Florence and Chianti region

After dropping our gear off at the camp site, we headed into the city to have a look around. We had booked to see David at the Galleria Dell Academia in the evening. After getting lost we made our way to the gallery and prepared ourselves to see the magnificent sculpture that is David. Sneaky Paul managed to take a photo as you arent allowed to take any inside, thankfully he didnt get caught!! Apart from seeing David in the gallery we were a little underwhelmed with the rest of the gallery pieces especially for the price you pay to get in! 

Ponte Vecchio (old bridge...)



Santa croce



Michelangelo's David ( Hidden camera)

Just a little street (Ash exploring ahead)

From exploring the streets of Florenece yesterday today we decided to go to the Uffizi gallery as we had originally booked for the day after. It was awesome! I recognised quite a few paintings from the textbooks I had seen them in in school so it was really special to see them hanging in front of me. We bought a book which described the paintings and as we walked around I read from the book which helped in learning more about the paintings. We spent a good three hours looking around the place and Im sure we could have spent more.

Outside the uffizi gallery

A close up of Ponte Vecchio

On Ponte Vecchio

Looking down on Florence

Duomo Florence

After two days in Florence Paul and I had seen everything we wanted to see so we thought we would take a little trip out to the Chianti region where the vineyards and olive groves are, also the scenery is beautiful. We got a list of all the wineries and made our way out into the countryside where we went to La Croce for some wine tasting and olive oil tasting. This is where Paul feel in love with Olive oil and bread! We headed back into the little town (cant remember the name) and ate a scrumptious lunch and finished off with a delicious gelato mmmm.

Nice little town where we stopped for lunch in Chianti region

 

Paul with an old olive oil press at La Croce

 

Views around Chianti region

Ash enjoying some gelato (Italian ice cream)





Italy summer trip - Siena

Onwards and upwards! We made our way up to Siena, the drive was around four and half hours so we pumped up the music and watched the scenery out the window (well poor Paul had to drive). In Siena we stayed in a camping ground a bit out of the city so after arriving in the afternoon we hopped on a bus into the city. Siena was really nice, cute little narrow streets and clean.

A little well we spotted on our walk

Beautiful Siena duomo

Piazza del Campo - This is where the famous horse race takes place. The horses race around the square and it is obviously all done up for the festival

Some cool dudes in front of the square

The square again... just in case you missed the last two pictures :)

Monte dei Paschi di Siena - Oldest surviving bank in the world. Founded in 1472 and has been operating ever since



One of the beautiful narrow streets











Italy summer trip - Amalfi coast

Our next destination was the Amalfi coast which we were really looking forward to. We hadn't booked any accomodation as we thought we would go with the flow and see what village we wanted to stay in. The roads were very scarey as the driving was just as crazy except the roads were a lot tighter!!! We survived the road trip and relaxed with a nice beer! The time in Amalfi was spent relaxing, eating and drinking beer :)

Relaxing after trying to find a park and climbing hills!

Lovely night time view

I like Pina Colada's...

Mmm pizzas

Picture perfect - view of the beach we were relaxing at

Another great photo - if only we could hop in to the photo

Spot light! Dinner in the dark as we had a power cut

View from our drive















Italy summer trip - Pompeii

Today the adventures of pretending we were back in the Roman times begun! We arrived in Pompeii sweating profusely (sorry but really no other way to describe it ha) and needed to find a place to park. We found a car park and the lady operating the car park told us we had to leave the car unlocked and the key with her... Not really knowing what the norm was we handed over our keys hoping for the best (bearing in mind our luggage and everything was in then, but hey when in Pompeii!)

Pompeii is the town/city that was destroyed and completely buried during an eruption of the volcano Mount Vesuvius spanning two days in the year AD 79. The eruption buried Pompeii under 4 to 6 meters of ash and pumice, and it was lost for nearly 1700 years before its accidental rediscovery in 1749. I definitely recommend visiting Pompeii it was extremely interesting!

Ash standing in what used to be the equivalent of a court house

Brothel...

Erotic pictures inside the brothel

One of the comfy beds inside the brothel



One of the bodies found -  due to the volcanic debris the bodies were somewhat preserved. You can still see the bone and teeth in this body

Ornaments that were preserved

Baths

Ash cooking a pizza in the oven

Ash pretending she is a donkey making the concrete rotate in order to grind the wheat to get flour

Paul looking hot (due to the weather) over looking Pompeii



Cobbled streets of Pompeii



This is the laundry. Urine was used to clean the clothes......NICE

After walking around all day and with the sun beaming down on us we felt that we had earnt a nice cold beer!

Ash having a cold beer after a long day walking in sun.







Italy summer trip - Naples

After hopping in little Ed we made our way through the crowded streets of Rome to the highway where we set off for Naples. What an interesting drive! 

On our way from Rome to Naples ( First time driving in awhile...)

We finally found our hotel after going around in circles, getting caught in traffic and swearing at the GPS. We stayed at a hostel in Naples which turned out to be quite nice and after dumping our stuff off we made our way into the town centre. First stop was castle nuovo which was close by, we were a bit stingy and didnt go inside but it was very impressive from the outside! We then dodged the cars, motor cycles and people and made our way up the town centre. We went inside the galleria umberto, a large glass-roofed arcade, said to be the largest in the world, the arcade is filled with shops but fortunately the credit card stayed safely in our wallets. The rest of our time was spent wandering around the streets people watching (which as you can see from the photo below was very interesting) We only had a day in Naples, and for us that was long enough...

Castel Nuovo on a lovely afternoon

Galleria Umbreto I



Time for a rest I feel.....



Video showing all the scooters racing around the cars (It was alot more crazier than this when we were driving)



Italy summer trip - ROME

We arrived late at night in Rome and went straight to the hotel in order to get a good nights sleep to awake bright and early the next day for when the walking would begin. Our first day in Rome was exciting, tiring, interesting and enjoyable. We headed out early in the morning to beat the crowds and to beat the hot sun. Thankfully it wasnt too warm as we were wondering around the streets, and not so thankfully it did rain! First stop the Collosseum! 

Collosseum from the roadside

Me and Ash inside the Collosseum

The Gladiators trying to get money (they ask to take your picture in order to get the money, very annoying)

After visiting the Collosseum we made our way around the other tourist sights and ruins in the area. The next stop/pause was to see the arch of constantine which is between the Collosseum and the Palatine Hill. 

 Arch of Constantine

National Museum of Venice Palace - its was once the seat of the embassy of the Republic of Venice, France and Austria and then returned to the Italian State

Stadium Of Domitian on Palatine Hill

View on top of Palatine hill

Where the love of bread and olive oil began :)

Ash filling up our water bottle (Great having free drinking water everywhere)

As the day went on we definitely needed a lot of water, Paul was leading the way around Rome and was doing a fantastic job. It was great to finally see the sights of Rome after all these years of hearing about it. Unfortunately though the Trevi Fountain seemed to be a bit harder to find... So when we did find it, it was GREAT and really fantastic too see.  

Ash outside the pantheon

Trevi fountain (finally)



Ash telling the anoying rose guy that he is ruining her picture...

After an exhausting day sightseeing and many blisters we decided an early night sounded good. The next day we went to Vatican City! We arrived early in the morning, well what we thought was early, and there was already a massive line of people trying to buy tickets to get in. As we were lining up Paul got bombarded by people trying to sell tickets and tours. At first we werent really listening to them and we were prepared to wait it out, however we got a good deal and decided to take a tour around the museum and Church. 



 Outside Vatican museum



Inside the Vatican museum 



Being naughty and taking a sneaky photo inside Sistine chapel

   

Ash outside St Peters basilica (very sunny!)

Me and Ash in front of St Peters tomb

Huge picture of Pope Benedict XVI

After walking through villa borghese (which is a massive park area) we saw a number of people having a lot of fun on the tandem bikes so we decided to have a go and it was sooo much fun! Needless to say it was a nice way to end the busy sightseeing day.  

Ash on the pedal car



Paul on the pedal car with a nice view of Rome in the background

Our last day in Rome basically consisted of picking up our little car which we named Ed! and this started the interesting adventure of driving in Italy!

Ed! The little race car...