The Italy Diaries: Photos

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Outside the VaticanFlickr is my friend. That's where I have uploaded the approximately 1 billion photos we took while in Italy. Blair complained I was putting too many pics up on Facebook, so I have deleted over half the pics we took.

What's here is not labeled, for the most part. Trips to Europe always end up with us taking 30 close up pics of some object or statue a tour guide emphasizes as being important, then us having no idea what we're looking at when we get home. Anyway, I find the pictures I return to are the ones of friends, or good meals, or simple street views that remind me of my time in a certain place. 

I've more or less categorized the pictures by city. I skipped Pompeii and Vatican City. Pompeii because ruins tend to look like little more than big gray rocks in photos, and the Vatican because really, how many pictures of religious icons and tapestries can you look at? 

Here are the links to the slideshows. There's only about 30 pics in each show, so takes about 2 minutes per city to go through them: 

 Below is my absolute favorite photo of the entire trip. Blair and I at the Colosseum, deciding whether or not someone lives or dies. Our choices are rather indicative of our personalities, don't you think?

I also like the photo of us on our last night in Rome, heading out for the group dinner.

Ciao!

 

 

 


The Italy Diaries: Random Encounters Maybe Aren't So Random

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Buongiorno! Ciao! Grazie! Gelato!

This concludes my study of the Italian language, undertaken during our recent 10-day foray to the land of pasta, wine, and really expensive leather shoes. 

I've got a lot to say about the trip. While any trip to Italy is of course fabulous, this trip was also fraught with landmines - tour buses almost overturning on hairpin turns in Tuscan hills, being trapped on a ferry during a storm with passengers tossing their cookies right and left, lost luggage, misplaced passports, fevers, sickness, and much more. But for all of that, I'd do the trip again in a minute. I fell in love with Italy and the people we traveled there with.

But all that is for a later blog. Today I want to write about the "random" encounters of the trip. (And yes, photos are coming. We just haven't had a chance to go through them yet. Soon, I promise.)

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Dealing With Curveballs

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Sometimes life doesn't flow the way you want it to. This week, for example, is a train wreck.

Blair and I leave soon for Italy. Poor guy came down with a horrible cold on Monday. Bad, but as the eternal optimists our thoughts were, "Yea! At least he's getting it out of the way before we leave on our trip." As I type these words, I'm listening to him in the bathroom, gagging. Not better. Worse. And facing a 24-hour travel day in the very near future. 

My throat has started tickling and I'm just praying the excitement over the trip will stave off any impending illness. That, and I think I may drink a lot in the next 24-hours to kill off any germs. ;)

Then there's Snowball, our newly adopted cat. I arrived home yesterday to find his left eye practically sealed shut. No idea what's going on there, except now I have to find time in an already frantic day to get him to the vet and then, more then likely, explain to our house sitter that not only will she be feeding our cats for the week, but she'll also more than likely be required to catch and sit on a cat while attempting to administer eye drops. 

My speech for Ignite Charlotte is written, but today must must MUST be devoted to pulling the slides together. I'm having a panic attack just thinking about it. 

Then there are the last minute details to attend to - visits to the bank and post office, return library books, write up instructions for the house sitter, last minute cleaning and laundry and--oh yeah--I haven't PACKED anything yet. 

But I can't think about any of that right now. I'm leaving in a few minutes to meet friends for a 20-mile run and I'm grateful. I'm feeling edgy and scattered and I know a long run, where I have no choice but to put one foot in front of the other for hour after hour, is going to calm and center me. Exhaust me as well, but calm and center me. 

I'll get everything done because you know what? I always do. Blair will rally, I won't get sick, we'll get medicine in Snowball and we will have a glorious time roaming all over Italy. 

I'm going to knock these curveballs out of the park. 

Cheers,

Dena

The Travel Diaries: Estonia, Finland, & My Meltdown on the Plane

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Tallinn, Estonia. If you have the chance, go there. Who knew?

We arrived late afternoon at this seemingly perfectly preserved medieval city after a 9-hour bus ride from St. Petersburg. I loved it from the word go. Cobblestone streets winding around curves into hills, a stone wall fortress surrounding the town still in place, and a central open square where you could (and we did) kick back with a beer or coffee and enjoy some great people watching? Count me in.

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