Archive for the 'Travel' category
Summary of the whole holiday – Beillissimo! and Delicioso!!
Beillissimo! Beautiful in Italian
Delicioso! Delightful in Spanish
What more can I ask for with such a holiday in two of my dream cities of the world?
I love my life. I love my experiences! My life is about travelling. Up to now, I had been to 16 countries, and 76 cities. My life is full of adventure, and exposures. This made my life satisifed.
La mia vita è bella e delizioso!! My life is beautiful and delightful in Italian………..:-)
I will come back here in Italy, but in different cities such as Venice, Naples and Milano………….Italy is a wonderful country with great food, nice people, exotic summer, and beautiful scenes. It’s a place full of romance and happiness…….
At last, something I must mention is that Italy is indeed a place full of good looking men no matter from age 18 to 60s, and Spain is also filled with beautiful sexy women and exotic hot men. 
Both places are indeed awesome!
THE END OF MY ROMAN HOLIDAY! Thank you all for your reading and support!
Grab yourself a Gelato and bring yourself a bottle of acqua minerale
Absolutely tasty and delicious! No doubt about the Italian Gelato! I absolutely fell in love with Italian acqua minerale. It is just so tasty. It did keep me drinking non stop. I could finish two bottles of two liters everyday. It was such a God’s gift under such exotic heat!!
Fontana di Trevi and Piazza Navona
It was so packed, absolutely crowded! This immense, and popular, fountain is always crowded – Fontana di Trevi
Popular tradition holds that if you throw a coin into the Trevi fountain, you will return to Rome. Facing away from the fountain, hold the coin in your right hand, and toss it over your left shoulder. Well, I didn’t do it though and I do think I will come back one day!
I enjoyed the crowd around the fountain. Many beautiful couples took photos by the side of fountain with big smile, kissing eachother, hugging, etc…It was a nice scene. It was warm, sweet and romantic.
Interesting stuff selling in the area nearby….
After I left Trevi, I walked to the Piazza Navona. This pedestrian-only zone is filled with umbrella-covered tables, gelaterie, hawkers, gawkers, street performers, portrair painters, tourists and lovers. It is one of the few places where you can spot politicians munching sandwiches next to dog-walking pensioners, next to wide-eyed tour groups, all sitting under the shadow of a Baroque fountain.
I sat down in one of the cafes, and enjoyed listening music playing by a street performer. Listen and enjoy! You can see street performer all around Piazza Navona.
I ordered a floating ice cream on coffee, and it was wonderful. I enjoyed so much in this environment, the music, the food, the Espresso, the Gelato……Italian are so friendly and warm. I LOVE ROME!!
I ended up my day in Piazza del Popolo, where I could take metro back to my hotel
The street performer around the Piazza del Popolo…The Egyptian mummy…
Shopping in Italy
Apart visiting rest of the tourist spots, I couldn’t resist to shop in any shops I passed by. Italian sales are very smart. The are very much similar to the sales in H.K. They all know how to sell their stuff to target consumers.
Sales: Where are you from?
Me: Hong Kong
Once she heard that I am from H.K., she immediately took out many possibly styles of clothes that I might buy. They all know Asian can shop, especially Chinese tourists these days.
Sales: Look at this! It’s Made in Italy! Nowhere else in the world you can find this quality, only in Italy!
Bingo!
They all understand shopping mind of Asian. They all know that we like buying things, made in Europe. In fact, it’s not easy to find things made in Italy these days, even included expensive brands. You will find everything easily made in China, regardless they are from low end to high end. Most of stuff I saw in the U.S., they are always made in China, some may be made in Vietnam or Cambodia. I found most of items are on sales in Rome with around Euro20, they are usually made in Italy. If same price you found in Spain, they are mostly made in India. This is the major difference of shopping in these two places.
Sales of shop did follow me around when I was in Florence, once I got in one. Most of stores are in chain, so those sales do mange few stores on the same street. Pretty interesting!!
Anyway, I am indeed happy with my shopping in this trip!
No commentsJewish Quarter and The Trastevere
Jewish Quarter is in every corner of Europe. I visited one in Prague, and one in Budapest. Jewish Quarter of Rome is different from those I ever visited. Both quarters of Prague and Budapest, you can see cemeteries. The one in Rome is different, where is purely residential area with tram as part of the local major transports. The name of Jewish Quarter is Area Sacra dell’ Argentina. The major features of this area is the connection of Rome’s most characterful medieval neighbourhoods: the Jewish Quarter, with its ancient Roman roots, and lively Trastevere, with its bohemian heart.
The cat in the Area Sacra dell’ Argentina
I read from my travel book that there are hundreds of street cats in Rome, specially in Area Sacra dell’ Argentina. It was really true. I found one by the Teatro Argentina as what the book said and showed in pictures.
This is Santa Maria in Trastevere, another beautiful church in Rome.
This area is very beautiful with surrounding of houses in redish orange colour. I took a little break and had a drink with my lunch here.
Monumento a Vittorio Emanuele II and Capitoline Hill
I walked and walked and walked. I walked all the way from Baroque Cornaro Chapel to Monumento a Vittorio. It wasn’t a very long walk, but took 20 mins, and it was exotic hot to walk along the path until my destination. I didn’t get around in the military museum, but took few shots of the Monumento.
It took me another 10 minutes walk to get to Capitoline Hill. I wanted to see the she-wolf suckling Romulus and Remus in Capitoline Museums.
The museum was great, and spent 2 hours in there before I found my way to Jewish quarter and Trastevere.
I saw a couple of taking wedding photos with Capitoline as a background. What a classic idea! Beautiful!
St Teresa
I had a long day to go, the second last day in Rome. I committed myself I had to finish the rest of tourist spots, before I left Rome.
St Teresa, Baroque Cornaro side-chapel – I felt touch when I saw St Teresa, a statute I admired for years until today. I eventually saw it. She looks so peaceful and kind.
What A Room With A View! It’s Firenze!
Firenze! Firenze! Flower! Flower! Firenze means flower in Italian.
Bellissimo! This is Florence!
Some of you might ever watched “A Room With A View“, which was a movie taken in Florence – a beautiful love story happened in Florence during 19th century.
I joined a one day tour, and with a “World tour”, a tour with a family from Los Angeles, a couple from N.Z., a girl from N.Y., and a group of visitors from Dubai. We were guided by two interesting tour guides, a handsome Italian man toured us from Rome to Florence, and a traveler looking local guide with “Pui Yee” glasses in Florence.
The tour was short, but we needed to leave from Rome around 8am, and the road trip took 3 hours. We headed back from Florence at 4:30pm. It was very short actually as we arrived around mid day in Florence. The local guide quickly took us to the Galleria dell’Accademia seeing “Sexy David” once we got off from the tour bus. It was the David that we couldn’t take photos, but we could take photos of the one placed in the Palazzo Medici Riccardi. It wasn’t the original statute.
Sexy David! The statute I longed to see, and I saw it!
Florence was beautiful, but time was too short. We browsed around in the area of Duomo (Santa Maria del Fiore), and had lunch nearby, a nice simple Italian lunch in a local restaurant. Pasta was nice, and the conversation of the group was interesting. I like talking to people from different countries, where I don’t belong to. It was a life exposure experience.
We had one and a half hour free time after lunch. I missed to visit Ponte Vecchio, as I spent my time to buy leather bag for my Dad, and a leather jacket for myself. 
Leather goods are well known in Florence, but I still found Spanish leather goods are more sophisticated. Here is the demonstration of goldsmith and leather making arts in a local store. You can see a girl with sunglasses in the mirror, who was busy taking photos and it was me.
We passed by a place selling wine and food on the way to Florence in the morning. I bought a pack of pasta, a bottle of pasta sauce and many chocolate.
When we were on our way back to Rome, we passed by an old village. Here is a video.
P.zza di Spagna, Scalinata Trinita dei Monti
After a long day spent in Vatican City, I went to a romantic place Pizza di Spagna. Very crowd needless to say, packed with people every corner of the steps. Visitors sat around along the steps toward Scalinata Trinita dei Monti.
Well known stores are around this area.
Vatican Museum
It took around 15 minutes walk from St Peter’s to the Vatican Museum.
The garden gave me a bit of feeling of Oxford University, is the same type of garden look in square shape.
I browsed around every floor, and the last room is filled with art works of Michelangelo all over the ceiling. The ceiling decoration was commissioned in 1508 by Pope Julius II della Rovere. Michelangelo was given the task of creating a monumental image covering an area of 500 square metres. The nine primary scenes from Genesis represent the Separation of Light from Dark, the Creation of the Sun and Moon, the Separation of the Waters, creation of Adam, Creation of Eve, Expulsion from Eden, Sacrifice of Noah, the Deluge, and the Drunkenness of Noah. No photos are allowed in this room. This room is with the lowest temperature compared with other rooms as the low temperature can maintain the quality of paintings.
This room is full of visitors. People were standing, and sitting by the sides. The room was completed packed with almost no extra space. Many looked up the ceiling, and amazed with what they saw. Some were too hot to speak, and looked like falling in sleep. No one wanted to leave the room. The noise was a bit loud. Security guards kept telling people to be quiet in three different languages – Italian, Spanish and English. I guess part of reasons the people stayed in this room for long, they were just too hot. There was not much air conditioning in every room, and each room was packed with many visitors.
