Sharing our Traveler's Diarya

Friday, July 29

We took the slow train from Naples to Venice. It was really comfy: AC, charging ports, etc., and it wasn’t even that slow! We left Naples at 9:30 and the train stopped at Rome and Florence before pulling into Venice central at 3pm. It was actually kinda nice having a train day to catch up on blog writing and reading our books, while glimpsing out at the pretty Italian scenery.

When we arrived and walked from Venice’s main train station down a main road to our Airbnb it was pretty crowded but not as bad as I had expected. Tourism numbers are still creeping back up and it seems they are not allowing cruise ships in yet so, in this way, tourism is capped to non day-trippers.

We walked north, to the neighborhood of Cannaregio. As we left the touristy block, the crowds thinned out and we found ourselves in a residential neighborhood walking with locals. Again (like Rome) we were staying near the old Jewish Ghetto and we saw signs for Kosher restaurants all around.

We had decided to rent a room in a shared apartment because 1) it was affordable and 2) it seemed like more responsible tourism, rather than kicking a resident out of their entire apartment. The other two rooms ended up being occupied by other tourists (?) but we felt better that we were at least sharing a tourist place.

We dropped our stuff off and set out to get some food. We ended up at a more touristy-type place but we spotted some tasty looking dishes on the tables so we went for it. We got tube pasta with citrus pesto and speck (thinly sliced pork belly) and it was very good despite being a little overpriced. We also randomly ordered a cicchetti sampler, a Venetian classic, which is like tapas of crostini toast or bread topped with different things like creamed cod, tomato cod, sardines with onions and raisins, etc. At the time we thought we were eating crab and thought it was good, later we learned it was creamed cod.

We wandered around the streets for a bit afterward, enjoying getting lost in a picture-perfect pedestrian paradise. We managed to find the grocery store and get some snacks and wine for later, and wandered back to the Airbnb to rest.

Saturday, July 30

We started the day with a walking tour of the southern part of Venice. We liked the tour because it included the not-so-popular areas like an old customs house that is across the grand canal from the most touristy area, St Marks square. The tour guide gave us a brief summary of the history of Venice and he told us some tips about traveling there. He also shared a guide with us that had more tips and a list of recommended restaurants.

After the tour we went to the closest recommended restaurant, Sudest 1401. Though it was under the list for typical Venetian food, it was not typical. It was a restaurant linked to some kind of art gallery and the menu was predictably bougie. We got a plate of grilled vegetables (eggplant, leek, and zucchini over mashed parsnip with garlic) and some lime spaghetti. Both were really good. We sat outside in a nice little garden next to a pond, listening to the cicadas roaring.

We figured we needed to see the main tourist highlights too, so we walked over to St Marks Square and to the basilica. There was about a 20 minute wait to get in and it cost 3 euro per person. We were already feeling a little ‘churched out’ so we didn’t think it was very special. The ceiling was covered in gold foil mosaics that depicted various bible scenes.

The best part may have been the floor which was covered in mosaic patterns of different colored stones. There was a sign that described how part of the floor had been completely underwater during a flood event in 2019 and they were still making repairs. We skipped the option to pay more to see the high altar or to see the museum. We considered getting tickets to the Doge’s (King’s) palace, but it seemed like the pricey ticket included other museums that we wouldn’t have time to see, so we skipped it.

Feeling tired, we stopped by a cafe for espressos. We successfully ordered in Italian and drank at the bar Italian style, and were rewarded by getting the Italian price, less than what was listed on the menu. We also felt really cool about it.

Feeling energized we walked over to the Peggy Guggenheim museum. Peggy moved to Venice in 1949 and bought a cute little house right on the canal. She collected art and displayed it in her house until she died and her house was turned into a modern art museum. We saw paintings by Picasso, Dalí, Max Ernst, Miro, and others.

There was also an exhibit about surrealist art that ended up being really cool. In particular I liked the paintings and sculptures from two female surrealists, Leonora Carrington and Remedios Varo. There were explanation placards in English for almost every painting so we ended up spending much more time in there than we expected. We had planned to go back to the Airbnb to chill, but we had evening plans nearby so we decided to stay out.

We strolled by a cute corner bar that had good looking cocktails and apps. With some maneuvering, we scored seats next to the bar (right in front of the menu on the wall that everyone was trying to read) and tried some new spritzes and cicchetti while people watching. We tried Cynar, which is herby and made from artichoke. We also tried Special spritz which was basically Campari.

Then we took our time strolling to the main event of the evening, a Baroque violin concert in a gorgeous old building. The building was the Scuola Grande Dei Carmini which google maps described as an ‘ornate 17th century brotherhood building’. We later saw posters advertising tours of the inside of the building. We arrived to the concert a few minutes early and were told we could explore the building ourselves before the show.

We walked up the elaborately decorated staircase into a main chapel-like room. There were wide rooms with dark wood paneling and intense sculptures and paintings in every direction.

We tiptoed back downstairs to the main hall just in time for the concert to start. A younger guy played the harpsichord and a woman played the violin. It was like a baroque jazz concert. I know nothing about harpsichord or violin but the musicians seemed like they were really good. We enjoyed listening to the music and taking the time to zone out and meditate in such a pretty space.

When the concert ended at about 8pm it was still light outside. We took our time meandering back to our place and happened upon the prettiest sunset. In Venice you get multiple opportunities to take sunset photos because even as you leave one bridge over a canal and turn left or right you find another bridge over a canal with a whole new background. Of course, even our IPhone cameras couldn’t do justice to just how pretty pink and purple the sky was.

Sunday, July 31

We joined a mini island-hopping tour to have a sampler platter of the islands around Venice. We boarded the boat around 9 and then stopped to pick up passengers in other parts of the city before setting off for Murano.

The main attraction in Murano is the glass blowing artists and their workshops. As part of the tour we were given a free glass blowing demonstration. They sat us on benches around a large warehouse room that had a furnace, a stool, and some tools in the middle. A woman spoke in Italian, French and English over a microphone while a man worked the glass.

She told us the man is 80 years old and is the oldest artist on the island who is still making glass every day. He put a hot stick in the fire and then demonstrated how to blow a vase. Then he got a lump and pulled at it to make a horse. Our jaws were dropping already and then be put a piece of newspaper on top of his newly made horse and the paper instantly went up in flames, demonstrating how freaking hot the glass still was. It was really cool and made the whole tour worth it.

Of course afterward they invited us to peruse the gift shop. I would’ve loved to buy something to support the cute, old, glass-blowing man, but everything in the shop was unfortunately really ugly. We had about 20 minutes before we had to get back on the boat and we realized that was just enough time to do nothing.

We walked along the waterfront and peeked into windows of all the glass making factories and shops. We found one with a bunch of people speaking loudly in Italian to a guy with a apron on- presumably the artist- and found some more fashionable jewelry so we decided to support their shop.

Then we got back on the boat and noted that the boat pushed off one minute ahead of time- good thing we weren’t late!

Then it was off to the island of Torcello. Again we were only given 45 minutes to explore the island. This was probably more than enough time because the place was teeny tiny but still, we felt rushed. It took us 10 minutes just to walk from the boat into the town square. Then I had to pee and they charged 1.50 (!!) Euro to use the toilet and I didn’t have the right coins. The attendant finally exchanged my two 20s and a 10 to give me a 50 cent, and let me in. But the clock was ticking.

We walked around the main square, opted to not go into the church and then strategized how to quickly get food. There was a snack stand near the square that didn’t look promising, but we had few other options. We got a ham and cheese sandwich and then headed back to the boat.

She had warmed up the sandwich. As we walked, I bit into it and tears of joy formed in my eyes. It was just a simple roll, with prosciutto and some kind of white cheese but it was so so good. Like, one of the best sandwiches I’ve ever had. And it was 4 euro in a tourist zone. Amazing.

We got back to the boat a little too early and cursed our timing as we stood around in the hot sun. But soon it was time to board again, leaving right on schedule, off to the next island.

The next island was Burano. Burano is known for its lace making and for its colorful houses. The boat guide explained that the houses were each painted a different color so that the fisherman would recognize their house after being away at sea. This seemed ridiculous to us, but the houses were really colorful and pretty.

We strolled around the island and took photos of the cute canals lined by pink, yellow, blue, and orange houses on either side. We didn’t see anyone making lace but there were many lace shops selling amazing looking patterns. We were so hot that we decided to get a granita- a slushy. I got Bellini and Carl got mango and we were as happy as little kids with ice cream.

We considered ditching our tour and staying in Burano longer, but we didn’t want to get stranded or pay more to get back to Venice, so we walked back to the boat on time.

Back in Venice we were the last to be dropped off again, in front of the train station. We considered getting lunch and then going to chill before our night tour, but the restaurant we wanted to go to was packed with people. So we walked home, snacked hard, and napped.

In the evening we emerged again, hoping for cooler temperatures. We went back to the restaurant, Trattoria Bar Pontini, and found it had calmed down. We were now early for dinner (6:30pm) so it was possible to get a table without a reservation.

The waiter was really enthusiastic and friendly and the wait staff seemed to be having fun with each other which always makes the dinner better. We got a platter of cicchetti sampler and a plate of spaghetti with cuttle fish and black squid ink sauce.

The squid ink pasta was really inky. As I was starting to get into it, our waiter came over and tied a cute paper bib to my neck, to protect my white shirt. The pasta was good but the cicchetti was even better. The creamed cod and the tomato cod tied for first place. We couldn’t resist getting tiramisu which came in a bowl.

We still had time to kill before our tour so we wandered toward the meeting point, stopping to get Aperol spritzes to go whenever we saw them. The first one was small, but only 2 Euro, and it was great. The second one was bigger, for 3.50 and we took our time sipping it as we made our way to the bridge that was the meeting spot.

We had booked a ghost, ghouls, and legends tour through Airbnb because the one in Rome had been fun, and it was a cool way to see the city. Our guide, Alex, was also a few minutes early so we talked to him as the rest of the group showed up.

We watched the sun set over the bay as the rest of the tour -9 total- arrived. Alex led off the tour with a ‘get to know you’ exercise and he had us vote to determine what kind of stories to tell. He explained that, in previous tours, people had been triggered or even walked away early because the stories were so gruesome. Our group was there for the scare and consistently chose the scary stories over cutesy ones.

We walked past the morgue and up to a church where the church’s sculptor witnessed a murder-suicide and etched a doodle into the church’s doorway. It was so badly drawn that we though Alex himself may have drawn it, but Alex defended the story saying it had been documented in numerous accounts. He told other stories that he claimed had been well documented but that ended with a spooky twist.

Alex pointed to a cement mound next to a bridge and asked us to guess what it was for. He told us it was designed to prevent people from hiding in dark corners and jumping out and robbing or stabbing people. Then we started seeing these mounds everywhere, especially near privately owned bridges.

The last story of the night included a full on Romanian blood-sucking monster. It was ridiculous but after we said goodbye to everyone and walked back through the dark alleys to our Airbnb I definitely had a chill of fear. It was midnight when we finally made it back. Grateful that no Venetian monsters had eaten us, we said ‘happy August’ and went to bed.

Monday, August 1

We had wanted to do a cooking class while in Italy, and our time to do it was running out. So we found one in Venice. It was overpriced, but they offered that we would make two types of pasta and tiramisu, my favorite.

We met our hosts in front of a church on the north east side of the city. Lin, who has been with the company for a few years and speaks fluent English, spotted us and introduced herself. Patrizia, whose house we would be cooking at, spoke no English at all. We told her we speak Spanish, if she wants to talk in Spanish, and she got so excited but then just kept talking to us in Italian.

We followed them back to Patrizia’s house. She lives with her partner on the top floor of a building that used to be an old convent. The old wooden beams still run throughout the apartment, with ‘modern’ (1980s) renovations intermixed. We met her partner, an adorable old man who sat on the couch the entire time and only stood up when it was time to say goodbye to us.

Lin led us to the kitchen where they had a table set up with a plastic table cloth on top. We started by making the tiramisu. Lin gave us instructions in English and Patrizia buzzed about and gave us a glass of Prosecco which she called ‘gasoline’ and insinuated that we needed it to help us cook.

When the tiramisu was put into the fridge to chill, we started on the pasta. Lin put flour right onto the tablecloth and had us pour water into the middle of our pile and begin to knead it all together to make dough. It was fun, a surprisingly easy clean up, and the noodles were great so we will be doing it this way from now on.

We made fettuccine using the pasta press and then she showed us how to make little spiral balls using a little wooden tool. She said they don’t make or sell the tool anymore, but we are determined to prove her wrong.

Then Lin escorted us upstairs to a wooden patio on the roof. It was then that we realized how close to St Mark’s Square we were – we could see the spires of the basilica right there! She had a great view of the surrounding area’s rooftops and there was just enough breeze that it was tolerable to be outside.

More prosecco was poured and we were given some stale bread as an appetizer. Then Patrizia brought up our little dumpling pasta that she had covered in a simple tomato sauce. We asked her what was in the sauce and she said tomato, onion, basil, marijuana, opium…So she purposefully did not show us how she made it. Even though the sauce was simple, it was tasty.

Then she brought the fettuccine. In the same sauce. This was a little disappointing but it did show off how good the noodles themselves were. I had drank too much prosecco, was too hot, and then was full of pasta. All I wanted to do was nap. Then they brought the tiramisu.

As we ate, Lin and Patrizia asked what we had seen in Italy and Venice so far. When we revealed that we had not been inside Doge’s palace yet, Patrizia seemed upset and ranted in Italian. Lin started laughing hysterically and asked if we had understood. I smiled and said ‘no’ and in my head said ‘why would we understand when we don’t speak Italian?!’ Lin translated that Patrizia said we must’ve spent too much time in the bedroom because we hadn’t been to the major tourist sites.

We laughed then, and told her we had made it to the Peggy Guggenheim museum. She shrugged, at first satisfied with this, and then said that if we wanted modern art we should’ve gone to New York, not Venice. Ok. This rant plus Patrizia’s insistence that Carl eat another bowl of pasta after he had already eaten two, made Patrizia our unofficial Italian grandmother.

Finally it was time to go and, as proof of how hot, drunk, and full of pasta I was, I forgot my purse. Carl went back to get his hat and got my purse for me. We stumbled back to our Airbnb and took a nap. On the way we took pictures of the Rialto bridge, which was fine.

I felt like I could’ve kept sleeping but it was our last full day in Italy so I roused myself awake for…more eating. We decided to go to one of the Jewish restaurants because we had been staying in the Jewish Ghetto and hadn’t tried their food yet. We went to a place called Gam Gam that was near us and that Lin had recommended.

We got the Gam Gam special appetizer that included lots of little dishes of chickpeas and sauces. We also got the fried artichoke which was real good (Carl’s favorite) and the eggplant in tomato sauce with chickpeas (my favorite). We got a 1/2 liter of the house white and savored it, knowing that we’d miss Italian restaurants and their cheap wine when we got back to CA. We ended the meal with a chocolate mousse that was recommended by the waiter. It was almost as good as the one we’d had in Buenos Aires, which made us reminisce.

Wednesday, July 27

We navigated from the Naples central bus station to our B&B. We had purposely booked a place close to the central bus/train station knowing that we’d be using this second visit to Naples as more of a transit layover.

Reviews for B&B Maryflower said it was in a grimy location but that the apartment itself was nice. These were accurate. We managed to luckily get into the apartment building, and up four flights of stairs. Then someone eventually came out into the hall to let us in. But once we got into the apartment itself it was so cold from the AC that we loved it and wanted to stay there all day.

We needed to eat something so we set out to find some pizza. The first place we tried was absolutely swarming with tourists so we went to the next. The next was also too busy for us. So we opted to go back to the oldest pizzeria, Port’Alba.

We got the Primavera (spring) which had red and yellow tomatoes, buffalo mozzarella, black olives, basil, and anchovies. It was very good. We also got a couple of Aperol spritzes and took our time relaxing and enjoying the food.

Eventually our FOMO got the best of us and we decided to squeeze in the Anthropological Museum that afternoon. It was pricey – 32 Euro for 2 people – and a few of the exhibits we had wanted to see were closed, but it was a huge museum with lots to see and we ended up spending almost 3 hours there.

The museum was essentially a repository of everything that had been unearthed from Pompeii, Herculaneum (another Vesuvius victim), and other archeological sites in the area. We were most impressed with the mosaics pulled from Pompeii as many of them were as good as paintings, or better, and from 1st century CE.

We also liked all the rooms with massive statues as many of them are greek gods. We played ‘guess the god’ before reading the placard and did pretty good.

On the walk back to our B&B we got some mozzarella, tomatoes, basil, crackers, and wine to make our own snack/dinner in the comfort of our very air conditioned apartment.

Thursday, July 28

The last things on our Naples ‘to see’ list were riding the funicular to the top of a mountain to see St Elmo Castle and the views, and to check out the Spanish Quarter.

We got ‘breakfast’ at the café on the corner using coupons given to us by the B&B. This method had worked really well in Rome, but not as well here. When Carl showed the staff person our coupon and she said ‘2 chocolate croissants??’ Realizing that probably all Americans love chocolate croissants like I do, we figured this was a standard order. We said ‘sure’ and went to sit outside.

They brought two ‘croissants’ out that were like bread buns and not very good. They had cut them in half and filled them with Nutella, which was the best part. I went inside and asked for some coffee too (Please!) and they seemed surprised by this order. It was nice to get ‘breakfast’ included in the room price but we were not impressed.

We walked through the historic center to the Spanish Quarter. We had been through this area many times already but we still enjoyed looking at all the little shops and dodging the motorbikes that zoomed down the small, cobbled streets.

There’s a bright red coral that grows on the rocks in southern Italy and it fills all the jewelry shops in Naples. Both of my temporary engagement rings had broken so it seemed like a nice opportunity to get a red coral ring as something unique to remember our time in Italy.

We lingered in front of one shop and an old man came out and gestured in Italian to explain to us what some of the charm bracelet charms meant (basically they all ward off the evil eye). I found a cheap, simple, yet elegant red and silver ring and asked to try it on. We went inside and when it fit perfectly I took that as a sign and got it.

Then we wandered to the Spanish Quarter and then to the funicular station. The funicular is very cute and old and seems to be used by the locals pretty regularly as a way of not having to walk up and down the big hill. We got it all the way to the top and then followed a family of tourists to the entrance of Castel Sant’Elmo.

It was 5 Euro each to get in which seemed pricey to us but we had come all that way so we did it. The castle isn’t the most beautiful thing but the views from it were worth it. We walked up and up and up on ramps into the castle and then within it before reaching a top terrace.

At the top we stood at the highest point in Naples and could see down to the whole city, the waterfront, the bay, and (in the hazy distance) Capri island and Mt Vesuvius. Some of the windows at the top acted like medieval AC units because they concentrated the air currents and created a cool breeze. We took our time looking out through these breezy spots.

At the top are also some modern art galleries which weren’t phenomenal but did provide a nice break from all the really old art and artifacts we had been looking at for weeks.

We hiked back down and took a different funicular line back to the heart of the Spanish Quarter. We found a casual seafood restaurant and got a table right next to the AC just before they got too busy. We ordered a seafood sampler appetizer and a Sorrento style gnocchi. The food was nice but a bit overpriced.

Feeling full, hot, and tired, we walked back through the crazy historic center streets to our B&B. We blasted the AC and took a nap. That evening we watched an Italian movie on Netflix called, “The Hand of God” about a family in Naples. It was a little weird and artsy, but we liked it. It was fun to recognize the place names and foods that we had learned on our trip so far.

Sunday, July 24

Italy travel tip: don’t travel from place to place on a Sunday. Everything is closed and there are fewer options. We wish we had known this when we planned our trip but, alas, we didn’t and our plans were set.

Our plan was to somehow get from Naples to the Amalfi coast, stay there for a couple days, and go back to Naples before heading north again. On any other day there would be buses leaving Naples every hour to go to Amalfi. On Sunday our option was to take a regional train to the town of Castellammare and take the 3pm Sita bus to the coast.

We just missed the time to take the express train so we wound up on the one making local stops around Vesuvius and Pompeii. There were a million tourists also waiting for the slow train but we (stupidly) said, “even if we don’t get a seat, at least it will be air conditioned”. We were wrong.

The train was just like BART. We all squeezed in. I was straddling my bag in an aisle and saw Carl’s head in the chaos by the door. There was no AC but the windows were open so when we finally moved, there was a breeze. At first it seemed insane for us all to be on the local train because it seemed like everyone was going all the way to Sorrento. But, one by one, people did get off and a sizable group got off at Pompeii (and probably baked to death).

Finally we reached Castellammare. We got off and bought tickets for the 3pm bus. We had two hours to kill. We walked to the waterfront which was a lot like the Martinez marina, except with the addition of a big volcano in the background. Then we found a casual cafe to hunker down in. But then they closed so we had to leave.

We ended up sitting on a park bench for a while, watching multiple wedding parties take pictures with the marina water in the background.

Finally the bus came and we piled on with a bunch of random people that had shown up last minute. It was a quick but queasy ride up the hill to Bomerano, where we were staying.

Amalfi coast is really pricey so we opted to stay inland a bit near a hiking trail. We chose a B&B that had good reviews and were really happy with it. The owner, Paul, met us and showed us to our room. About an hour later we spoke with his daughter who told us about the area and took us to the main square to show us where the hike, Path of the Gods, started. They were too nice.

We relaxed in the AC and then went to dinner at a place the daughter had recommended. On our way out the door, the owner, Paul, caught up with us and gave us detailed instructions for our hike the next day. He even sent pictures of certain parts of the trail where we would need to turn or stay straight. It was a lot of information but he was so kind to share so many details with us.

We went to the restaurant, L’Angolo dei Sapori, at about 7, which is early in Italy, and there was almost no one else there. A waiter lead us outside. He was so excited. He asked us if we wanted wine- red or white?!- when we hesitated he brought out both to taste. He started with the white and it was so good so we stuck with it.

We ended up ordering seafood pasta and the fish of the day: Sea Bream. Plus a side of eggplant. It was all so so good. The pasta was homemade and the seafood was fresh and salty. My favorite pasta so far. Even the bread was good. We got a tiramisu because everything else had been so good we knew we could trust it. And it was good.

Paul’s daughter was waiting for us when we got back. She said “good night!” and we went upstairs to sleep.

Monday, July 25

We woke up just before 8 and went downstairs to get breakfast. Paul was surprised when we just asked for espressos instead of big cups of American coffee. He served us yogurt and warm pastries. There was only one other woman in the dining room eating with us but all the tables were set, so we figured there must be others staying there.

We got ready to leave for the hike and Paul ran out with two frozen water bottles. He explained that we could keep filling them along the trail as the ice melted. It ended up melting completely before we were done, but it was such a nice gesture and we ended up needing the extra water.

We set off just as we saw a bus of tourists get off at the hike stop. We had stayed at the place we did so we would be close to the trail but, because we wanted to get our breakfast, we ended up on the trail about the same time as those that woke up early and took the bus.

Still, there weren’t too many people and we quickly found ourselves immersed in nature. The trail was absolutely gorgeous. Right away we had views of the cliffs around us and the ocean glimmering below. About halfway down the trail we saw the coastal town of Positano, with colorful buildings climbing up the cliff side.

We knew the hike wouldn’t be too long but it was even shorter than we thought. We got to the coastal town of Nocelle at about 10am. We decided to try to walk all the way to Positano rather than take any shuttles. There ended up not being a clear trail so we had to walk along the road for a bit.

Then we found Positano and walked around, trying to find the stairs to get down to the water. There were so many dumb tourists and it was so hot and frustrating to try to walk on teeny tiny sidewalks with all of them.

We came upon a casual cafe and decided to lurk long enough to find somewhere to sit and get a bite. We got a table right next to the AC but it only had one chair. So we took turns sitting and got spritzes and a really yummy focaccia sandwich.

The spritz made me just disoriented enough that the beach felt so chaotic. The public beach had black rocks that looked like torture to lay on. There was an area where you could rent chairs and an umbrella but it was 30 euro per person.

We hemmed and hawed and decided to get the eff outta there and see if Amalfi town was any better. We stood in line and got tickets to a ferry that was leaving in 10 minutes. It was perfect timing.

We sat inside the ferry to soak up the AC. The windows were greasy so we enjoyed the view of the cliffs but didn’t take photos. We pulled into Amalfi town and it felt like more of a transit hub.

We walked along the boardwalk to the public beach where a couple of very, very tan, rotund, shirtless men are making a killing from renting out chairs and umbrellas to tourists. It was 25 euro for two chairs and an umbrella and we said “yes please”.

They gave us a spot in the middle of the beach, near the walkway. We took turns hot stepping to the water and floating for a few minutes. There were so many people in the water that it was like pushing through a crowd to get out into the open area.

We got good use out of our lounge chairs until the sun set far enough that the umbrella wasn’t doing much and we decided it was time to go.

Getting a bus back to our B&B was a nightmare. We almost got on the wrong bus twice and then realized we were waiting in the wrong spot (there were absolutely no signs, of course). Finally we thought we found the right bus but it was packed full and left without us.

So we waited until the next bus at 5:30. We still wouldn’t have seen the next bus if it weren’t for a large mob of people yelling “Agerola!” and us pushing in after them. We had to sit all the way in the back (but at least we got a seat!) and they packed people on again. They could’ve packed more, but they left some people behind for the next bus which wasn’t scheduled for another hour.

Then we had the craziest ride of our lives, up and over the mountain via switch backs. Being in the very back gave us the vantage point of how close the back of the bus gets to the cliff and the rocks. We prayed to all the gods. We finally got off at our stop and I nearly kissed the ground.

For dinner we checked out a casual place that had great google reviews. The place is called Crazy Burger but google reviews said they had some of the best pasta and pizza in all of Italy. We got there soon after they opened and could see they were already busier than their staff could handle. Still, they were very nice and the food was some of the best we’ve had.

We sat outside in the front courtyard underneath a terrace covered in grape vines. We got an antipasti plate of cured meats, cheese, olives, and some type of delicious melon. We also ordered the first pasta on the menu. It had ‘bacon’ and tomatoes in it and it was soo good.

We got a bottle of house red wine which they served chilled and it was like drinking really nice apple berry juice. We decided to get tiramisu again which was good, but not as good as the night before. By the time we left just after 8pm, the place was really busy.

Paul’s daughter greeted us again as we walked into the B&B. We said ‘good night and see you tomorrow!’

Tuesday, July 26

We had no set plans for the day so we waited until Paul served us breakfast to ask him what we should do. He suggested taking a bus to the nearby town of Ravello and then to a picturesque beach.

To get to Ravello required two bus rides. One to get from where we were staying in Bomerano down to the coast, to Amalfi town, and then from there another bus going south along the coast a bit before going back up into the hills to Ravello.

The bus from Bomerano was supposed to come at 9:30am. The bus showed up on time but it was already totally packed with people. The bus driver said he could only take 3 more passengers on board. There was probably 15 or more of us waiting at the stop. Some people managed to sneak in the back door but we were not part of the lucky few that made it. So then we had to wait for the next bus at 10:15.

We walked around a bit before finding a seat in the shade to wait. At about 10am an empty bus pulled up. The bus destination sign had said ‘Agerola’ (a mountain stop) but the driver switched it to Amalfi and got out to have a cigarette. So we think she was called in as a special added bus to meet demand.

Everyone climbed aboard and the bus was full. We watched as some people came running up and scrambled to get on (they had expected the bus at 10:15). If she hadn’t stopped we may never have made it out of that town. As we drove toward the coast she picked up a few more people along the way but then it was packed and she had to pass by some very sad looking tourists that were waiting along the road.

There seemed to be more traffic and it felt like it took longer to get down the hill. Finally we arrived in Amalfi and then it was time to get another bus. I nearly started to cry, but we just stuck to our plan to just get to Ravello.

The next bus had fewer people but it was also smaller so it was just as crowded and chaotic. Human behavior really is at its worst when trying to board a packed bus.

Another queasy ride up the hill and we were finally let off just outside the town wall of Ravello. Paul had told us that there was a small city of old buildings to see, but he didn’t tell us there was a fee to get in. We decided it wasn’t worth it and just explored the outer, ‘newer’ (still medieval) town area.

There was a coastal fog that had risen and settled in the mountain valley and it made the whole area about 10 degrees cooler than the coast. The sky was so dark it almost looked like it was going to rain. We enjoyed every second of that cool air.

We found a cute, artsy restaurant and decided to splurge a little bit for a nice lunch. We got bruschetta (toast) with some kind of artichoke paste and a vegetable, white sauce lasagna. The lasagna was somehow kinda sweet and I loved it. We also got two craft beers which we haven’t done in a while. They weren’t our favorite, but it was fun to try something new.

As we sat there the noon church bells rang out. With the dark clouds looming in the mountains over the medieval walled city, it was an ominous scene.

After lunch we walked around a bit and looked at ceramic shops before deciding to walk toward the downhill. There is a garden with great views but it was 9 euro to get it so we skipped it.

Because the bus was so awful we opted to just walk down the walking path (cement stairs) for the approximately 1 mile walk to the coast. We called it the ‘Path of the Mortals’.

It wasn’t as picturesque as the Path of the Gods but it wasn’t as bad as walking on the road. The path led through so many beautiful vegetable gardens and occasionally there was a coastal or mountain view. Walking a mile down cement stairs in flip flops didn’t feel great, but the promise of a cold ocean to jump into at the bottom kept us going.

We were basically the only ones there except for a group of four young Europeans that were hiking up (god knows why) and asked us, with tears in their eyes, how much further. We also passed just one older (British?) couple. They were walking slow and we said, “at least it beats the bus!” and the man growled, “you can say that again!”

Finally we got to the bottom and decided to go to Atrani beach which is just one beach east of Amalfi, where we had sat the day before. We rented two nice chairs and an umbrella and ran to jump into the water. Later I went to the little old bar just under the highway bridge and got some lemon spritzes to go. The very old man put some sort of lemon ice cube in the glass and then filled it up with Prosecco. It was foamy and delicious.

Once the sun started to creep under our umbrella we decided we should head back. We walked back over to Amalfi and got bus tickets in time for the 5pm bus. This time we knew where the bus would leave from.

When an empty bus pulled into the parking lot to turn around we knew it was ours before we even saw the destination name on the front. But, about 30 other people also, somehow, knew it was their bus. So we stampeded to get onto this bus, which was parked right next to another bus.

There was an obscene amount of shoving. Two guys nearly got in a fist fight. At one point the bus next to us wanted to leave but there was still a crowd of us in front of his bus, shoving to get on our own bus, so we ignored him.

Somehow we made it on and were able to stand near the back of the bus. We got our arm workout as we held on while the bus zoomed around each windy corner. We ended up getting off one stop before ours just because we couldn’t wait to get off. At least we never have to ride that bus again.

We showered and then went out to dinner. We decided to go to the same place went the first night, L’Angolo dei Sapori. The charismatic waiter remembered us and welcomed us to sit outside, by ourselves, because we were so early. We got a caprese salad appetizer and then the citrus shrimp risotto because the Amalfians love everything lemon.

Wednesday, July 27

We had a lazy morning of eating breakfast, packing, then checking out. We left out bags at the B&B and went for a walk to the viewpoint that the owner’s daughter had told us about. Even though it was only 930am it was already hot.

When we got to the park and the overlook over the sea we could feel the cool sea breeze coming up and over the cliff. It was like standing in front of an AC unit. We enjoyed the view for a bit and then walked back to get our stuff and say bye to our Bomerano family.

The B&B owner told us we could get the bus back to Naples from the town square but the square sits on a one way street with traffic running toward the coast. This didn’t seem right to us so we asked the man at the Tabbachi (bodega) where we bought the tickets. He drew us a little map and told us to get the bus on the other street, the one going north to Naples (which made sense).

Still, as we stood in the sun next to a bus sign (a rarity in Italy) I had doubts we were going to miss the bus and have to go back to the death trap that was Amalfi to get a boat or something. Heaven sent, the bus came a few minutes late and there was still two seats next to each other, just for us. Another queasy hour later, we were back in Naples.

Monday, July 18

We arrived to Naples, secretly said goodbye (and be well) to our Canadian girls, and trekked the 20 minutes to our Airbnb.

Right off the bat, Naples felt different than Rome. It felt a lot less touristy and grungier, though not necessarily in a bad way. It felt like a more authentic place.

We found our Airbnb and all the keys hidden in the lock boxes for self check in. The apartment was teeny tiny but it had a kitchen in the loft area and an AC above the bed that was powerful.

We set out to get groceries. The grocery store was conveniently close but also very tiny. I could feel our anxiety rise as we tried to navigate narrow aisles with our push basket.

Carl made a really yummy pasta with mushrooms, onions, and that cubed meat we don’t know what it’s called. We went out to the terrace where it was cooler than the loft kitchen. As we sipped the red wine our San Jimmy Airbnb host had given us we listened to the sounds of the neighborhood. We could hear classical music playing, a tv somewhere, a barking dog, and of course, a crying baby. We then watched the last episode of Stranger Things (!) and went to sleep early.

Tuesday , July 19

We woke up still not feeling great but powered through for a free walking tour. We met the guide underneath a Dante statue in Dante Square. He explained the history of Naples which originally was a Greek city and for a time was a province of the Kingdom of Spain, ruled by Spaniards that were originally French. So it has always been a very multi cultured mix of European and Mediterranean people. The guide explained that this is why Italian is such a fickle language- because it pulled from many different languages that were spoken in the region at the time.

Our guide led us into several different churches and pointed out the different architectural styles of Neoclassical, Baroque, and a Gothic church that was rebuilt after it was almost completely destroyed in WWII.

We winded through the skinny streets and were shown the location of the first pizzeria, music shops associated with the conservatory and the best restaurants to get pizza as well as authentic desserts.

After the tour we went to Attanasio, one of the pizza places he had recommended. We got a classic margarita pizza and it was good, but not the best we’ve had. Then we went to the next restaurant, Mazz, to get desserts. We got Babá, which is like a rum soaked cake, and Sfogliatelle, which is a crispy pastry filled with sweet ricotta and spices (cinnamon?).

Despite getting an espresso with our desserts I was still able to go back to the Airbnb and fall asleep immediately. We slept away the hottest part of the day and emerged again in the evening, when it was still hot but not an inferno.

We walked down to the waterfront to the Castel dell’ Ovo (Egg Castle). It’s called Egg Castle because supposedly Virgil hid a magic egg in it and said that as long as the egg didn’t break, the castle wouldn’t fall. No one ever found the egg, broken or not, and we felt like it was a pretty weird story overall. Yet, the castle did still stand, so.

We walked pretty far, past Mappatella ‘Beach’ (more like pile of rocks going into the water), and then turned around and walked back. We saw several people taking wedding photos with the view of Mt Vesuvius in the background and debated whether that would represent a good omen.

We had an uneventful dinner of leftovers and went to sleep early to prepare for the next day.

Wednesday, July 20

Capri

While planning our trip we debated whether to stay on Capri for a few days or to do a day trip. Then I looked at how much it cost to stay there, and it was exorbitantly expensive, so we settled on day trip.

We got a ferry out relatively early, at 8am. Still, it was busy and we could tell we were approaching the island along with hundreds of other tourists.

As soon as we got to Capri we found a booth selling boat tickets for a tour around the island plus a stop to the Blue Grotto. We had read tickets should cost about 20 Euro, and these were 21 so we went for it, hoping we’d be part of an earlier slot and beat the crowds.

We did not beat the crowds. Everyone had the exact same plan as us. The boat tour was nice though. Our boat driver/guide was joking the whole time and pointing out all the rock formations. He’d get the boat very close to the rocks but never managed to crash.

We went all the way around the island. The best part was going through the gateway rock. It’s good luck to kiss as you go under the gate, so we did, and the guide sang.

Finally we got to the Blue Grotto. We were told it would be an additional charge to go in and at least an hour long wait, maybe two hours. We said we still wanted to do it (we came all this way, heck). So the driver/guide divided passengers from our boat and another guide’s so that those that wanted to stay and wait could, and the rest went back to port.

It ended up being about an hour’s wait. Finally a man in a rowboat came up to our boat and asked for 2 participants to hop in. We eagerly jumped up and got into his boat. Another couple joined us on the other side and we all had to lay flat as we entered the cave.

Once in, we sat up and marveled at the glowing blue water. The sunlight comes into the cave only through the water below us, creating a cool effect where the water glows a bright blue, seemingly, on its own.

The rowboat guide paddled us around for about a minute, took some pictures of us, and then we had to lay down again to exit. All in all it lasted about 5 minutes. I don’t think it was quite worth the price + the wait but our FOMO would’ve eaten us alive if we hadn’t done it. And, it was really cool despite being overhyped.

Our guide led us back to port and from there we managed to get a bus up the hill to the village of Anacapri. While we waited in the line for the bus we scarfed down our homemade sandwiches. When the bus pulled up we laughed at how small it was but we quickly realized the buses HAD to be that small in order to fit up the crazy, winding hills.

We packed into the bus with mostly normal people and one guy who was like the Korean Mr. Bean. He was all of the place, talking to himself, and flailing around with every jerk of the bus. Another passenger asked, “why don’t you put your backpack down?” to which Mr Bean looked at him like he was crazy, turned around abruptly, and smacked the nice passenger and another one with his huge backpack hanging off one shoulder.

Finally we made it to the top of the hill. From here Carl smoothly navigated us to the Instagram famous chairlift. We rode the chairlift up to the very tippy top of the hill. The chairlift ride was actually really fun and it beat having to hike up, which I wouldn’t have been able to do in that heat.

At the top we took lots of pictures and then headed back, enjoying the views even more on the way down.

We walked around Anacapri a little bit but we were too hot to do anything. So we stopped at a restaurant and ordered some drinks and a large, cold bottle of water. When I ordered the water I must’ve looked crazed because the waiter seemed to giggle at the sight of us. After pouring ourselves a glass, chugging it, and pouring another, we took turns holding the cold bottle on our faces.

Mildly recovered, we took another bus down to the village of Capri itself. Another terrible bus ride, but no Korean Bean.

In Capri we walked down the big hill to a garden we had heard about. It was 1.50 Euro to get in and it was a total rip off. It was smaller than my parent’s backyard. But, it did have spectacular views of the coast. Had we not done the tippy top view point, this would have impressed us immensely. We still enjoyed it and took a bunch of photos.

We walked back up the hill to Capri village and decided to walk from here back down to the port, rather than take the Funicular. It was only about 15 minutes downhill and mostly in the shade. Still, we could hardly wait to jump in the ocean.

We meandered over to the public beach and it was absolutely covered with people. I think everyone had followed the same itinerary that we had. We managed to find a spot under a Roman arch to change and then a spot along a wall to sit against and relish the shade.

The public beach isn’t sand, it’s rocks. And it is terribly rocky. We both looked like baby deer trying to get into the water and not fall on a half-naked Italian. Once in the water though, it was sheer bliss. It was so nice and cool. We took turns swimming and then sitting in the shade and air drying.

Then it was time to get the ferry back to Napoli. We had a great day on Capri. We did all the things we wanted to do and we didn’t die of heat exhaustion. But it was expensive and absolutely swarming with people.

Thursday , July 21

Procida

Another day, another island. Of the three islands off of Naples’ coast, Procida is the smallest and least touristy. We’d heard it had nice volcanic black sand beaches and pretty coastlines full of colorful houses so we decided it was worth a visit.

Carl found cheaper ferry tickets through a site that was all in Italian. This was handy, until we weren’t sure where to pick up the tickets or get on the boat. After going to a couple incorrect spots we ended up running/speed walking to get to the ticket office (which may as well have been in an evil genius’ secret lair it was so hard to find) and were absolutely drenched in sweat when we finally got on the ferry.

Somehow there were still seats inside in the air conditioned area so we camped out there for the hour ride and tried to lower our body temperature. When we arrived, we peeked through the smeary boat windows to see that the coast really was as pretty as the blogs had said.

We followed one blog writer’s suggestion of walking along the port road for a little bit before cutting right and walking up a hill to a view point of the other side. At the top of the hill are a couple old cannons and a view overlooking the neighborhood of Corricella which was full of colorfully painted houses and little boats.

We went a little further, all the way to the top viewpoint, which gave a view of some abandoned buildings and the mainland behind. Then we walked down to Corricella. It was almost 1pm and we were feeling hungry so we decided to get a fancy lunch.

We found a place right on the wharf that had white table cloths and blue glass ware. We started with an Aperol spritz and a limoncello spritz (best one so far) and then ordered some seafood bites. We went with Tuna Tartar and a spaghetti with swordfish and green chili peppers. The noodles were doused in a really nice olive oil and they were delicious.

Then it was time to find a beach. We had to walk up the hill to the main road and walk along that for a bit until we saw signs for the beach. Down several sets of staircases we arrived at the black sand beach. It was beautiful, especially contrasted with the colorful houses, but it was gruesomely hot.

I laid my towel down on the black sand and when I stood on top of it, I cried from pain of the hot sand scorching my feet-through the towel! So we covered our stuff with other bits of our stuff as best we could to shield from hot sand and sun and we ran into the water. The water was nice and cool and got cooler the further we swam out.

The beach is actually in a kind of bay and there are volcanic rock jetties protecting the shore from waves. So we could actually just sit in the shallow water and relax without getting knocked around. It was a nicer beach than the one we had been to at Capri, but it would probably be best to visit on a cold day when you want the sand to be warm.

We could’ve grown mermaid tails and lived in that water forever but we decided we should get back. So we packed up, hiked back up the hill, and back across the island to the port.

We still had a little time before our boat so we went to a cafe and got some spritzes and some ice cream. Carl tried a green spritz that had some strange liquor in it, but he liked it.

Finally it was time to get the ferry back. All in all, Procida was a tiny, cute place that was nice to visit and was definitely less stressful than Capri.

Friday, July 22

Pompeii and Vesuvius

We read a lot of blogs and ‘how to’s’ for visiting Pompeii and Vesuvius and came to the conclusion that it would be best to go with a tour group. Going solo would’ve been cheaper and given more freedom but it also would’ve meant navigating potential scam artists at entrances to both and navigating a hot bus system in the middle of the day. We got a tour from Get Your Guide and were glad we did.

We met the group at about 9am next to the city’s main train station called Girabaldi. There were 32 of us on the tour, and the guide, Nuncia, did an excellent job herding us. She led us to an air conditioned bus (praise be) and it was about 40 minutes to Pompeii.

When we entered into Pompeii just after 10am it was already mercilessly hot. Nuncia said there is about 8 hours of things to see in Pompeii but we would only be there for two hours so she would show us some highlights. We walked down one of the main roads to an area of villas that were thought to be owned and lived in by rich families.

We went into one of the houses, Casa del Menandro, so named because one of the rooms had a large painting of the writer, Menandro. Our guide showed us the garden courtyard, the summer dining room, winter dining room, chapel, and spa. Many of the rooms still had their red and yellow painted walls, that were actually better preserved thanks to the volcanic ash layer. We could even see some details of the paintings, including the one of Menandro.

In another house we were shown a clay recreation from a mold of a teenage boy who had died during the explosion. We were surprised there were not more of these recreated bodies on display but Nuncia said most of the things found in Pompeii are actually viewable in Naples’ archeological museum.

We were also surprised to learn that of the estimated over 11,000 people that lived in Pompeii, only about 1,150 bodies were found. Vesuvius erupted in a series of events with the first being a shower of pumice rain that people could have escaped from.

We were led up to an intersecting main road and then to the Lupanare, a brothel. I was about to ask Nuncia how they knew what the building was used for when she pointed out a series of phallic way finding signs and, inside, a ‘menu’ of options for customers to choose from. The preteen boy in our tour group then had a really hard time opening his water bottle before running off in embarrassment.

We ended the tour at the main plaza area and what used to be a basilica used for political meetings. Then we were brought back to tourist land and most of the group ate at the prepaid lunch while Carl and I ate our homemade sandwiches on a shaded bench in the parking lot.

After lunch we piled back into the bus for a 40 minute ride to Vesuvius. The bus took us most of the way up the mountain (1,000 meters) and we hiked the remaining 300 meters. Although it was the hottest part of the day, there was a strong breeze up there and a big cloud that gave us some shade.

We took our time going up, reading all the signs and enjoying the volcanic nature. Then we hiked around the crater’s edge to the other side. Looking into the volcano itself was not that impressive. The crater is massive and the volcanic formations are beautiful, but the real thing to see was the view from up there. Walking around the crater gave us panoramic views of the south part of Naples, the bay, and the backside of the Amalfi coast. We took lots of pics and prayed for another 100 or so years of it not erupting, and hiked back down to the bus.

Another 40 minute bus ride and we were back in Naples. We said goodbye to our guide and the group and went back to the Airbnb to chill until dinner.

For dinner we followed recommendations from our Airbnb host’s food guide. They had recommended a casual spot near the apartment called Antica Trattoria da Carmine. We ordered the pasta and potato and the clam spaghetti. The spaghetti was good, because the clams were fresh. The pasta and potato was really good and tasted kind of like homemade mac and cheese.

We also got a bottle of the house white wine which was fine, except for the bits of cork floating in it. I think our waiter was on his first day on the job as he brought us two bottles of water, one of which the manager lady took away and seemed to scold him. He also opened the wine bottle back in the kitchen, brought it out to the table and just left it on the table. This was very different wine culture than every other place where we’ve ordered a bottle and awkwardly tasted the wine while the waiter watches, pretending like we know wine quality.

We sprung for a tiramisu desert and we’re happy we did because it was so good. Then it was time to go back to the Airbnb to try and fail to get an Italian movie with English subtitles on Netflix.

Saturday, July 23

Naples

Years ago I saw a picture of a sculpture of the veiled Christ on Instagram and had saved the name of the museum to be able to one day see it. Well the day had finally come! Lessons learned from Florence, we got tickets to the Museo Cappella Sansevero ahead of time but then realized we didn’t really need to.

The museum is just one room, a chapel, filled with art commissioned by Prince Raimondo di Sangro of Sansevero house in the 18th century. Actually, the whole building and the things inside were from his vision of creating the most beautiful place. Prince Raimondo was an interesting character who dabbled in art and science, wrote a book that was banned by the Christian church, invented things like paint colors and machines, and wrote his own (humble brag) eulogy.

No photography is allowed inside the museum, so we spent more time reading the museum explanations and staring at the sculptures. The veiled Christ wasn’t as impressive as I had thought it would be, but my expectations were high. The most impressive sculpture was one of a man coming out from a fishing net, where the net was all marble.

In a twist of events, the museum included a visit to the underground area where two life-size anatomical sculptures of a man and a women are kept. These sculptures show just their circulatory system and were so detailed that modern day art historians debate how they were made. It is clear they were dissecting bodies at this point but unclear how they recreated even the teeny tiny veins and placed them so accurately.

We finished the museum in about half an hour, which was much shorter than we had expected. So we went to a cafe (same one we had been to before) to get a babá, sfogiatella, and coffee.

Then we walked around for another hour killing time before our next scheduled museum tour. We walked down one street that had very perfect rows of laundry hanging above us. They seemed too perfectly spaced, and the laundry ropes tied too tight so we came to the conclusion that they were actually fake lines, for tourists like us to ogle at.

Near here we bought a tiny Naples red horn as a souvenir. These things look like chili peppers but it’s actually a really old school good luck charm to ward off evil spirits (one blog said a bloody horn of an animal).

When we showed up to the Lapis museum, they said we were at the wrong time and the English tour was at 3pm. So we went back to the Airbnb to chill ourselves and wait for 3pm. Carl got a haircut and I took a nap and then it was time again.

We had seen and learned about the Lapis museum on our walking tour. Our guide told us that the church was the lapis church because of a stone that was given to it, which now sits outside and you can rub for good luck.

The church has been renovated to be used as an art space and a museum for the history of the original aqueduct of Naples. We took the ‘water museum tour’ to see the aqueduct and the underground areas converted into bomb shelters during WWII.

The guide was knowledgeable and nice, but he talked as we were walking down stairs so we often couldn’t hear him. But it was cool to descend 30+ meters below ground to see the old water chambers and passageways. They’ve artificially filled a couple of these chambers so tourists can see what it would’ve looked like. For the others, the guide showed how people in WWII would have sat underground for hours or days waiting for the bombs to stop.

At one point the guide played a video for us, which projected onto the ceiling above us. The video was about 3 minutes long and was a scene of airplanes bombing the building we were in, with walls falling away and the blue sky being revealed. It was fine, but about 2 minutes too long. The guide said there was another video of a Napolitan husband and wife bickering while in the bomb shelter but the guide wouldn’t show us because it was all in Italian and the translation wouldn’t be as funny.

We were only underground for about an hour which was sad because it was so nice and cool down there. When we emerged again we debated sneaking back in to sleep in the caves at night.

Feeling peckish, we realized we hadn’t been to the world’s oldest pizzeria and that 4pm would be a perfect, not busy, time. We walked over to Antica Pizzeria Port’Alba and were happy to find them open and not busy. Turns out they do close at 5pm for a break between lunch and dinner, so our timing was perfect.

We got spritzes (Aperol and Hugo) and a DOC pizza to share. It had Buffalo mozzarella, basil, and the best pear tomatoes I’ve ever had. The dough was perfectly salted and chewy. There was no tomato sauce between the dough and the cheese. And it was dripping with oil. It was so good, and very likely the best pizza we’ve ever had.

Since we ate at a weird time we went to the store and got some mozzarella, basil, and tomatoes for a late night snack later. We went back to our Airbnb to enjoy the AC and prepare ourselves for the next day’s journey to the Amalfi coast.

Thursday, July 14

We checked out of our hotel and got coffees and pastries from our favorite corner cafe again. Just as we were headed out we asked the front desk guy where the nearest taxi stand is so we could get one to the bus station. “Oh no no no!” he said, “there is a taxi strike! Don’t take a taxi.” We freaked out for a second before he told us there is a light rail next to the train station that would take us directly to the bus station.

It was one of the easiest things. We bought tickets at a little stand and the light rail came almost immediately. It was a quick ride out into the country side and then we found ourselves at the bus station an hour before our scheduled bus.

So we got a sandwich and hung out in the air conditioning. The bus came right on time. The bus ride to Rome was smooth and went by quick. One man stunk so bad of stale cigarettes I thought I might be sick and another man was sniffing snot back into his head so loudly and aggressively that I thought he was going to be sick. Luckily we were driving through beautiful Tuscany and I noticed many of the fields were completely full of giant sunflowers.

As we neared the Rome bus station I started a text conversation with our Airbnb host. He said there were also taxi protests in Rome and that the police had blocked off several major streets which would affect our ability to take the bus. He gave us new instructions: take the metro line A and then one of three potential buses.

We got the metro, found the bus stops, got on one of them. Immediately it had to veer off its scheduled course because of street closures. We watched our location on google maps as we went the wrong way for several blocks and then the driver corrected and we went back toward our stop. Hurray! We got out and walked through a maze of really old streets to our Airbnb, right in the middle of the Jewish Ghetto. The street is filled with Jewish-style Italian restaurants that we couldn’t wait to try.

We met our host and he showed us the four keys needed to open the four doors to the apartment (two for the front, two for the apartment). He also showed us that the AC is broken but that if you drain off the water (which only takes five minutes) it works fine. He didn’t mention that this draining needed to happen about every hour, which we found out pretty quickly.

We found the nearest grocery store and stocked up with dinner, breakfast, and cocktail supplies. We went ahead and bought a bottle of Prosecco and Aperol because we were having so many Aperol spritzes we might as well make them ourselves and save some euros.

We made a nice Italian dinner of ravioli and sausages. While we were cooking the door buzzer went off and wouldn’t stop buzzing. I ran outside to see if someone was pressing the button, but no one was there. It buzzed sporadically whenever someone entered the building. Then, for no apparent reason, it turned on and stayed on and it was SO LOUD. I messaged our host and he had no idea what was wrong. Thankfully, it finally stopped.

After dinner we went to the Campo de’ Fiori to meet our guide for a ghost tour! There was a good group of people on the tour: two younger Californian girls, a family of four from Belgium, two women from The Netherlands, and two couples from England that admitted they arrived in Rome earlier that afternoon and had been drinking since.

Our guide did not immediately tell us where she was from but later revealed that she was from Peru but her dad worked in Italy in the Brazilian embassy. This personal story was revealed because the Brazilian embassy building is one of the prettiest in Rome, a former palace. Our guide told a story of the woman that used to live in the palace and how she still haunts the embassy to this day.

We also learned about poor Giordano Bruno, who was tortured and killed by the Catholic Church because he believed the earth was not the center of the universe. They burned him slowly at the stake in 1600 in Campo de’ Fiori, right where we stood. This plaza is now filled with restaurants and bars and is one of the only squares in Rome where you can’t see a church.

Our guide led us along and told a range of stories about ghosts, prisons, “witches”, executioners and trash. We stopped at one spot where she read a sign in Latin that said ‘do not dump your trash here’ under which was a big pile of trash. Even funnier, while we stood there the garbage truck came and they loaded the bags in because that was a designated garbage spot!

Sadly, the thing we had wanted to see most was a church full of bone sculptures that is under renovation (and apparently has been for a while). Still, we could look at the outside and the cool carved poster that says “today I die, tomorrow, you” and has a slot under it for donations. The church was used by a group of monks who took on the task of collecting the city’s dead during the plague years. With so many body parts and the river overflowing all the time (so burying was tricky) they repurposed bones to make chandeliers, crosses, and other churchy objects.

We ended at Ponte (bridge) Sant’Angelo which crosses the Tiber River to Castel Sant’Angelo. Our guide explained that the woman that haunts the Brazilian embassy is sometimes seen escaping over this bridge in her chariot, late at night. The bridge also goes into the neighborhood of Trastevere, where tons of bars and clubs are. Drunks are typically better attuned to seeing ghosts, so this tracks.

We said goodbye to the group and Carl and I crossed the bridge to look at the Castle up close. Our guide had mentioned that it used to be less castle-y and more monument-y but that the popes had erected a secreted passageway out of the Vatican to the castle and had subsequently fortified it.

We walked back toward our Airbnb along the river. All of a sudden we saw something huge and bright orange in the sky. It was the moon!! It was hanging low in the horizon and it was just about as big and as deep orange as we’ve ever seen it. We called it our Aperol moon and took that as a sign to go home and have a spritz.

The door buzzer didn’t go off anymore so we reasoned it must have been ghosts that were appeased by the Aperol and olives we left out for them.

Friday, July 15

Carl made an ‘Italian-American breakfast’ of eggs with Asiago cheese, grilled tomatoes and prosciutto. Yum! Then we walked over to the Pantheon. It was only about 10am and it was already HOT.

When we arrived to the Pantheon I didn’t recognize it because the outside was so drab. Back in its day, it would’ve been covered in bronze and marble. But, these materials have all been pilfered for other buildings such as the bronze altar in the Vatican.

We got audio guides which was a nice change of pace for us. It was a good guide but so heavily focused on all the Christian sculptures and paintings and didn’t delve enough into the symbolic architecture. It did mention how the oculus, the hole in the middle of the dome, let’s in sunlight in accordance with times of the year. For example, at noon on the summer solstice, the beam of light hits the front entrance. During the winter solstice, the beam highlights the high altar.

From the Pantheon it was a short walk to the Trevi Fountain. I had seen pictures of the Trevi Fountain online but did not expect it to be as big and shiny and bright as it was. There were also a million tourists yelling, pushing, and jostling to get a cute photo. It was hot and loud so we quickly took our photos and left.

To cool down we swung over to Il Gelato di San Crispino, where our guide the night before told us the Pope gets his gelato. The gelato was in metal tins with muted colors, unlike the piles of color at other shops. Our guide had told us this was a sign of real gelato. We tried the wild honey and the pistachio, with the honey gelato being some of the best we’ve had in Italy.

Not quite ready to call it quits, we walked over to Piazza Venezia to check out the massive monument sometimes referred to as the ‘typewriter’ which stands almost in the middle of Rome.

It was free entry and the path led us up the steps, through the building, and up to the lookout on the other side. We could see the Colosseum and the Vatican’s dome. There was an option to take an elevator to the top but it was 12 euro and did I mention it was SO HOT?!

It was a short walk back to our Airbnb and we decided to get a big lunch at a Jewish-Italian restaurant. We went to Giggetto, which was recommended to us by Faby (our guide from over a week ago) and our Airbnb host, so we figured it must be good.

We got Jewish-style fried artichoke and fried, anchovie filled zucchini flower, which was weird but good. We split spaghetti carbonara which was very eggy and cheesy, and roast lamb. The lamb was a big ol’ hunk of meat but it was flavorful and good.

Stuffed and hot, we went back to our Airbnb to chill in the AC for a while. I worked on the blog and Carl booked day trips for us for the upcoming weeks. The AC shut off about every hour and Carl had to go turn it off and drain it. Meanwhile, I kept us fully quenched with multiple rounds of Aperol spritzes.

Saturday, July 16

We had booked a looong tour of the Vatican to make sure we saw everything. This meant starting at 7:30am which meant leaving our Airbnb at 6:45am. Despite trying to rest up the day before, I hadn’t slept well and woke up with a sore throat and a headache. I decided to wear a mask and power through.

We met up with our tour group at one of the fountains outside the basilica. Our guide, Sara, asked us to take note of how long the line was because later we would see how the line would lengthen across the courtyard and around with a wait time of over an hour. Getting there at 7:30 meant we could get through faster, and with fewer tourists already inside.

Sara pointed out the Swiss guards, who are guards that were born in Switzerland and specially trained to protect the pope at all costs. They still wear the same red and yellow outfit as was designed in the 1500s to match the house colors of the pope that instated them.

She led us into the plaza and up to the dome climb. There was an elevator for part of it and then a series of winding stairs that followed the curve of the dome, all the way up. From the top we could feel a nice breeze and look out onto all of Rome. At some point Rome declared that no building could be built taller than the Vatican Dome so we really did have the best view of the city from up there.

When we got back down we were given a chance to look at the inside of the Basilica which was covered in every direction with gold. We also saw Michelangelo’s sculpture, Pietà, which depicts Mary holding Jesus. In the 1970s a man attacked the sculpture and broke off Mary’s nose and fingers. The sculpture was restored, but now sits behind bullet-proof glass.

Sara led us down into the crypts where we could see the original church’s foundations and columns and the tombs of popes that did not make it to be Saints, and so could not be buried in the basilica itself. We went back outside and were led to a cafe to buy coffees and snacks before the next part of the tour.

Sara led us around to the museum entrance. Some people left our group and some new people joined. There was a family of four that joined and seemed to be having a melt down from the start.

Sara told us that if we spent one second looking at every artifact in the Vatican museums we would be there for a whole year. We didn’t believe her until she led us through a maze of rooms filled with items. There were sculptures, tapestries, pantings, pottery, jewelry, etc. The museum consists of items collected by popes since the 16th century.

As she led us around she mentioned a story about one time a tour participant asked where the emergency exits are. They asked, “what happens when there’s a fire?” Well, the building was built hundreds of years before the idea of building codes were invented. Plus, the Vatican has their own fire fighters who are the ones responsible for building a new stove every time a new pope is chosen. So, if there is a fire? You have to pray your way out.

Among our favorite sections were the map gallery which shows maps painted in 1580 of Italy and the world as seen from the pope’s perspective (so southern Italy is upside down).

Also the Raphael rooms which are four rooms painted by Raphael in early 1500s and intended for apartment rooms for Pope Julius II. The frescoes take up all of the visual space of the walls and ceiling. The most famous and interesting fresco was The School of Athens which depicts famous people like Aristotle, Plato, Euclid, and Ptolemy just hanging out and chatting to each other.

Finally, it was time to see the Sistine Chapel and the massive ceiling and wall frescoes done by Michelangelo within which is the famous, The Creation of Adam. By this point in the tour, several participants had dropped off like flies, including that poor family with two whiny kids. Before the chapel Sara said goodbye and we were left to see it for ourselves and find the exit.

She didn’t accompany us into the chapel because it is considered a holy place of worship and you are not supposed to talk (or take pictures). But imagine telling hundreds of people not to talk as they pile into an enclosed room the length and width of a high school gym and strain their necks to look at famous works of art above them. The guards had a microphone and kept asking people to be silent, but it was useless.

Carl and I tried to whisper to each other what we thought each of the paintings were depicting (and later found we were mostly correct) and to point out interesting features. Carl pointed out an image of a cat and dog fighting at the base of the table in a painting of the Last Supper. As if we were in high school, I said the dog looked just like a possum and we started uncontrollably laughing under our breath at the thought that Michelangelo thought it was important to show a cat and possum fighting during the last supper.

We exited the chapel and tried to find the exit from the Vatican but we were looped around another maze of rooms. We went through more museum rooms, a food court, the gardens, and several gift shops before being spat out in front of the museum entrance. From there we walked all the way around the Vatican and back across the Tiber river to our Airbnb.

It was 2pm and it was so hot and we felt exhausted. We took a nap and shower and recovered ourselves by dinner time.

For dinner we decided to try one of the famous restaurants we’d heard about in Trastevere, the hip neighborhood just across the river from us. We found the first place on our list, Trattoria de Enzo, and the line outside of it stretched down the whole block. Several people had Aperol spritzes in hand, suggesting they had prepared for the wait they were about to endure.

We didn’t have that much patience so we went to place number two, Nannarella, and were able to get a table for two inside just before a big line formed. We ordered the bruschetta sampler, Nanarella noodles with eggplant, olives, capers, tomatoes, and the meatballs in oxtail sauce. We also got a bottle of the house red wine which came in a very stained Chianti bottle.

We stuffed ourselves and it didn’t help that the water was sparkling, not still, so we were the most full we had felt in a long time. We waddled back to our Airbnb and vowed to not eat so much next time.

Sunday, July 17

We didn’t have set plans for the day, having already done all of our bucket list items for Rome. I woke up feeling more sick, and I think Carl’s sickness crept up on him as the day wore on.

We decided to go see Pope Francis for the Sunday midday blessing and then get lunch and go from there. We walked over to the Vatican and had to go through two different security checks before being allowed to enter the main plaza.

We stood, sweating, in the direct sun, waiting for the Pope to come out from his teeny tiny window. What little shade there was underneath the colonnade was packed shoulder to shoulder with people, and we wouldn’t have been able to see his window from there anyway.

But he came out promptly at noon and spoke, in Italian, for 13 minutes. All around us people were cheering for Pope Francis as if he were a soccer star. At one point they even sung, “Oleeeeeé, olé, olé, olé, Papaaaa, Francis” We couldn’t understand the sermon in Italian but we did here him mention Sri Lanka and the indigenous people in Canada, so we know he was somehow weaving current events into his blessing.

Afterward we walked back toward our Airbnb and went to a restaurant we had spotted before, just on the edge of Campi de Fiori. We got one of the last tables and sat down before realizing we had no idea how expensive the place was. We ordered Aperol Spritzes and two pastas to share. We got gnocchi with tomato sauce and mozzarella and a thick, spaghetti-like noodle with greens and bits of fried pork cheek that was probably the best dish we’ve had in Italy.

Learning our lesson from the day before, we got the remnants of the gnocchi boxed up and went home to nap away the hot hours. To save money and stay cool we decided to have omelettes of leftovers for dinner. Then we finally watched Roman Holiday.

Monday, July 18

We had to check out at 10am but our bus to Naples wasn’t until 3pm. We figured we may as well head to the bus station, where google said there were some cafés, and hang out there versus a café in the city.

When we arrived at the bus station we realized our plan was a mistake. The FlixBus stop had no signs. We recognized where we had been dropped off several days before and this lat/long matched the spot on google maps for FlixBus but other than that there was absolutely no way of knowing that’s where the bus would be. The random spot in the parking lot was fully in the sun with no seating. So we set off to find a café to pass the hours in.

We then realized that all the cafés were across a highway. We crossed underground using the metro path and then walked along the freeway to a place that had eight 5 star reviews. Walking along a busy freeway in 96 degrees, with all our stuff on our backs, and a stuffy nose was a literal hell.

We got to Gusto & Style restaurant and were happy to find it open and staffed with a very nice (Albanian?) family that spoke no English. As we walked in they looked shocked at our appearance and said in Italian “very hot outside!” as they rushed to turn on every fan they owned and point it at us. We got a weird pizza to share (prosciutto, black olive, artichoke hearts, and boiled egg). We took our time eating and were able to kill a couple hours.

Not wanting to overstay (and in need of WiFi) we left and walked back up the hell street to a smaller, greasier looking café called Tex cafe where we got espressos and WiFi.

Too early we walked back to the bus station. There was a flea market type area with EZ ups covering tables piled with clothes selling for 1 Euro or even .5 Euro. Carl got a lightweight long sleeve shirt and I got an iPhone headphones adaptor (because I had just left mine at the Airbnb).

We found an area under a tree that was in the shade, adjacent to a pile of trash, but near where the bus was supposed to come. We joked that we should’ve got some beers to drink out of paper bags to really set the scene. Perhaps even a fire in a metal trash can.

As we stood there, 6 different people came up and asked us where the FlixBus stop was. We said that we could make no guarantees, but we thought it was right there (pointing to the spot of asphalt a couples meters away that was literally sizzling).

One guy with a European accent smiled and replied, “ok, we also pray”. An (Italian?) woman set her stuff down in the dirt, right next to ours, as if we had adopted her. Two guys that asked us then said they would be right back, that they wanted to buy something at the market, and then they never came back.

Right on time the bus pulled up and a confused throng of people came out of bushes and other hiding spots to climb onto the bus. The Italian woman that we had adopted went up to the driver and yelled at him to which he shrugged off quietly, cigarette in mouth, both hands up in the air.

For the record, our bus ticket was 4 Euro per person for the 3 hour journey from Rome to Naples. While it wasn’t a pleasant wait, perhaps that’s what a cheap bus ride wait is all about.

The ride went by fast despite two young Canadian (?) girls talking SO loudly, gossiping terribly about their friends (poor Jules), the time they overdosed (!!), and telling very awful boring stories about Ryan Air flights and lost vape pens. Finally they fell asleep and we rode into Naples…

San Gimignano

Thursday, July 7

We took the metro to the bus station and found our bus (FlixBus) pretty easily. Then we had about 45 minutes to wait outside on crowded benches. When we finally boarded there was only about 10 of us and the bus didn’t make local stops so it was a straight shot from Rome to Tuscany for about 3.5 hours.

We got out at a town called Poggibonsi and navigated to the local bus stop to take another bus. We weren’t sure how to buy tickets and it wasn’t until the bus showed up and we waved some euros at the driver that he told us to buy a ticket at the office, pointing behind us. He asked which bus we wanted and we indicated his. He made the ‘hurry, hurry’ hand motion so we ran to the ticket office and got tickets just in time. We still could barely pronounce San Gimignano and the ticket office guy gave us the most dramatic ‘huh?’ look. We said ‘San Jimmy!’ and he understood and laughed.

The bus dropped us off at the town’s South Gate. We were staying close to the north gate but when we asked to go one stop further he just wagged his finger at us so we got off and walked through the town.

San Gimignano is a medieval, walled town on a hilltop in Tuscany. It is famous for its six ‘skyscrapers’ which are tall, stone towers built by wealthy families in the area as a way of showing off. So some people refer to it as a medieval Manhattan.

We walked through the gate into the walled city and it felt like we were in a dream. The streets are narrow and cobbled and cars aren’t allowed inside. There are tourist shops selling Tuscan leather, cheese, wine, and boar meat plus lots of different souvenirs. There were a good amount of tourists and most of them had American accents. We were not unique travelers traveling during a pandemic anymore.

We walked through to the North Wall and found our Airbnb. We ran into the owner just as he was leaving to come pick us up in his car on the south side. He showed us into the most adorable, old apartment. It was surprisingly big but didn’t have air conditioning so it was stuffy and hot. He explained where everything was while I stared at the tiny fan that wasn’t on yet. Finally he let us be and we opened the windows to let some air flow in.

By this time it was about 7pm and we were hungry. Eating at 7 is early for Italians so we figured we could get a table at a nice place without a reservation. We googled best restaurants and found a steak place nearby. We did indeed get there early enough to not need a reservation, and they had tables outside in the courtyard.

As we walked outside I heard someone say my name…it was Leah! She and her HUSBAND Daniel had chosen the same restaurant at the same time! We didn’t want to disrupt their romantic dinner so we didn’t join them but just sat awkwardly nearby, close enough to still catch their eye and hear their conversations with the waiter. It was serendipitous and awkwardly funny.

We ordered a burrata salad, steak tartare, and a huge steak with rosemary potatoes. The burrata came with greens, cherry tomatoes and a pesto sauce and it was the best burrata we’ve ever had. Chef’s kiss. The steak tartare was good, but not revolutionary. The main event steak was cooked rare and had maldon salt on it. It was so good.

We paired everything with a bottle of Pinot Noir from San Jimmy that was good and not too expensive. The meal itself ended up being our most expensive meal on the trip, as if it was OUR honeymoon meal in Tuscany. But we thoroughly enjoyed it and have no ragrets.

We told Leah and Daniel we would see them the next day and we stumbled back to our apartment to watch an hour of Gladiator before going to sleep.

Friday, July 8

Happy Birthday Leah!

We slept in and awoke to the sound of four Italian men arguing in the courtyard outside our bathroom. Once we were ready, we headed across the walled city to the other side to find the cheap grocery store our Airbnb host had recommended.

We got supplies for our picnic later and some fruit tarts that we enjoyed on a shady park bench just before diving back into the walled city. We rested in our cute little apartment until that afternoon.

Leah and Daniel had rented a car so they picked us up and drove us to a nearby town to a trailhead that Leah had read about. The trail went along a creek that, for some reason, had beautiful milky blue water. There were tons of people picnicking and swimming in the water. It was beautiful. We regretted not bringing our swimsuits.

We found a quiet spot in the shade and laid out our blanket and picnic supplies. It was nice, but absolutely infested with mosquitos. We talked and ate while nonstop swatting them away. We finished the sweet wine I had bought in the Budapest airport and decided it wasn’t worth it to sit there any longer.

Daniel and Leah had heard that the town where the trailhead was had better nightlife than San Jimmy. They recommended we get a cocktail and some tiramisu somewhere to celebrate Leah’s birthday. We found a place in town that had cocktails and pastries, but no tiramisu. Daniel went on a hunt while the rest of us sat on the patio and sipped our Hugo Spritzes. Finally he returned with a tiramisu ice cream cake. It wasn’t traditional, but it was tasty.

When we were done it was almost 10pm so Leah and Daniel drove us back to San Jimmy and dropped us off at our Airbnb. They might move to CA so we told them we would meet them there.

Saturday, July 9

We started the day with hiking up one of the medieval towers called Torre Grossa. We climbed the stairs to the top floor and then a ladder to the roof. The Torre Grossa was built by the government when they mandated that no towers could’ve built higher than it. The privately owned towers nearby circumvented this rule by building two towers that were almost as tall.

From the top we admired the Tuscan scenery, with vineyards as far as we could see, and the chaotic layout of the medieval walled city. We climbed back down and checked out the many Christian paintings and sculptures in the museum on the first floor.

We went back to our Airbnb to eat some breakfast and do some laundry before wandering around the city some more. We were grateful the Airbnb had a washer but the drying system was a line that hung over the pedestrian street. We felt awkward hanging all our clothes above the tourists walking by but the clothes ended up drying SO quickly and didn’t fall or get bird poop on them, so it worked out well.

We found a medieval fountain and several viewpoints. We tried to get lost by taking random tunnels left and right but we somehow ended up at the main square.

The gelato place was staring at us so we had to get some. I got a flavor of grapefruit and champagne that blew my mind. Carl got lavender and mixed berry that was also phenomenal. We sat in the shade and people watched before winding our way back to our apartment.

That evening (5pm which feels like noon because it’s so hot and the sun doesn’t set until 10pm) we went to a wine tasting. On the top of a hill on the west side of the town is a place called La Roca that offers different types of wine tasting. We went for the ‘Superior’ experience which includes 6 wines and lasts for 1.5 hours.

We were surprised to learn that the tasting would include 5 white wines of the same grape varietal, Vernaccia, and one red. We had thought the famous Tuscan wine would all be red but were pleasantly surprised to learn about the Vernaccia which is heavily regulated to earn the mark of ‘Denominazione di origine controllata e garantita’ (DOCG).

The first one was the most citrusy and minerally, and they seemed to grow more buttery and complex as we tried them. Carl and I want to learn more about wine and this experience made us realize that even the same grape from the same place can taste so different.

The tour was led by a man who worked at the shop, which seemed to be a center for the DOCG. He let us have a final glass from our favorite and sit and chat with the other participants for a while. One guy was from Vancouver and was traveling alone having just finished his medical residency. There was also a couple from Kansas City, Missouri who were SO nice and they convinced us that Kansas City is full of nicer people and better housing prices than anything we will find in CA.

We talked with them for so long that eventually our guide had to kick us out so they could close up the shop. We said goodbye and went back to our Airbnb to have a drunken dinner of the leftovers from our picnic the day before. We started watching a Netflix original dramatized documentary about Julius Cesar, called Rome, and it was actually really good!

Florence

Sunday, July 10

We checked out of our Airbnb and walked through the middle of town to find a cafe to hang out at for a bit. We landed at the one that serves gelato and claims to have the world’s best gelato which is right next door to the gold medal winning gelateria we had gone to the day before.

We got cappuccinos and a tiramisu. The tiramisu was so elaborately decorated that it felt like my birthday. It was also so very good.

When it was time, we got the bus to Poggibonsi. While looking up directions, google told us that there was a strike and trains were being canceled. Somehow, gratefully, our train wasn’t canceled but the other trains going to Florence were, so our train was especially packed.

When we boarded it was like a comedy. There were people sitting in the aisle so we couldn’t move past them and where there weren’t people there were massive suitcases. Then a guy with a bike got on and left his bike in the very middle as he went to use the bathroom, whose door many people were leaning against causing ever more shuffling.

We managed to scooch in further to the train, away from the door, and then miraculously found fold down seats that our bags could fit under. We watched at the next stop as three more bikes, two strollers, and more honeymooning couples with massive roller bags tried to squeeze on.

Finally we made it through the hour journey to Florence, the final stop, and everyone got off. We walked just a couple blocks from the train station to our hotel. The man that checked us in was much more laid back than we were feeling. He took our passports and showed us to our room.

We came back downstairs to collect our passports and pay and he looked at us like we were crazy. He said he needed time to copy the passport information and that we could pay later (some undetermined time). He also said he’d let us know (later) whether we could stay another two nights as I had requested via email because Hostelworld did not have a function to modify the reservation.

So we relaxed, changed clothes, and went down again in 20 minutes to get our passports and find something to eat. We landed at the first pizza place we saw and got a table for two outside. We tried melon (cantaloupe) with prosciutto and it was really nice.

The herb pizza with tomato we ordered was soggy and they didn’t fool us when they put big Roma tomatoes instead of cherry tomatoes as the menu had described. But the table bread was good and they provided oil and balsamic so we doused everything in that.

Then we decided to stroll around the city and see what appeared to us serendipitously. We planned to do a free walking tour the following day so we used the time to just explore (free time as Karen likes to call it). We first walked to the Arno river which runs through the middle of the city. We strolled along for a bit until Ponte Vecchio, a medieval bridge lined with jewelry stores.

We later learned that the bridge used to be lined with butcher shops but that the city’s benefactors, the Medici family, didn’t like the smell of meat on their way across the bridge to their palace so they required all the stores to be gold shops instead.

We turned toward the city center and walked up the main road to Piazza della Signoria. The Palazza Vecchio, a previous Medici palace turned museum, sits on this square as well as a bunch of sculptures including one of Neptune, Medusa being beheaded, and an exact replica of Michelangelo’s David.

We followed the throngs of tourists up the main road to the Santa Maria Cathedral (Cattedrale di Santa Maria del Fiore). This medieval church is covered in beautiful red, white, and green marble (Italian colors) and has a dome, bell tower, baptistery and a crypt.

On the back side of the domed building there is a row of restaurants that follow the curved shape of the building. We paused at one offering a drink deal and decided to get a Negroni and an americano (Negroni with soda water) and admire the backside of the cathedral. It was also an awesome place to people watch.

So far, touring Italy it seems like all of America is here. Every tourist accent we overhear is American and there are hoards of them. There are also a lot of people from Spain, who are also very loud when talking in public. We are glad the world is healing and people feel ready to travel but we regret not getting to Europe sooner, before everyone else. Still, being here has made us realize how lucky we were to see sites like Machu Picchu and Angkor Wat all to ourselves.

From here we passed by an Italian author’s book reading on the street before coming to another church, that of Santa Maria Novella. Also beautifully decorated in marble, on the top of this church there is an image of a baby face in a sun that just reminded us of teletubbies.

We walked back to our hotel and, still full from a late lunch, decided to skip any formal dinner and just get a couple beers at the local bar/cafe on the corner.

Monday, July 11

Upon awakening we discovered that, not only was the hotel bed awful, but the room had several mosquitos that had been feasting on us throughout the night. Carl got a very unfortunately placed bite on his eyelid that swelled and made him look like Quasimodo. He put his contacts in and sunglasses on to try and hide his monster face.

We started our day with a trip to our now favorite corner bar/cafe to get coffees and pastries. The same guy was working there that had been there the night before.

Our only plan for the day was to take a free walking tour and then see where the day takes us. We joined up with the tour in a parking lot near the train station. There were so many people that they divided the tour into two groups. We were assigned to the cutely dressed, short Italian woman with a thick Italian accent.

She led us over to a corner of the parking lot and began telling us about Florence and the Medici family. She was holding the microphone to her mouth (instead of using the headset) and had the speaker hanging from her waist (instead of her neck) which saved her outfit from being affected but prevented the intended sound quality every time she shifted.

We gathered around a parked car that, of course, the owner came to drive away and then another person drove in to fill the spot. There was also some construction going on behind us that seemed to echo along the walls. As a result of all this, we could barely hear our guide. We shuffled to get closer to her and then just had to hope it would get better.

At the next stopping point our guide may as well have been riding the jackhammer herself. We were in a terrible spot, so close to construction, with not enough area to gather around her. Carl and I just looked at each other and laughed because we couldn’t hear anything. For the rest of the tour I shoved my way toward the front of the group and caught the gist of what she told us. Later, talking to Carl, it became apparent he hadn’t heard a single word she had said, but enjoyed looking at the sites nonetheless.

She looped us around the city central and we actually stopped at many of the sites we had seen the day before. We learned about the wealthy Medici family and how they sponsored great names like Leonardo Da Vinci, Michelangelo, and even Galileo, until he was accused of heresy.

Our guide also pointed out good markets to buy souvenirs, where to get cocktails later, and the street, Via dei Neri, where we could find the best focaccia sandwiches and the original gelato.

After the tour we went back to Via dei Neri and got a prosciutto sandwich on focaccia with mozzarella and mushroom sauce. The sandwich place, All’Antico Vinaio, has multiple store fronts and no seating. Lines of hungry people wrap around the street and the curbs are full of people squatting, happily munching on their massive sandwiches.

We shared one so that we could save room for gelato. The Gelateria dei Neri has the supposed original gelato flavor, Buontalenti, named after architect Bernardo Buontalenti who is claimed to have invited gelato when he mixed together milk, cream, eggs, and sugar. I got Buontalenti and liked it though it’s really subtle. Carl got black cherry that was quintessential Italian gelato (and absolutely delicious).

Afterward we considered going to the Santa Maria Cathedral and going up the bell tower but the tickets that included the dome were all sold out, so we decided to wait. Then we considered going to one of the many art museums but discovered that all the public museums are closed on Mondays.

So we settled for the Galileo museum. The Galileo museum should instead be called the scientific instruments museum because it is overflowing with every kind of scientific tool from microscopes to telescopes, but it has little in terms of anything related to Galileo himself.

The museum does have Galileo’s middle finger on display, for some untold reason. There were also a display of terrestrial and celestial globes that we found interesting, and a collection of terra cotta cut-away replicas of babies coming out of the canal the wrong way (used for educational purposes).

It was hot and we had no other goals for the day so we went back to the hotel to rest before dinner. For dinner we asked the front desk guy where to eat. He recommended Osteria dei Centopoveri, just down the street.

We got there at the exact right time and were able to get a table without a reservation. We started with an appetizer of prosciutto and burrata that was (obviously) delicious. Then we shared a plate of gnocchi with cheese and rocket and wide noodles with boar sauce. Confident from our recent wine tasting experience, we ordered a bottle of Tuscan white wine and we ended up really liking it.

Tuesday, July 12

Too late we realized we should have bought timed tickets to the Accademia Gallery to see Michelangelo’s sculpture of David. All the timed tickets were sold out so we decided to get to the museum as soon as it opened and see what happened.

They opened at 8:15am. We showed up just after 8am and there was already a sizeable line. We realized that they accepted people from the timed entry line at their designated time and then let in about 8 more people from the commoners line, our line. Carl and I debated whether to stay, knowing we had a train booked for 11:30am out to Pisa.

We decided to stay until 10am to see what would happen. As luck would have it, we were the last two people that they let in at 10am. Once they let us in we tried not to rush immediately to the David. But when we turned a corner we saw him standing underneath a huge glass dome at the end of the hall and it really was phenomenal. We had seen an exact replica standing outside the Palazza Vecchio (where the original once stood) but somehow the original seemed so much greater.

We took our time to look at the David, walk around, and take photos. We couldn’t agree on whether the statue was supposed to depict David before or after he slayed the giant.

Then we wandered around the rest of the museum which wasn’t much. It mostly consisted of lots and lots of gothic or renaissance artist’s paintings of biblical scenes. So many baby Jesuses, so many Jesus on the cross, so many Virgin Marys.

At least we figured out that John the Baptist is always looking disheveled and often wearing a camel hair dress. Any Catholics reading this might be thinking ‘well, duh’ but we had never seen enough of him, repeatedly, until this museum. We also later discovered that St John is the patron saint of Florence, which helps to explain why he is in every painting.

Satisfied with our visit we left just before 11am and had time to get a tripe sandwich before hopping on the train. The sandwich, Lampredotto, is the fourth stomach of a cow. It comes with a spicy sauce that mostly masks the fact you’re eating guts, but not quite enough. We didn’t even get a chance to eat it because when we got on the train we had to wear masks. Also we ended up sitting across from each other because the train was so full, we were lucky to get seats at all.

Pisa

When we got off at Pisa we walked the long way around the station (on accident) and ate the rest of the sandwich. We walked into town and across the river toward the leaning tower.

We couldn’t see the tower until we turned a corner and we were basically right under it. It was leaning more than I had imagined and apparently they had just fixed it in the early 2000s to not lean so far.

We took some photos and then bought tickets to ascend into the tower later. We decided to get some food and maybe some WiFi to google how safe it was to go up this janky tower…

A woman at the tourist office told us about two places that serve authentic Pisa-style pizza. By the time we got to the first one, Il Montino, they were closing for lunch and not serving pizza. So we walked back across the river to the train station and went to Nando’s which google described as a ‘no fuss’ pizzeria.

We ordered at the counter and they later brought us our pizza, cut into two perfect half circles and served on two plates. We got one with speck (pork belly) and gorgonzola and it was really, really good. We had wanted to kill some time at the restaurant but, being a ‘no fuss’ kind of place, it didn’t feel right to sit there too long (and they seemed to be closing for lunch).

We walked back up the main drag and found a place offering drink specials so we got an aperol spritz and a Hugo spritz that both came with a free slice of pizza with capers on it. It was pretty good!

Then it was time for our trip up the tower. When we first went in they had us wait inside at the base. The floor was SO sloped, it was like being in a fun house. Then we climbed the 220 + something steps up the stone, spiral staircase to the top. With each step we could feel what side of the tower we were on and it felt like the outer wall was either leaning in toward us or away- it was trippy.

At the top we had 360 degree views of Pisa and surrounding Tuscany. Then we were allowed to go up another, smaller, spiral staircase to the very top. It was a little scary being up there and the metal gates they had installed did not give much comfort. One man near us tripped on the steps and I just about had a heart attack because I thought he was a goner (he was fine though).

From the top looking down onto the town (especially to the East) you could tell we weren’t standing on level ground and it created a weird optical illusion that actually made me kind of nauseous.

Back at the base again we took a few more photos before deciding to walk toward the train station to kill a few hours with another cocktail. We got some more Aperol Spritzes that came with potato chips, peanuts, and mini focaccia sandwiches: dinner!

When we got to the train station there was an earlier train to Florence that hadn’t left yet. We decided to play it safe and get our assigned train at 8pm and then regretted it when a smaller (and we would find, un- air conditioned) train showed up for our departure time. Still, it is so nice to be in a country where public transit is so easy.

Florence

Wednesday, July 13

Having learned our lesson with a long wait to get into the Accademia gallery, we booked tickets ahead of time for both the Uffizi gallery and the Duomo.

Before heading to the gallery we stopped at our corner café, which we discovered is part of a chain called Moka Arra. The same guy was working there that had been working two mornings before and the evening shift. We watched, impressed, as he managed the cafe by taking orders, delivering food to tables, making coffees and cocktails, and handling payments. He did the job of 10 Starbucks employees and in half the time.

We also watched as an Italian woman ordered a glass full of Campari at 9am, drank it whilst standing in the cafe, and then threw some euro coins down on the counter to pay before leaving.

Then we walked over to Uffizi and still had a bit of a line to pick up the tickets and enter the museum, but nothing bad at all. Entering into the museum we were led down, up, left, right, through passageways and dungeons before having to climb several flights of stairs to reach the actual entrance. They made you work for it.

The first thing we saw was a row of marble sculptures. We had been impressed by the smoothness and human details on the David but the ruffled togas were so impressive. Making stone look like a piece of fabric draped over a muscle or knee cap will never not be impressive.

We then entered into the iconic hallway lined with statues and busts on both sides and topped with a ceiling full of frescoes. Some of the ceiling paintings were a little lewd and we wondered if it had been several centuries since anyone from the Catholic Church had bothered to look up there.

From this hallway there were entrances into adjacent rooms lined with paintings. We saw paintings from all the great Renaissance artists like Boticelli, Raphael, Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and others. We saw the Birth of Venus, Primavera, and the iconic painting of the Duke and Duchess of Urbino. We learned that many of the marble statues had been ‘touched up’ over the centuries so that they were both not original but also reflective of artists over a greater span of time rather than one point in time.

We spent about three hours in the Uffizi and then were kicked out for the museum’s lunch break just as we’d had our fill.

We walked back over to Via de Neri to get another focaccia sandwich. We picked the sandwich shop with the line going around the corner into the alley, because at least it was shaded. Just as we had stepped up to the sandwich counter to order a pigeon sitting above the shop let loose. The poor girl right in front of me got a massive green gob of pigeon poop on her shoulder. Luckily, she was wearing a spaghetti strap dress so the poop just got on her skin, not the cloth. I was so thankful it didn’t get on my white t-shirt because that definitely would’ve ruined my day.

Shocked from the bio attack, we didn’t know what to order. We asked the sandwich guys what to get and they suggested the Favolosa: salami, pecorino cream, artichokes and eggplant. It was fabulousa, indeed.

We couldn’t leave the street without getting gelato so we walked back down to the famous gelateria. I got cafe and ordered a shot of espresso to go with it. Carl got passion fruit and he loved it. We had to fight with a Russian family that had 1,000 children in order to get a seat, but we did and sat and enjoyed our treats in the air conditioning for a few minutes.

Then it was Duomo time. There were no more tickets left to climb the Duomo but entry inside of it was free. The interior of the church is relatively bare compared to all other Italian Catholic churches. This is because they moved all the art into a museum for storage and protection.

Still, the building itself is impressive and the dome’s ceiling is mind-blowing. The whole thing is intricately painted, so high up in the sky. It hurt our necks to look at it. The ticket package we bought allowed entry to the crypts which is below the church and shows the original mosaic floor and steps as well as some spooky tombs from about 1300-1350 CE.

Afterwards we went up Giotto’s bell tower. The outside of the tower is clad in the same red, green, and white marble as the church and it is covered in interesting carved images (not just biblical scenes!). The inside was not decorated but provided great views of the plaza and the surrounding old town. Three times I thought we had climbed to the highest point allowed and three times there was another, smaller, windier staircase leading up the the top.

They let us stand on the top of the tower, above the bells with the roof right next to us. But there was a metal fence over us that prevented perfect panorama photos. We still took too many pictures and then rushed to get down the nauseatingly narrow staircases before too many other tourists tried to come up.

We ended our long day of staring at things with a visit to the baptistery and then the duomo museum. The museum includes replicas of famous statues that you can touch, which Carl did. It also had a nice video on the history of the dome and we learned that it took forever for them to install a facade to the building but that they eventually decided to make it look gothic, like the original would have been.

We were all museum-ed out. I then went to get my nails done for an hour and enjoyed just spacing out. Carl and I met up for dinner. We went to a place down the street from us that had good reviews and cheap, authentic food.

The menu only had the option of pre-set meal where you choose each course from a list. It was 20 euro for two courses (pasta, then meat), a side, water, and wine. At first we didn’t like having to follow this ordering regime but when the bill came and it was indeed only 40 euro total, we were very happy.

We shared ravioli, seafood spaghetti, mixed meat plate, and Francesina, Tuscan style boiled beef marinated with wine and onion. They brought us a cute little bottle of Chianti and a paper bag full of bread. It was good, authentic (we assume), and cheap, like the reviews said.

On our way home we stopped by our favorite corner cafe and sure enough our guy was still hard at work. We bought a bottle of Italian beer and took it to go and marveled how this shop sells everything we could ever want or need.

Tuesday, July 5

My friend, Leah, just got married over the Fourth of July weekend. We decided that rather than fly back mid-trip to attend her wedding we would instead spoil a day of her honeymoon and meet her in Tuscany for her birthday picnic.

To do this meant that we needed to get to Tuscany by the 7th. We had the perfect flight booked from Amman to Rome but it was canceled, for no reason, kind of last minute. So we booked another with a layover in Budapest and were grateful it wasn’t too expensive.

The Amman airport was actually really nice and we were able to get one last Turkish coffee before going to the gate. We flew with Ryan Air which, you know, isn’t great. They had us ‘board’ nearly an hour before take off time but then we stood in the gate vestibule for forever, waiting for the plane to arrive.

Finally we boarded. We then sat on the tarmac for another hour. People were starting to get restless and several were told to sit down when they tried sneaking to the bathroom. I myself was experiencing the tail end of some kind of food poisoning and let’s just say I almost didn’t make it. Finally the seat belt sign clicked off and I just about pushed an old woman out of the way to get to the toilet first.

In addition to being in the same row as the screaming toddler, I sat behind a man who though it was ok to put his bag under his seat, where my bag should go. When I told him he needs to move it to in front of him he said “but then I have no space for my feet”. I almost murdered him. But I really wanted to see Leah in Tuscany so I held back. Before I could throw his bag into the aisle he took it and put it overhead.

The lovely layover in Budapest made up for the nightmare flight to get there. We found a sports bar and were able to watch a women’a waterpolo game- Hungary vs. USA. I then bought something at the duty-free store to try to disguise my excess luggage in front of the Wizz Air staff. I either did a magnificent job or the woman that checked our boarding passes didn’t care at all as she scanned them and looked me directly in the eyes to welcome me aboard.

The flight was a little delayed but we still got to the Rome airport just before 10pm. We decided to try to catch the 10:08pm train to the middle of the city. Google said it would take us 6 minutes to walk to the train and we only had about 7 minutes to spare once we booked it. We ran and made it on in time to pick some backward facing seats just before the train started moving. Right on time like Mussolini would have loved.

From the central train station our hotel was only a short walk, located just across from the Santa Maria Maggiore Plaza. We came to the spot where we thought it should be but saw no signs for the hotel. We walked up and down the street. Finally I spotted a door buzzer with a tiny placard that said, “Domus Maggiore” and rang it. A waitress from the cafe next door rushed over and asked us if we were staying at the hotel. When we confirmed, she invited us over to the cafe to check in.

She then led us back to the huge doors where I had just rung the buzzer. She showed us that the tiniest key of three on the keychain is for the big door. We went inside a classicly old European building and walked up to the second floor (third floor for Americans).

Then the largest key was used to open a door to a hallway of four hotel room doors. Finally, the middle key was used to open our door. We did not remember this and later felt like we were trying to solve a Goldilocks riddle to figure out whether the tiniest key was for the biggest door or viceversa. Our room looked out onto a quiet courtyard and we slept like little Italian cherubs.

Wednesday, July 6

About 730am we went down to the café to get the breakfast part of our B&B. The waiter told us we could have whatever we wanted. Pastry? Coffee? Sandwich? Anything. He let us get an espresso, a cappuccino, a prosciutto sandwich, and two pastries. I considered asking if I could also get a fruit tart but I didn’t want to find out at what point he would make us pay extra and I didn’t want to give him fuel for gossip about fat Americans later. I got one chocolate pastry and one pistachio and they were amazing.

Then it was time to walk to the Colosseum for our 9am tour. It only took about 15 minutes and the path led us through a dry, but pretty, park full of ruins. The tour meet up spot was right next to a water fountain that provided free, cold water. There was even a spigot for sparkling water. My mind was blown. I filled my bottle up with sparkling water but later regretted it because the cap of my bottle exploded off and the water leaked into my bag (nothing damaged though).

We met up with our tour group and our guide, Faby, a little, middle-aged, adorable Italian woman. She showed us the Colosseum, Palantine Hill, and the Roman Forum. She described about 2,000 years of Roman history in less than three hours and did so in a way that we stayed interested even in the unbearable heat.

We learned that the Colosseum was originally named Flavian Amphitheater after the large family dynasty that were patrons of it. Next to the building there used to be a large statue, The Colossos, where the Colosseum stole its name from.

Our guide included entry to the Arena, the floor where gladiators used to fight. Faby told us all about the gladiators and showed us the skeleton foundation for the elevators and trap doors that used to bring gladiators and wild animals onto the stage.

Then we went up to the first and second floors to get views from above. After taking a bunch of photos we left and walked up to Palantine hill. Faby explained so much of Roman history and a little bit about how scholars knew this history. For example, the best preserved buildings are ones that were converted into churches and so saved from either destruction or neglect by Christians eliminating evidence of paganism.

Faby showed us pictures of recreated images of what the area would have looked like. She held up these images of the imperial palace and the Roman forum in front of us, so we could compare the ruins we saw to the recreation. It was an excellent tour.

At one point Faby asked us if we had been to the Pantheon yet. Most of the group replied that it was next on their list. She said we must go to see it because it is an example of great Roman architecture, like the Colosseum. She said, “If you don’t see it (the Pantheon), I kill you. I come to your town, and I kill you.” It was the most adorable threat.

When the tour ended we asked Faby for lunch restaurant recommendations and then followed the pathway through the Roman forum, underground, toward Venice Plaza. We stopped in the underground tunnel for a bit to cool down and read some of the signs about the findings in the area. It was so hot outside.

We decided to go to a spot on Faby’s list that was closest. It was expensive but it was close, and it offered authentic, homemade pasta. We decided we could spend money on one good meal per day. We ordered Aperol Spritzes and immediately felt better. For food we got Cacio e pepe (pasta Roman style with cheese and pepper), veal with gorgonzola, and some kind of salty mixed veggie dish that had artichoke heart, bacon, peas, and some other green beans.

After all this I was ready to fall asleep on the table. We ordered two espressos and then tried to hang out for a bit before asking for the check. They ended up charging us for the water AND the bread that they had put on the table AND refilled. So I made sure to refill my water bottle with the table water and noted this for future lunches.

Afterward we walked back around to the Colosseum to get some photos from outside. There were still many tourists milling about which was kind of surprising because it was 96 degrees F. Our energy was zapped quickly so we shuffled back to our hotel to shower and nap and wait for cooler temperatures.

Carl let me shower first but somehow I knocked the sliding glass shower door off one of its hinges. I asked Carl to help me fix it. He fiddled with it a little bit and then all of a sudden the whole thing shattered. We both stood there, in the shower, nearly naked, completely surrounded by a pile of broken glass. Luckily Carl was wearing his glasses as he took the brunt of the glass sprinkles. He gingerly stepped out of the bathroom and threw me some towels to put on top of the glass to walk out on.

We cleaned ourselves up as best we could and then went downstairs, to the cafe, to tell someone from the hotel staff what had happened. At the very least, we needed to borrow a broom to clean up. The man working the cashier didn’t speak English and had no patience for us but very quickly a young woman came out and said she was happy to help us.

When we told her what had happened her first question was whether we were ok. Then she tried to get us to have a coffee or anything to drink on the house while she went upstairs to assess. We decided we wanted to go with her. When she saw the pile of glass and the little bit of blood in the shower she didn’t react dramatically at all. She opened up a room next door for Carl to shower in (and brush the glass shards off) and she got to work cleaning while I waited outside.

Less than an hour later she came outside and retrieved us, showing us back to our room. She gave us fresh towels and said if we needed anything we could just call her. I showered with flip flops on and water pressure low to keep from spraying the whole bathroom. All in all it was a shocking experience but the hotel staff person was so nice to us that it ended positively.

We then chilled ourselves under the AC until evening. Finally hungry again we ventured back to the main street to a pizzeria we had seen earlier. We got a mushroom pizza and two Peroni beers for pretty cheap. We then walked back toward our hotel and got gelato from the cafe under our hotel. I got tiramisu flavor and was not disappointed. We admired the outside of the Santa Maria Maggiore Basilica as the sun set at nearly 9pm.

Thursday, July 7

We slept in and checked out at the last possible time at 10am, going downstairs to get breakfast again. The staff woman who had cleaned up our broken shower was waiting tables and she told us we could order whatever we wanted for breakfast. We ended up getting a sandwich, one pastry, four cappuccinos, and two delicious, fresh-squeezed orange juices. She kept asking us if we wanted anything more, emphasizing it was free.

They let us leave our bags at the cafe so we could walk around for a few hours before our bus to Tuscany. We decided to go across the plaza to the magnificent church we had been staring at the whole time we were in front of our hotel. The inside of this church blew us away. It is the most beautiful church I have ever seen, and I’ve seen too many.

The ceiling was covered in gilded gold squares and everywhere you looked was different colored marble or stone. The floor was a giant mosaic and each wall was covered in different colors, broken up by carved reliefs or beautiful paintings. We sat and admired all the stone and handiwork and imagined what the other historical sites, like the Colosseum, would have looked like fully decorated like this before they were repurposed for Christian churches.

Then we walked around a little and found a quiet place on a shady street for a light lunch. We got anchovy pizza and I ordered a limoncello which was served cold, but not over ice and ended up being more syrupy and strong than I would’ve wanted. Finally it was time to collect our bags from our hotel/cafe and we rode the metro to the bus station to get a bus up to Tuscany. We would be back to Rome again in about a week to see the rest of the sites, especially the Pantheon, to save Faby a trip to California to murder us.

Another blog brought to you by Carl…

We arrived in the evening to Queen Alia airport. Jordan immigration was easy, and the officer next to ours gave me recommendations about what to eat in Jordan. He even interrupted the group he was processing to make sure I knew to eat Mansef with my hands. We had arranged a ride with our hotel and found our driver waiting for us. Nobody hassled us like in Cairo. The car was nice and the ride was quiet for a change.

We checked in to the Boutique Hotel in the center of Amman, and the owner Ali pulled out a map of what we should do the next day. We nodded along sleepily and then headed to our room. The street outside was loud as many people in Jordan are off on Friday, but we had no trouble falling right asleep.

Friday, July 1

Anni was awoken by the 4am morning prayers, but I either slept through it or blocked out the memory. When we did get up we headed to the roof for breakfast, which consisted of more mezze as well as Jordanian breads with Za’atar and cheese. There was also the best cantaloupe of our lives. We soaked up the views of the surrounding buildings built into the hillside, and were excited to spend the day walking around the city.

We started with a hike up the hill to the Amman Citadel. We walked around and basked in all the history around us. People have lived in this site for tens of thousands of years and many empires have laid claim to it.

The citadel museum had artifacts from Paleolithic and Iron Age peoples, and there were various structures that had been a part of the Persian Empire, Greek Empire, Roman Empire, Byzantine Empire, and Islamic Empires. At one point the afternoon prayers started and we could hear mosques all around the city converging on us.

We traveled back down the hill for lunch, stopping at Hashem, a place so famous for its falafel that even the king has eaten there. We got stuffed falafel and hummus with lamb. A plastic sheet was placed over the table and some pita thrown down, and we ate with our hands. It was all great. We swung by a coffee shop after and I had my first Turkish style coffee, which was floral and delicious.

Our next stop was the Roman Theater. We climbed around the ancient structure and enjoyed having the place mostly to ourselves. At the base was the Museum of Popular Traditions and the Jordan Folklore museum, both of which showed Bedouin life. The most intriguing part of the attractions however were the disproportioned figures on display, which looked like life-size Barbie dolls, some converted into male roles.

We looped around the main streets of Amman. Everyone we crossed paths with told us welcome to Jordan. We checked out the famous Husseini Mosque, but being unfamiliar with proper etiquette I was too scared to go inside. We walked through the open air markets and took in the smells of fruits, perfumes, and spices. Our favorite shops sold air conditioning units, which were blasting cool air to demonstrate their effectiveness. The owners didn’t seem to mind up walking VERY slowly by.

On our way home we stopped by the Habibah sweets to try kunafa, a spun pastry soaked in syrup and layered with cheese and pistachios. It was as amazing as our hotel owner Ali had promised.

That evening we went up to Rainbow street, the heart of nightlife in Amman. The party scene hadn’t started yet, but we found a food court area nested in the back of some artisanal craft stalls. An adorable kid helping his parents sold us dolmas, samosas, and a Palestinian treat that was indistinguishable from a chicken taquito. We also had a great strawberry and blackberry juice from another vendor.

The special treat from the market were fig cookies, which the owner proudly said were sugar free and milk free. His wife who was making the cookies had us all take a picture together. We attempted to buy a box but they refused our money, giving us the box as our reward for being the new sales models for their company.

Saturday, July 2

We had a tour booked for the next 3 days that would include Petra, Wadi Rum, and the Dead Sea. Our driver, Ahmad, told us to call him Habibi (roughly translated to darling in Arabic), and it was quickly apparent that he would be much more than just our driver. He told us our current itinerary was only “half good,” and that he would like to change a few things with our permission. The first day was supposed to be a simple drive down the desert highway to Wasi Musa with a few stops along the way, so when he offered instead a canyoneering adventure and scenic drive along the Dead Sea we readily agreed.

Our Habibi was quite the character. He was a fan of driving race cars and drove our hybrid like one, often texting and vaping at the same time. He had made a fortune running a clothing factory in China and then Egypt, but lost everything during the Arab Spring, and was now driving tours until he could restart business. Our tour had promised a driver with limited English, so we were lucky to have someone who would also act as tour guide, interpreter, and photographer. Plus we did twice as many activities as expected. Could have gone without the speeding though.

After leaving the city we stopped at a van in which a man appeared to both live and sell coffee out of. He served us coffee that was billed as a mix of capuchino, latte, and Nescafé. Not sure what that means, but it was good and we felt amped as we cruised down nearly 400 meters below sea level to the Dead Sea while Habibi blasted EDM.

Our first (off book) stop was Wadi Mujib, where we were provided life jackets and told to walk up the river as far as we could. We hiked through the beautiful sandstone canyon, occasionally swimming when the water was deep, and using ropes to ascend the steeper sections. It was gorge-ous. My phone in its waterproof pouch can’t do justice to the colors of the rock surrounding us.

After 45 minutes we reached an impassible waterfall and turned around. On the way back someone who must have been a lifeguard showed us where we could slide down the smooth rocks instead of climbing down, compete with a splash into the river. As we left the river we noticed tons of tourists checking in, and we realized we had been very lucky to have the canyon mostly to ourselves.

From here Habibi pulled over to the public area on the Dead Sea so that we could see the salty beach. We hiked around and took pictures until the dirt we picked up on the way down combined with the salty beach to form a thick paste under our sandals.

Back in the car we marveled at all the religious history around us, with signs pointing to where Jesus was baptized, where Moses was buried, and where Lot’s wife was turned to salt.

We turned from the Jordan Valley highway onto the Kings highway and ascended from below sea level to 1200 meters above. The scenery changed from white to brown to red and we pulled over several times to take photos. We were amazed by how many farms we passed on this drive, not expecting the desert to be so fertile.

At the top of the valley we stopped at a hotel overlooking Dana Reserve for tea and more views. The tea was “Bedouin style,” aka black tea with mint and lots of sugar. It was the best of the many Bedouin teas we would have in the coming days.

Our next stop was Shobak castle, built in the 12th century by the crusaders but later used by local kingdoms. The surrounding houses were caves with simple structures built out front, providing natural temperature control. We also laughed at the nearby “worlds smallest hotel” which was an old VW bug on the side of the road with a bed in the back.

We then arrived at Wadi Musa and went to Little Petra, Nabataean ruins built around the first century and thought to have been a suburb of Petra. We opted for a local Bedouin guide from the town next door, which had been formed when the Bedouins living in Petra were kicked out by UNESCO. He had a thick accent and limited English, but was nice and we were happy to support him.

He walked us around the many building carved into the sandstone canyons, surprisingly well preserved considering the soft material and history of people squatting in them. One diving room still had the beautiful Greek-style frescoes intact on the roof. There were many channels dug into the walls to collect rainwater into big wells at the base of most buildings, critical to survival in the desert. Several of the cave-rooms had black swirled designs on their ceiling- formed from decades of smoking tobacco inside.

At the end of the canyon we came across a bunch of kittens living in a tourist shop and Anni melted into a puddle. While we were there a local came up with a backpack full of leftover rice and chicken and we watched as more cats came out of every crack to join the feast.

We invited Habibi to dinner and he took us to a restaurant away from the tourist zone. We finally got Mansaf, which the immigration officer had told me about and is considered the national dish of Jordan. It consisted of lamb and rice served on a thin bread and covered with fermented yogurt sauce. I ate with my hands as instructed in case immigration was watching, and it was delicious. We also had some kofta and maqluba, a rice and chicken dish known as upside-down because it is served directly from pot to plate at the table.

Very full, we all drove up to an overlook just outside to town to enjoy the sunset and take goofy pictures. We finally got to our hotel for the night at 8pm and exhausted went to bed early in anticipation for another busy day.

Sunday, July 3

We got up at 5:30 in order to be the first people in Petra when gates opened at 6am. There appeared to be only 2 other couples in the entire park, and it was still chilly as we started the hike through the canyons and into the city. The area around Petra is thought to have been inhabited for 7,000 years, with the most impressive structures being built in the first century CE by the Nabataeans, who were able to carve out this oasis in the desert through their skills in water management. At its peak 20,000 people were thought to have lived in Petra.

At the end of the canyon was the Treasury, the most famous building in Petra, named from a local rumor that treasure was hidden within. It is now understood to be a mausoleum for a past Nabataean king. You can see the bullet holes in the fresco where Bedouins had tried to dislodge the possible treasure. It was truly stunning.

We also had the place to ourselves aside from a few locals trying to sell camel rides and guides to view points. We declined any offers as the camels did not look well and there was a large sign in English saying that any hikes to viewpoints were free and did not require a guide.

We continued past the treasury as the canyon opened into a wide valley with houses carved into every wall. We hiked up to an area overlooking the valley with larger structures thought to be more kings tombs and stopped for breakfast, which consisted of dry sandwiches the hotel provided for take away because we missed their complimentary breakfast. We continued to soak up the area as the sun crept up and the heat increased.

We continued along a columned walkway past an amphitheater and several temples, with countless dwelling units on either side. At the site of the great temple a kid came up to us and tried to sell us a pack of postcards for 1 Jordanian Dollar ($1.25 US Dollars). We didn’t want the postcards but we gave the kid a dollar anyways.

Ten minutes later another little girl came up to us, selling the same postcards. When we said we didn’t want to buy them she said “Aw! Come on!” in a perfect English accent. I then asked her why she wasn’t in school and she shot back saying there was no school. We later learned they were indeed on a summer break.

At the end of the walkway we reentered a canyon and stared at the daunting stairs which would lead up to the second most famous structure, the Monastery, so named because some crosses had been carved into the back of the cave during the Byzantine age. The sun was now fully up and temperatures increasing, but we had brought a lot of water and were ready for the challenge.

We met a family from Sun Valley, Idaho along the way, who we would continue to leapfrog the rest of the day. We would also use each other to distract the vendors, who had strategically set up shops along the narrow pathway and were the most confrontational people we had met in Jordan. A few times my pinky was grabbed against my will to force a pinky promise that I would check out their shop on the way down.

At last we made it to the Monastery which, though less decorated than the Treasury, was bigger and more open. The people charging to climb the rocks to see another view hadn’t made it up yet so we enjoyed climbing up a bit to see the Monastery from above and check out the surrounding canyon lands.

We did our best to power past the insistent staircase vendors and get back to the main square, which was now packed with other tourists and vendors. We took some side trails to see a church and some other tombs we missed the first time through, and after much searching found a shady place out of the way to choke down the rest of our dry sandwiches.

Feeling satisfied we found the energy to make our way back out of the canyon, pitying all the tourists just starting their day in the midday heat. As we exited the park we ran into our Habibi, who bought us espressos and gyros as we packed back up to hit the road. As we left Wadi Musa we saw a shop advertising the “best view in the world.” We stopped at the next turn, the “second best view in the world,” and got some final pictures of the valley from above.

Our original itinerary had us spending all day in Petra with a jeep tour in Wadi Rum the next morning, but Habibi figured with the long days we could do the jeep tour in the same say and allow for a unplanned visit to Acaba and the Red Sea the next day. We agreed, and sped along to Wadi Rum, stopping just once at a Turkish train from the 1950s to take more pictures.

We arrived to Wadi Rum at 4pm, and at the end of the road loaded into a 4×4. Wadi Rum is a preserved area of beautiful red sandstone rising from the desert, famous as the filming location for Lawrence of Arabia as well as most movies that take place on Mars.

The landscape was unreal. We cruised along and stopped at a few points of interest, including a natural arch, a canyon with ancient carvings, and a large dune that we hiked up. At each stop we were offered Bedouin tea, which we eventually had to start declining due to overcaffeination and not wanting to tip any more.

After 2 hours of touring the desert we arrived at our camp for the night. It was much nicer than advertised, with private tents, showers, and electricity. Habibi wanted to climb up the mountain behind the camp for sunset and we joined him, being careful with the soft sandstone. Anni wore her photo-opp ready skirt and decided to just go up halfway, taking pictures of us from below. We reached significant elevation in a short amount of time and were rewarded with incredible views of Wadi Rum during the perfect time of light.

We returned to camp and met up with the other 5 tourists who would be spending the night there. The bedouins showed us how they cooked the chicken and vegetables on top of coal buried under the sand, and we all sat down for a feast that also included salads and mezze definitely not cooked in the desert.

Stuffed and with perfect nighttime temperatures, we sat next to a campfire with our new companions and swapped travel stories under the stars. The crescent moon provided a surprising amount of light, but we were still able to see the most stars since our time in the Bolivian desert.

Monday, July 4

We had a mezze breakfast in the Bedouin camp and then packed back into the jeep for a final cruise through Wadi Rum back to the land of pavement. Habibi had arranged us a snorkel tour of the Red Sea, so we sped down to Aqaba at the far south end of Jordan. Aqaba seemed like a nice town with many date trees, and we could see across the sea to both Israel and Egypt.

We boarded a glass bottom boat and set sail into the Red Sea. We immediately started to see coral and fish below us, and we crossed over a sunken airplane. Our captain set anchor down near the shore, and we put on snorkel gear and jumped in. The water was a bit cold for Anni’s taste but was very clear, and we swam around the famous red coral which gives the sea its name.

We spent 45 minutes swimming around 2 reefs and a submerged transport ship, and saw many anemone fish, sergeant majors, and wrasses. We were also surprised to see a lion fish and a puffer fish. The star was a juvenile butterflyfish whose pattern we had admired on an Australian fish guide but never saw on that trip. When we got out of the water our captain showered us with fresh water than then forced us to assume the Titanic pose while he blasted the song, My Heart Will Go On.

After this we were back to our scheduled itinerary, which was to spend the afternoon at a resort on the Dead Sea. We headed back north along the border with Israel, noting the increase in military presence. We arrived at the resort around 2pm, and headed first to the buffet lunch. We enjoyed a greatest hits of Jordanian cuisine and waddled down to the shore.

The resort had a designated swimming area with a guy spraying everyone with fresh water after leaving the sea. We entered the water, conscious of the 10 minute maximum of being in that level salinity. It was a wild experience being so buoyant. We were able to lift our arms and legs out of the water while still floating on our backs.

We got out and coated ourselves in Dead Sea mud as Habibi had instructed. It was so hot my sweat didn’t allow the mud to dry completely, but we allowed ourselves to bake awhile before jumping back in the sea to wash off. Our skin felt softer afterwards but we weren’t convinced it was worth all the effort.

We ran into our friends from the Wadi Rum camp and all went to the pool to grab a beer. The pool was not as cold as desired considering it was 101 degrees outside, but we tried to make the most of our resort time. Around 6pm we tracked down our Habibi to get us to our Airbnb.

We had a relatively early flight to Budapest and then Rome the next day, so in anticipation we had booked a room next to the airport, about an hour from the city center. Habibi grabbed us some falafel sandwiches along the way in anticipation for our remote lodging, and we arrived just before sunset.

We said our fond farewells and checked into the Airbnb, which was quite roomy and much nicer than expected based on price and location. It had been a long action packed few days and we enjoyed the peace and quiet before going to bed.

From Carl’s perspective…

Monday, June 27

Neither of us slept well the night before our flight to Cairo. It was likely due to anxiety about entry into Egypt, but maybe it was an omen of the day to come. We were expecting a rough 24 hours of travel with layovers in Hanoi and Mumbai before reaching our final destination of Cairo at 5am local time.

We got to the airport 3 hours early in preparation. Disaster then struck. VietJet denied us boarding passes, saying that we needed an Indian visa to transit through, despite the Indian immigration website clearly stating this was not the case. No amount of arguing with every airline employee in sight and discussing with our travel insurance agency made a difference. Anni had murder in her eyes, so I pulled her aside so that we could regroup.

Throughout our trip we have booked the cheapest flights possible and gambled with nonrefundable tickets. We’ve experienced a few cancellations and delays but this was by far our biggest failure. Exhausted and frustrated, we weighed our options. Our next week was already planned, so we decided with the sunk costs to go ahead and book a different flight to Cairo leaving that evening on Turkish Airlines. It was 4 times the cost of our initial flight, but we were just thankful this option existed.

We spent the rest of the day in the Seoul airport having a last Bulgogi dish, planning the rest of our travels, and reading. Some members of the Korean tourism board asked us to do a survey about Korea, saying it would take 2 minutes. It actually took 20 minutes, but we got some Starbucks gift cards out of it.

The airline had a limit of 8kg for carry-on bags (ours were 13kg). Not wanting to check in bags with a too-close-for-comfort layover in Istanbul, they allowed us to shift things around so that our backpacks weighed 8kg and our “personal item” smaller backpacks carried the rest. We quickly repacked again once out of sight of airline staff.

Flying with Turkish Airlines was quite the change from the budget airlines we had become accustomed to. The flight had movies and meals, and we were happy despite the rough day. We watched House of Gucci, which per Turkish standards had all sex scenes removed, but was fine with some mild violence against women.

Tuesday, June 28

We sprinted through the Istanbul airport and made it to the next gate just as boarding was scheduled to begin. One fellow passenger laughed with us because he had seen us rushing through and he was also on our next flight (he was like a genie and boarded before us too).

As we caught our breath we realized nobody around us was wearing masks, really the first time we’ve seen this since March 2020. No respect for lines among passengers, but we were able to board and had another pleasant Turkish Airlines experience with a meal and movies.

We were a bit scared by the ominous warning on the US state department website that Egyptian authorities have been known to deny entry to US citizens without reason, but all it took was paying $50 USD in cash to an Egyptian bank counter for a sticker and we were in. No proof of vaccination or COVID testing, and no masks in sight, all in contrast to what the US embassy in Egypt website had stated.

Our Marriott credit card was ready to provide us another 2 free nights, so we booked at Mena House, a historic hotel in Giza with views of the pyramids. We planned to take an Uber there but this first involved shaking off the hordes of people trying to sell us rides, and then quickly learning the Arabic numerical system in order to identify the right license plate.

The ride from the airport took an hour, and we marveled at the desert countryside, uniform architecture, crazy drivers, families running across the highway, and heaps and heaps of trash. After spending the last month in the developed world it was all a bit of a shock.

We arrived around 10am and were luckily able to check in early. An emotional roller coaster ensued as we were upgraded to an upper floor pyramid view room, but then downgraded to a ground floor pyramid view room, which was still better than we paid for but now a bit disappointing after learning of the better room. We were also sold on a package that included breakfast and access to the snack room, which we promptly raided and then went to nap.

We were shocked awake by a phone call a bit before noon, with the concierge asking us how everything was. This was the first of 50 times we would be asked about how our stay was going at Mena House during these 3 short days. We weren’t terribly upset though because we had set alarms to go off at noon anyways. We gathered ourselves and called another Uber to go to the Egyptian Museum to learn about ancient Egypt and get into the mood for the planned pyramids tour tomorrow.

Our Uber ride was eventful in that we got into a mild car accident with a bus. There was some yelling and fist shaking but no insurance information was exchanged as far as I could tell. Considering that every car we saw had multiple scratches and dents I assume this to be a regular occurrence.

We first stopped at an Egyptian restaurant nearby the museum, and ordered grape leaves (dolmas: Anni’s favorite), baba ghanoush, and kofta. I also had a delicious mango juice that was essentially ripe mango purée, legit the best since our time in Colombia. Everything was great and the waiter appeared to be having a good time, showing us how to eat boiled fava beans and practicing his little bit of English.

The short walk to the museum involved lots of people grabbing my arm to offer some good or service, followed by having to run across an 8 lane highway. Overall, we were glad we were not staying in downtown.

We had read that the Egyptian Museum was lacking in explanations, so we agreed to hire the nicest of the locals waving their “certified guide” badges at us. Karim was great, and he excitedly gave us an overview of the Egyptian dynasties, taught us about the meaning behind different statue positions, and walked us through how the Pharaohs were entombed all while dabbing the sweat from his face.

The pure volume of artifacts was astounding. Mummies were spilling out of stacked drawers, and cabinets full of statuettes could be found shoved into corners seemingly ignored and gathering dust. It was incredible how well preserved the papyrus scrolls and tablets full of hieroglyphics were.

The famous mummies that used to be here were recently moved to another museum which hasn’t opened yet but there was still so much to see. We worked our way through to the most famous artifacts, including the golden burial mask of King Tut. Karim explained that Tutankhamun was really a nobody in the history of Ancient Egypt, not even mentioned in the ancient texts, however he is now the most famous Pharaoh because his tomb was unearthed in the modern age, luckily saved from the last few millennia of grave robbing.

We finished our tour as the museum was closing, and Karim ran around pointing at the piles of artifacts we didn’t have time to see. The whole experience was a bit spoiled when the price we had agreed upon was suddenly doubled due to slight of hand with the pricing cards he had, but we were still happy with our experience and left him with 1.5x the initial agreed upon price.

We caught an Uber back to our hotel, and were pleased to find the evening snack room supply could be used as dinner, with lots of small plates of fruit, grape leaves, shrimp, curry chicken, and cakes. We spent our last functional moments to tour the hotel grounds and take in some views of the pyramids at night, then collapsed into bed early for our first full night of sleep in a few days.

Wednesday, June 29

We woke up early to get breakfast before our tour started. The Marriott Mena House breakfast blew us away. There were buffet tables full of fruits, pastries, mezze, cheeses, and even lox. We ate as much as our jet lagged bodies could handle, all while staring at the pyramids we would soon be exploring.

We met our guide for the day, Ahmed, shortly after. He ushered us through the Giza entrance process, slipping the guard some cash so that we could avoid the scanner. This seemed entirely unnecessary as the lines were very short, but I think he wanted to show off a bit.

We stood in the security shed building while he then explained for nearly an hour about how the pyramids were built and the best current understanding of why. He was very knowledgable and we learned a lot, but would have preferred to not be having this lecture in a hot closed room, especially when just out of reach the pyramids appeared to be providing adequate shade.

We paid extra to enter into the first great pyramid, the Pyramid of Khufu. At first there was a cooling breeze, but very quickly it became a stuffy nightmare as we ascended up and into the pyramid through a narrow entrance while other tourists attempted to escape via the same small tunnel. There wasn’t much to see in the King’s chamber, but seeing how the tunnels were carved out was neat.

After some pictures in front of Khufu’s pyramid we got in our air conditioned car to a lookout where we could see all 3 of the great pyramids. From here we hopped on some camels to take a quick journey into the desert for further photos ops.

Ahmed introduced us to our camel guide saying, “you’ll like him, he comes from a rich family.” The camel guide (didn’t catch his name) had great English but was actually pretty awful at taking photos. He had a cigarette in one hand and the reins of Anni’s camel in the other as he led us across the desert. He was in an intense conversation with another camel guide so we ended up being in a kind of group of four with an English couple

I was not prepared for how big camels are. When it stood up I thought with certainty that I was falling off. But the ride was smooth and the camels seemed friendly. At one point a bunch of fighter jets in formation came flying over us and above the pyramids. Nobody really seemed to know why, and the camels were unconcerned.

We then drove to a point in front of the Great Sphinx, which appeared to be the closest we could get due to ongoing reconstruction. An eager young man took our pictures in various goofy photos before being paid off by Ahmed. In Egypt every small action done for another person necessitates some Backsheesh (tip). It was nice to have Ahmed around to let us know who needed to be payed off and how much.

Our next stop was Saqqara, an hour away from Giza necropolis, so Ahmed grabbed us some falafel and we enjoyed some time in the air conditioned car. We flew down the side streets, admiring some beautiful old houses, but also catching sad glimpses of people emptying their trash bags into the river. We stopped on the way at a papyrus factory, which was a bit of a tourist trap but we really enjoyed seeing how the papyrus was made. The woman showing us everything was a great salesperson and we liked the art so we bought some.

The biggest highlight of Saqqara was the Pyramid of Djoser, also known as the Step Pyramid. Ahmed explained how this was the prototype pyramid, and the lessons learned during its construction could be seen in all the others. Almost nobody else was around.

We walked through the funerary complex and up to the pyramid, where we then descended into the cool burial chamber below. This had been recently renovated making the journey easy, and we were rewarded with a view of the giant granite slab tomb in the center.

We journeyed around the complex, checking out the well preserved carvings and entering a few other tombs. The guards here really seemed to enjoy trying to get you to “break the rules” to get backsheesh, and we did our best to balance the respect for history and the respect to current culture. Egypt is complicated.

Ahmed grabbed us some black tea with mint and sugar to sip in the shade of the guard stand with the company of three stray dogs. Then we got back in the car and headed to Memphis. Once the capital of ancient Egypt, the area now functions as an outdoor museum. The most impressive was a giant statue of Ramses II that the museum building was built around. It was now late afternoon however and temperature was up to 95, so we were thankful to jump back in the car with AC and head back to the hotel.

We said farewell to Ahmed, peeled off our sweaty clothes, and jumped in the pool. We again enjoyed dinner in the snack lounge. I started the process of returning back to normal life by having a call with a hospital recruiter while Anni unsuccessfully attempted to crash the wedding going on at the hotel. We again fell into bed early, exhausted from a full day.

Thursday, June 30

We got up early and decided to do one last tour of the Giza necropolis on our own. We walked past the various scammers steering us away from the entrance, and politely declined all the offers for guiding, camel riding, and photographs. It was nice to go at our own pace and explore parts we hadn’t been to on the day prior. The same guy who took the goofy photos in front of the Sphinx was still there, he must pay off a lot of people to hold that juicy spot.

We made it back to our hotel in time for our last breakfast buffet. We stuffed ourselves while admiring the pyramids in the hazy morning heat. Then we packed up and checked out. The Uber ride to the airport was our most uneventful yet, and we had no problems checking in with EgyptAir. We had arrived 3 hours before takeoff per recommendations for international travel, but security and passport control was so quick that we had lots of time to kill.

The Cairo airport did not appear to sell any Egyptian food. There were a few cafes selling packaged sandwiches, but they seemed more enclosed areas where people were allowed to smoke. Forced to choose between a bar and grill, Italian, or Burger King, we chose the bar and grill.

We ordered some local beers and a cheeseburger, which per the menu came with a salad but were told no, only fries. When we got the burger it most definitely had come from the Burger King next door. We then watched as a man tried to steal a bottle of wine saying that he was waiting too long to get his change back and he had to catch his flight. Finally the waitress came back with his change and he gave the bottle back. Turns out he was on our flight.

Our flight to Jordan was only 1 hour, but immediately upon takeoff the stewards started frantically passing out inflight meals of…packaged sandwiches.

Saturday, June 25

Carl and I decided to take the slow train to Seoul – the S(e)oul train! – because it was cheap and we didn’t mind having a few hours in transit to rest. We got to Seoul around 3pm. We took a taxi to save the headache of figuring out the subway for later. The taxi driver dropped us off at the top of a pedestrian street- Insadong- and pointed down the street with a flick of his hand. I had realized it when I booked it but we were staying at a hotel off of a very busy pedestrian shopping street that was very cute!

The pedestrian street of Insadong had tons of little souvenir and local craft shops. There were also a bunch of traditional tea houses advertising Pat Bing Soo, a Korean desert (like halo-halo) with shaved ice, red bean, condensed milk, rice cakes, and jellies.

When we got out of the cab we realized that Seoul was way hotter and more humid than Busan. We were really sweating by the time we walked up to the hotel to check in. The front desk guy was there and let us check in. But when we went to put our bags in the room it was still dirty from the person before. He said that we could leave our bags and the room would be cleaned soon.

I guess it was nice that we got to leave our bags but it was a real bummer to see our room messy from someone else. The bed was unmade and there was a trash can full of trash and it smelled weird. Still, it gave me a chance to change into a more humid-friendly outfit and we set off again.

Feeling mildly hungarian we stopped at the traditional tea house next door to our hotel. When we walked in it looked like the cute little old lady club was having a meeting. They took up the whole front room and they all had traditional tea cups in front of them which they clanged down as they laughed and gossiped (I assume).

We were given a nice little wooden booth next to the window. I got an iced coffee and Carl got a traditional green tea. We spotted kimchi pajeon on the menu and went for it. Tony’s cheesy kimchi pajeon is still the best, but this one was good. The woman running the shop did everything. She greeted us, took our order, cooked ALL the food, and closed out our bill. She was awesome.

We did some research on how to manage the insane Seoul subway system and made our way to the Namsangol cultural village. This is a tourist village comprised of traditional buildings where there are opportunities for craft making or watching traditional ceremonies. Our timing was perfect because right when we showed up they had started a traditional wedding ceremony. We watched for a little bit, actually enjoying the traditional music.

We were so impressed that everyone in the ceremony was wearing such elegant, layered, traditional clothing in such sweltering heat. We noticed that it only costs about $1,000 US Dollars to have a traditional Korean wedding ceremony here and we did consider it for a hot minute.

Too hot to stand still, we moved on to looking at the traditional houses. In the courtyard some games were available like one where you throw arrows into tiny buckets. They also had the little cloth square flip over game that was the first game in the TV show Squid Games. Carl tried and was terrible at it. A man and his son were watching and they very kindly gave him some pointers. Carl then improved a bit. I didn’t even bother trying.

At the top of the park where the cultural village sits there’s a huge artificial crater with a time capsule in it. Seoul created their time capsule in 1994 to celebrate their 600th year anniversary of being a city. The capsule contains microfilm records of things representative of traditional and modern culture and is due to be open in 2394 to celebrate Seoul’s 1,000 year anniversary. I wish I could be around to see what kind of technology they have in 2394 and whether they even would recognize a CD with images saved on it.

After the cultural village we found a trail through a huge park that runs east to west. We walked the paved trail to the cable car. They packed the cable car to the brim but we were able to see out pretty far despite the haze in the sky.

When we got to the top we saw a multi-storied viewing platform where every handrail was absolutely smothered in love locks. I guess the tradition in Korea is to come here on your 100th day of dating your partner and add your love lock to the collection to ensure your love lasts as long as the lock. Carl and I did some quick math and figured out we’ve been dating for about 2,300 days. So we decided we didn’t really need a lock at this point.

Then it was time to go up the tower. We noticed a couples package that included two tower tickets, two beers, and a love lock that sounded perfect for us. But when we asked the ticket booth person he crossed his arms and said no.

Then there were staff promoting Trip.com by giving discounts to tower tickets. We tried to scan the QR code to get to the website, but everything was in Korean and my phone seemed to reject the webpage. So the staff person asked for our credit card and she used her own phone. If our credit card gets hacked, she’s suspect number one.

We rode the elevator up and admired the views from the top. Like Busan’s tower there were some light show displays along the way so by the time we were at the top we had about 30 minutes until sunset. We looked out into the hazy sky and wondered where the sun even was.

Southeast of us the sky was brighter and the river seemed to shine. We figured this was all the sunset we would get. We descended the tower and found our couples beer pairing and decided to get a churro too. The food court area was terribly designed causing a wind tunnel to blast through between the restaurant and the outdoor seating area. We sat for a bit until I (who had been complaining all day about being too hot) was too cold.

We walked down hill and stopped at a few city view points before getting to the bus stop. Our plan was to get the bus back to Insadong and find some light dinner around there. The hoard of people waiting for the bus was daunting but when we bullied our way on we weren’t even that squished.

When we got off at the pedestrian street in Insadong I remembered that our hotel reviewer comments had said all the restaurants in the area close at 9pm. It was like 9:05pm as we speed walked from place to place – seeing people eating inside- as the restaurant staff held up crossed fingers and said ‘no’.

The only thing open was a chicken and beer place. We decided to get chicken and beer one last time. The chicken was well cooked and the beer was cold but after we were more than ready for a detox.

As we walked back to our hotel on the deserted pedestrian path we heard some live music in the distance. Someone was doing a Coldplay cover as if the universe was saying “I didn’t forget, did you?”

Sunday, June 26

(BTW I forgot a crucial story about COVID testing in Korea when I posted the blog for Busan 1. I just went back and updated it. Not sure how I forgot to write it before because it was so traumatic).

We started the day with a good ol’ COVID test. Technically we don’t need one to go to Egypt but we read that sometimes Egyptian officials don’t accept non-QR code vaccination cards. The US is one of the few countries (I actually don’t know another one) that does NOT have a QR code for vaccine cards. Hilarious that some people believe the vaccine has a tracking chip in it when our country’s level of technological sophistication is so low that all I have is the flimsiest piece of paper that I have to clutch dearly and keep in a cool, dry space.

I was really nervous about the test (see Busan post, day 1) but it ended up being fine. We determined it was still the second worst COVID test of our lives, but nothing could top the time in Busan.

We treated ourselves to a trip to Paris Baguette. PB is a Korean chain that has meh coffee but all kinds of yummy, fresh baked pastries. We got one with a hot dog (a must have when visiting Asia), one with red bean (ditto) and a very chocolatey looking one.

We decided our main objective of the day was to see the palace and then Carl and I had some errands to run before our last barbecue dinner in Korea.

We were able to walk to the palace from our hotel. On the way we saw many hanbok (traditional dress) rental shops. We thought it was a cute idea to dress up and take photos in the historic place but it was way too stinking hot to be putting on rental clothes let alone a big dress.

Again our timing was magnificent because right as we showed up they were preparing to hold the changing of the guard ceremony. We watched as the guards came in the west gate and marched toward the South. Then a man hit a huge drum that was SO loud it gave everyone such a fright. He did it a few more times and, even when you knew the sound was coming, it sent shivers down the spine.

After the ceremony we walked into the palace and lead ourselves around on a self guided tour. The buildings were beautiful and it was interesting to see the historic furniture that’s been preserved. There was the tiniest, short reading desk in the King’s quarters that made my knees hurt just looking at it.

We went back to the traditional tea house next to our hotel for some Pat Bing Soo to cool down. It was traditional style -more beans than sweet candies- but it was really good.

Then Carl and I split up to accomplish some chores. I was on the hunt for a used clothing store to swap some clothes. Carl was looking for a haircut. There was a thrift store near us but it was closed on Sundays. The next closest place I could find was about 40 minutes on the subway. I trekked all the way there with my bag of clothes.

At the counter I started pulling out clothes and indicating I wanted to sell them. A tall, lanky boy who looked like he should be in a skatepark somewhere, swaggered over and stared at me. I held up my shirt and said, “sell?”. In monotone but perfect English he said, “we don’t do that here”. He watched me as I shoved my clothes into the tiny plastic bag again. For some reason it all felt pretty embarrassing.

But I didn’t want to leave without getting a light long sleeve shirt so I swallowed my pride, hefted my bag o to my hip, and looked around. I found some items and went to the dressing room and noticed a text from Carl, referring to his haircut, “you might have to fix this”. So it was an embarrassing afternoon all around.

I ended up buying a shirt and a long skirt and then leaving my bag of clothes in front of the closed thrift store. Hopefully someone will take them. Carl ended up having to go to three different barbers before finding an old man in a basement that agreed to cut his hair. He definitely had an Asian style fade, but it wasn’t as bad as his text implied.

The best reviewed barbecue restaurant in our neighborhood was actually just a block from our hotel. When we approached we saw a bunch of people waiting out front. The man that appeared to be the host checked names off a list on the wall but didn’t ask for our name or even look at us. I scanned the list and saw Hugo and a UK phone number. I gestured to the two western looking guys sitting near the front and they confirmed we write our own name on the list.

The wait wasn’t bad and then we were brought in to a table already decorated in banchan. We ordered pork belly and shoulder and they cooked it for us. I think Carl enjoys the cooking part but it was nice to not have to worry about it and they did a really good job. The meat was perfect. We cheered (geon bae!) to our last night in Korea.