Buongiorno mi amigos!
We flew from LA to London on Virgin’s new “Flying Slave Ship” for a three week tour of Italy, which started in in Nice, France where our hotel booking got screwed up. Our reservations were for a hotel in northern France. It’s kind of like flying into LA and having hotel reservations in San Francisco. Things worked out just fine when we found a hotel near the beach. It was called The Little Mermaid and decorated with Danish photos. They attached their room keys to billiard balls which is always a sign that you’re staying at a Five Star hotel.
A couple days later we showed up to rent a car at EuropCar at 12:02 and the door to the office was locked. The employee came over and told us that they were closed for a two hour lunch. After waiting for Fifi to finish her vichyssoise, we slowly and carefully drove the windy coastal road to Monaco (better than Princess Grace did) and that night I won about $225 playing roulette in Monte Carlo’s Grand Casino.
Next came the Italian Rivera with an overnight stop in Imperia at the Croce de Malta Hotel, or as we called it, “Hotel Bad Bad Leroy Brown.” We ate at a restaurant called The Hungry Hobo, and since Hobo’s are well known for their fine dining prowess we went there. I was disappointed to see the dining room filled with tables and chairs, I was hoping for box crates around an open fire and drunk bums eating beans out of the can.
We spent two nights in the sweet little seaside hamlet of Portofino, named after a restaurant in La Habra.
We spent 3 days in Cinque Terra which means Five Terras, so the correct answer is 15, and yes you have to show your work!
We had beautiful sun in Monterosso, so one day we took a 4 hour hike way up into the hills. Whose idea was this?! It was like the VonTrapps escaping Austria at the end of Sound of Music, but at least I didn’t have to wear lederhosen or carry Gretel on my back.
We got a little bit of beach time, so Euro Dave was able to bust out the Speed-o. Less than a minute after “dropping trou” I’m approached by an Asian lady in a floppy sun hat who offered me a massage. Turned out that massages on the beach is her business, but it still adds to my theory that ladies can’t keep theirs mitts off of middle-aged dudes in Speed-os.
We drove south on the autostrade towards Pisa, saw the tower, which I’m happy to report is still leaning. Italians see highway lane lines as mere suggestions, and would love to drive inside my trunk if they could.
We rented a 2 bed, 2 bath apt within a villa in Tuscany. Our backyard is olive gardens (when you’re there you ‘re family) grape vineyards, and the water faucets flow Chianti.
We attended a Chestnut Festival in Lucolena. It was a cool experience because it was real, locals only, and every guy there (and some of the women) looked like Roberto Benigni. In a collective cluster of black shoes and black jackets, I was wearing shorts, flip-flops & a baseball cap, so I might as well showed up in an Uncle Sam costume carrying a surfboard. We indulged ourselves in vino & roasted pig flesh right off of the carcass. We bought handcrafted jewelry & notebooks, and had a Molto Bene time.
In Florence we saw Michelangelo’s David which I grew up seeing at Movieland Wax Museum in Buena Park and it didn’t really look any different. I gave a Euro to a crazy looking lady wearing a bathrobe on the Ponte Vecchio and then later saw her in a store buying cigarettes… I love to help people!
We took a day trip to Siena, and did some wine tasting on our last day in Tuscany at a family vineyard where our kids played with their kids while we sampled their wares.
We dropped off our rental car in Rome at the airport named after Leonardo Di Vinci, who they honored, I believe, because he invented the airplane’s fold-down tray table. We took a harrowing taxi ride to our hotel while the driver’s radio appropriately blasted Queen’s song, “Don’t Stop Me Now.”
Our hotel room seemed very small after having a 2 bed, 2 bath apt for a week.
In Rome we toured ruins by day and cheered the Lazio soccer team at the Olympic Stadium at night.
Continuing on in my attempt to eat all of God’s creatures, I lunched at a Roman restaurant near the Coliseum that offered pigeon on the menu. I thought this will be sweet, sweet, revenge for all the splatters they’ve left on my car windshield’s over the years, so I ate the pigeon with fava beans and a fine chianti (cue Hannibal Lecter’s evil laugh). Mmm, that was some mighty tasty Flying’ Rat, way meatier than I was expecting.
Margarita, the racist tour guide, took us on a tour of the Vatican museum, where she showed us unbelievably detailed tapestry, priceless artwork and statues, and reveled that she “hates the Chinese.”
The Sistine chapel was dark, quiet, and impressive, kind of like Miss Jane Pittman. In St. Peter’s Basilica we got to see the crypt of Pope John Paul II who is under “beautification” until April 27, 2014 when he is officially named a Saint, though there is speculation that the Saints may trade him for two Cardinals and an alter boy to be named later.
Door to door, Rome to Fullerton was 24 hours of travel, which gave me plenty of time to think about Lin Yutang’s quote, “No one realizes how beautiful it is to travel until he comes home and rests his head on his old, familiar pillow.”
Arrivederci mi amores!!!