Category: Italy

It’s hard to believe we finally made it back! The trip back to the US was as painful as we expected, but luckily we gave ourselves plenty of days to get home. To briefly recap, we made the journey home back in mid July for my son’s wedding and to finally close on our new home. The wedding was held about 2 hours north of where we live (Phoenix) in a mountain town called Flagstaff. This is a great place for a July wedding in Arizona since it is about 20 degrees cooler (-11.1 degrees Celsius cooler) than where we live. The ceremony took place in the forest among the pine trees and was absolutely beautiful. It was a spectacular weekend of fun with family and friends. About 10 days later, we took possession of our new home. We ended up staying in Arizona a few weeks longer than we initially had planned in order to try and get somewhat moved into our home. In the end, we managed to get most of the way moved in, but there is still a lot more to do when we finally return for the winter (ugh).

August 27th arrived, and it was time to make our way back to Zoe.  The chaos of summer travel in a post pandemic era had not let up, and I was dreading making this trip yet again.  We ended up flying from Phoenix to Chicago (arriving at midnight) and spending the night before catching an early morning flight to London Heathrow.  We arrived in London around 11:00 pm and then had to take an hour long Uber ride to Gatwick Airport, where we spent another night.  Bright and early the next morning, we caught our flight to Catania, Sicily.  We made it out of the airport only to discover that we had missed the bus to Licata by 5 minutes.  To make matters worse, they had cancelled the next bus which meant we had to sit at the airport (on a concrete bench) for 2 hours before the next bus.  Since this now put us in rush hour, our 2 hour bus ride took closer to 2 hours and 45 minutes.  We left the US Saturday afternoon and did not arrive to Zoe until Monday evening.  Needless to say, I was not a very happy person when we finally made it back to Zoe.  Hopefully, the journey home at the end of October will be far less painful  🤞.

Well, now that you are all caught up, let’s resume our journey in Sicily.  Since we arrived in Licata with little time before our departure, we decided to spend some extra time here and do a little exploring (plus we had our spot in the marina paid until September 6th…..why let that go to waste?).  The marina here is quite nice.  There are a couple of restaurants onsite, a supermarket within walking distance, and the breakwater is constructed in a way that provides an excellent (and very popular) exercise route.  About halfway down the breakwater, you will encounter about 20 cats and a cat condominium (I kid you not!).  Okay, so I don’t really think the little trailer is strictly for the cats, but we aren’t entirely sure who the little trailer belongs to.  The cats are definitely inhabitants, but I’m pretty sure they are not the ones responsible for the empty beer bottles.  Since it sits perched over a fish farm below, we theorize that it’s more of a watch station for someone (I can only imagine the way it looks inside with all those cats running around 🤢).  If you walk in the opposite direction, you will find one of the tallest lighthouses in Europe and a beautiful monument to the fallen and missing Italian sailors at the port entrance.  Just beyond the port, there is a huge expanse of beautiful, sand beach and a large swimming area nestled inside a reef.  Unlike cat alley, this area was home to lots and lots of stray dogs.  One in particular decided to befriend us for our entire beach walk.  Ironically, when a couple of barking dogs charged towards us, our little buddy barked back, and they turned around a left us alone.  I guess he advised them that we were okay people…..haha.

A few fun facts about Sicily in general…..it is the biggest and most highly populated island in the Mediterranean.  It is also one of the hilliest and most mountainous parts of Italy.  Interestingly, you will find a tremendous amount of Greek influence here in Sicily as they founded many of the coastal cities which still exist today.  As a result, there are some incredible, well preserved ruins of temples, theaters and monuments left behind from ancient times.  Okay, enough of the history lesson.  There is a method to my madness.  I tell you all of this as a precursor to our latest excursion off the boat.

A 45 minute drive outside of Licata brought us to the hilltop city of Agrigento, home to the Valley of the Temples.  We spent several hours wandering the vast archaeological site which is home to many well preserved Greek temples.  In an effort to not bore you with too much of a history lesson, I will let the pictures speak for themselves.

After thoroughly exploring the grounds in the blazing, hot sun, we headed off to our next excursion.  We drove through the town of Naro where a castle sits upon the highest point.  Here, we found breathtaking views of the valley below and the sea just beyond.  We did not spend a lot of time here since we had an appointment at a local winery for a tasting and lunch.  We arrived at Bonsignore Vineyard where we were greeted by the owner.  He and his wife had basically sold up everything to buy the vineyard and accompanying villa.  They had renovated the villa as their home and over time, have plans to create rooms for guests to spend time in the vineyards.  We began our adventure in their courtyard where we were treated to a tasting of 3 of their wines.  Each one was quite delicious (and award winning).  We were then able to choose a bottle to accompany our luncheon.  The lunch was also spectacular.  We experienced 4 or 5 different courses made of local, organic ingredients specific to the region.  After our extremely filling lunch, we wandered out to the vines where we learned a little about the grapes, their progression from vine to wine, and had a little taste straight off the vine.  Since we were the only 2 at the vineyard, it was really a unique and special experience.  In case you were wondering…..yes, of course we bought some bottles of wine to bring back to the boat (and they gave us a couple of bottles of their house made olive oil)! YUM!

It was an amazing day.  We love our time on the sea, but the best part of being in this part of the world is exploring the past and immersing ourselves in the culture, people and places.  We plan to spend a few more weeks in Sicily before making our way back to Greece.  While we won’t have time to see all the places we had hoped to, we do plan on returning soon.  This year our focus will be exploring the southern and eastern portions of Sicily itself.  When we return, we will focus on the remaining coastline and the surrounding islands.  Before I leave you here in Licata, one more fun fact about this area….Licata was one of the first cities liberated during WWII by American and British forces in 1943…..how cool is that?  Anyway, we are thrilled to be back on Zoe and will be getting underway soon.  Our plan is to get set sail tomorrow morning and make our way 6 hours east to the town of Ragusa.  Standby for more adventures from the beautiful island of Sicily!

Sadly, our time in Crotone had come to an end.  This place definitely holds a special place in our heart after spending time here, and I would have loved to stay longer, but it was time to get some miles on.  We had our weather window, so we bid farewell to Crotone at 12:30 in the afternoon for our 23 hour passage to Sicily.  I’m always scheming to try and minimize my time on shift in the dark, but somehow I always manage to screw myself.  This time was no different.  I managed to have the shift leading up to and well past sunset and then again several hours up until sunrise.  Dan gets one shift in darkness, and I seem to always end up with two.  Like I said, I do this to myself…..EVERY TIME!

The passage was pretty uneventful with very few cargo ships and fishing boats around to give me grief.  Once dawn approached, Dan decided to throw out a couple of fishing lines and try our luck.  About an hour out from our destination, he managed to snag a tuna and spent the next half hour bludgeoning it to death and bleeding it out.  We now had a beautiful 10 pound bluefin tuna…..yum!  Of course, the back of our boat now looked like a murder scene…..who knew tuna had so much blood!  We pulled into the anchorage of Naxos below the beautiful, hilltop town of Taormina and the smoking beauty of the volcano Mt. Etna.  Before long, another catamaran came in and dropped anchor near us, and much to our surprise, they were flying an American flag!  When the back of their boat became visible, we saw that they were registered in Dallas, Texas.  It’s not often we run into Americans on our journey, so of course we had to invite them over for drinks and stories that night.  This very young couple had taken a sabbatical from work, bought a boat, were logging some serious miles throughout Europe before sailing the boat back to America this winter.  We were seriously impressed!

We planned to spend two days at anchor before moving over to the mooring balls at the other end of the bay to pick up our guests and explore the sites.  I awoke the next morning at 5:00 a.m. to the boat pitching around wildly.  Apparently the Straits of Messina were blowing strong again which sent 3-4 foot rollers into the bay and directly into the side of our boat.  We rode it out for a few hours hoping it would die down, but it only got worse.  When things started crashing to the floor and toppling INSIDE the cabinets, we decided it was time to go.  Luckily, the mooring ball field was very sheltered from the swell and could take us earlier than we had originally planned.  As we made our way across the bay, I went to the front to get our lines ready.  Not my brightest move.  A roller came, and I felt the deck drop out from under my feet….oh this was not going to end well.  As it flew back up and crashed back under my feet, I tossed my body onto the deck top and held on.  I decided to finish the lines in calmer water.

Before long, our friend Tim and his son joined us on Zoe.  We had big plans the following day.  We would take the bus up to the beautiful city of Taormina and explore for a few hours before meeting our driver and guide who would be taking us to explore Mt. Etna.  We wandered the streets of Taormina taking in all the beautiful buildings before wandering up to an Ancient Greek Amphitheater.  Unfortunately, it was a blistering hot day, and we were all struggling with the oppressive heat.  Soon it was time to head  back down to the bus depot to meet our driver.  We all prayed he had a car with air conditioning.

We met our driver and guide and headed out on our hour and a half drive up to Mt. Etna.  It truly is a magnificent volcano to see up close and personal.  We made several stops on our drive up where we explored the topography of the volcano, the resulting landscape changes from eruptions, and talked about the history of the volcano.  It is THE most studied volcano in the world because of it’s unique nature.  The summit area consists of 4 summit craters.  Another part of our excursion had us putting on hard hats for an exploration of an amazing lava tube.  We descended deep into the depths of this tube complete with dripping stalactites.  It was wonderfully cool down in the tube.  We were told if there was any seismic activity, access to the tubes would be forbidden due to the dangers.  After we learned about the tubes, we headed off to some hiking trails through the volcanic sands.  Here we had some amazing views of the surrounding area and some of the ancient craters.  The diversity of landscape on the mountain is incredible.  Some areas look like you are on the moon, and other areas are rich in birch trees and abundant greenery.  Sadly, we did not see any lava flows or cool stuff like that.

The next day, it was time to get underway again.  Our next stop was the city of Siracusa (Syracuse).  We left early as this would be an 8 hour passage.  The best part….we FINALLY got to sail!  Well, at least 1/2 of the trip.  Once we lost the wind, our journey got very hot again, so the 3 guys decided to jump off the back of the boat into the deep sea (7000 feet/2133 meters deep)!  Luckily we threw out a line and float because the current was moving away from the boat at a pretty good clip.  I managed to make them squirm a little when I joked that I could just sail off and leave them there floating if they made me mad.  Yeah, it was a little mean….haha.  Once they were cooled off, we got moving again.  A few hours later, we spotted our first shark….EVER.  We have never, ever seen a shark in the Med.  I must admit, it was a little freaky (and I’m not sure the guys will jump into the deep sea again anytime soon).  We were then treated to dolphins a couple hours later.  There were several pods busy playing and before long they came to the boat to play in our bow spray.  This is one of our most favorite treats when we are out sailing.

We anchored in the big bay outside of Syracusa.  This was another amazing walled city filled with Ancient Greek history (yes, you read that right….Greek artifacts).  We visited the ruins of the Temple of Apollo, the Fonte Aretusa which is a fountain fed by a fresh water spring and home to the only natural Papyrus growing in Europe.  We visited the Fontana Diana which dates back to the 9th century.  We enjoyed strolling the cobblestone streets and winding through narrow pathways.  We found a quaint little restaurant down one of these narrow pathways and enjoyed a very nice dinner off the beaten path and out of the tourist areas.  Our original plan was to spend 2 days here, but we have been in a brutal heat wave and where we were anchored was not really swimable (harbor bay….yuck) so no way to keep cool.  We decided to leave the next day and head down to a bay where we could anchor and spend the day swimming.

Once again, we were able to sail most of the 4 hour passage to our next stop….Isola di Capo Passero.  The swimming was awesome except for the jellyfish that kept cruising through.  The next morning we took the dinghy to an island between the two bays.  We pulled it up on the beach and walked the path up to the ruins of a castle.  We then motored over to the end of the island in search of the marble remains from a ship that sunk during Roman times.  Tim’s son jumped from the dinghy into the water to try and spot it, but it was really hard to find among the rocks and plant life on the sea floor.  Our plan was to leave that evening and make an overnight passage to our final destination in the town of Licata.  Since we had some potentially high winds with swell getting around the point, we decided to pull up anchor, get around the point, and find another nice bay to hang out in and swim until we ready to leave that evening.

Once we got past the point, we found a nice spot to anchor and swim.  The water was refreshing and crystal clear.  All seemed well until those lovely jellyfish made their appearance.  This time, the guys spotted one that was 18” (.46 meters) in diameter….YUCK!  Just before 7:00 p.m., we were underway for our overnight passage.  Man, we’ve done a lot of these in the short time we’ve been here!  As forecasted, the wind was a little blustery (on the nose) and the water was a little choppy.  This time, I took the 10-2 shift. This was one of my least favorite passages thanks to all the fishing boats that were out at midnight.  They are not on our AIS tracking system which makes it hard to see what direction they are going or how far away they are.  At one point, I had one coming straight at me!  I deviated my course 10 degrees, and he continued to come straight for me.  I ended up changing my course 30 degrees further, heading toward shore and was shocked at how close he passed beside me despite my change in course.  I was not a happy camper.  Before long, I noticed 2 more fishing boats heading in to port.  Once again, they were headed my way.  At that point, I fired up our second motor and zoomed out of their way.  I was finally clear of the bay and the busy ports deep inside.  By the time Dan came up for the 2-6 a.m. shift, I was pretty worn out from the stress of playing chicken with the fishing boats.  He told me later that his shift was very peaceful and quiet.  Of course it was!

So, here we are in the marina at Licata.  Our guests disembarked here, and we have been busy getting the boat cleaned up and ready for a temporary shut down.  We were happy to be in the marina today as the winds kicked up to 30 knots with 40 knot gusts…..not fun!  This will likely be our last post for a bit as we are heading home on Sunday.  We will leave Zoe here in the water for the next 4-6 weeks and return home for my son’s wedding and the close on our house (finally)!  Super exciting events, but dreading the trek home in the middle of busy, summer travel time.  We will be back with more adventures sometime in August!

After picking up our documents to officially check out of Albania, we were underway for Italy at 5:00 p.m.  Since we had never been to Otranto and were unsure of where to handle all the formalities of checking in, Dan decided to hire an agent to assist us with the paperwork. When we were last in Italy in 2018 (our first year onboard) we did it incorrectly and narrowly avoided a problem.  This time we wanted to do it right. Since Otranto is not a major port of entry, we were told we need to arrive very early because the officials were only there for a few hours in the morning (hence the 5:00 p.m departure the day before).  This was slated to be a 13 hour passage with no real wind to sail with.  As we got outside the bay, the seas were a bit bigger than forecasted (shocking, I know) and the winds were up, but straight on our nose.  This still meant no sailing, but it also meant slowing us down quite a bit.  I opted to take first shift since I prefer to ease myself into driving in the dark.  Unfortunately, by doing this, I inevitably end up doing double nighttime shifts and Dan only gets the middle (I think I may need to rethink my strategy).

Our passage across the Adriatic was pretty uneventful, and we arrived bright and early at 5:00 a.m. (managed to shave an hour off despite the slow start).  We dropped anchor in a beautiful, sandy bay and headed down for a nap.  Not long after falling into a deep sleep, the agent called to tell us he arranged a spot on the wall for us, and we needed to come right now.  So, up we popped to pull up the anchor and head into the quay.  We quickly tied up and Dan bugged out with the agent to get us formally checked in to Italy.  Ironically, all the officials were housed right behind us (probably could’ve saved some agent money there, but who knew?).  We were a short walk to the castle walls and cobblestoned streets.  Inside the walls were lots of lovely little shops and restaurants.  The next day, we rented a car and headed inland to the town of Lecce, known as a “foodie” city.  We entered one of the gates to this ancient walled city and set off to explore.  Lecce is known for it’s Baroque buildings and is over 2000 years old.  It is nicknamed the Florence of the South.

Our first stop was Museo Faggiano.  This was a private house up until 2001 when during renovations, the owner discovered archaeological  remains dating back 2500 years ago.  He discovered cisterns, secret passageways, tombs, skeletal remains, a Knights Templar fresco, and many other treasures.  It took them 7 years to fully excavate the site which they turned into a museum open to the public in 2008.  The building dates back to pre-Roman times.  It is said to have been a Knights Templar house between 1000-1200, and then a Franciscan convent until 1600.  We spent a great deal of time exploring every nook and cranny of this fascinating piece of history.

From there, we headed to the ancient Roman Theater from the 2nd century(not discovered until 1929).  Although we were not able to explore the interior, we did get some great views from above.  After that, we were off to explore a number of spectacular churches.  Each one we walked into was more incredible than the previous one.  Here again, I will let the pictures tell the story.

After a couple of days, we were on our way once again.  Our next stop was Santa Maria di Leuca in order to position ourselves for our next big passage.  Here, we were at the very tip of the heel of Italy preparing to cross the Gulf of Taranto on a 13 hour passage to Crotone (located on the “ball” of the foot/boot).  The gulf can blow some pretty big winds with choppy seas, so once again, timing was very important.  We decided to make this passage during the day with a 5:00 a.m. departure.  This would get us into Crotone while the sun was still up (important to us when anchoring in a place we have never been).  As continues to be our misfortune, what little wind we had was square on the nose…..more motoring!  We also learned that this part of the world is quite warm right now, so making this passage during the day was a dumb idea.  We were sweltering!

We arrived in the town of Crotone and dropped anchor in a big, beautiful bay surrounded by beach clubs, restaurants and a lungomare (seaside boardwalk) that went on for miles.  Luckily the depths were shallow enough that we were anchored pretty far out from the chaos.  The next morning we motored 2 hours north (yep, still not sailing) to a bay in Strongoli.  Our mission here was to search for the Italian ship (the Nave Petrarca) that Dan’s grandfather had died on when it was torpedoed by the British during WWII.  We had an approximate location, so this was going to be an interesting endeavor.  We stopped and asked 3 men fishing off their boat if they knew where the wreck was, and they pointed us in a general direction.  After searching for over a 1/2 hour on Zoe, and Dan searching by swimming while I used Zoe to try and hover near the supposed spot, we had no luck.  Dan then jumped in the dinghy to search further from Zoe while I remained on board watching him.  Eventually, frustration took over, and he decided to zoom over to another boat where a man was fishing.  Before long, they both came over to the boat where I used Google translate to explain what we were looking for a why (I then proceeded to butcher the language trying to read it to him).  He understood and knew exactly where to take Dan.  Dan followed him in the dinghy while I made notes of the land features of where they were.

Dan came back to the boat so that we could move Zoe closer to area (we had been nowhere near the pieces of the wreck).  As we motored over there, he told me that the man had invited us to have lunch with him (the first boat of fisherman had returned and one of them translated the lunch invitation).  We dropped anchor in very shallow water and Dan swam the pieces of the wreck.  This was a very special moment for Dan as he had never met his grandfather and had only heard the story from his dad growing up.  It took a fair amount of research (all in Italian) and it was gratifying to actually find it.  Article on the Petrarca and it’s demise is here:  https://conlapelleappesaaunchiodo.blogspot.com/2014/07/petrarca.html?m=1  

After spending time with what was left of the wreck (the torpedo had blown the ammunition ship sky high leaving only small pieces of debris behind).  We hopped in the dinghy and headed to shore to meet our new friend.  He did not speak English, and we do not speak Italian so this was truly an adventure.  We got in his car and he brought us to his home where he and his wife made us an amazing home cooked multi-course lunch with local wine.  After a couple of hours, we told them we had to leave because the winds were coming up and we had a marina awaiting our arrival.  Back on board, we spent two hours bashing back to Crotone (imagine that….going in the opposite direction and the damn wind was on our nose yet again!).  We came into the marina and tied to the quay.  After welcoming us, the marinero handed us a bottle of local wine to enjoy.  Wow!  On top of that, each morning we were brought freshly made croissants from a local bakery.  Holy cow, I love this place (my waistline, not so much).

The next day, our new friends from Strongoli drove down to the marina and picked us up.  They drove us back to their town and up to the old city of Strongoli high in the hills to the cemetery where a memorial had been constructed to honor the lives lost on the Petrarca.  Once again, we would have never been able to find this treasure on our own as it was hidden in a lower courtyard of the main area of the cemetery.  His grandfather’s name was not on the memorial, and we learned that the names were for the bodies that were found (18 out of 82 lives lost….very sad).  We were then taken to see the castle and panoramic views of the old town where our new friends once lived.  From there, we headed back down to Crotone for some lunch.  They took us to this little local gem where you had to ring a doorbell for admittance to this beautiful little fish restaurant.  There was no menu (or English) so our hosts expertly ordered a fancy fish feast for us with very tasty local wine.  Numerous small plates of different fish came out for us to try.  It was an absolutely amazing lunch.  We returned to the boat and made plans to meet for a pizza dinner the next night.  We were told that Crotone has the best pizza outside of Napoli, and our friends have a Sunday night pizza tradition.  Mind you, neither of us still speak the others language, so watching our interactions was I’m sure quite amusing to those around us.  Google translate became our best friend on both sides!

Once again, our friends arrived Sunday night (this time bringing gifts of homemade sardella and a huge can of locally produced olive oil).  They drove us to a beautiful spot on the water and a poolside table.  They ordered a delicious “pizza by the meter” with several different flavor sections.  It was excellent!  After returning to the boat, we enjoyed a quick apperitivo onboard (it was getting close to midnight).  We said a sad farewell to our new friends with a promise to reconnect when we return to Italy in August where they will hopefully join us for some sailing.

Our next journey was to Sicily and the town of Taormina.  This would be another 24 hour, round the clock journey.  We headed out of our beloved little marina spot a little after 12 noon.  Care to take bets on whether or not we sailed?  Of course, we did not!  There was either no wind or it was directly on the nose. The wind gods have not been playing nice with us so far this year 🙁

It was a pretty uneventful, overnight passage.  However, about an hour out of our destination, Dan landed a 10 pound (4.5 kg )tuna.  Woo hoo, yummy eats for several days!  So, we have arrived in Sicily and will keep you posted on our next adventures as we make our way around this beautiful island.

As our time in Europe is rapidly slipping away, Dan and I decided that exploring some of Italy’s inland sights (places neither of us had ever been) was just what the Doctor ordered.  Rain was coming in, so it seemed like a good time to escape the confines of boat and secluded island life.  Our ultimate goal was to explore Tuscany, but that was the extent of our planning…..no reservations anywhere, just a rental car and the two of us. We quickly packed our bags and headed out.  Well, the packing was quick anyway.  To get anywhere from the island we are living on is quite a challenge.  We need to walk 1/2 mile from our boat to the vaporetto stop (think bus on the water).  Obviously, this runs on a schedule and not on demand, and our timing always seems to be off.  We grabbed a seat in the rocking “bus stop” and waited for a ride.  We jumped on board and grabbed a seat for the 40 minute ride through the canals of Venice to where the rental car was booked (it’s 10 stops from our island to our stop in Piazzale Roma.)  This is a very busy part of the city, so we navigate ourselves around the traffic and people congestion in search of the elusive rental car facility (for some reason, these places are always hidden away in some really obscure location).  We managed to find it about 1/2 an hour before closing…yikes.  We were finally off on our grand, land adventure.

Part of our purpose for this last minute planning was to time it with the weather system that was coming….we didn’t want to be confined to our quarters when the rain came.  Sure enough, as we hit the road, the rain began….just intermittent drizzle…nothing major.  Our first stop was about an hour away, in the town of Bologna.  Driving here was very interesting.  The city center is electronically fenced and restricted to resident travel only.  Electronically fenced means there are cameras at every driving entrance to the city that snap your picture if you drive into the city without being a resident.  Unfortunately, the signs that warn you of this are all in Italian!  The fine is 50 euro per camera capture!  I have a bad feeling we will be getting a bill sometime down the road.  We won’t mention the ridiculous number of speed cameras along the route that I am sure “Mario Andretti” tripped more than once🤣  Anyway, we finally found the appropriate parking area and headed into Bologna.  It was a charming town with beautiful architecture, cafes and shops.  By this time, the drizzle was coming down more steadily.  Since we had not yet eaten today, we decided to stop for a late lunch.  One meal a day is often the theme here for us when dining out.  You’d think we’d lose weight on this plan, but those one meals are usually ridiculously large.  Today was no different.  We found a cute looking place with an intriguing menu and chose a table outside, under the canopy.  We opted for the Taste of Bologna which consisted of 4 courses of specialties of the region.  The meal began with a plate of assorted meats and cheeses.  Along with the typical, hard meats of Europe, there was boloney.  I haven’t eaten baloney in probably 35 years!  I vaguely remember losing my taste for it, but….when in Balogna….yada, yada, yada.  It was actually quite fabulous….great….now I’m craving a boloney sandwich from my childhood years!  After this starter, we were treated to 2 types of pasta….also fabulous.  Next came sliced beef with arugula salad (I am already full at this point!)  You guessed it….delish also.  We finished with an unusual interpretation of tiramisu and limoncello.  The waiter seemed to enjoy chatting with us so he brought us a complimentary blueberry liqueur as well.  It was quite a fun way to spend a rainy afternoon (by this time it was pouring).  Dan quickly did a search to find us a place to stay for the night out in the countryside.  I give him an A+ on this one.  He found us an awesome little cottage on a farm in the country.  When we arrived in the pouring rain, the owner greeted us at the door to our cottage and already had a roaring fire going.  It was cozy and romantic, and I wish we could’ve spent several days here, but we had a number of places we wanted to see and not much time to do it in.  My desire to stay did wane a bit when I discovered a GIANT spider in the bathroom, and Dan was unsuccessful at killing it 😳  Time to go!

The next day was a beautiful, sunny day as we headed out to the city of Florence.  After an hour and a half drive, we once again found ourselves in the chaos of a city center that was electronically fenced.  It was extremely busy and confusing here, but we eventually found the proper parking and headed out on foot to Florence.  Once again, we were treated to breathtaking architectural structures, sculptures and art.  Long considered the birthplace of the Renaissance, the historical beauty does not disappoint.  We walked around the Duomo which is a huge, domed cathedral in the center of the city.  All around the city are these amazing, full bodied sculptures of famous people or depicting a historical moment in time.  As you can imagine, the city was jam-packed with tourists (my favorite).  It was challenging to move around with any efficiency, and there were huge lines for every place of interest.  It probably did not help that we were there on a Sunday either.  Needless to say, my crowd-a-phobia kicked in, so our visit was not as thorough as it could (and should) have been.  I will try again on another visit 🙂  I find that my words fall short in truly describing Florence, so I am going to let our pictures do the talking.

After a few brief hours in Florence, we were back on the road to our next destination, San Gimignano.  The hour drive took us through some of the most beautiful countryside you could imagine.  We were surrounded by rolling hills canvased in vineyards and olive groves.  The vegetation along the way was already beginning its transition to fall with a spectacular array of changing colors.  Periodically the scenery was dotted with a sprawling Tuscan villa or a charming hilltop fortress.  Prior to departing Florence, Dan quickly did some research and booked us an apartment in the heart of the hilltop fortress of San Gimignano.  I was a little skeptical after our last stay in a hilltop fortress in Croatia.  There had been very little to actually do there, and you had to park far away and outside the walls (making it a painful trek with bags).  Well, this started out very familiar….parking WAY down the hill and schlepping our bags a long, vertical distance.  Thankfully, this is where the similarities ended.  The town was bustling with people and encircled a wealth of specialty shops, cafes, wine shops, and historical sights.  It was like stepping back in time.  We met our host outside of the apartment, and he showed us to our place (at the very top of the building…..noooo).  The accommodations were fabulous.  We had a lovely one bedroom apartment right off the main “drag” of this walled city.  Once settled, we headed out to get the lay of the land and line up our plans.  We decided that this evening we would just relax in our apartment with a mattress picnic of local specialties.  We found a great little shop where we purchased some wine, meat, cheese, and marinated artichokes.  We also decided that this amazing place needed an additional night.  We were able to keep the apartment for another night, so the next day we spent exploring every nook and cranny.  As with Florence, I think the pictures are far better than what I could describe.

For our last night in San Gimignano, we decided to try this Michelin starred restaurant that was practically next door to our apartment.  Their menu showed a 5, 7, and 9 course chef’s tasting menu to which you could add a wine pairing.  We figured we’d try the 7 course and therefore fasted the entire day in preparation…haha.  I’m sure this will come as a complete shocker….it was amazing.  We were able to select our tastings from the menu…two from each of three different categories plus a chef inspired dessert.  I really do not want this to become a food blog (it’s suppose to be an adventure blog), so I will leave you with pictures to peruse if you’re interested.  Unfortunately, this particular land based adventure was heavily food based.  After our wonderful evening, we wandered the old city once more, taking in the nighttime beauty and its lighting.  Tomorrow we were headed into the Chianti region of Tuscany.

Once again, my fabulous travel planner made a few phone calls and found us a room at a vineyard where we would participate in an Italian cooking class the following day.  We spent another hour driving through the countryside….it’s a sight you just can’t grow tired of seeing.  We arrived at the winery on a beautifully warm, sunny afternoon.  The manager was busy with some visitors doing a wine tasting, so he handed us each a glass of wine, told us to sit and enjoy the courtyard and would be with us shortly.  Once finished, he checked us in and took us to our room.  Another stellar find by Dan!  The next morning, we met with the owner (wife) and she walked us through the items we would be learning to make.  She took us into the restaurant’s kitchen, handed us an apron, and so began our private cooking class.  It was awesome!  First we made a tiramisu so that it could chill while we continued.  The great thing about the cooking class is that you then dine on the treasures you have made.  Given Dan’s lack of cooking experience and time spent in the kitchen, there was a great deal of laughter and joking as we learned.  Next was the pasta lesson.  We made the pasta dough, in their traditional manner, which would then be used for ravioli and tagliatelle. While Dan worked on pressing out his ravioli dough, I made the filling.  This was a potato based filling which is prominent in the northern mountain regions of Italy.  The other special ingredient we used in the filling was saffron.  This winery was also a saffron farm, so this was a rare treat.  We had a lot of fun making the pasta, but wow, ravioli is A LOT of work!  The last dish was a lightly floured, pan fried slice of chicken breast in a dessert wine reduction sauce.  She had me throw together a quick bruschetta bite for a starter.  After, she had us relax in the courtyard while she brought us each dish to enjoy and were expertly paired with wines made from their vineyard.  This will truly be one of those memorable experiences (especially if I can replicate the dishes when I get home).  

Sadly, it was time for us to make our way back to Venice.  We had a 3 1/2 hour drive ahead of us, and the joy of supply shopping 😢 Here lies the problem with living in a marina on an island in Venice.  We have no easy access to anything.  To put the boat up for winter, we needed some supplies (including 20 liters of motor oil!)

Despite being on the mainland of Venice, shopping was still quite challenging.  After a couple of stops, including a giant mall, we decided we had done all we could.  We weren’t due to return the car until the next day, but at this point, we were eager to get home.  We headed to the car return (long since closed), took video of the car for our records, and loaded up our bags with close to 100 pounds of stuff.  Needless to say, this was not fun.  The thought of dragging all of this on and off the vaporetto (which would require transfers this late at night) had us both feeling really stressed.  So, we went to find a water taxi.  We knew this would be more expensive, but it would go directly to Certosa (our island home), and more importantly, to our boat (remember, we are 1/2 mile walk from the vaporetto stop).  We just about choked on our tongues when the taxi driver told us it would be 80 euros….yikes!  Yes, we splurged on this.  Not only were we treated to a beautiful night ride through the grand canal and back canals of Venice, but we were dropped one boat away from ours with help hefting our bags on and off.  Ahhhh, we were home once again…..and it felt good.