It is impossible to completely describe our recent trip to London, and parts of Italy. Suffice it to say, it was an great adventure. This trip was 10 days long and had far too many highlights to recount. It was a true "Juliana vacation": Expertly planned, incredibly fast-paced, very active, food-focused, and wildly fun. Here's an attempt to describe a few highlights, and even a few bumps, in random order.
Juliana's planning for this trip was intensive, elaborate, and months-in-advance. There was an important family component. It was so great to be able to leave the SarahToga with Ron and Jean at our house. She loves being their hiking buddy while they visit the PNW. We're immensely grateful that they could watch her while we were away, and keep an eye on the place. Not to mention reparing some things around the house while we were gone!
We also had the privilege to meet some of Juliana's extended family (cousins) in Tuscany, who live near to where Juliana's Great-Grandparents had lived before emmigrating to the US. We were merely tourists on much of the trip, but the family welcome in Tuscany made us feel like visiting Royalty. What an incredible experience to meet such warm and generous people. I dug out the least wrinkled shirt out of my backpack (all we packed), put on some non-hiking shoes, matted-down my cowlick, and tried my darndest to be polite while not knowing a word of Italian. It took the utmost concentration to keep-up with the lively conversation while similtaneously gorging myself on the delicious food and wine.
A weekend in London was added as the first destination because I'd never been there before. The Tower of London (which we toured and stayed near) is surrounded by sites, culture, and history. We both agreed that our gut-feel is that London seems very livable. The Burrough Market was as amazing as any great public food market I've ever been to.
The in-flight magazine put it right alongside Portland's Farmers Market, and Vancouver B.C.'s Granville Island Market, both of which we love. It was at the market where we first experienced one of the recurring themes in the trip. Beware the wrath of Juliana if you cut in front of her in a queue. Her wrath escalated over into Italy, where ironically she became a queue cutter herself when we were in danger of missing a train!
And yes, even some British food we sampled is "worth writing home about". We visited "The Pie Minister", for a pasty, with pork and veggies. The previous night we'd enjoyed the requisite pub-pint with fish 'n chips. Our last night in London was the celebration of the first weekend of vacation as the only tourists in great local pub/bistro. Sadly though, that night also mourned the loss of our pocket camera (left on a bus), and more importantly most of the pictures we'd taken in London Friday and Saturday. It was not surprising at all that the food was so great in Italy, but the best bread we had on the whole trip (a bacon Baguette) was from a French cart in St James park in London after our bike adventure there.
The hiring of trains, planes, and one wee-automobile were all quite succesful, thanks mostly to Juliana's pre-planning and sometimes her quick thinking. I've never before experienced driving a tiny, retro-styled sporty car (Fiat 500) through dozens of traffic-clogged European round-abouts, into a real Italian mall(not a tourist mall), through a Medieval castle, and up and down windy mountain roads, all while rocking out to a new Pearl Jam album. That is about as much fun as a "driving fan" could ask for! Not to mention being able to hike a gorgeous ridge along the Mediterranean, go swimming in the next town, and then board a train back to your hotel. All in time to clean up and have dinner. Experiences like that even make it tollerable to overhear other obnoxiously loud tourists from Eugene Oregon while you hike and while eating dinner.
It's even more bearable if you have an American travel celebrity to blame for too many Americans. The saying we came up with was...
"DAMN YOU Rick Steves!",
...said while shaking your fist the way Jon Stewart does.
Oh, and two tickets on Ryan Air from London to Pisa only cost something like 30 Euro! Are you kidding me? They didn't even charge me to go to the bathroom like I'd heard they would! Although they did try to sell us bags (yes bags) of booze.
However, no travel is without at least some nail-chewing, brow-furrowing, or even F-bomb dropping moments. Like when savvy traveller wife is swearing loudly and profusely in the Florence train-depot because we just missed the express-train to Rome. Only moments ago she'd bought 80 Euro tickets for both of us. I learned to take heart. There is always another way. She'll figure it out! For example, why not jump on different train to Naples? Who cares if there are no seats! We can sit in the hallway, on the floor, in the very front of the train, pay-off the conductor when he yells at us, and still get to Rome. It really wasn't bad at all. We got to Rome with time to spare and checked into the last room of the trip. The B&B wasn't like the Convent with the fresco on the ceiling from the previous night in Florence, or any of our previous accomidations, but all the places we stayed were unique, and great in their own way.
The sites in both London and Italy were spectacular and varied. No, we didn't see everything, not even close. We didn't have enough time in the places
we did visit. Though despite our grudge against Rick Steves for causing us to trip over throngs of Americans, we were grateful to him for one thing. Juliana brought along some of his informative audio tours of Florence and Rome. She and I were joined at the hip, walking around while learning about the busts of famous artists, architects, and other "gods", while plugged into the "jesus phone", and Steve was narrating. I thought Michelangelo's Pieta in St Peter's Basilica, was particularly moving in-person.
Juliana built activites
for me into the trip. She's amazing. There was not one, but two excursions on bicycles. I vaguely remember Juliana asking me about what I wanted from the vacation, months ago, and saying something about getting exercise. The biking aspects were Juliana's idea, meant to make me happy. On both occasions, when I found out the details, I had a great deal of doubt. Each time my thoughts seemed to swing from "You're crazy Woman!", to sometime during the experience where I thought "This is bloody awesome!" The first of those times was when I learned the plan to ride a
Tandem bike through the streets of London as part of 65,000 cyclists in "The Mayor Of London's SkyRide". This vacation taught me that if I want Juliana to do anything, even crazy things, all I really need to do is get it
on her list.
The cities and sites we toured had history that was truly humbling. We were so many pubs in London (for a pint), bars in Italy (for espresso), gelatarias, pizzarias, and places to sample great food. The Cinque Terre and the Mediterranean were beautiful. However, I think the time spent in Tuscany was the peak highlight for us both. The town of Buti was by far the least touristy place we visited, and we stayed there longer than anywhere else. What really set it apart was the combination of amazing food, meeting Juliana's family, the B&B and its owners, the perfect a variety of activities, and even the fellow B&B guests (all from Iowa).
Michael, the host of our B&B, took us to Lucca to do some road biking, for our second bike adventure of the trip. The Tuscan ride went through crazy traffic, out of Lucca, on the shoulder of a country road, along a river, toward our destination, a medieval bridge and town. 10 minutes into the ride I could not have been happier or having more fun. I had a huge S#*%-eating grin on my face. So. Much. Fun. We capped our 40-mile tour of the country with a ride around Lucca's famous wall, and a guided tour of some of the sites in the city, all on our rented road-bikes.
There's already talk of going back to Italy next year, but time will tell. We might not always be able to do such things, at least not quite like that. I really like it that we are both getting better at remembering, not just the highlights, but even the bumpier parts of vacations. The unplanned adventures are important parts of the story and they can sometimes be really entertaining, especially in retrospect. Even with the pace, intensive planning, and occasional mid-trip melt-downs (impromptu naps in a grocery store parking-lot), Juliana's "Conqueror Vacations" are the the best I've ever been on.
2009 is living up to my superstitions for odd-numbered years.
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