Hotel Solemare Albenga

Flew to Milan from Dublin then took the train to Savona to board the cruise. Quaint little seaport town which I wish I had more time to explore. Forgot to take a picture of the ship! Not sure how I feel about a big cruise ship (3,800 passengers) but the price was right so thought I would experience it!

... of fresh air and great scenery. We bumped into an old man foraging for funghi. We had a wee convesation with him as he had a little English and was obliging when Kim asked to take his photo. The church was closed when we got there but it was more about the hike than the destination.

The hike took longer than we expected so we missed our run, but managed to squeeze in another capuccio at our local before we left.

... the local bar and settled in for a few drinks and complimentary tapas.

Wed 11 Nov
Riva Ligura even better in the sunlight had a pretty little piazza and church which had a beautiful painted interior - much unexpected by us. The novalty factor was it had automatic sliding doors!

... poi è comparso l'itinerario. E con l'itinerario le prenotazioni.
Lo Yucatan lo gireremo in auto, abbiamo affittato a Merida una macchina dal 26 ottobre al primo novembre; avendo un mezzo a disposizione non mi sto a preoccupare del soggiorno, avremo la possibilità di scegliere;

So, the long haul back. Fortunately, there is an excellent motorway all the way up to Ceriale (we have decided to call in at camping visited on way out). Unfortunately, we hit our first real traffic jam halfway up! Mustn't grumble - after the miles we have done. The beauty of ...

27 giorni alla partenza!!
Devo ammettere che ero molto più entusiasta di organizzare il viaggio in Sudafrica, anche perchè Adam mi aiutava e mi suggeriva soluzioni.
Comunque siamo a buon punto anche per questa vacanza.
Arrivo a Città del Messico il 16 ottobre, il 17 voliamo a Tapachula (la perla del Soconusco) e poi ci muoveremo in bus fino a Merida, dove vorrei arrivare il 24 ottobre. Da Tapachula ci ...

And Day 4 sees us blasting off for Italy. Robbed blind by French; enter endless tunnels of neighbouring coastline, and dread paying for them... Fab drive (- and fantastic value when we exit for Garda: only 28 euros for whole stretch, where French extorted 38 for one-third of distance!) Hole up for ...

... dormito un po' e poi ho mi sono divertita ad ascoltare le telefonate demenziali di un tipo fulminato che chiedeva alla presunta fidanzata se poteva inviarle un messaggino, ed è andato avanti così da LaSpezia a Roma...

Da Roma a L'Aquila con il bus. A questo punto sono un po' in ansia, tutte le fantasie dei preparativi si scontreranno con la realtà.

... on the phone. When I was there, we went out to all these great, genuine little hole in the wall restaurants that served absolutely amazing food. Liguria, the region that is home to Savona, Genova, etc., is famous for pesto, so I ate a few pesto dishes. We had lots of wood-fire oven cooked pizzas and watched some champion's league football matches. Peter made me try the main apertifs and special house cocktails at the team's favorite bar hangouts. He walked me through Savona's little ...

I was on my way from Rome to Barcelona by train. On the border between Italy and France, the train workers went on strike and stranded about 12 travelers including myself at 2AM. We got off the train, and as we waited for taxis to take us across the border these 12 strangers (many of whom didn't speak common languages) pulled out whatever they had in their backpacks (candies, food, drink, trinkets) and everyone shared what they could with everyone else.

San Remo, Liguria, Italy anacristina