Aquileia

Hello from Trieste,
On Sunday we left the Venice area and took a morning ferry ride to get to the outer eastern reaches of the Venetian Lagoon where we resumed our cycling. It was magical to see the Venice skyline in the morning light with all of the working boats buzzing around the Grande Canal.. We were expecting an easy day of riding as we left Venice but the day turned out to be grey and cold and our ride took us along muddy, marshy flat lands. Not very scenic and the wind threatened to blow us back to Venice. We donned jackets and soldiered on spending the night in a large beach, resort area reminiscent of the Algarve.When we finally saw the beaches on the Adriatic Sea near the resort they were quite beautiful and there were all sorts of holiday camping sites, large beach hotels , little bars and tacky shops dotting the coast. Our hotel was a bit depressing since it was almost empty and the many staff were hovering close by ready to swipe your plate away the second you finished. I’m guessing that come the heat of summer the sea shore and hotels will be full again.
On Monday we cycled through the seaside town of Caorle which was a very pretty town with requisite old church and leaning tower, cafes and more tacky tourist shops. I could imagine it would be very nice in the summer sun, Unfortunately, the clouds and rain followed us on our journey that day. But, we were glad for the relief from the heat. Jackets stayed on.
We are now in the northeastern area of Italy called Friuli-Venezia. Like the South Tyrol region, this is an autonomous region with a very complex history. Three languages are spoken-Italian, German and Slovene - a slavic language. From an historic point of view, this region was a critical area for the Romans and there is evidence of Roman settlements in almost ever place we’ve been. Helen is loving that part.
On Monday night we stayed in a beautiful town - Portogruaro. We were fortunate to find a restaurant with an excellent wine list and a very knowledgeable young waiter who guided us to a White wine made from the Friulano or Sauvignon Vert, which is grown widely here . It was very dry and aromatic ( sorry Sharon, not one that you would like). Then we had a Cabernet Franc which was delicious and certainly rivalled the best we’ve had from the Okanagan. No one tried the Prosecco which is from this region and “on tap” in the bars it’s so popular.
Our cycling for the past two days has been perfect as the grey weather passed (jackets off) but the extreme heat isn’t back yet. We’ve enjoyed lovely rides through farmland and small scenic towns with friendly , waving locals and good coffee at every stop. On one lunch stop, we couldn’t find a shop for provisions but found a truck selling meats and cheese. The man happily prepared us three plates for lunch and some drinks. We are fortunate that everywhere we travel people still love Canadians and recognize Mike’s maple leaf emblazoned shirt.
On Tuesday night we arrived in Aquileia and had lots of time to check out the Basilica and the museum. Aquileia was a very large Roman settlement of 100,000 and a major trading city way back when……. The church is the first Christian church built in Roman territory (about 300 AD ). after some law passed that banned the persecution of Christians and allowed them to build churches in Roman territory. The show piece of the church is the mosaic tile floor which is intact and tells many stories like Jonah and the whale. There were so many Roman ruin bits and bobs around this, now, small town that even in our hotel there had been excavations done and there was a protective glass cover over an area where we parked our bikes. (Picture included) There was another large field in town of - what looked like - piles of stones all from excavations. Kind of like a roman ruins junk yard. I don’t do too many museums, but the archeological museum in Aquileia was well worth a quick visit with Helen. She was pretty excited by everything so I had to keep her company.
Today we had a perfect ride into Trieste - the capital of this region. We stopped on the way at a small town called Visogliano where our friends Barb and Les lived once for a brief time. Les, Mike wants you to know that he does not have an e-bike and that little detour required biking up a big hill which was not his favorite part of the ride today. We also saw the International Physics Institute that we assume you worked at, Les.
We’ve seen lots of real castles along the way and today we stopped at a “fake “ castle called Miramar built for some Austro-Hungarian royal Prince who came to a bad ending in Mexico. Helen likes to make sure we know which castles are real and were used to defend something important, and which castles are the fake ones, or just “party palaces.” - as she likes to call them. This region was part of the Austro-Hungarian empire so this was a great resort area for the royalty and rich people from the Hapsburg Empire.
Biking into Trieste was lovely as there is a very long beach, park area and boardwalk that goes on for miles. Lots of people were out lazing around on the rocks in various states of undress.
This is Europe so…. Well let’s just say that Roman ruins weren’t the only ancient things we saw today.
Trieste looks like Vienna with all the neo-classical styled buildings. (Hopefully I got that correct). The main square is open to the Adriatic Sea and we dipped our feet in to cool off. Trieste is a gateway city between western and eastern Europe and it has been the setting for many spy novels because of its proximity to the former Eastern Bloc countries. Tonight we head out in search of more sea food although we read that the Austrian influence makes this a great spot for pork dinners. We saw many miles of mussel farms in the ocean as we biked along. No bad decision I guess.
Tomorrow we bike into Slovenia and where we’ll lots more ups and downs as we are well out of the flat plains and into the rocky Adriatic shoreline. The heat is rising again so we’ll start very early…. If I can rally the troops. ( sound the bugle)
That’s all the news for now. Hope everyone at home and in other places are all well .
Thanks for your notes.
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