Venito: Bellissimo!

The last stop on our Italian vacation was Venice. Beautiful Venice. We turned in the rental car at Marco Polo Airport (thank goodness!) and hopped on a water bus that took us to the island that is Venice. Venice is an island (actually 117 of them connected by bridges) that has absolutely no cars. What a welcome change! We walked most everywhere we went while there. The only other option is to take some type of boat. On our first night there we found that the map given to us by the hotel was nearly completely useless: the millions of little side streets and alleys that makes up Venice are not on the map. This took some getting used to for Steve. I, however, liked just wandering down streets, finding unexpected things around each corner, hoping you were walking in the right direction. On our first night there we ate in an enchanting restaurant that had a back patio with a ceiling of vines with lanterns hanging from them. It was very romantic. (The food was also very good: tagliatelle with crab sauce...yum). We visited the Doge's palace, St. Marks Square and Basilica, and the Ponte di Rialto. All of these places were packed with tourists but as soon as you were away from these sights Venice was much less crowded and you could really take in the city.
The highlight of our time in Venice was the gondola ride. What is more romantic than a gondola ride? Our gondolier began the ride by pointing out some of the sights we passed and soon the gondolier in front of us began to sing. About halfway through the ride Steve proposed. (He did a very good job!) After the gondola ride we went for gelato (our favorite dessert!) and then walked back to the hotel. The perfect end to the perfect vacation!
There's not much left to tell of our Italian vacation. The next day we took a train back to Rome (on this trip we used every type of transportation imaginable: plane, car, bus, subway, boat, gondola, train) which was nice- we got to see lots of the countryside. We spent the night at a hotel close to the airport to make our early flight (turns out they would have held the plane if we'd been late- they held it for other people!) and headed back to reality (almost, we still got to fly home in first class). Our Italian vacation was amazing. Italy is more amazing and beautiful than I could have ever imagined. Oh, and while we were in Rome we both threw a coin backwards with our right hand over our left shoulder in Trevi Fountain, just to make sure that we go back one day!

Pisa

Ah, Pisa. Pisa was the second stop on our Italian vacation. In order to get there we rented a car and drove from Rome. This, I believed, was going to be the true test of our relationship. I'm not a fantastic navigator and driving in Italy is difficult under the best circumstances. I believed that if we could make it through driving in Italy we could make it through anything. Once we got out of Rome the Autostrada (Interstate) wasn't so bad. Once we got to Pisa our directions didn't work quite so well, though. We got lost and wound up having to go to the airport and hire a taxi to take us to the hotel. Once we were there we learned that the hotel had everything that it had promised...just down the street. "You need to park your car? You can do that just down the street." "You want to use the internet? Well, ours is down but you can use it at our sister hotel...just down the street." "You want to exchange money? You can do that at the bank...just down the street!" All other things considered, the hotel was nice and very cute. Unlike Rome, all of the sites in Pisa are conveniently located in one location. With one stop you can see the Leaning Tower, the Duomo, and the Baptistery. They are all very beautiful and the tower leans more than I imagined. While in Pisa I had the best food that I'd ever eaten. We had dinner at Osteria dei Cavalieri and it was amazing, even though when I first looked at the menu nothing excited me. For an appetizer we had the prosciutto and fried dough (if you've never eaten prosciutto you absolutely must. It's delicious.) For my main course I ordered homemade tagliatelline with duck, carrots, and juniper berries. I was hesitant to order the duck because I'd never had it before and let's face it, they're quite cute. Steve convinced me to take a chance and I did and I'm so glad. I've never tasted something so delicious in my life. For desert I had crunchy egg ice cream with almonds (I know, sounds kind of gross- crunchy egg ice cream?) and it was heavenly. That meal was the highlight of my time in Pisa. Pisa was a nice change from Rome, much slower and quieter. We enjoyed our time in Pisa (and definitely the food) but our favorite was Venice, which I will chronicle next time, dear reader.

ROME!

Our first stop on our Italian vacation was in the Eternal City: Rome. Rome is amazing and I loved being there (even though it was in the middle of a heat wave and felt like we were on the surface of the sun the whole time). There are so many amazing things to see in Rome. My favorites were Trevi Fountain and the Pantheon. One of my favorite things about Rome is its contradictions. One minute you're admiring ruins that are thousands of years old and were once the center of nearly the entire known world and the next you're nearly run over by a taxi. (Crossing the street in Rome is like a high-stakes game of dodgeball and driving is an extreme sport. Doing either entails risk to life and limb and is not for the faint of heart.) We spent 3 days in Rome and both agree that if you ever find yourself in Italy Rome is definitely somewhere that you must visit.
(A side note: The picture above is one Steve took of me at lunch one day. Behind me is Piazza Navona, one of the most beautiful in the city. It was certainly a wonderful setting for lunch. Just a week later we were back in Clayton and had lunch at Wendy's where I had a wonderful view of a gas station. Oh how things change!)

Who'd have guessed?

In January 2009 when I started this blog, the goal of it was to write about getting off my butt, out of my house, and meeting new people. Who knew then how much things would change? I just returned from Italy (an AMAZING trip about which I will post soon!) where Steve asked me to marry him. 20 months ago when I started this blog if someone had told me that I'd be here now I would never have believed them. I would have laughed at them and asked them how much they'd had to drink. But here I am: blissfully happy, in love with and engaged to the most amazing man in the world. Isn't it amazing how quickly life can change, and just when you least expect it? (BTW, the picture was taken on the gondola just a few minutes after he proposed. He did a good job!)