Living and Travelling in Italy: Visits and Travels

May 15, 2011

Since my last entry, lots has been going on. I spent the day on April 29th in front of the TV watching the Royal Wedding. I loved her dress.

I prepared for the arrival of my sister Jean and our daughter Shelagh on Saturday. George and I left early in the morning to go to the airport to pick them up. Their flight arrived on time but we waited and waited for them to come out amongst the many crowds around us. It was so busy at the airport because the next day was the ceremony for Beatification of Pope John Paul II, hence the millions of people. We finally made our way out and drove to Lanciano. All in all a trip like this for us is about six hours of driving in total.

We had a few quiet days before I took Jean and Shelagh to Florence by train. We spent two nights in Florence and took in many of the sites, plus shopping at the market and a side trip to Pisa. If you are ever in Florence, there is a great restaurant called l Latini where we ate one night. They have two sittings, 7:00 and 9:00. Traditional food and lots of it, very entertaining and worthwhile.

Duomo in Florence

Shelagh and Jean in Pisa

On Friday, May 6th, we then took the train to Naples, followed by the local Naples train to Sorrento. This local train we took runs every 1/2 hour, the crowds were incredible. We couldn’t even get on the train we were trying for along with many others. Finally we managed to get on a train and headed to Sorrento, an hour’s trip, stopping along the way. George was meeting us there. We were also meeting friends of the Rutherford family, Bonnie and Al Stewart who just finished a 10 day tour of Italy and who was being joined by their daughter who arrived in from London, England for the last leg of their trip. After meeting up at our fabulous hotel in Sorrento, we sat outside overlooking the cliffs with a view of the sea and caught up we with each other.

Sorrento

Form our balcony in Sorrento

The next day we took the boat down the coast to Amalfi. On arrival we only spent 20 minutes there which was enough. We then took a cab up to Revello which was much more quaint and quiet. We had a wonderful lunch at Palazzo Sasso overlooking to sea. This restaurant is part of the hotel. If you want to stay the night, it would only cost you about 600 euros for a standard room!!! After a wonderful day we headed back to Sorrento by boat and went out for pizza in the square.

Amalfi Coast

Family friends - Al, Bonnie, Jean, Me, Shelagh, Kaylee

George, Shelagh, Jean and I drove back to Lanciano on Sunday. After a day of rest Jean, Shelagh and I took the bus into Rome, a 3 hour trip, did a 5 hour walking tour of the major sites, then took the bus back to Lanciano. We took it easy in Lanciano for the day then the next day went to Pescara for a day of shopping, lunch and the beach.

On their last day we did a day trip to the Tremiti Islands which lies near the Gargano Promontory. It is known as the pearls of the Apulian Adriatic Sea. It is predicted that these islands were formed after breaking away from a strip of land. After a wonderful day exploring the islands and sitting on the beach in 29 degrees C weather we headed back to Lanciano and enoyed our evening sitting on a nearby patio having fresh pasta and local wine.