Hotel Riviera Rapallo

We will be staying Riomaggiore (one of the five villages) and have booked our accomodation already at Casa Lorenza  We will be staying in apartment Nettuno.

What shouldn't we miss while we are here?

... randonne de 4.5 heures avec des vues incoryables sur la mer et les falaises.

avec le retard du train, nous somme revenue a Pise en debut de soiree. Apres un autre excellent repas accompagne d'un chianti local, je me lance a la recherche d'une auberge pour notre destination de demain : florence

... the Med before taking us inland and through the olive groves.

On arrival at Portofino we were greeted with a similar village to those in Cinque Terre but not quite as quaint. Not sure what all the fuss is about...Santa Margherita wins our vote.

Back at Scooby for lunch of bbq chicken wraps and biscotti for dessert, then onto the autopista to lovely Lucca.

... leaving you with a bright cheery feeling, the sun is shining and there are palm trees everywhere. Anyways back to Genoa the soon to be ground hog's day of our trip. We had checked, checked and double checked our ticket to make sure we knew of any transfers and where they happened. We made sure we were in our rightful seats even we have had to many experiences of getting in trouble for being in the wrong seat and we are tired of playing musical chairs. As we ...

... the 11C and there aren't any Roman ruins because the Genovans needed to build somewhere so they just built on top of the old stuff! Anyways it is built on a hill and the modern part is at the top and to get there you travel over little tiny streets and even smaller alley like paths where the buildings appear to almost meet at their tops. We also saw the 16th C palaces nearing the ...

... some shops and then all of a sudden there it was... the sun! We walked down to the beach and searched for pebbles before making our way to Vernazza.

The next town along with Manarola (where we are staying) is a bit smaller than Riomaggiore and Monterosso but just as, if not more beautiful. Vernazza is probably known mainly for its large scale (compared to the city) boating docks that wrap around the entire marina. The girls and I stopped for gelato before making our way ...

... only made a feeble promise of 'I'll do it later' (which he never kept). I would really have just left this part out, because the Cinque Terre experience was spectacular, but for those traveling there in the future I think it's important to know which companies will shamelessly exploit the high demand for their locations. We met Carien and Karen late (Karen had decided that she and her passport needed some time apart, so she left it on the ...

... and the waiter suggested they get the fresh king crab. In an attempt to prove how fresh the crab was he brought to our table 2 enormous live crabs which were still moving around, frightening the ladies. They ended up eating the crabs claiming self-defense. The next day we went out shopping around 1 only to discover all the shops are closed for lunch for 3 hours. We wondered around the city peering into the shops we hoped to go into, later discovering that shop fronts are ...

... and there was one booth with a raffle, so for one euro you draw a number and win a random prize. Katie played and won face paint so everyone got decorated and then we ran down to the beach to catch the fireworks. This display was even longer and more beautiful than the one in Prague! Sparks shot out right over the ocean, exploding back out to us as if they were fireflies of the sea. I stood craning my neck, bare feet buried in sand, celebrating the beauty of the world.

... attempt in Bangkok, Thailand! Between the current events in Bangkok and Sri Lanka I may be altering my itinerary... Reading a very interesting book called the Orientalist about a Jewish author who passes himself off as a Muslim during the world war (please excuse my simplistic description, the book is actually much more complex). It boggles my mind how complex the history of the world is. There is a lot of talk about the Bolsheviks ...