Prague

Correction: This post refers to the "Old Town" and "New Town" of Prague. While both do exist, I screwed up the references. The New Town is actually right next to the Old Town, and contains the likes of Wencelsas Square. What I referred to as the "New Town" throughout this post actually refers to the Castle Quarter, the area on the west bank of the river. Sorry!!!

Most of our travels so far have stayed in Western Europe. We really want to make it further east at some point (Poland and Russia are high on our wish list), but those are a little further down on the list. We were able to take a short weekend trip (45 hours door to door, to be exact) to Prague, in the Czech Republic. Although not quite Eastern Europe (I think it is officially "Central"), this is different from the likes of Rome and Paris.Saturday, October 3rd

Since we were making such a short trip of it, we knew we needed to leave as early as possible. When we booked our 6:15 flight, though, we didn't think about just how early we'd need to get up. Because the trains don't come too often that early, we had to catch a 4:08 train, which meant our day started before 3am. On the way to the station, we actually ran into several people making their way home from their various Friday activities.

When we step off the plane in each new country, we like to check the place off our list by one of us giving a resounding, "Check!!" Possibly the most memorable moment from this trip is the look on Jenna's face after she said it, then quickly realized that what she actually meant was, "Czech!!"

It took a little while to get through the airport and into town, but by mid morning we had checked into our hotel and were out on the streets. The city is split into an Old Town and a New Town, with a river running through the middle. We wandered through the Old Town a little based on the location of our hotel, but our plan was to see the New Town this day, so we made our way across the Charles Bridge that connects the two.

This bridge was built in the 1300s, and at that time was the only way to cross between Prague Castle (in the New Town) and everything else that sat in the Old Town. The bridge is one of the top attractions in the city, partly due to its age and importance, but also because it is lined with a bunch of statues and just generally looks cool. Unfortunately, at the moment they're doing some renovations, so parts of the bridge are closed off and full of scaffolding, and it is going to stay that for few a few more years. The parts that are open are cool, but the pictures just didn't come out too great with all the construction. We had a great time walking across the bridge and seeing all the people and listening to the street performers along the way!

The main site in the New Town is the Prague Castle, but there were a few things on the way up the hill that it sits on that we stopped at. The first thing was a monastery with a great view over the city. Afterward we stopped by a Jenna must - the Museum of Miniatures. This was a weird little place - they had about 15 different miniature displays, but of the uber miniature sort. Like a chickpea with a copy of the Mona Lisa, or a flea with a tiny padlock around its leg. You had to look through a microscope to see these tiny things. I'm sure it takes a ridiculous amount of skill to make these tiny things, but it seemed like a bit of a novelty.

Our next stop was the Castle, which is really more of a fortress. There is a small city, including a huge Cathedral (the real center point of the castle) and a nice little shopping street. All of it sits on top of a large hill that looks down across the river to the Old Town, and it is is surrounded by castle-type walls.

There were a few things that we saw inside the Castle, like the old shopping street (Golden Lane) and the Old Royal Palace with its great hall - with entrances made to be big enough for horses to enter, so they could have games in the hall. The prize of the Castle, though, was definitely the Cathedral. It was massive and as impressive as many of the cathedrals we've seen throughout Europe.

This stained glass window was very vibrant and apparently an important bit of local art. Made in the 1930s by a local artist at a high point of Czech nationalism, it shows the people coming out of darkness into a light brought by Cyril (who brought Christianity to the area and created the Cyrillic alphabet - think Russian), and St. Wenceslas (who was the first Christian king of the area and is now the patron saint of the Czech people).

This is the tomb of John of Nepomuk, another local saint who was killed by being thrown off the Charles Bridge and drowned at the orders of the emperor The details as to why are sketchy, but the leading thought is that the Queen confessed to him, and the King thought the confession included adultery. When John wouldn't divulge the information heard in the confession, he was put to death. His tomb is made completely of silver - they estimate it to be about 1 ton worth.

There were also all of these beautiful rose windows.

After leaving the castle we headed down the hill and up another big hill (luckily by funicular this time). This hill was supposed to have the best views in the city, and is supposed to be the best place in town to bring a first date. I must say, the views of the city were amazing!

By the time we'd come down off the hill and warmed up a bit with some Starbucks hot chocolate, it was time for dinner. We ate at a local place that served traditional Czech food (working man food - meat and potatoes). After filling up good on chicken and wild boar (you can guess who ordered what), we strolled through some parts of the Old Town in the moon and street lights. We made our way to the main square where we thought we'd watch the famous astronomical clock strike 10:00. We gathered with about 100 other tourists and waited about until about ten minutes past before we gave and went back to the hotel, where we found out that the clock only does its thing (see definition of "thing" below) until 9:00 at night. Somewhat defeated, we headed to bed...

Sunday, October 4th

Sunday was our Old Town day. We started off with a decent free breakfast from the hotel before heading back into the main square. This time, we did get to watch the famous clock strike the hour. It is astronomical, so I guess it shows all kinds of extra information like what astronomical sign it is, when the sun is supposed to rise/set, etc. We pretty much couldn't tell what it said, even the time. We had to look at our watches to tell when it was going to ring! When it does ring, it puts on a nice little show. Death comes out, flips an hourglass, and starts ringing his bell. At the same time, each of the 12 disciples roll past to show their faces while 3 heathen sinners hang their heads as they apparently face their judgement. At least that is what I got out of it (with a little help from the guide book). The other interesting thing with this clock is that it shows what "Saint's Day" it is. If you happen to not know, most non-Protestant Christian faiths devote each calendar day to a specific saint (like St Patrick's Day or St Valentine's Day), and this clock will give you a reminder of whose day today is.

Our original plan was to spend the morning in the Jewish district. Leading up to WW2, prior to the atrocities of the death camps, the Jews in the city were forced into the worst area of town. They built up several little sites that are supposedly worth a visit, but unfortunately for us the weekend of our trip was a Jewish holiday, and everything was closed. We had a walk around the neighborhood and tried to peek in some of the sites, but ended up spending significantly less time there than planned.

We headed back to the main square in the old town and walked through the various stalls that made up the market there. We then headed into the cathedral on the square, where we were actually fortunate enough to catch the end of a service. We then toured through the church a bit before heading back out to the square to enjoy a nice meal of brats/chicken skewer (Aaron/Jenna) and peasant's potatoes (small potatoes grilled with cheese and onions). It was pretty delicious!

Since we didn't get to the Jewish Quarter, we had quite a bit of extra time, and were able to make it to the Museum of Communism. After WW2, Czechoslovakia fell under communist rule, and this museum is a kind of memorial to that era. Maybe memorial is a bad word for it - the museum was created more as a reminder of what life was like, and to let everyone know that things are much better now. It was a very interesting museum, having tons of information on the history of how the communists came to power, and what life was like. They had recreated sections of a school, a factory, and a general store, and it was interesting to see what it was like and learn a little bit about what it would have been like to live there.

They also had a lot of the museum devoted to the Velvet Revolution - the name they've given to the fall of communist rule in Czechoslovakia because it happened peacefully, without a single blow (sort of - there were definitely some scuffles in the streets between the people and police). Anyway, there were no major conflicts, but after several days of protests by the people, the government leaders simply stepped down. You get a piece of it in school, but the focus is always in Russia and the Berlin Wall. It was really good to get a perspective from one of these smaller communist nations.

By the time we finished with the museum, it was nearing our time to leave. We spent a little more time wandering through the streets to get a little more appreciation for the beauty of this city, which miraculously came out of WW2 nearly completely unscathed. We walked back through the Old Town Square and through some of the quaint side streets before making our way back to the airport.

Miscellany

We generally focus on the big trips and events, but during that time the little things accumulate, so we thought we might put together a few of the memorable things we've done lately that don't deserve their own posts.

Concerts

One of the great things about living in such a major city is that pretty much any major concert tour makes its stop here. The problem is that in a city so big, they tend to sell out right away. We were lucky enough to be on Ticketmaster first thing for two that we really wanted to see though, and got great tickets for Both U2 and Coldplay at Wembley Stadium.

U2 was about everything you'd think it would be. They are probably the biggest rock band on the planet and led by one of the most recognizable names in music, the one and only Bono. Aside from the fact that they've put out some great music in the past 20 years, we also have a lot of respect for what the band does with their popularity - getting involved in a lot of charitable causes. The show was incredible. The stage was something between a space ship and a giant spider - I don't think it would fit in any stadium that didn't have a open top. They played all their best songs, except of course Jenna's favorite (The Sweetest Thing). We didn't have the best seats (they looked mostly like ants), but luckily their ridiculous stage had a giant screen that made things a little more visible. Anyway, not sure why we've never made it to one of their shows before, but we'll definitely try to catch them again.

Coldplay was also very good. Like U2 they are a British band, and their lead singer Chris Martin (a household name here) is married to American actress Gwyneth Paltrow. U2 is a little pretentious, thinking they're about the best band ever (which, to be honest, they have an argument for), and as such they had two no-name English bands open for them. Coldplay on the other hand still has a little humility, and had two big openers. First was Girls Aloud, which is a Spice Girls type band that is really big here but probably hasn't quite picked up across the pond. We didn't care much about them so we skipped it. The 2nd opener was Jay-Z, probably the biggest name in rap music. It was a pretty odd choice, but apparently he and Gwen are good friends, and he and Coldplay collaborated on a song on Coldplay's newest album. Anyway, it wasn't necessarily "our type of music", we did know a few of the songs, and he put on a super-high energy show. When he walked off the stage it felt like the show should be over, and we still had the main act!



They also put on a really great show. They are pushing their new album, so it was pretty heavy on the new stuff. That was okay, since we like most everything on the new album, but they also did mix in a lot of their older stuff, including dropping in about 50 huge "yellow" beach balls for the song that made them famous. They also did not sing Jenna's favorite song, Bonus Track! Again, one that we'd definitely go back to.

Greenwich



Greenwich (pronounced "grin-itch"), is a town on the Thames that used to be just east of London, but has now been swallowed by the city, and is actually quite central. We had a free Saturday in September and decided to spend the afternoon there.


This is the home of the famous Prime Meridian - 0 Degrees Longitude. It is also the home to GMT - Greenwich Mean Time - essentially ground zero for how we tell time. Officially, all time zones are given a time of GMT plus "x", So CST is actually just GMT + 6:00. As such, there is a big conservatory here. Apparently there was a lot that went into determining the longitudes. It has a lot to do with the rotation of the earth and time and a bunch of other scientific stuff, and it was all very important to navigation and seafaring. The conservatory had a little museum that explained it all, but to be honest we didn't understand it too much or care. We pretty much just wanted to say that we stood on, or stradled, the Prime Meridian...which we did.


The picture above is supposedly the line of the meridian leading up to a sculpture of the globe.

The 4th Plinth


Trafalgar Square is a major landmark in London - a large open square in front of the National Gallery art museum. When it was built, the plan was to put statues at the corners of the square. They built all four plinths (fancy name for the base that the statue sits on). They put up three of the statues, but for whatever reason they didn't have the money to build the fourth. They held off for several years, and by the time the money was available, the powers that be couldn't decide on which king/general/rich guy to put up there. While they were deciding, they started putting up temporary statues, and apparently it stuck.


For some time now, they've been putting statues that were on tour or waiting for a permanent home or whatever on a short term basis. So, the 4th Plinth has become famous as either a place to see something on display short term (usually a piece of art work as opposed to a classic statue), or to see an empty plinth.


A local artist named Anthony Gormley recently came up with a great idea for the plinth. (He was also a professor to Jenna's brother Hesse when he got his master's in Switzerland.) He decided that it would be nice to put the "normal man" up there. I think it is supposed to be something about the importance of the standard citizen - something along the lines of them being as important as the guys who stand on the other 3 plinths. Anyway, his plan came to fruition, and for 100 days from July to October, for 24 hours a day, some random person was standing on the plinth (anyone could apply online, and they were selected at random). Each person got 1 hour (that means 2400 people) to do whatever they wanted. A lot of the people were trying to bring awareness to some cause or another. Others tried to just have a fun time or show off in some way. We made our way past the plinth a couple times in the 100 days, and here is a recap of the ones we saw:

Chiari Malformation - Lady bringing attention to this rare sort of brain malformation. Not really sure but I guess it affects balance? Her presentation worked at least a little, because we'd never heard of it, and now we have.

Bingo! - This guy had assistants in the crowd who handed out bingo cards. He then drew out balls and called numbers with a megaphone. It was fun, but we didn't stick around long enough to win a prize.
Lady with crazy pink wig and swimsuit dancing - This lady was, well, wearing a crazy pink wig and a swimsuit and danced around. She was promoting families taking vacations in England.

Fisherman - He sat in a chair and...fished. Get Hooked on Fishing is a mentoring program for children while fishing.

Lady (we think) wearing a big eye - She was trying to speak for the blind. She also tried to throw balls out into the crowd, presumably with information on them. Ironically, the giant eye made it so she couldn't see, so the balls didn't get out to the crowd too well.

Indian Elvis - By far our favorite. It was 9:00 at night. He told us that he only found out about being on the plinth 24 hours earlier. In his short time to plan, he came up with dressing up like Elvis and singing his songs. He only had an iPod connected to a cheap boombox, so the sound wasn't great. Also, he obviously didn't know all the words, because he was using a clipboard with the lyrics. It was hilarious, though - his thick accent singing these songs by The King was great. The crowd got really into it - especially one crazy guy who was running around and dancing and singing like he was the main attraction. Anyway, we'd planned to stay fro 5 minutes, and ended up watching this guy for 30.

Windsor

Windsor is the official residence of the Queen, and at 800 years old it is the oldest occupied castle in the world. If you've been reading, we were thwarted in our first attempt to visit when they closed the entrance five minutes early. This time, we had a free Saturday, and devoted the whole of the day to getting out there.

It was an interesting visit. There's a big mix between the castles that you see everywhere else that are simply tourist attractions, and the palaces that you see everywhere else, that are super fancy. On the outside it looks like your standard castle, but on the inside it is very palatial, fitting of the fact that the Queen and her family do spend a lot of time here. It is supposed to be the Queen's favorite of all her homes, so she's there quite often. She was actually there the day we visited, but didn't happen to be greeting guests.

Could go into a lot of detail about all the stuff we saw - royal apartments, the grounds and gardens, and the chapel, but I'm sure people don't care that much, and this post is starting to run pretty long, so...

The French Riviera

After a summer spent bundled up in Ireland and England, it was finally time to get away to the sun and the sand. Our destination: the French Riviera on the Southeastern coast.

Friday, September 11th - Marseilles & Nice

In order to save on the flights, we arrived in Marseilles, which is not officially in the Riviera, but is a couple of hours west. It is the second largest city in France, and we thought it would have a few things for us to do. It was probably a bad omen when we had to find an extra travel book when our Rick Steves' France and Lonely Planet Western Europe didn't cover the city.

Needless to say, we could have lived without Marseilles. We went into the city and saw a few of the major sites - marina, fish market, and a few other forgettable sites. After about an hour, we realized our mistake and headed to the train station to catch a ride to Nice.

We arrived in Nice in the late afternoon, checked into the hotel, and headed out through the town and down to the beach. Nice is a pretty good sized town, and has over a mile of beach front. Unfortunately, that beach is made very rocky, so it isn't the most comfortable. There are several bars on the beach that thrive off charging €15 for a chair, but it seemed like most of the cheapskates, including us, just accepted the pain of the rocks.

We spent about an hour on the beach before our dinner bells started to ring, we decided to have a walk along the main promenade and through the town. Much to our chagrin, we very shortly came across a sandy section of beach - it seemed like they had basically shipped in a bunch of sand and dropped it on top of the rocks. We really wished we had seen that an hour earlier, but we were able to take advantage later in the weekend. We were really confused because there were tons of people laying on the rocks right next to the sandy section, and we could figure out why they didn't move over 50 feet to the comfortable stuff. Maybe the French don't feel pain? Something to look into...

Anyway, after walking along the beachfront and through some of the little shopping neighborhoods, we headed off to dinner. The cuisine here is more Italian than French (lots of pastas, not any snails). The Italian border is only a few miles away, and this section of the country actually used to belong to Italy. Back in the time of Napoleon, Italy was restructuring its provinces and gave the region the choice of what it wanted to be. With the popularity of the French emperor, they went French, but they have kept a lot of the Italian heritage, including the food.

Saturday, September 12th - Antibes

Antibes is another small town nearby - about 20 minutes by train from Nice. This is known as one of the best places in the region for the beach, as it is not quite as big and packed with tourists as other places like Cannes, but it is still a good size town with long, white sand beaches.

It is also home to some ridiculous yachts. The French Riviera is home to some of the richest people in the world. All of the towns have marinas full of the most outrageous boats you've ever seen. This is one of the mid sized ones in Antibes:

The owners of a lot of these boats live far away (like London), so they don't get to use them all the time. As such, a side business of yacht rental exists in the area. One the size of the one above could be yours for the low, low price of $30,000 per week (captain and crew included). We saw lots of yachts during our time in the area, but the largest concentration was here in Antibes, including one so big that it couldn't fit in the marina and had to dock out in the sea. Don't worry, though, the owner could still get to town quickly and easily in the helicopter that was sitting on the boat!!

Antibes was incredibly relaxing and really just great. We literally did nothing here other than sit on the beach. We slept in, had a late breakfast, caught a mid-morning train, went straight to the beach, and didn't leave until dinner time. Jenna was in heaven, I dealt with it. Not exactly my ideal vacation, but it was relaxing to just sit and read, nap, and people watch, and I was able to break it up with the occasional trip to grab lunch or drinks.

For dinner we headed into the town, just away from the beach, and had some more great Italian food in the cellar of a nice little restaurant. The place was cool as the basement seemed like it was a cave cut out of the rocks. it also didn't hurt that the food was really good - pizza for Aaron and pesto for Jenna. Yum!! It was a perfect end to this very relaxing day.

Sunday, September 13th - Nice, Monaco, and Villefranche

We didn't have a ton to do on Sunday, so we headed to the beach in Nice first thing. We grabbed the small patch of sand mentioned above, and hung out until lunch time. For lunch we went to the town's market square to grab some Socca. This is a local specialty, made by only one place, and people literally line up to get it. It is basically a crepe, but made out of chickpeas and quite a bit thicker than the crepes you'd find elsewhere in France. We heard that they do run out, so we go there at 12:15 (early lunch for Europe) and waited. Lucky we got there when we did, because after 45 minutes, we got the very last portion. We even ended up having to share, since they couldn't give us the 2 portions we'd ordered. It was pretty good, but to be honest we probably wouldn't eat it again, especially considering the trouble you have to go through.

After lunch we went off to visit Nice's Russian Cathedral. Back in the 1800s, Nice was the spot for European aristocrats to take their holidays, and it was very popular with the Russians trying to get away from the terrible weather. Since they would spend months at a time here, they needed a place to worship, so an Orthodox church was built. It was very interesting to see, as of course it is very different from the standard cathedral you see everywhere else.

After checking out the church, we hopped on the train to Monaco. This you'll probably know as the home to the most famous and extravagant casino in the world - the Monte Carlo. Monaco itself is actually its own separate country - the 2nd smallest in the world next to the Vatican. 800 years ago a man snuck into the town, killed of the ruling family, and established himself Prince of the small region. Today, his great, great, great........great grandson is the prince, making it the oldest surviving ruling family in the world.

Monaco is a world of excess. The marina was outrageous - boats bigger than my college dorm and our current flat. There are 30,000 residents, but only 1/3 are real natives - the rest have just moved there for the tax breaks (0% income tax). The per capita income is also the highest in the world. It was really just kind of ridiculous. Parked in front of the casino (mind you in the middle of a Sunday afternoon), we saw a Lamborghini, and Aston Martin, 2 Bentley's and 7 Ferraris. There were also several Mercedes and other nice cars that we could never dream to own, but paled in comparison to their neighbors. This is definitely the land of the haves, and the have yachts!!

We spent about 30 seconds in the actual casino. It was really disappointing, because they charge a €10 cover charge to even get in the door. We didn't have any money to lose, so we didn't want to gamble, but we did want to see the casino floor. We were unwilling to pay a cover to enter, though, so we peeked our heads in as much as possible and then turned around and left. Guess the cover charge works, because it kept at least 2 people out that day who didn't belong.

Overall, we weren't super impressed with Monaco. Yes, it was very nice, and the boats and casino and everything were something to see. It was also nice to check yet another country off the list. But in all, unless you plan to actually go and gamble, there isn't really much to see or do, so we left filling pretty unfulfilled. Maybe some day when we're rich and famous we'll dock our yacht next to the Lady Moura, valet our Rolls at the front, and spend an evening rolling the dice, but until that day comes, I don't see us making it back to Monaco.

When we left it was about time for dinner, so we headed to another nearby town - Villefranche Sur Mer. We had a little walk along the beach here before going into town to eat. We ended up at an overpriced touristy place, but the food was decent and there really aren't any restaurants other than that anyway. The dinner was so-so, but after dinner was great. The town has a small footpath leading along the water, through part of the town, and past the marina. It was a beautiful evening and a very romantic walk, made even better by the gelato that we picked up before we started. A wonderful way to end the day and a huge pick-me-up from the downer of Monaco.

Monday, September 14th - More Nice

The last day of our trip was literally spent doing nothing again. We got up late and headed to the sandy section of Nice's beach. We stayed there all day, had a picnic lunch, read, slept, etc. It was a great way to end the vacation. It was a full day at the beach - our flight wasn't until late in the evening - but I really don't have anything to say about the day other than that we spent it in the sun.

In all this was a great vacation. Somehow this post has turned out to be pretty long, but it really felt like we didn't do a single thing while we were there. And to be honest, that was wonderful.

Milan & Lake Como

On our long trip through Italy at the beginning of the summer, we had to pass on one of the major cities, Milan. It is in the northwest part of the country and was a bit out of our way. Also, we'd heard that it wasn't the best place to visit anyway. We had heard, however, that it was near the Italian lake district, which was supposed to be amazing, and Jenna really wanted to go. So, we ended up planning a trip for the beginning of September, the first weekend after the "end of the busy summer travel" to try and cut back on the number of annoying tourists we'd have to deal with.

Friday, September 4th

We arrived in Milan at around 10am, but due to the distance of the airport to the city, and some issues figuring out the logistics for getting around, we pretty much had to head straight out to a 1:30 appointment (after grabbing pizza of course!). We had tickets to see The Last Supper, which is in a church away from the main part of the city.

The Last Supper is a fresco painting (if you've been reading, paint mixed into the plaster of a wall/ceiling), and was done by the leader of the Ninja Turtles - Leonardo. They only allow a few people in at a time, and you have to get your reservations several months in advance. It is gigantic and very impressive. We've seen recreations and photos before, but the real deal is something else. There are no photos allowed, but we snuck this one, which actually turned out really well.

Leonardo had used an experimental technique, which caused the painting to start to deteriorate within a few years. Now, several hundreds of years later, it is actually in pretty bad shape, as a lot of the colors are fading or parts seem to be breaking away. Andrew's (far right)face is pretty much gone. There were hints, though, of its former glory, where you could see what the colors had looked like, and we stood in awe for about 20 minutes imagining how it would have looked then.

This alone really made the trip to Milan worth while. After we left, though, we headed to the center of town for the icing on the cake.

That is a picture of the Duomo, Milan's cathedral, which is one of the largest in Europe. We walked around the square a little and took in this church, which was really impressive. It was built completely out of pink marble from a nearby quarry, and has literally thousands of statues, both inside and out. Each of those little spires that you see in the picture has a unique statue on top, plus then there are more scattered all over.

They built the Duomo with politics in mind. They spent a ton of money to make it really big in order to make Rome (to the south) happy. Apparently the Catholic church showed a little more love to those who were willing to show their devotion by opening their pocket books. In order to get some support from the Germans and Austrians to the north, though, they shunned the "popular" Italian architecture of the time, like that used at the Vatican, and instead went with a Gothic theme, which was more popular in northern Europe.

After spending some time learning all of this and taking in the main square, we headed through the Galleria, a small, very upscale shopping area, to the Teatro alla Scala, which is Milan's opera house. From the outside, it isn't much to talk about, but the inside is incredible - one of the most elaborate buildings we've seen that wasn't a palace. This is probably the most famous opera house in the world, and most major operas throughout history have played here. They had a little museum with original scripts, playbills, costumes, and some other interesting random things like letters written by a young Mozart. I'm sure this would have been really interesting to opera fans, but what made us love it was that we got to see them practice. They have a couple of the luxury boxes open for tour, so that you can see down into the actual hall, which was amazing. The picture below is from the website, through, as they were rehearsing for a performance when we visited. We got to watch for about 10 minutes before they kicked us out, and it was really interesting. Made us want to go see an opera!!

After the opera, we headed back through the Galleria enjoying an excellent Gelato, and decided to tour the Duomo. We started with the roof, which was originally built to have people go up there - with stairs leading all the way to the top and several little spots to stop and sit and take in the art that they've put all over the building. Luckily, they've recently also installed an elevator that takes you most of the way up!! By the time we got up there, it was sunny and warm and we really enjoyed just being on top of the world.

We also went on a walk through the inside of the church, which aside from being full of hundreds of more statues, was not much different from the standard European cathedral.

After leaving, we headed back to the train station to make our way to Varenna, a small town on Lake Como, which is where we spent the rest of the weekend. After about an hour on the train we got to our hotel at about 9:00. We were pretty hungry and decided to eat in the hotel restaurant, which was on a nice patio. It was dark so we didn't get any view, but the food was really good...just one more reason to love Italy!

Saturday, September 5th

So this is what we woke up to.

Amazing.

This is Lake Como - in the Italian Alps just across the border from Switzerland. There are a few other lakes near by that make up the Italian Lake District, but this is supposed to be the best and most accessible. It is also the home of George Clooney when he's not working in LA. He was actually there while we were, but we didn't see him - guess we don't hang out in the same type of places.

We didn't do too much. As our friend Rick Steves says - this is a place to lower your heart rate. We had a walk through the town of Varenna, which was very nice. We stopped in the small grocery store and picked up some fruit and sundry picnic goods and headed to the town's "beach". Basically, one of the bar/restaurants in town had a big patio area next to the lake, and decided the best use would be to cover it in gravelly sand and rent out beach chairs. It doesn't really have access to the water, but since the lake is fed by the Alps, it is freezing water anyway, so that was not a huge problem. The sun was shining, though, and that was enough for Jenna, so we spent most of the afternoon there.

By mid-afternoon, we were really starting to regret the fact that we forgot our sunscreen, so to prevent further baking, we decided to go back to the hotel for the afternoon. They were supposed to have a nice patio with some umbrellas and we thought it would be nice to sit out and read. Boy were we in for a nice surprise. The hotel (Eremo Gaudio, if you're planning a trip), was at one point a monastery up on the side of the mountain. The reception and about 1/2 the rooms (including ours) sit below the original monastery nearer to the lake. A short funicular ride up the mountain takes you to the actual monastery, though, where the other rooms are. This is where the amazing rooftop patio was, and we literally could not believe it. The commanding view from up here was spectacular, and the building itself was just amazing. What a spot for the monks to come for worship. It is no surprise that they picked this place. As we stood up there and took in the majesty of the lake and mountains and everything else, all we could do was thank God for the beauty of His creation, and the many blessings He's given us that allow us to enjoy them!!

After a quick clean-up in the hotel, we headed off to dinner at a small local place with nice patio seating. Again, we enjoyed some great Italian food. While waiting for my calzone to cook, we saw a feat of feats. The guy next to us ate an enormous calzone (literally 12 inches across). This alone had me so stuffed I could barely walk out of the place. For dessert, though, he went ahead and ate a full pizza. The crust is pretty thin, but still, it was the same size of a US medium, and he downed it all like a champ. He wasn't overweight or anything - just a normal middle aged guy who ate in one sitting what could easily fed both Jenna and I for 4 meals. Needless to say, we were both extremely impressed!

After dinner we had a nice stroll through the town trying to find a suggested place for dessert. We never did end up finding the place, but it was okay because the town and lake were nice in the evening, and we probably didn't really need the dessert anyway.

Sunday, September 6th

Sunday was another day spent on the lake, and again, we didn't do too much (which was perfect). Our plan was to spend the day on one of the lake's main towns - Bellagio. We caught a mid-morning ferry the mile or so across the water to this town. It is quite a bit bigger than where we stayed, and has a lot more shops and tourists. It was a Sunday morning, so a lot of stuff was closed, but we still enjoyed walking through the town and peeking in the windows. Later in the afternoon some of the shops did open up and we were able to stop in and see lots of stuff we wished we could afford to buy. Many mental notes made of things to purchase when we return some day.

We headed through the town and out to a small park on the lake. We hung out in the park for a while and enjoyed the beautiful weather and scenery. We then went and had another great lunch at a restaurant near the park with great water views.

As we had to get back to Milan for our flight, and the trains don't run too often on Sundays, we had to leave Bellagio fairly early. We spent a little more time in the park before we headed back, though, and just had a really relaxing time there.

After a ferry back to Varenna and a goodbye to our hotel (we had to grab the luggage), we headed off for a 4:00 train to Milan. Fortunately, this gave us just enough time to make it back to the city center for a few final views and pictures of the Duomo, and what sadly may have been our last Italian gelato for a while.

This ended up being a wonderful trip. We really did almost nothing, but it was so enjoyable to just take in the amazing scenery and relax - something that we hear some people do when they go on vacation.