A city under oppression of the leadershop of Franko for many years, Barcelona has re-surfaced over the past 20 years. It is a growing and exciting metropolis with an edgy raw feeling. For us Barcelona was the discovery of Gaudi and the Modernistas of the time. Our first tour around the city on the hop on hop off double decker tour bus (we did this on a very hot sunny day and actually we didn’t get off until we had spent at least 3 hours touring around the entire city area gave us a very good layout of the distinct sections of the city.

Sitting on the Hop on Hop off tour bus

During our stay we did the Familia Grada tour (Gaudis Church masterpiece still under construction) a Modernista tour, a Picasso tour, went on an extensive bike ride along the gorgeous coast and all over the city and we walked walked walked from one Gaudi exhibit to another.

Gaudis Sagrada Familia front entrance

Shot from the stairway of the Sagrada Familia

Spires being built at the Sagrada Familia

Gaudi Park

Bike riding along the boulevard to the Arch

Yes Barcelona has an Arch de Triumph as well

Biking on the beachside

Caleb bought a soccer ball, encouraged by all the soccer going on during the finals in Spain, which we took up to the Olympic site a number of times to kick around. Both kids were starting to get weary of sight seeing and often wanted to just hang out at a park or stay in and chill out.

We were also in a delimma of where to go next, what to do for our final month of travels. Mark and I had discussed going to southern Spain, to Portugal, maybe to Morroco. But the idea of touring around more cities was even exhausting to me. So before heading to Paris to meet up with my parents we rented a car and decided to slowly explore around Northern Spain starting with an introduction to Dali. As for where we would go for our last month in June, something would come to us eventually.

Lianna

PHOTO CONTEST: Barcelona, Spain (April 29 - May 12)

Photo Competition
The kids and Lianna had a photo competition one day in a park in Barcelona.
Let us know which photo in each section you like the best.

THE TREES

TREE ONE


TREE TWO


TREE THREE


TREE FOUR


TREE FIVE


TREE SIX


THE BENCH

BENCH ONE


BENCH TWO


BENCH THREE


BENCH FOUR


BENCH FIVE


BENCH SIX

Venice, Italy (April 25-April 29)

Over looking St.Marco Square
Venice, Italy
Mark

From Tuscany we drove to Venice, dropped off our car at the entrance, and walked 300 metres to our hotel! How that worked out was all part of our focus on finding the right hotel and the right restaurant, the right toilet, meeting the right people, getting on the right boat plane bus train, etc. We had just booked the place the night before on the Internet. We took it because it was cheap (for Venice), not realizing it was right near the car rental drop-off area.

Lugging bags from hotel to hotel

Caleb in the narrow streets of Venice

We passed by a crowded restaurant on our first night in Venice - always a good sign when a restaurant is crowded, so we stopped. The weather was cool but there was no room inside and I was ecstatic to see that there was actually a table for us outside. "We'll just have to put up with it," I thought. This was definitely the place to eat. We ended up sitting next to some Italians (the place was filled with them, one of our criteria for eating at a restaurant in Italy especially) and we actually ended up carrying on a conversation with them completely in Italian! They had a son about Caleb's age, and he spoke a bit of English, and between the seven of us we were able to converse. We asked them how they liked Venice, and they looked at us with long faces and shrugged, opening their arms wide as if at a loss: "Eh, we're from Rome" they said in Italian. The only word we actually understood was "Rome", but the meaning could not be clearer, and the four of us laughed and understood what they meant: once you're from Rome, everything else is second, and it's true. Rome is the top.

Artemis tries a mask in Venice shop- there are mask shops everywhere

Caleb with Mask

Mark and Caleb snacking

Some rainy days in Venice
We stayed in Venice 4 nights, and then, suddenly, our trip to Italy was over! We had spent nearly a month here, although it seemed like a second. Everything seemed easy in Italy: we took to the language quickly and without effort; finding food was more about finding great food, as opposed to good food, which is everywhere; accommodation was fantastic; the people friendly and happy and fun; the culture rich and interesting.

Typical tourist scene in Venice as everyone gets lost constantly

Having a chat with a retired gondalier-he bought us a glass of wine while we waited for the rain to stop at this cute restaraunt

Flooding in Venice in San Marco square

The gorgeous canels in Venice

Caleb went crazy for Diabolo every chance he got

Mark contemplating at the Jewish memorial in Venice

Sipping Cappaccion in a local cafe

Cocorico makeup poster near hotel

Artemis in front of an outside art piece

Again we say "Gracie gracie mille gracie Italia!" We will be back, and it's comforting to know it will all still be there, just as we left it, si bellisimo.

Mark

Tuscany, Italy (April 14-25)

Tuscany, Italy
Mark

From Rome we rented a car and headed north, to a tiny village in Tuscany called Secchiano, right in Chianti country. We had no idea what the place looked like, as it was recommended by a woman whose place we tried to rent, but was unavailable. She recommended this place in Secchiano to us, a friend of hers. It was a complete house, two bedrooms, small private patio with view, kitchen living room and dining room, 65 Euros a night. We took it sight unseen and crossed our fingers. Little did we know what we were in for....

Vineyards of Tuscany

We exited the highway and stopped at the large Ippercoop, which is Italy's version of Superstore. This means more types of mozzarella than you can conceive of; huge loaves of fresh bread sold by the kilo; fresh local produce; local proscuito and sausage and cheeses; freshly made pizzas and chickens and rabbit (which we ate whenever we could, as it is delicious); mortadella rolls as large as a tree trunk; and of course fresh pastas in every shape and size. Unable to make up my mind as to which pasta to buy, I asked the woman next to me which one was good. Without hesitation she blurted out "All of them!" The same thing would happen when asking a local which restaurant was good. And they were right.

Approach to Secianno

View of Secciano from a distance

We got lost on the way to Secchiano, and luckily we had a cell phone and got exact directions again from the woman, as the people who owned our rental did not speak English. We've had a cellphone since Borneo, where we purchased a cheap Nokia for 30 bucks CDN. After that we would buy new simms for each country, usually about 25 bucks, and you're off and running. Quite handy at times. We finally found the turn we had missed three or four times and headed up up up as the woman on the phone said. Just keep going up, which we did, passing through very modern and not very pretty small neighbourhoods, wondering if this is where we were going to be staying. Not very romantic we thought. Up up up we went, and as we climbed the neighbourhoods gave way to small farms and old villages. We were on the crest of a hill, with slopes falling off on either side of us. We could see olive trees and grape vines and old stone buildings. Up up up we went until there was no where left to go, and standing there was Gianna, the woman who owned our villa. "Finalamente!" she called as we drove up.

Road up to our Villa in Secciano

Welcome to our Tuscany Villa

Entrance to Villa - previous one a shack nearby

We were on the top of the crest with panoramic vistas all around us. Gianna led us into the small private garden area, which contained a pic-nik table and covered swinging chair, potted flowers, some grass and some tile for patio, all very pretty. Through the glass front door to the inside we were all enchanted by our new abode: beautifully painted plaster and stone walls; varnished wooden ceiling beams; stone and tile floors all impeccably finished and complemented by wooden furniture. In the dining room was a large wood burning stove (which we used daily); the kitchen was tiny with a gas stove and fridge and well equipped for cooking. On the side board in the dining room was a bottle of homemade wine and olive oil, gifts for us from Gianna and Sandro (the wine was gone by morning and the olive oil by week's end). A small living room off the dining room, and then up the slate stairs to the top floor, with two bedrooms with wooden windows so clean we wondered if they were open and a bathroom with all the necessities, including bidet and washer.

View from Bathroom of Villa

Eating in the Villa

Artemis trying wine in Tuscany villa

From the bathroom window in the mornings we could see the horses in the field and the olive trees dropping off down the slope. We were there for 11 short days, during which time we drove around the gorgeous countryside up and down the winding hilly roads. We stopped at vineyards and tasted wine (for free); went to local grocery stores for fresh beautiful food; went through 15 or so bottles of local wine while playing cards or watching the Godfather or the Big Labowski well into the wee hours of the night. We ate amazing homemade pasta and pizza. We snooped around fields and backroads looking for firewood, as we burned quite a bit of it, and despite getting daily supplies from Gianna, seemed to go through it all too quickly.

Hiking through the countryside

Our bottles of Wine over the 12 days

Florence was a short train ride away, and we went there twice; we visited Sienna, St. Gimignano, San Giovani, Tivoli, Rada - where we ate wild boar stew and fresh sausage and pasta. We took walks in the woods, spotting wild boar tracks and deer tracks and empty shotgun shells, as this is a prime wild boar area. It is common to find entire wild boar legs, hoof and hair still attached at the lower part, sitting in perfect display holders in shops. These holders allow the whole leg to be seen and make it easy to slice the meat, which does not need refrigeration as it is cured to a deep red colour.

Door knockers in Florence

Special coffee in Florence

Fountain in Florence

Walking up to the Pitti Palace in Florence

View from gardens in Tivoli

Fountains in Tivoli

Best Gelato in Italy in San Gimignano

Streets of San Gimignano

View from San Gimignano

Next onwards to Venice by car.
Mark