Lucca

The little town of Lucca was on the way to Cinque Terre, so we stopped for a night, which turned into two. Which was easily deserved. The town and the hotel were amazing. They had free internet, and brought us breakfast right to the room. The city walls are still completely intact, which is unusual. Usually, cities build into the walls or tear them down for parts. There is a wide path on top of the walls that provides a city park, and the locals use it as a jogging trail. Along the path are planted trees: different types for each of the four sides of the city. It's an easy city to get to know. The walls keep it confined, the streets and alleys aren't too much of a maze, and there are many tall distinct towers that provide convenient landmarks. We walked around the walls, learning the layout of the city. There are beautiful views from the top of the walls.

















We climbed one tower (guinigi) which has trees growing at the top. Here's a view.




















This is the tower. You can see more of these "putlog holes", and other evidence of the type of construction where they built the scaffolding right into the wall.
















The towers at the corners of the city walls have underground passageways. I'm not sure what their purpose was, but I managed to get into one. Here's me in the dungeon.
















The city had an amphitheater during roman times, and the only evidence left of it now is the Piazza Dell'Anfiteatro, a strangely circular piazza. You can see where the boundaries of the amphitheater used to be.


Lucca is far more laid-back than any place I've been yet. I don't imagine there is any crime at all there, and locals and tourists mix in the streets while taking walks. Lucca seems like a place that is becoming a tourist destination, but has not yet reached mainstream attention. I hope not, but I imagine it being overcrowded in 15 years.


Doing laundry in the sink with hand soap.

Siena

The guidebooks say that Siena is divided into 17 distinct districts that are fiercely competitive. The district you grow up in supposedly defines your identity. I didn't see any evidence of it though. I was hoping for banners in each district identifying them, and locals talking trash about the neighbor districts or something. Perhaps it's just something they tell the tourists. Or maybe the tradition is still alive, but not visible to tourists. Us tourists, we do take over Siena in hoardes. We found a spot in the crowded Piazza del Campo, and had a picnic. I had a hotdog sandwich with cheese and pesto. It hit the spot. Meat is expensive here, so I'm getting creative.

Here's my foot in front of the town hall.
















Scaling a castle wall.




















We kept seeing these holes in the walls of all the old buildings, and couldn't figure out what they were for. After looking it up, it seems they are "putlog holes". They were built into the wall in order to hold the scaffolding beams as the wall was built.

















I'm getting better at Italian. I might be spending too much time looking down at the dictionary than up at the sights though... Gotta watch the stop on the cobblestone streets.

Florence

The street vendors here love it when it rains 'cause they peddle in umbrellas. And they've probably been doing pretty well lately. Luckily, I'm usually on a train when it's pouring. Took one to Florence the other day, and met up with Elaina, who I'll be traveling with for a while. This is the place the renaissance started. Lots of art. I happen to be in Italy during "culture week", so all the state-owned museums are free, so I've saved quite a bit on that, and have checked out museums I normally wouldn't have. We went to the Uffizi museum. I think statues are my favorite form of art. And we saw David at the Academia. I always thought he was standing in a strange posture, but never realized that it's because he's holding a sling (that he just used to kill Goliath). It hangs down his back, and isn't really visible in front. It surprised me.

Covering most of one of the main piazzas (piazze?) in Florence was a huge canvas that an art group had set out along with cans of paint and brushes. There was a crowd milling around the perimeter, wondering what it was all about. A few people had started to paint pictures and graffiti. I wandered out there, dodging wet paint, and drew a picture worthy of a kindergartener's fridge. Later in the day, the whole canvas was covered with layers of questionable artwork. As a whole, it was an interesting piece though. And an interesting social experiment.














Some people soaked their feet in blue paint, and walked around the canvas. There were many phrases in various languages, some cryptic messages, and some true artwork.















Florence has a great public market. No need for Walmart when you have great bakeries, butchers, and vendors selling all kinds of stuff under the same roof! I had a really good roast beef panini there.

The duomo is huge. It was near the hostel, so we used it as the main landmark when getting around the city. Here it is from a view across the river, on the biggest hill around.












And the river Arno from the hill. With the Ponte Vecchio (old bridge). It has a separate passageway that was built in the 16th century by the Medici's so they could freely walk between their palaces and offices without mixing with the locals.















Here's the mural at the end of the day.















I've never seen such a difference in the price of food at a grocery store and at a restaurant than in Italy. It's not just tourist restaurants, I think. It seems like the only option for the locals is to cook and eat at home. And for travelers on a budget. Here's a grocery store feast.

Venice

The Italian countryside, as seen from the train, is beautiful. I'd like to stop at one of these small towns to see what the more relaxed side of Italy feels like. One of these days, I want to use couchsurfing.com to stay with a local and have them show me around. I think that would be a great way to see how the locals live, and to experience the local culture. I wanted to try it in Venice, but was too lazy. So I'm staying at a cozy little hostel with a Malaysian, an Australian, and a Brazilian. I think I want to go to Borneo some day; sounds nice. The hostel's actually nice. Fridge and everything. We checked out the city, which is easily walkable. It's easy to get lost, but it's an island so you can't really get too far. Going in a straight line isn't really an option here. You have to zigzag through the city, finding all the correct bridges to cross the canals. Otherwise, you'll find yourself at a dead end looking at a canal you can't cross, and you have to backtrack. When I got into town, I took the water bus along the grand canal, checking out all the main sights along the way. There is an old historic building around each bend. But the most interesting thing to do in Venice is to just walk around the narrow streets getting lost, looking at shops and wondering how this city flourished so well in such circumstances. Transporting cargo seems to be an issue here. But it is very nice to know that you won't get run over by a car, or even a bicycle. Only pedestrians for miles. So, there's a shop across the canal from the hostel where an old guy sells wine by bulk. He has old recycled liter water bottles (hopefully washed), and you pay 2 Euro to fill one up with wine. It's not the greatest, but not the worst either. I can't help but wonder how sanitary it all is. The wine is in a big glass bottle. He blows on a little tube into the bottle to get the siphon started, and fills up the water bottle. Last night, we all filled our bottles up and headed out to Piazza San Marco. There were several bands playing old classical music. Then we hopped onto a vacant gondola moored at a dock to say we've been in one, 'cause they cost 70 euros.

The French

I seem to be learning more about every other culture except Italian while in Rome. A guy that works at the hostel organized a group to go out last night. It was about 30 French students and three "others" including me. The French students were a rowdy bunch, and had a song for everything. They take shots, and they all chant something in French. Someone comes back from the bathroom, and they all sing a little song. One of the two tables would sing something, and the other would try to sing it louder, and on and on until one table won. I'm told they used a ton of slang, and often would slip into "verlan", which is like our pig latin. I think you take the first syllable and put it at the end. The word verlan is itself verlan for l'enver, which means inversed. They were a bit difficult to get to know, as the French are private people who don't ever make superficial friends, I'm told. So they stuck to themselves mostly. Though a few of the more drunk ones chatted us up a bit. Making three-day friends is, it seems, a big part of the hostel culture. It's surprising how you can make good friends in so few days while traveling. Most you will never see again, but I imaging some of the friends I've made I'll see at some point. I may take them up on an offer to stay in a strange new country, or they may take me up on mine. It's a bit strange, because I usually only make close friends. Anyway, they all went out to a club after the restaurant, but I went back to the hostel because I had to get up early the next day to take a train to Venice.

Old ruins on the hill

Took a day trip to Tivoli today. It's a little hill town situated on the bend in a river, overlooking some really beautiful countryside. It's where Roman emperors and other rich Italians through the years built their vacation villas. I tried to go to a Renaissance-era one, the Villa d'Este, but it was closed 'cause it's Monday. I guess it has a water powered organ.
There is a spot on a hill with a spectacular view of the waterfall and the surrounding countryside where there are the ruins of ancient temples. They themselves are built on the ruins of the even more ancient (13th century BC) city of Tibur. It's not hard to see why they picked the spot.

Roma

Well, I managed to book two party hostels in a row. I don't think I did it intentionally. At the hostel in Barcelona, the first thing they say .. can't tell if it's a disclaimer or their way of saying get ready .. is "this is a party hostel". And they take it seriously. Here, in Rome, there was no such warning, but they do like to have fun! Every night, they start it out with a bunch of free alcohol in the kitchen. The first night, it was a big bowl of sangria. I guess that's Italy's way of welcoming me from Spain. The places we went out to haven't been very Italian though. An Irish pub, and a bar with a band playing rock music in English. I've been trying to get over being sick, so I thought I would take it easy today. But they kicked us all out at 11 am from the hostel. I guess there's a daily lock-out for "cleaning". So, I walked through the rain to an internet cafe here.

The sights in Rome are amazing. The first day, I walked all around to get my bearings, as usual. I was walking down the street, and looked up from the map, and there in front of me was the colosseum! I'm a sucker for all the old roman ruins, even the little remnants of walls that can be found in most old cities. But, the colosseum is still intact and has so much history! It's amazing to see. Inside, I just stood for a while up in the seats drinking it in. Their architecture and technology was incredibly advanced. I bet that in roman times, for a foreigner, it would have been even more amazing to see the colosseum than it is for me. At least I've seen pictures, and I know that such a structure is possible to build.

I wish the roman forum was more intact. It's just ruins now, much worse than the colosseum. The pantheon is mostly intact, though, because the christian church decided to use the existing structure rather than pilliage its materials for another. The marble that faced the outside has been taken though, so it doesn't look as shiny as it would have in roman times. The oculus, the hole in the top of the dome, lets light into the pantheon and seems to naturally light the whole thing perfectly.

And I saw St. Peter's Basilica, an amazing building. Inside, every wall has some masterpiece sculpture on it. I can imagine that, if you were catholic, that having mass there could be quite emotional.
The sistine chapel is alright, though I like the "School of Athens" fresco better, which is in a much less crowded room that is on the way to the sistine chapel. Though it's interesting to see a room that has frescoes painted by Raphael, Michelangelo, and Bernini.
The Trevi Fountain is really beautiful. It's at the site where an aqueduct historically ended in town, and they built a fountain there in Rennaissance times to celebrate the water's arrival. It's one large sculpture. The bottom, where the water flows, is like a riverbed and waterfall, and above that, rock and trees and other natural forms. Then, above that, the stone morphs into a scene of humans, and greek gods and horses in front of the facade of a building with corinthian columns.

The pizza's different here, BTW. The dough is more like ciabatta bread. They're rectangular, not round, and it's by-the-slice. You pay by weight, and when you get it to go, they cut it in half, and fold it so it's like a sandwich. Delicious! Every place I go, I gotta find the cheap eats. It was tacos in Mexico, bocadillas in Spain. Pizza here. Beer's expensive here, but wine's cheap.

There's a korean girl here in the internet cafe singing American pop songs. She's been doing it for an hour and its really annoying, but no one here seems to think it's weird. I think she's playing a karaoke game on the computer. This is a very hectic internet cafe.

Barcelona sucks

The beach was ok actually. The weather did turn around, and it's sunny now. The historic gothic quarter has some cool history and an interesting grid of narrow lanes. Also, there was an eccentric architect, Antoni Gaudí, that built these weird structures here around the turn of the century, including Park Guell. It's a little fantasy land where all the buildings look like fluffy cupcakes. A group of us from the hostel had an epic picnic there. We spread out all our food in the middle, and it looked like a feast for an army! I wish I could show you pictures, but sadly you will be without for a while. And I lost most of the pictures I've taken so far. I got jumped on the way back from a club last night, and they took my wallet and camera and left a few bruises. That was fun. At least they didn't find my passport. My wallet had only 10€ and no credit or atm cards. I love my money belt right now; it kept everything safe. I think I'm not going out tonight.

phone

Here's my phone number here. It's gonna change to an Italian number on the 16th though.
+34 633260960

Valencia

I kinda wanted to explore the castilla area of spain more and see a bunch of castles, but it seems like it's not so easy to find a place to stay. I thought about heading out there and asking around for a cheap place to stay... but I kinda doubt it would have worked. I probably would have ended up on the street... or spending 60 euro for an expensive hotel. It's semana santa (holy week) so many people are traveling right now. So, I headed to Valencia. This place is much more relaxed than Madrid. And I'm told Barcelona is very much a rushed atmosphere. It's interesting how the locals everywhere have a ton of pride in their regions and have feuds with each other. I've been told by several locals that the people in Barcelona aren't very friendly. I was sitting next to an old guy on the train over to Valencia who had a stroke or something four months ago, and he was relearning how to speak. He lost most knowledge of words. This actually made it easy for me to understand him. Most of the time, the locals speak too fast and use words I don't know. I had a pretty good conversation with this guy though. He whispered to me about the rude Barcelonians after looking around to make sure there weren't any there. Spaniards have more pride in their regions (Valencia, Catalonia, etc.) than in Spain itself. There isn't a strong central government. The provinces themselves are pretty much autonomous and are represented in the European Union.

The Valencians even have their own language, so they say. I think it might just be a dialect. But since Spanish is spelled phonetically, a different dialect should be spelled differently, and I guess be a different language. The street signs here are in Valencian. And stores with Valencian pride also write their signs and menus in Valencian.

Anyway, I explored the city here, then went to the park with some people and drank on the lawn. Then got some tapas.

Exploring new cities

When I get to a new city, it seems to be my tradition to... buy a map, walk around and get lost, then gradually learn the layout of the city and stumble upon my hostel. Toledo was different though. I got lost about a hundred times and still have no idea what the layout is. It's a maze, with a ton of little narrow streets that wind aroung. Beautiful though. And, like many things here, it dates back to Roman times. It was the capitol of Visigothic Spain, and has a long religious history.

Segovia was much easier to navigate. It's my favorite historical city so far. It's an old walled city that has an aqueduct running to it, originally built by the Romans. It's on the right in this picture of the plaza mayor, looking down from inside the city walls.

There is also a very cool castle in Segovia. It's perched on a peak at the edge of town, right on the wall. You can climb a trecherous spiral staircase all the way to the top of the tower and look out over the land.

The other night, I went to an electronic music festival outside of Madrid. Most of the people there didn't speak very good English, which was kinda nice. I've gotten to the point where I occasionally run across people who know less English than I know Spanish. At this party, it was actually unusual to be a foreigner, unlike downtown Madrid. Also, there was a fog machine at the party that was malfunctioning and kept freezing people's heads.

Crazy night

Madrid seems like the LA of Spain. This is where the wealthy socialites party. I found that out last night thanks to Alejandro, guy whose job is, apparently, to schmooze and promote clubs. He´s a friend of a friend. He took us out to two of the nicest clubs in Madrid, one of which (Buddha) is the preferred hang-out of the famous people here. I´m glad I brought a nice shirt! The girls here got all dolled up, and we met up with Alejandro, who paid for absolutely everything the whole night! We partied in the VIP area, and they kept bringing carafes of liquor and mixers out to the table. The Buddha is an amazing club. The floors and walls are made of some kind of aromatic hardwood, and that´s the smell that hits you when you enter. There are buddha statues everywhere. The lounge area has really nice alcoves, and they serve hookahs. We hung out with a foolballer for the Real Madrid team (these guys are big celebrities here), and met a guy they said is the Donald Trump of Spain.


Also, I checked out the Sofia museum. Not much interesting, except for Guernica by Picasso. It was free today.

Madrid

Got up really early, and almost missed the flight to Madrid because the public transit isn't perfect. Stansted airport is totally not in London, btw. If you're ever there, plan extra time.

Got to Madrid, took the metro to the Ópera station. Same situation here. I can't help but look around and notice how incredibly European it all is! I don't know why I'm surprised. The plazas here are really beautiful. I found the hostel, and walked around most of the city to get my bearings. My calves are killing me!

In the afternoon, everyone takes a stroll here. The most important streets here are pedestrian only, and are very well used. Calle Arenal, where the hostel is, was packed with people chatting and taking a paséo (walk). When people get hungry, they pop into a bar, grab a beer, and get a small plate of hamón or something. People seem to snack all day instead of having dedicated meals. Then, later, people go out to the bars, drink and have tapas. I love this culture! People are always socializing. It's a ritual to hang out with your friends and have tapas every day. The people here seem very content.

The next day, I went to the Prado museum with a friend from the hostel. The highlight, for me, was the ¨garden of earthly delights.¨ It has some very dream-like imagery and an almost abstract style for a painting of its era.

I took a long nap after that, then met up with some people at yet another hostel to go out. The party here doesn't start until 2 or 3 am, and goes until 6 or 7! There was a huge crew of us from the hostel, maybe 30 people, all walking down the street in a pack. I was able to practice spanish quite a bit today. I still can't understand enough to join a conversation and not be a drag, but I'm getting better.

K, it's the next morning, and I'm hungry! This hostel aparently doesn't provide breakfast.

Jet lag, communism, etc.

We'll see how this blogging thing goes. I'll try to keep it up, but no promises!
Got to London yesterday. That was mostly a let lag recovery day, as is today actually. Hopefully tomorrow won't be. Anyway, I walked around Hyde Park which is right next to the hostel. It's amazing walking around this city with all these old buildings. There's so much history here, and the locals walk past it all without thinking about it. Pretty much every building has some history.

Here´s "speaker´s corner" in Hyde Park, the northwest corner, where people historically have ranted about politics. The building shown is just a place where you can buy ice cream I think.

Today, I took the tube to the east end of London, at the London Tower, and walked back through the whole old city. I got off the tube, and right there in front of me is a midieval castle! And it´s build right on an old Roman wall that dates to about 200 AD I think. I'm still definitely getting used to all this. William the Conquerer built the initial tower soon after he conquered, and various kings down the line added more and more walls around it, and a moat. You can almost imagine knights on horseback crossing the bridge over the moat, and archers defending the castle through the arrow slits.

The original tower built by William the Conquerer is the tallest part in the back with four towers.















I checked out all the sights on the way back. The architecture of Westminster Abbey and the houses of parlaiment is particularly interesting.


















The G20 summit in going on in London, and the whole city is bolstering its defenses against the protesters. There are a whole lot of cops here, though none are very intimidating. They wear bright yellow reflective coats, don´t have any weapons, and are not exactly physically intimidating. The meter maids are invariably more intimidating. Anyway, near the banks in the old city, the protesters gathered. I walked down there, and there were two concentric circles of cops shoulder to shoulder around the demonstrations. I squeezed through to check it out, being careful not to talk so as to give away my American accent. It was a little crazy in there. Apparently, communism is the answer to ending the recession.


















When trying to leave, the cops wouldn't let me. You can get in, but you can't get out! So a group of us were walking around the perimeter, trying to escape the fray. We eventually found a way out. I guess the cops wanted to control people leaving.
















On the other end of the spectrum, as I arrived at Buckingham Palace to check it out, a crowd had formed with thousands of people on the street. They were waiting for Obama's motorcade to maybe catch a glimpse of him. Definitely a different crowd. Obama´s in that car.

Just trying out posting with photos.

Testing

Does this blogging thing work? Where's the question mark on this keyboard?