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Italy
  • Diana O
  • Diana O

Italy

A 15-day adventure by Diana Read more
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  • Trip start
    June 17, 2023
  • Diana OItalyTraveler
    1

    Munich layover

    June 18, 2023 in Germany ⋅ ☀️ 27 °C

    Featuring: Lufthansa’s creepy CGI safety demo, yet another watch through of World War Z, and Sydnee being the only one of us who managed to sleep on the plane.

  • Diana OItalyTraveler
    Milano Centrale station.
    Statue of the second to last king of Italy.Really old castle.Foyer of the less old palace.The armory.This used to be a bedroom and bathroom until the king decided he wanted a dining room.Ball room. In the background, you can see the platform the musicians played on.The king's personal cathedral.Roman ruins in the background and foreground.Outside partial view of the 180,000 square foot palace.Basilica of Superga.

    Turin

    June 20, 2023 in Italy ⋅ ⛅ 25 °C

    What a gem. We wanted to know what it would be like visiting a non-touristy city and Torino was only an hour train ride away. The royal palace was incredible and they simply had Roman ruins hanging out in the middle of town. Apparently some duke wanted to tear them down in the 16th century but a rando advisor convinced him not to. We didn’t get to the Basilica of Superga but I did get a photo of it way up there - next time.Read more

  • Diana OItalyTraveler
    Incoming: lots of canal pics. I like photos with convergence so this was a good place for that.
    Peek at the grand canal.The lower levels on many of these units can only be used for storage because they flood so often.We did a gondola ride for Sydnee. It was nice, the guy gave us some history.A palace on the grand canal. You can see what remains of the original frescos.Sunset view.One second later, turned around.All the old clocks were 24 hour clocks.The Doge's Palace.Another 24 hour clock with an astrological center.The winged lion with a Bible which is the symbol of the city.idk who this guy is or why he's riding a crocodile but he's cool.Obsessed with this enormous fish head.City flag.

    Venice

    June 22, 2023 in Italy ⋅ ☁️ 28 °C

    One of our two shorter legs, we had about a day and a half here. Honestly, I was not enormously excited about going here, and it mostly met my expectations for it. There’s something both interesting and depressing about visiting a once-great city who is now obviously in an accelerated decline.Read more

  • Diana OItalyTraveler
    Medici dome and duomo. It was so colorful compared to Milan's.
    The Signoria.Diana and the serval. 1st to 2nd century AD.Couldn't get a full picture of this because it was mobbed. Primavera by Botticelli.The birth of Venus.I loved the draping on this one. More Roman era.Uffizi Gallery ceiling.The streets of old Florence are very quaint.Ponte Vecchio, the only medieval era bridge to survive WW2.Florentine steak. It was exquisite.Public drinking water. Not as ubiquitous as we were led to believe.We happened to be here during the San Giovanni celebration, so we got fireworksView from the hill up from our Airbnb. You can see the dome and the Signoria tower.Old city wall.The Medici palace's largely original worship room.So many Vespas.

    Florence

    June 24, 2023 in Italy ⋅ ☀️ 29 °C

    What a gorgeous city. The old parts were so impressive at every turn, and the new parts look like San Jose, so I loved it. We went to the Uffizi Gallery and saw countless famous paintings in real life, we ate a Florentine steak recommended by Rick Steves, and we saw the Medici dome (and accompanying duomo) in real life. There’s still lots to do the next time we come here.Read more

  • Diana OItalyTraveler
    They're not kidding about the lean.
    Accompanying duomo.A classic.I became obsessed with the wall. It was built in the 1100s.The baptistry.Aviation really messed this walled city stuff up huh.View from atop the wall.The trains here are great. This time we took a regional one instead of the bullet train.

    Pisa

    June 25, 2023 in Italy ⋅ ☀️ 30 °C

    Another day trip, this time to Pisa. I wish we’d had enough time to walk the entire city wall because I really liked that. I also didn’t realize that there’s a beautiful duomo and baptistery next to the leaning tower. They’re super not kidding about the lean, though.Read more

  • Diana OItalyTraveler
    Their courthouse.
    The Spanish Steps during golden hour. They were covdred in people.A random tiny gothic church on the north side of the river.She's a biggun'.Just some random Roman ruins amidst the city.Piazza Navona.More Piazza Navona.I was trying to get a nice pic of the river but the seagull photo bomb was appropriate. So many.

    Rome

    June 27, 2023 in Italy ⋅ 🌙 28 °C

    We needed more time here, but we knew that going in. We also made the decision to shelve the sights that’s required admission because of our Vatican City tour mid day. Still, we laid eyes on a few of the big ones and will simply have to come back again for the rest.Read more

  • Diana OItalyTraveler
    The Basilica and piazza at night.
    One arm in another country.Basilica dome in the background.This is a Roman era pine cone which was apparently a big deal back then and had its own neighborhoodView from one of the Vatican halls.Roman mosaic work.This was a special type of stone from Egypt that was very hard to work with. It is now "extinct."Mosaic from a Roman home. Note the asparagus which doesn't grow natively and is a symbol of wealth.Hall with maps of Italy before Italy existed. Not all of them match today's maps.Coat of arms of one of the old popes.Most of the paintings in this room were done after the artist's death by assistants, but not these.Inside the basilica.

    Vatican City

    June 27, 2023 in Vatican City ⋅ ☀️ 33 °C

    The main focus of our visit to Rome wasn’t Rome itself, but Vatican City, the smallest country in the world. We couldn’t find unattended tickets on the day we had available to see the Vatican, so we ended up with a private tour, which was honestly great. The Sistine Chapel was beautiful (no pictures allowed) but disappointing because all everyone had to do was stop talking for two minutes and almost nobody could manage it. St. Peter’s Basilica was definitely the star of the show, though.Read more

  • Diana OItalyTraveler
    (Go Beavs)
    Apparently the caldera is a prime peregrine falcon nesting spot.View of Napoli.Weather thingy?Napoli has tons of little shrines in odd places all over the city so this didn't surprise me.We brought lunch since the hike occured over lunch.There were wildflowers all over the mountain.In 1944, Vesuvius had a smaller eruption and lava flow.

    Mount Vesuvius

    June 29, 2023 in Italy ⋅ ☀️ 19 °C

    One of my new year resolutions is to do a hike every month, since hiking always seems to get sidelined for running or lifting. Knowing we were coming to Naples, I thought it would be fun if my June hike was on Mount Vesuvius. It wasn’t very long but the first 15 minutes were a pretty steep hike.Read more

  • Diana OItalyTraveler
    A grand shopping mall that was built in 1873 but never took off.
    What's left of a Greek era (2500 years old) wall/tower. I'm standing outside the city at the time.Painted ceramic tile from the late 1800s showing Napoli at the time.Dante. This used to be a statue of the King of Naples but Napolean tore it down when he conquered itOne of the largest streets. The Spanish made it when they conquered Naples in the 1730s.When Naples was forcibly unified with Italy, Garibaldi made his "welcome to the fold" speech here.Mussolini built this brutalist style building to welcome Hitler during the fascist era.A plague tower (left), a castle that got converted to a church (middle), and the old church (right).If there's any semblance of a street (or sidewalk), there are mopeds going down it.A year round Christmas market.When you're lucky, there are those metal pylons to duck behind when a car drives by.The street our Airbnb was on.A car going down the street our Airbnb was on. It barely fit.There were shrines like this all over the city.A newer mall with actual stores and a nice astrology themed mosaic.Mount Vesuvius in the distance.The oldest castle in Naples, built in the 1100s.The poorly preserved remains of a Roman villa. A 1960s apartment building is attached to it.

    Naples

    June 29, 2023 in Italy ⋅ ☀️ 29 °C

    Naples was a totally different flavor than the rest of Italy. Tiny tiny streets that nonetheless had cars and mopeds zooming down them. Spirited conversations in the streets day and night. Crawling with people but notably mostly not tourists, just people living their lives. They had some of the oldest ruins we saw (several remains of walls that dated back 2500 years to greek times) which nonetheless were barely acknowledged other than a viewport down and a fence to keep people from falling in. If you read about the history of this city, it all makes a lot of sense. I thought this place was the most vibrant city we went to.Read more

    Trip end
    July 1, 2023
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