Mer officially “handed off the baton” last night, so I am in charge of the rest of the vacation. We started off this morning by checking out of the hostel and walking to the train station, just in time to miss the train to Florence pulling out of the station. The next train was around 11:30, so we suddenly had two hours to explore more of Ravenna.

We stowed the baggage in a storage place and headed off toward the church of San Francesco. I wanted to see the church again (it is a beautiful and simple Franciscan church), but along the way I had noticed the remains of a ruined palace that was free to the public. We swung in there, and in addition to the ruined walls that were still standing were about twenty partial stone mosaics that had decorated the palace. These were not so fine as the glass and gold mosaics we had seen yesterday, but they were still very pretty.

After the palace, we did stop in at the church of San Francesco. We looked in all of the small side chapels and looked at the length of the church from the back. At that point, I decided we should head back to the train station, which we did, where we caught the train to Bologna and then on to Florence.

The train to Bologna was a normal Italian train, but the train to Florence was a very spiffy express train. We shared our four seats with two American girls from Arizona who were over in Europe as a celebration of the older girl graduating college (she was on a five-week tour, while her friend was over here for two weeks). They were interesting people, and seemed genuinely amazed when Mer told them we were over here for our fifteenth wedding anniversary (they thought we were younger – happy, that!).

We were originally going to head right on to Siena, where our hotel was, but I could not skip Florence. Mer spent a semester of college living in Florence, and I had liked the city when we visited about eighteen years ago. So I decided we should spend a couple of hours in the city. We stashed the bags in storage, and headed in to the Duomo, with its famous dome.

The Duomo area was a madhouse of tourists, but we did get in line to get inside the church. We had to wait about five minutes to get in, but once in, I was amazed at how clean the church was, visually. The walls held few decorations, and there were very few tombs or statues about. It was harmonious and beautiful. We spent about ten or fifteen minutes looking around, mostly up at the ceiling and dome.

We then popped over to a restaurant to grab a sandwich. We ate inside because we had the small dining room to ourselves, and it was a peaceful break from the crazy streets outside. Thus energized, we tackled the big tourist sight of the day – the church bell tower.

The bell tower is right next to the church, and happily, Mer had never done the tower before – she had only climbed the Duomo stairs, which costs more and usually has a line. I rarely get to introduce Mer to new things, so I was pleased by that. The downside to the experience for Mer was that it required her to climb 414 narrow steps. The downside for me meant that the top was quite high up, and I am scared of heights.

The bell tower stairs have four huge landings for people to rest, with views from all four. The first and third levels were well protected, and I felt more or less okay. The second level had a huge hole in the floor, and although it was barricaded off, it did not make me feel very good. The last level led to the outside, with a narrow passage around the top of the tower. It is enclosed in a wire cage, but I could not handle it, and I stayed inside the bell tower while Mer checked it out. I liked the stairs, though.

We headed back to the train station to catch the 5:10 train to Siena. We will be in Siena for two nights, which will give us a chance to get a bit of rest while still seeing sights. Siena is built on several hills, but happily, there was a series of escalators and people-movers that took us from the at-the-bottom-of-the-hill train station up to the city. The walk to our hotel in the old city center was longer than I expected, but we found the hotel all right.  I was surprised that the city center was mostly pedestrian – there were still a handful of cars and a few mopeds; it was a bit irritating to have to move out of the way of a single car crawling its way though the foot traffic.

We headed out for supper once we had checked in. The clerk at the desk recommended a restaurant nearby, so we tried that. Siena has a pasta, pici, that is a regional specialty, so we got that with a simple, slightly spicy tomato sauce. It was excellent, and it was like a very thick spaghetti noodle.

After supper, we headed down to the main square, il Campo; it is best known for the somewhat insane horse race held in the square twice a year. The square is really small, and how they race horses around it is a bit of a mystery to me. The city is divided into seventeen neighborhoods, and each neighborhood is very loyal to its horse in the race. The race draws over sixty thousand spectators.

Il Campo was much quieter for us. There were a few hundred people about in the square and surrounding restaurants. The evening was cool and perfect, so we got gelato and sat down on the ground. Once we had finished eating, we followed the lead of some of the locals, and we lay down on the bricks. The whole square is sloped toward the huge and impressive town hall, so you still are looking at the building even when reclining. We spent over half an hour like that, and it was very relaxing.

After a day of heights, we should have more in store for tomorrow – Siena has towers to climb as well, and adds the bonus of being built on hills.

I awoke to the sound of cooing doves or pigeons, and I was not pleased about that. It was still pitch black out, and I needed the sleep. I tossed and turned for a little while, when to my shock Mer’s alarm went off; it was set for 7:30. The room was still pitch black. I investigated, and it turned out the farm house “shutters” were actually solid, so they blocked out all light.

We got ready and had a nice breakfast of rolls and very fresh scrambled eggs. While we were eating, the peacock called a few times, so I decided I wanted to go see it before we checked out. We walked around the back of the house to the pen where the peacock and peahens live, but we did not have a good view. As such, we worked our way around the adjacent goat pen so we could get a better angle. After we’d gotten most of the way around, we met a small horse that was untethered. He was cute and walked past me, right to Mer, whom he promptly headbutted in the arm and tried to bite. I shooed him off, but as soon as I walked a few paces away, he tried to get at Mer again. This happened a third time; we then decided discretion was the better part of valor, and we fled inside to check out. It turns out the small horse is very young, and likes to play, including biting. So noted. While Mer paid the bill, I sneaked outside to try to take some pictures of the peacock, which I managed to do. It is a bit of a strange thing to be “on the lookout” for an herbivore.

We headed back to the bus stop, where we were disappointed to find out that there were no buses to Padua, which was only ten to fifteen miles away. Instead, we had to get a bus back to Venice, which was about twenty miles away. At least we managed to get seats at the back, so that we could avoid the crush of people who eventually filled the bus.

When we got back to Venice, we schlepped our luggage over to the train station, where we found that the next available train to our next destination, Ravenna, was about an hour-and-a-half wait. That was the first time this whole trip we had to wait for more than thirty mintues. We took advantage of the time, even with luggage in tow, to head back out into the city. We immediately jumped down a back alley to get away from the crowds, and we emerged ten minutes later on a side canal that seemed to be used largely for commercial boating. We found some canal-side chairs at a restaurant, and we ordered a dessert to munch on while we waited for our train. It was a tremendously pleasant spot, and the food was very good.

Our train ride from Venice to Ferrara was easy and straightforward. The train system in Italy is, by and large, excellent. We were a bit surprised when we saw that the train to which we were transferring was a two-car train, driven by diesel engine instead of the usual electric engine. This little train never got going terribly fast, and it stopped at many small stations, but it did get us to Ravenna around 4:00. As an aside, we did amuse ourselves by watching a group of four Italian teenaged males, when they would check out pretty girls who walked by. Some stereotypes have some truths in them.

Our hostel, which turned out to be pretty basic, was a fifteen-minute walk from the train station. I have to admit I doubted Meredith a tad at this point. The entire fifteen-minute walk was very pedestrian and nondescript, and I could not think of why we were in Ravenna. There were no mountains, no lakes, no ocean – nothing I could see to make me think this was a place to see. Happily, it turned out I was very wrong.

Ravenna has lots of history, and much of it takes the form of religious art or architecture. Once we checked into the hostel, we walked back to the center of the city, which is mostly pedestrian-only (always a big plus in my book). On a tip from the receptionist at the hostel, we checked out the church of San Francesco. She told us to look for fish. Okay. We saw a door under the altar area, and it had a slot for money. I put a euro in the slot, and a dark area lit up – it was the access to the old Roman crypts, with some surviving mosaics on the floor. That was all cool enough, but in the fifteen-hundred-plus years since the crypts were built, the water level has risen, so the crypt is under three feet of water, and goldfish now swim around in there. It was quite cool. As an added bonus, the organist of the church was playing while we were there.

And if that were not enough, around the side of the church is the tomb of the Italian poet Dante. We wandered over to see that and the park next to the tomb where the people of Ravenna buried the body of Dante during World War 2 to protect it.

We proceeded on to the main sight of the town – the Basilica di San Vitale. It is an impressive church outside, but the inside was mind-blowing to me. I love religious art, and my favorite art forms are sculpture and mosaics. I had always thought old mosaics were always in pieces on floors of old buildings. Not here. Here, the mosaics are intact, on the floor and walls and ceiling, and they are the most spectacular mosaics I have ever seen. They are subtle and colorful and look as if they could have been painted on. They were brilliant. The church even had a prayer labyrinth, which Mer and I used to pray for some sick friends of ours. What a beautiful church.
In the back yard, so to speak, of the church is the Mausoleum of Galla Placidia. The Roman woman for whom it is named is probably not buried inside, but the inside is completely covered in more impressive mosaics, and these are the oldest in Ravenna – probably from the fifth century. They were amazing.

We swung by another famous mosaic-rich church – the Basilica of Sant’Apollinare Nuovo. This church has rich mosaics down each side of the church, one side celebrating Mary and the other celebrating Jesus.

We were running out of time, since most sights close at 7:00, but we squeezed in one free sight that closed at 7:30 – the free Arian Baptistery. This small building was built by Arians (heretical Christians who claimed Jesus was created by God and was just human until infused with divinity at his baptism), and the ceiling still has a grand mosaic of the baptism of Jesus.

By now, most of the sights in town were closed down, so we headed off to supper. We dined outside, as is Mer’s preference, and sat next to some Germans on one side, with some American girls we had seen on the train sitting behind us. After supper, we grabbed some gelato from the pedestrian area, and we headed back to the hostel for the evening. What a pleasant surprise Ravenna has turned out to be.

Is is dark in the middle of the night in the Dolomites – really, really dark. At some point I woke up before sunrise, and I could not see a thing. I bet the stars up there are spectacular, although we could not see them last night because of the rain and clouds. We got ready efficiently this morning and had another huge breakfast spread, which included meats and granola and yogurt, since the area is very Germanic. After breakfast, we did take a thirty-minute walk in the meadows, since the rain had stopped overnight. The mountains were playing hide-and-seek with us, sometimes being visible and sometimes being shrouded in clouds and fog.

We checked out and did take time to go and pet the now-two-day-old goat babies. We then hauled our bags up a long hill of a couple of hundred feet in elevation to the chair lift. We took the chair lift down, and then we caught the bus after a twenty-minute wait. The bus took us to the cable car, which took us down to the main road, where we caught another bus right away, which took us down the winding mountain road to the train station. We just caught the train to Verona, where we transferred to a final train to the day’s destination, Venice.

Venice is overrun with tourists, but still maintains a magical atmosphere. We stored our luggage at the train station, and headed out into the city. As soon as I saw the Grand Canal, I got excited. Sadly, we only had about four hours to explore the city, since our hotel was on the mainland at the end of another bus run, but you can cover a lot of ground in Venice in four hours.

The best thing to do, by far, is to jump into the warren of roads and alleys in the city. Mer knew she wanted to get to a place on the eastern part of the Grand Canal, but she did not care how we got there, so we took whatever road or alley seemed best (usually the one with the fewest tourists). You can get quite alone once you are off the main paths of Venice, and sometimes you hit dead ends or a canal with no bridge. Sometimes you find or small churches, or cute squares, or beautiful apartments with pretty window boxes. The fun of Venice is Venice itself.
We did finally find the restaurant Mer wanted – it was located right on the Grand Canal with great views of the boat traffic. Since it was about 4:30, they were not serving any real food, so we ordered dessert and a hot chocolate, and we amused ourselves for over a half hour watching life go by in boats. We noticed tons of private taxi boats filled to the brim with Asian tourists taking pictures of everything. There were work boats steered by men who were more interested in their cigarettes than boat traffic. There were gondoliers who yelled conversations at each other, sometimes as many as five all at once. It was quite a spot.

We then plunged back into the maze of streets. If we had a specific destination, I did not know what it was until quite a bit later, when Mer announced that she wanted to get back to the train station so she could take a water bus to St. Mark’s and back. We actually found where we were on the map, which was more or less eighty percent of the way across Venice. We needed to go west and north, which seemed simple until you threw in the canals and dead ends. It took us a long, but very scenic, time to get back to the train station. By then, we did not have time to take the water taxi, so we walked along the Grand Canal and other main tourist streets for about twenty minutes before heading back to the train station to get our bags. From there we walked over to the bus station to catch a bus for the mainland.

What a bus it was – it was an “expando-bus,” a standard bus with an additional section put on the back to hold more passengers, and we still almost did not fit on. It was wall-to-wall passengers for over twenty minutes out of the forty-five-minute bus ride. We finally got seats for the last fifteen minutes or so.

Once we got to our bus station, Mer had to ask around for directions. Meanwhile, I saw a sign for our accommodations – a working farm/villa. With Mer’s directions and my confirmation, we walked to the farm, taking about ten minutes to do so. We were greeted and shown to our room, which was very serviceable, with a very cool wooden-beam ceiling. The mistress of the house made us an excellent supper of pasta, salad, and rolls. While we were eating, she had an argument with a drunk man outside, and he left. Then, we heard a peacock calling outside the window, and we found out the farm has a peacock. Peacocks have a distinctive call, which is slightly startling when you do not expect it. It made for an interesting dinner. The landlady was very kind to us and talked to both of us, even though my Italian is almost nonexistent.

So, at the end of a day involving three buses, two trains, two cable cars, and a lot of footwork, along with the loss of 6,700 feet of altitude, I am pretty beat. Here’s hoping the peacock is on my sleep schedule.

It has been a bit of a day of contrasts – city to country, hot to cold, dry to wet, high to really high, and trains to buses to cable cars. It is kind of hard to take it all in.

We started out this morning in Trento in our posh hotel. Trento is in a mountainous area, and our hotel had grand views from the patio where we ate breakfast. Poor Meredith – when I found a four-star hotel for a hundred euros a night (about 130 dollars), I was pleased. When we were upgraded to a two-hundred-euro suite for free, I was smug. When we saw the huge breakfast buffet with yogurts, four kinds of croissants, four kinds of breads, fruit, cereals, and five kinds of dessert, I was pretty much insufferable. In my defense, Mer had given me a slightly hard time when she saw I had booked a four-star hotel. She managed to put up with my ego by soothing herself with three kinds of croissants.

We left the hotel and caught a city bus down to the castle, where we got off and found Richard’s church. Its members welcomed us quite warmly, and told us to sit in the back where we could get an English translation of everything by listening to headphones. It turned out that on this Sunday, Richard was translating. The church was pretty full, with about eighty people or so, and a bunch of kids – it is a very young church. Two of the five songs sung during the service were songs to which Mer and I knew the English words, so we sang those while the others sang in Italian. The sermon was based on a passage in Galatians where Paul talks about faith in Jesus versus dependence on the law. The pastor applied that to modern life as well, and warned that even Christians have a tendency to fall back on making rules that add to the gospel, when we really need to depend on Jesus. He likened it to a sickness treated with drugs that mask the symptoms as opposed to going to the surgeon to have the sickness cured. He stressed that we need Jesus to cure the sickness, and we need to keep relying on him.
We ducked out of church just as a children’s presentation was starting for Sunday school – we wanted to catch a train that left around 12:50, and we were afraid we would miss it if we stayed much later. We got our tickets, and had about twenty minutes to lounge about, so we sat in Piazza Dante, where we enjoyed the breeze (church had been really hot for some reason).

We took the train north (and up) to Bolzano, which is a good-sized city at the start of the Dolomites, a rugged mountain area. We grabbed a bus that went up and up and up through some hair-raising turns on a mountain road, with some amazing vistas. We jumped off the bus up in the mountains near Castelrotto, where we got tickets for a long cable-car ride up through spectacular views. When we got to the top in Compatsch, we waited for another bus; the wait allowed us to soak it all in – we were surrounded by steep and often bare rock cliffs, some with snow still on them. It started to rain very lightly, on and off, but not enough to dampen our spirits. We got our last bus, which took us to our last cable car, which was really a fancy chair lift. We got lucky here – the lift was still running. It closed at 5:00, and it was 4:20, so that was okay. But once we got on it, it started raining harder, and when we were about three quarters of the way up, there were two flashes of lightning. Once we got off, they shut the lift down. We had passed isolated snow patches on the way up, and we were more or less eye-level with sides of mountains that still had good amounts of snow on them.

By now it was raining pretty hard, and we had a ten-minute walk to our hotel. Happily, we had only gone a minute or so when the lift operator drove by and gave us a lift to the hotel, which was very appreciated.
The hotel is a beautiful alpine structure with lots of exposed wood, located at 2054 meters (6700 feet). Since the temperature was only in the low forties when we arrived, they had the heat on, which was quite welcome. We checked in and dumped the bags, and went back to the bar for hot chocoalte. Once we were warmed up, I borrowed an umbrella (Mer has one), and, largely on Mer’s prompting, we went out on a ninety-minute walk along the dirt roads. We looked at some of the trails along the way, but they were either muddy, under water, or both. The dirt-road walk was fine, if wet. The views were breathtaking in all directions – there were mountains and rushing streams and lots of evergreen trees and moutain fields. It was such a pity it was raining, but it was still amazing. We found occational patches of snow on the side of the road, probably left over from piles made by the snow plow. Mer may have been hit by a snowball in June.

We got back to the hotel, slightly cold, slightly more wet, but quite happy. We stopped by the goat pen (containing goats with bells), where we were delighted to see one-day-old goats with their moms. They were tiny, and very cute. We popped up to our room, where we changed clothing, and went downstairs for supper, which was included in our stay. It was a four-course meal (Including dessert), and was excellent. The dessert, mille foglie, was perhaps the best non-chocolate dessert I have ever had.

Sadly, it was still raining after supper, so Mer and I decided to stay cozy and warm. We hope it will be dry tomorrow morning before we head out, but even if it not, the journey here was amazing and worth all the trouble.

Mer loves the travel writer Rick Steves, and her “bucket list” is to make sure she gets to all fifteen or so European countries about which he has books. She has read his stuff for years and years, and often makes travel itineraries based on his books just for fun, even when she does not have a trip coming up. So, it is a big deal when Mer goes “off Rick.” Today was one of those days – we headed off to Trento, in the north of Italy, which is a city Rick Steves does not mention. He may not be alone – when we checked into our quite posh hotel, our very nice receptionist found out we were from the United States, and she asked, “What are you doing here?” Trento (or Trent, in English) is not on many American tourist destinations, although it is a big skiing area for Europeans.

We left the lake district this morning, taking a train from Varenna to Milan, then a different train from Milan to Verona, then finally a third train from Verona to Trent. It took about four and a half hours, and then we still had to catch a bus to our hotel, which was on the edge of town. The happy result of the location is that the hotel is a four-star hotel, but costs more or less the same as hotels in the center of town. Then, for whatever reason, the nice receptionist gave us a free upgrade to a small suite. We were quite pleased.

We got into the hotel around 3:30 or so, dumped the luggage, and wandered the grounds. We skipped off to get a snack (an ice cream bar each), which we brought back and ate outside near a fountain. I then took a quick nap while Mer grabbed a book and sat outside looking at the mountains. She came back inside and woke me up just before 6:00 so that we would be in time to meet Mer’s friend, Richard.

Richard and his family are the reason Mer was willing to go “off Rick.” Richard is an Australian man who fell in love with an Italian woman and lives in Trent. Mer and Richard met about twenty years ago when Mer was living in Florence for college, and Richard was there learning Italian. Richard had long had a goal to be a missionary to Trent, and he came to Italy (without knowing how to speak Italian) to do just that. Mer and Richard met at an English Bible study in Florence, and have stayed in touch all this time.

Richard came with his five-year-old son to pick us up, and he drove us to his apartment on the other side of town, just over the Trent line. Shortly after we arrived, Richard’s wife, Pinuccia, arrived with their seven-year-old daughter. The children are fun – they speak Italian, but do understand English, and they are quite polite. Pinuccia speaks a small amount of English, and she is very hospitable. Richard hosted a very good dinner for us prepared by his wife, while we talked and watched the children. It was a lovely meal, and we managed through the language issues pretty well. We spent about three hours with the family, and then Richard drove us home. We are hoping to go to church with Richard and his family tomorrow, but that will be contingent on our figuring out the bus system.

We were up and rolling around 8:00 today, and we got to have breakfast in the hotel, which was a time-saver. It was quite good – hot chocolate, rolls, and two croissants. That got our day off to a solid start, so we could head out to the local castle, way up the main hill of town. The signs all claimed you could walk up the steep path in fifteen minutes, but that turned out to be optimistic. I think we were much closer to twenty-five minutes to get up there, but there were great views along the way; as a bonus, we could see some snow-covered Alps today, since it was a clearer day today than yesterday.

At the top of the hill is another little town that looked very cute. We passed the really, really small cemetery and very cute church, and made our way to the paid entrance to the castle. We paid the admission and proceeded past an owl (there is a falconry show at the castle once a day) and  some very cool wooden sculptures, to the overlook at the base of the main castle. It was an amazing view. The lake was below, surrounded by mountains, and we could see lake and mountains in three directions.

Mer and I have made a concerted effort to get pictures of the both of us on this trip, so Mer asked a nice Australian couple if they would take our picture. They agreed, and then we took a picture of them. We chatted a bit while looking at the views, and then headed up to the main castle. Out in front of the castle were four more birds for the falconry show, so we watched them briefly; they could not do too much, since they were tethered.

We headed into the castle, and found that there was a keep inside (a defensive tower in the middle of the castle). We went up a flight of stairs, crossed a small, but real, drawbridge, and climbed three flights of really old-looking stairs before coming out on the top of the keep. The views from up there were really amazing, and allowed us to see in all directions. We met up with the Australian couple again, and swapped photo opportunities. We lingered for awhile before heading down. We very briefly explored the grounds before I needed a bathroom, and so we headed back to the restaurant at the gate of the castle. The Australian couple was there, having a beer and a glass of wine. While I was in the bathroom, Mer sat at the next table and started talking with them. When I came out of the bathroom, I saw they were in the middle of chatting, so I sat down and ordered a Sprite. We spent the next hour or so chatting, and they invited us to sit with them.

Their names were Rod and Kate, and they were on a five-week tour of Europe. Rod is a retied military man who is about to celebrate his seventieth birthday, although Mer and I had guessed he was about sixty. Kate is younger than Rod, and still working (although we never found out what she is currently doing). Rod and Kate have lived and worked all over the world, and Rod even has been to Camden, Maine, which is the next town over from where Mer’s grandfather lives. They were very lively and funny people, and it was a real blessing to get to talk to such interesting and entertaining people. As a gesture of thanks, I told Mer to pay for their drinks while I used the restroom before heading out. Rod came upon Mer as she was finishing paying, and extended the offer to meet him and Kate at their hotel for drinks at 6:00, if we were available. When I found out, I shifted my plans to make sure that would happen.

We headed back to the small town and looked in on the small church. It was very lovely inside, with paintings of saints above each window, and a simple and pleasing design for the layout. We then headed off down a slope to go find a waterfall advertised on a sign on the trail. At the bottom of a small valley, we found a small falls, but could see a much larger falls up the valley. We went up the other side to see if we could get up there to see the falls, but never found a way. After a few minutes, we turned around and went back to the castle trail, which we took all the way back into Varenna, and then on to our hotel.

We grabbed two slices of pizza in the hotel, which we ate in the room while we rested for twenty minutes or so. Rod and Kate (the Australians) had been out on a three-hour rental boat trip the day before and strongly recommended it, so I decided to try it. We found the rental place and rented a brand-new boat for two hours, from 2:30 to 4:30. I got a quick and basic lesson on the boat, and we were off, following an itinerary recommended by the boat company.

Varenna is on Lake Como, which joins with Lake Lecco to form an upside-down “Y.” We went south and down the left-hand fork for a bit, admiring the coastal towns and the very rugged mountains on this part of the lake. We turned toward the split itself and went around the popular tourist town of Bellagio and into the right-hand side. We headed south toward some especially scenic mountains until we reached a small island. We went around the island and headed north along the far shore, going by a villa used in films in the James Bond and Star Wars series. We went north until we were across the lake from Varenna, and went back across to the town, where I promptly badly botched the docking. Happily, the boat owner was there, and he jumped on board and docked the boat for us. It was a relaxing and scenic two hours.

We returned to the hotel to rest for a bit and get washed up to meet Rod and Kate at their hotel at 6:00. We did stop to get gelato on the way to the hotel. Rod and Kate’s hotel is right on the lake, and the veranda is beautiful. We had a seat overlooking the lake, but under an iron trellis covered by vines. Rod and Kate were very happy to see us, and we sat down to drinks, with me and Mer both grabbing hot chocolates (and I later had a Sprite). The hotel also brought out a few finger foods with the drinks. We then proceeded to talk and laugh and have a great time for about three hours; Rod and Kate had even seen us go by earlier in the boat, which was funny. Rod and Kate seem great for each other, with keen senses of humor and lots of great stories. We said goodbye at 9:00, and Kate gave us her e-mail address, and we got a standing invitation to look them up in Brisbane if we get there, which would be a wonderful time.

Mer and I were not really hungry, but I felt as if I should eat something so that I did not wake up hungry in the middle of the night. We found an adorable restaurant right on the lake, with little candles making for a magical atmosphere. It was almost completely dark, and the lights from the small town across the lake were really pretty. We ordered a light supper, and we were waiting for it to arrive when Rod and Kate walked up. They had decided they were hungry, and they’d enjoyed this restaurant earlier in their stay. After we all had a good laugh, they pulled up seats at the next table, and we chatted for another hour or so while we ate and enjoyed the cool evening.

We said goodbye, again, and Mer and I took it easy walking back to the hotel. I think Lake Como near Varenna has now slightly edged the Cinque Terre as my personal prettiest place on Earth.

We left Milan efficiently this morning – Mer wanted to get going to the Lake District, which was a great call. We were up at 7:00. We grabbed some croissants along the way to the train station, and we were on a train out of Milan by 10:20. We very quickly got into the mountains north of  the city, and we arrived at our destination – Varenna, which is a town of about eight hundred on the less-traveled side of Lake Como.

When Mer mentioned the Lake District, I pictured a bunch of lakes like we have back in Maine – a whole mess of small and medium-sized lakes. Varenna is on Lake Como, which is huge and deep. It is framed by towering mountains on the east and west, and is certainly in the running with the Cinque Terre for our vote for most beautiful spot on Earth.

We checked into the hotel around 12:00, and since it was Mer’s day to be in charge, she had us back out the door and down to the ferry dock. There are a lot of towns along both shores of Lake Como, and a ferry connects them all, although the most common runs are among five towns right around Varenna. We booked a round-trip ticket on a slow ferry, although I did get to see the fast hydrofoil boats in action, which was really cool. The slow boats stop at five stops in four towns (in addition to Varenna). The boat ride was relaxing, with a cool breeze to ward off the heat of the afternoon. Pretty much everywhere you looked was beautiful – pretty towns on the edge of a huge lake surrounded by mountains. Several things stood out for me on the trip – the first was a small church halfway up a huge mountain. I have no idea how to get up there, but it was eye-catching. I noticed several former private villa grounds that are now public (judging from the people wandering around in them). I also noticed two lines going up a mountain that I later found out were funicular train tracks going up a very steep slope.

After the easy boat ride, we walked along the waterfront path and got something to eat, around 2:30. We ran back to the hotel so Mer could change into hiking clothes, and we headed out. We were running out of cash, so I decided to try an ATM again using my oldest credit card. I guessed at the PIN, using a PIN from twenty years ago, and happily, it worked. We had cash again, which eased our minds on that front.

We headed to the edge of town and headed up a steep road. After some hunting around and asking one person, we found the town cemetery. Mer and I both like visiting cemeteries – they tend to be in pretty places, and show some of the color of the local community. This cemetery was pretty unique in my experience. It was built on four tiers into the side of a mountain. Italian cemeteries use slabs of stone on top of the whole grave, which is different from American practices. This cemetery also had electric votive candles on many of the graves, so they had lots of little lights everywhere. Many of the headstones had actual photos of the person, which put a very personal touch on the grave – a number of people were caught in light moments, so that they looked as if they would be fun to hang out with. Lastly, because space is at a premium, there were several options for interment. The standard grave is what Americans would expect, except for the slab of stone on the grave. There were also mausoleum “slots” that held whole bodies, but stacked one on top of another. There were small slots that held urns of ashes, and finally, on the top two tiers of the cemetery, there were private mausoleums for individual families. We had a good look around the whole cemetery, and we were impressed by how well taken care of the place was. There were fresh flowers on many of the graves, and there were brooms stored around so people could sweep around the graves of relatives. There was no sign of disrespect anywhere that I saw, and that pleased me.

After our cemetery tour, we headed up into the hills on a well-maintained walking trail. The trail eventually led us to the Fiumelatte, the shortest river in Italy at less than a thousand feet long. The path took us to the source of the Fiumelatte, where it comes gushing out of a mountain hole with enormous force. It then cascades down the slope of the mountain, crashing into boulders along the way, and dumps into Lake Como. The power of the river is intense, and the air around the river is noticeably cooler because of the cold water. The park had installed a footbridge right over the river, which was pretty thrilling to stand on while looking at all that water flowing under my feet.

We headed back along the trail, and our trail map suggested we take a few-minute detour to go to the Baluardo, a scenic overlook. That sounded great, so we took the trail up. And up. And up. And longer than a few minutes. The trail we were on was dangerous at times, where a fall would have resulted in severe injury at best. After about twenty minutes, I went ahead for about three minutes, and never saw any opening. I went back to the now-frightened Mer (because she was yelling for me, but I was too far away to hear), and we went all the way back to the main trail. By then, we were tired and thirsty, so we took a water break. While we were drinking, we noticed a small side-trail about twenty yards up the path with a pole. Like a pole that used to hold a sign. Then Mer saw a hand-painted sign on a rock wall that said “Baluardo” and had an arrow. We had been on the wrong trail before. We took this new trail, and in just a few minutes we were on a great and beautiful overlook. At least we found it.

We headed back to town, and it was almost 8:00. I assured Mer that it was on my list of things to do to go see the castle tomorrow, and so she did not need to feel the pressure of trying to see it today. That made her happy, and so after a quick stop at the hotel to wash up from all the sweat of the hiking, we went to the far end of town to a quiet (not-tourist-infested) restaurant. We sat outside despite growing winds. The winds did die down, but then a thunderstorm rolled by and dumped a ton of water down. Happily, we were right in the center of a covered area outside the restaurant, so all was well. By the time we finished supper, the storm more or less had passed by.

We walked back to the hotel by going along the waterfront. Along the way, I spotted and bought a couple of pieces of dessert that were a cross between a chocolate chip cookie and a piece of cake. We got them to go, and ate them back in the hotel room. Our room has a small but pretty view of the lake and mountains, so it has been pretty to see the town lights across the lake coming on, as well as the occasional lightning flashes on the mountains. We get another entire day here, and I’m very happy about that!

Today was Mer’s day – she was in charge, and it was our last full day in Milan. Since Milan is a fairly large city built on a plain with no major river in the city, the sights are all more or less of the man-made variety, and so Mer based her day around those sites.

We started the day off walking toward the Duomo. Mer put me in charge of breakfast, and I saw a possible cafe down a side street and decided to try it. It was excellent, and very local in color – although the people behind the bar spoke English to me, everyone in the place was clearly (and loudly) Italian. Mer and I got two pains au chocolat (chocolate-filled pastries), and I got the thickest hot chocolate I have ever had – it was pretty close to trying to drink pudding. It was still a tasty breakfast.

Thus fortified, we walked to the Duomo square, and past the Galleria, to behind it, to a small square in front of our destination, the world-famous La Scala opera house. Mer wanted me to see it for cultural literacy, but they also have a small opera museum inside that also lets you into a box seat to see the theater itself. The theater is very impressive, with the stage more or less as big as the audience space, and with box seats lining three walls, five or six boxes high. We had the good luck to be there when the stage crew was testing some lights for a forthcoming production of The Valkyrie, and the lights back-lit a small forest of metal poles that cast wild shadows over the stage. It was very striking.

The opera museum was actually pretty interesting (I’m not an opera aficionado). It had lots of strange instruments from over the years, and I love instruments. It had portraits and costumes and busts and manuscripts of operas – Mer was able to identify the place in the music from the handwritten score of Verdi’s Requiem, which I found impressive.

Perhaps our favorite display was a special display on the opera Aida. The exhibit had costumes and props from four different productions of Aida from four different decades. That was cool enough, but the focus of the rooms was the artwork of Italian gradeschoolers who had done artwork based on Aida. The work was deeply impressive – some of it would have gotten an “A” from Meredith in her twelfth grade AP English class, let alone in a class of fifth grade students. Meredith had tried to impress on the students in her J-term Italian culture class that the history and culture of Italy run very deep in the people, and these student displays showed that quite well.

After the opera museum, we made the short walk over to the Pinacoteca Ambrosiana museum, which is the best art museum in Milan, and has a special exhibit on Leonardo da Vinci, with many of his handwritten journal entries on display (fun fact – Leonardo wrote his notes backwards, for some reason). Mer’s guidebook said the museum would take eighty or ninety minutes. It took us two and a half hours, of course. We did get an audioguide to tell us about the important artwork, which was very useful. Much of the artwork is religious in nature, which I love because I know the subject material. Just as interesting as the artwork was the museum itself – the building is varied and beautiful. The only downside is if you follow the suggested route through the museum, you can easily miss two or three rooms of art that require you to double back before seeing the Leonardo exhibit.

The Leonardo exhibit was eye-opening. I knew the man was a genius, but it was ridiculous. He was an important artist and engineer and civil engineer. On his sketches, on a single page, he might have the sketch of a large sculpture, a primitive forklift to move that sculpture, and some random geometry problems. And his notes are all like that – physics and art and metallurgy and engineering and on and on.

The best way to follow genius is lunch, and we had a great one. Mer took me to an Italian fast-food place that was mobbed, mostly by locals. They served up, essentially, fried calzones (folded pizzas). Oh, man, were they good. It was one of the rare times where the main meal was much better than the still-good dessert.

By this time it was 2:30 or so, and we finished the day of touring with an extensive exploration of the Duomo, the cathedral of Milan. To get inside the church is still free, even for tourists, and so we walked around the inside of the church looking at things Mer’s guidebook pointed out. Then, we rented recorded commentary that told us information on fifty or so things in and about the cathedral. It was very informative, and a little overwhelming. The cathedral is just as impressive and decorated on the inside as it is on the outside. The single biggest surprise for both me and Mer was the display of three dead cardinals in glass-sided tombs. Two were from the early twentieth century, but one located in the small crypt was from the fifteenth century. All three were decked out in their cardinal robes and were wearing death casts of their faces. I have to admit that I have never seen anything like that before in any of my travels.

Some other things we found interesting – there was a small chapel in the crypt dedicated to cinema. They showed the crucifixion scene from Zeffirelli’s Jesus of Nazareth, but with much of the center of the screen blacked out. The result was only hints of what was going on, which was very effective in creating a sense of confusion and chaos during the crucifixion. We also were both impressed with a carved marble slab with the names of all the bishops of Milan, from the current bishop, who took office in 2011, all the way back to the first bishop of Milan, around the year 55. The church also had a tomb of a bishop from around 1050, the treasury had book covers from the fifth century, and the cathedral itself was started in the fourteenth century. Christianity is an old religion, and these great churches help you feel some of that history.

After touring the inside of the church, Mer wanted to tour the roof, which you can do. We climbed up a bunch of stairs to one of the lower roofs (about seven stories, I believe), where you are free to wander around among the carvings and buttresses. I have a deep fear of heights, but I did well in places on the roof where there was a lower roof. I panicked pretty well in all the places that had a sheer drop. I did half the tour and then sat down in a safe enclosed space, and I let Mer do the rest by herself. She said it was very cool, including more stairs to get you up to the highest roof (another three stories or so), and she got to walk under a bunch of buttresses. I was happy for her, but glad I did not attempt it.

We called the official touring quits after that, but it was too early for supper, since Italian restaurants tend not to open until 7:00 or later, and it was only 6:00. So, we strolled some of the pedestrian shopping areas, and got some gelato near the castle. We actually wandered into the castle to see if the cats were still there (they were not) before heading to the restaurant. We got rained on lightly, but the threatening thunderstorm never did much more than produce thunder, so we were happy enough. Sadly, the restaurant Mer wanted to go to was closed, so we went to one down the street. We were the only customers (Italians eat supper much later than Americans do), and we got a rice and sausage dish that was filling but fairly bland – a first for me and Italian food.

We finished the evening off trying to find a dessert place selling Magnum ice cream in custom flavors, but never did find it. We did find an amazing chocolate place that had a huge chocolate fountain on display in the window. That is usually enough for us, but the inside was chaotic, and we could not figure out the menu or the ordering system, so we headed on back to the hotel, in a very rare non-dessert state of having eaten.

I think we had a highly successful day in Milan, and I have a good feel for the core of the city. Now I’m looking forward to the mellower lake district tomorrow.

Milan is arguably the shopping capital of Europe, so it is a touch surprising Mer decided to bring Mr. Spendthrift here. But I get ahead of myself…

I had a very rough sleep last night, and Mer and I got up around 8:30 for a 10:00 checkout from our hotel in Corniglia. We got ready in a leisurely manner, and checked out about 9:45. Happily, Caitlin was checking out at the same time, so we were able to say goodbye to her. She was a gem of a person with whom to hang out, and I hope she has great times ahead in Florence, her next stop.

The store at which we wanted to get breakfast did not open until 10:00, so we went back down to the terrace overlook to look at the ocean and the coast in the bright sunshine (because it was sunny, but hazy). That did the trick, and we were able to get our morning fix of focaccia, which we got to go so we could get to the train. We caught the shuttle bus just before it was to leave (it only runs about every forty-five minutes), and we caught our train right away as well. We had to take a short hop on the train to the last Cinque Terre station, Monterosso, since Corniglia’s train station was so small it only took cash for train tickets, and train fare to Milan was over fifty euros. We bought our tickets to Milan and had to wait about twenty minutes, so we took the opportunity to eat breakfast.

The train ride went smoothly, and was very scenic. The first half of the trip or so was along the mountainous coast, so that when we were not in a tunnel, we had a hard time knowing where to look – there were mountains to the right and ocean to the left. The train was very nice, with a compartment of six comfortable seats. We had two Italian women as companions for the trip, with three other people who came and went for short hops.

Once in Milan, we knew it, since the train station level down to the Metro level of the station was separated by four levels of shopping. Mer bought us a two-day pass metro to near our hotel. The hotel was about a ten-minute walk from the metro station, and we had no trouble finding it. We checked in, dumped the luggage, and headed back out into the city.

Mer’s first destination was Milan’s castle, Sforza Castle. The Sforza family was the most influential family in Milan during the fifteenth and sixeenth centuries, and they lived in this very impressive fortification along the Milan city wall. It now houses museums. Mer knew from her Rick Steves guidebook that you can get in for free after 4:30, so that is what we were aiming to do – Mer mostly wanted to see an unfinished Michelangelo Pieta sculpture, so that did not require a full day and full admission price.

The castle was very cool, but what was not cool were all the hucksters and scam artists around. They worked the crowd in a pack, so it was hard to shake them. That turned out to be a theme of the evening at both the major sites to which we went – lots of scam artists about, which is a shame, since people should have the right to see these things without being harassed. On the plus side, we were looking at some round stones in a ditch and wondering if they were meant to be cannon balls when we both spotted a tiger-colored kitten. He was adorable, including washing himself so hard he fell off the rock (no harm done). We also saw the mother cat and, later, two other cats, all in the ditch/moat area. That cheered us up from the irritating people.

Since we had some time before 4:30, we wandered out the other side of the castle into a huge and beautiful park. On the far side of the park is a huge arch in celebration of Napoleon, whom the locals mistakenly thought would liberate them from tyranny. When they found out Napoleon was a tyrant, they turned the horses on the arch around so the rear ends faced France.

The park was a great place in which to wander, and the local sun-seekers were out in force, both men and women. We also got several displays of varying degrees of Public Displays of Affection, which would also be a theme of the evening. Mer and I wandered to the far end of the park and back, and then reentered the castle to find the specific museum that housed the Michelangelo. There are several small museums, and we could not find the right door. We tried one upstairs – wrong. The told us where it was, so we tried downstairs. Wrong. They told us where it was, so we finally found it, and worked our way through several labyrinthine galleries to find the statue. We found it, only to discover it was closed for today because of technical issues. Sigh. We used the bathrooms and left the museum.

We then fueled up on wonderful chocolate muffins from a nearby bakery before we used the metro to head over to the Duomo. Milan’s Duomo is considered THE example of “flamboyant gothic” architecture. It is really over the top as far as decorations go. Mer and I were a bit horrified to step off the metro and be greeted by a huge TV screen showing ads for Samsung on one side of the Duomo. Even in the U.S. we have not stooped to ads on churches. We later guessed and hoped that Samsung was sponsoring the extensive renovation work on that side of the cathedral, and we are hoping the ad will go away when the renovations are complete.

We are saving the inside of the Duomo for tomorrow, when Mer will not have bare shoulders and I will not be in shorts (there is a dress code for the church). We admired the outside, and then wandered into the adjacent Galleria – a two-block-long shopping area all under a glass roof. In the middle of the shopping area is an extensive mural which depicts important regional cities, like Rome. The symbol for the city of Torino is a bull, and somehow it has become a tradition for people to plant their heel in the bull’s private parts and spin around three times. This is supposed to bring you good luck, and Mer did try it. The poor bull’s nether regions have to be replaced every few years because the tradition wears them out – there was a definite divot in the floor when Mer tried it.

We finished wandering around the square and the Duomo, during which we found and watched a street performer manipulate six glass balls in his hands and along his arms – it was like juggling, but the balls never left his body. It was pretty fascinating to watch, and we tipped him a couple of euros. We went off to supper after finishing our square tour. Mer was looking for a specific restaurant, and we found it along a flower-lined street. The staff there took wonderful care of us, bringing us a full pitcher of water (unusual in Italy) with ice (unheard of in Italy) when we both asked for water. The food was excellent, including three different types of made-in-house bread.

We ended the evening by heading back to the Duomo area to get gelato from a stand down a side street. After the ice cream, we walked back to the hotel, and I was pleased to get us launched by remembering that cathedrals almost always put the altar of the church in the east side of the church, so we were able to figure out which was way was south, which helped us find our streets.

This morning we woke up about 8:00 and got ready and were out the door about 9:00. We walked the 365 steps down to the train station to pick up a one-day trail pass. The Cinque Terre are connected by a trail system which I wanted to hike (today was my day to be in charge). To help maintain the trail system, the towns charge for a pass which you need if you want to hike the main trail (it seems as if the less-traveled trails are free). The passes can only be obtained at the rail station, so we walked down there. As we were walking, it started to rain, but Mer had an umbrella, so she was fine (I don’t mind getting wet). We got to the station and got our pass, but then it turned out the trailhead was up in the town. The shuttle bus was empty, even of the driver, so we hiked up the 365 steps to get back to the town. Just as we got to the top of the steps, the bus went by. It seems it runs based on the train arriving, which makes sense.

It was warmer out than we’d thought, so we dropped some clothes off at the hotel. By now, it was 10:00, so we decided to get some breakfast. We walked over to a focaccia store to buy some fresh rosemary focaccia. It was delicious. I then wanted a hot chocolate, so we wandered up the street to a cafe where the hot chocolate was so thick and rich-looking that Mer even decided to get some (which is very rare). It was hazelnut flavored, which was a little unfortunate because I like my chocolate plain; but it did make Mer happy.

We stopped back by the hotel, and Mer asked about the trail, but the man at the desk warned us off the trail, saying it was somewhat dangerous when wet because of all of the exposed rock and mud. So, I decided to see if the rain would stop later, and we made plans to take the train to the first town, Riomaggiore. We rode the bus back down to the station and got on the trail for the ten-minute ride to Riomaggiore. Along the way, we were amused by a funny Italian man who was speaking excellent English to several Taiwanese tourists, and he was quite witty.

We piled out of the train at Riomaggiore and headed into the main part of the town. We took the main street up to a church, where we poked our heads inside. It was simple, but pretty, with a wooden statue of Mary dating back to around 1500. After the church, I saw a narrow set of stairs that went steeply up the hill to one side, so up we went. By the time we got to the top, we were eye-level with the bell tower of the main town church, and quite a ways above the train station. The views were spectacular, especially of the heavily-terraced hills around the town. We walked over toward the ocean, where we discovered a small castle. We went in and up, and were enjoying the views when a gust of wind turned Mer’s umbrella inside out. That broke one of the supporting struts, and while the umbrella still worked some, a slight wind would cause it to collapse. Here, Mer made a very rare (for her) sports joke. Since the umbrella was a Cleveland Indians umbrella, she said she should have guessed it – the umbrella started out strong and then folded. I was quite proud of her.

We headed back into the town a different way, which took us by the main church. It was pretty, and we went inside that one as well. We came out a side entrance and knew we were not in the United States when we came out to a six-foot stairway with no railings and no warning. We made it down fine.

We went back to the station and took another road up to the Via dell’Amore, which is a walking path to the next town. Sadly, it was closed because of rock falls. As we walked back to the station, our train was pulling out, and the next one was not due in until 1:20, about ninety minutes away. So, we walked up a new street and were delighted to find the source of the under-roadway stream at one end – a very pretty little stream. We kept going up the road, which bent back toward the sea, and we stopped to look at the view when our dinner companion from the night before, Caitlin, walked up. She had gotten up early and walked from Corniglia (Town 3) to Vernazza (Town 4), and when she got to the town it started to rain. So, after she grabbed some food, she took the train to Riomaggiore, and she was planning on catching the next train to Manarola. Since that aligned with our plans, we decided to travel together. Caitlin also pulled out a trail map and showed how there was a back trail that connected Manarola to Corniglia, and that sounded fun to me. So we headed back to the station and went to Manarola.

Once there, we headed away from the crowded part of the town by heading up. I stopped off quickly to buy Mer a new umbrella, and then we headed up to the high parts of the town. Along the way, we saw a high path that climbed up and up, over the town and into the terraces of grapes and other crops. That was a great-looking trail, and we wanted to take it, but Mer thought we should find a bathroom first. So, we kept going up and found a small square with another pretty church, and past the church we found the open stream that ran under the road in this town. The rain more or less stopped along the way, which was a happy development. We did not find a bathroom, so we headed back to the main part of town, toward the harbor, where we found a gelato store with a bathroom. We got ice cream and used the bathroom. Before tackling the hilly trail, I wanted to check out the sea, so we headed down to the edge of the ocean. There was a small path along one side, which we took, which led to a very cool isolated dock that was surrounded on three sides by rock. The ocean was rough today, and the waves were very cool. It was a happy find.

We tromped back up through the town and jumped on the trail. It was amazing. I’ll sum up, since the whole hike took about four hours. The first part was seriously steep, and along the way we passed a huge light-up crucifixion scene that was tastefully done (simple and abstract). Much of the first part of the trail was up steps made of rocks, and we were all sweating pretty well by the time we got to the top. The views along the way were amazing. The town below was beautiful. The trail wrapped around the hill, so we lost sight of Manarola, but the terraced hills were pretty to look at, and the sea kept coming into view.

The trail eventually wound through the hill town of Volastra, where we made a quick detour into a church that was built around 1240. The trail in this area was more or less flat and wound through many terraces. Along the way, Caitlin kept identifying plants and insects, since she was a science major in college and loves plants and bugs. It was very cool to see the world through someone else’s eyes, since Mer and I usually do not notice bugs, and many times miss plants.

The trail wound along terraces and the ocean, and at times both Manarola and Corniglia were in view. The landscape kept changing – often it was farmers’ “fields,” but the path also took us into a wooded area that was a lot like the woods of Vancouver or, as Caitlin told us, Seattle. Eventually the path started going down again, and we made our way, triumphant but tired, into Corniglia. The hike was a classic example of good coming from a group – it is unlikely Mer and I would have tried the hike on our own (there was an easier, lower trail we could have tried), and Caitlin also expressed doubts as to if she would have tried it on her own. Yay, us!

We all went back to the hotel to get ready for supper (wash up and drop off my backpack). We all went to supper together back to the same restaurant as yesterday, where we had a leisurely meal that we felt was well deserved. We had great seats outside that overlooked the ocean.

After supper, we tried the second gelato shop of the town. The dark chocolate was so good, I went back for a second one while Mer and Caitlin were still finishing up theirs. We went back to the hotel, where Caitlin said goodnight. I had hoped to take the train to Vernazza (Town 4), but it was 8:00, and I was afraid it would be 9:00 before we could get there, depending on the train. So, I decided we should explore Corniglia more. We walked down the main “road” between buildings, and discovered a beautiful scenic overlook that was over the ocean, and we could see Manarola clearly on one side, and some of Vernazza on the other. We got there as the sun was starting to set over the mountains over Vernazza, and it was beautiful.

After the terrace, I wanted to check out the miniscule harbor, so we hiked all the way down to the water. The hike was pretty, and we saw three or four cats along the way. The actual harbor was very small, with one large dock. We stayed away from the dock because the seas were rough, and often the waves were crashing over the cement on the dock. The exposed rock of the harbor hills was stark and beautiful, and made the walk down and back worthwhile. We hiked back up, and made our way back to the hotel around 9:30 or 9:45.  What had started out as a rainy day with plans in flux turned out to be a magnificent day.