9 Days and Counting

I usually need to get to less than the One Week mark before I start getting super excited about an upcoming trip. 

At the 9 day mark, this time, I'm almost there. I splurged on a Samsonite Aero carry-on bag which weighs in at 4.6 pounds and did a weigh in fully packed at 16 pounds. Considering my size 11 clodhoppers weigh a pound each, that's not bad. 

On our first trip to Europe- Insight Tours Turkey in 2004? we lugged along cases the size of bar fridges with suits, evening wear, 8 changes of clothing and in my case, 10 pounds of camera gear. The limit was 20kg and we were close. My camera gear these days is a Moment Case and 3 lenses that fit my phone as well as a backup Panasonic zoom camera.

 My travel guides are no longer hard copies, rather they are e-books that add no extra weight. I've printed maps and directions to most of our lodgings, again with backups in the form of downloaded google maps. Ditto tickets for already booked buses, trains, planes that will get us around the country.

 While these blogs are mostly for my own and my kids as future proof of my travel madness, they might provide a bit of entertainment or sedation assistance for folks stuck at home. I did notice that some trolls had used earlier blogs to post links to scammer sites and gambling pages so I will be blocking similar losers and increasing my privacy settings. The internet seems to be populated by more and more dickheads these days and it can be a challenge to keep them out.

 I do hope to acquire a SIM card for travelling and that it will allow me decent enough speeds to upload photos. The last couple of trips, connection speeds were somewhat iffy, so that was not always an option.

 Anyway, just to bring folks up to speed, the synopsis is:

 Sept 16th Arrive in Rome

 Sept 17th Vatican Tour and visit to Roman Forum

Sept 18th  Tour Colosseum and Borgia Art Gallery

Sept 19th  Bus to Siena and revisit the city.

Sept 21st Rent car and head for Montepulciano area, Pienza, San Gimignano etc

Sept 27th Return car and take train to Lucca

Sept 29th Train to Pisa airport and flight to Catania

Sept 30th Catania to Taormina

Oct 2nd Taormina back to Catania for 3 days

Oct 5th Catania to Syracuse

Oct 8th Syracuse to Palermo

Oct 14th Palermo to Toronto via Munich

 If that seems like a lot to bite off, it is over a full month and is actually a lot less strenuous than the average organized tour, which would cover the same territory in 14 days or less. Considering the fact that we've already covered much of the ground on previous tours we are actually taking our sweet ass time to revisit some spots, ignore others and just have a bit of fun.

Rome in some respects never gets tiring, but on the other hand it can be completely exhausting. It is big, busy and bonkers, with traffic so slowly that one can get off the Hop on Bus, visit the "famous site" and get back on the same bus, just 2 stops over. On our last trip the Metro station near our hotel was "Closed" no explanation given. Taxi's were all taken. So the only option was a 1km dash over cobblestones dragging suitcases to catch the Airport train from Termini. 

This will be our third visit to the Eternal City- we've already seen so much, yet there is so much more to see. Similarly Siena, where we spent several days in 2017? and Palermo in 2019. 

 There is something about Italy that makes it the most amazing destination on the planet. It is small enough that three would easily fit inside Ontario yet it has more to see than the entire country of Canada.

 I recall on previous visits waking early and walking the streets of Venice, watching the mist rise slowly off the waters of the narrow canals, the smell of fresh baked bread and freshly brewed coffee tempting my nostrils as I walked past small, just opened cafe's, boats being offloaded with their catch of fresh fish and glass carboys of wine- destined for the stomachs of restaurant patrons yet asleep.

   Can it get any better than that?