Buon Natale in Italy

Christmas and New Year were spent travelling through Italy this year. We flew into Milan on a very foggy morning, very surprised that the airport was actually open. I had booked an apartment through airbnb and it proved to be a great choice, a little expensive, but close to everything. There wasn't really much time to sight see but the photos will fill you in on the two days we were in Milan. The hop on hop off bus was a great way to see the city. Had my first taste of real Italian food.

 

 

      




We booked train tickets to Venice and use the hop on hop off bus to get to the Central Train Station on the 22 December. It took about 2 1/2 hours to get there and another hour to work out how to get to our hotel. The Palazzo Contarini Della Porta di Ferro was my favorite hotel of the whole trip! Decent breakfast, close to the Basilica and tourist sites, good wifi and a comfortable bed were pretty hard to beat. We spent most of our time walking around venice. Our travel buddy, Lise, had picked up a bad head cold so Tony and I were on our own most of the time. We managed to get to Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve at the church just around the corner from our hotel - beautiful experience.

 

 
 

We had pre-booked a rental car, which Tony picked up from the airport and left at the carpark overnight. The water transport in Venice is reasonably priced and frequent so getting back to the carpark on Christmas Day wasn't a problem. The trip over to Genoa was pretty uneventful til we got to the city itself. The carpark was quite some distance from the apartment I had booked, airbnb again, but the owner guided us through safely. The waterfront was the major attraction for us but we enjoyed wandering around the old part of town as well. The apartment we stayed in was above a piazza with 4 bars in it, a bit noisy but I had earplugs.

 
The drive through to Florence was a little cold to say the least. The temperature outside the car dropped to 1 degree at one stage and we drove through a flurry of snow too. Luckily there was no snow in Florence. The rain followed us throughout the trip and spoiled the stop off in Pisa. The umbrella didn't manage to keep me dry and I even managed to slip on the wet marble paving. We dropped the car at the airport, bit of a mission trying to find the rental car depot, then caught a cab to Hotel Medici. To say this hotel was disappointing is an understatement. They directed us to their apartment building (which was 3 streets away), after we had booked a double and a single room. The "apartment" was what you would expect from a backbackers, nothing like the website photos. We had no wifi and breakfast, back at the hotel with the wifi, was bread rolls and coffee. Disappointed - yeah right!
Apart from the hotel Florence itself was okay. The Galleria Dellaccademia was a real highlight, with David as the centrepoint. The Duomo was splendid and the Ponte Vecchio is worth a mention for gold and silver. As usual the food and wine were wonderful!

     

       

               

    

 

Last stop was Rome. We caught another train from Florence to Rome, having been warned about the drivers there being just as crazy as Egyptian drivers.
The Vatican Suites were wonderful! The hotel wasn't far from St Peter's Square, the Basilica, Vatican Museum, some great restaurants, the Hop On Hop Off bus and the river. The weather was still cold and the ride on the bus was freezing but we toughed it out and made the most of the sunny weather. Even though the local food was delicious we were able to try some Chinese and we finished the trip off with an Indian restaurant.

 

         

                        

  

       

Loved Italy! Would visit again but next time maybe when it's a little warmer :-)

5 Days In Lebanon

With Tony being of Lebanese descent we couldn't not take a trip to the "Paris of the Middle East". After ignoring the travel warning on Trip Advisor I managed to find a great little hotel tucked in behind the corniche (waterfront road) in Beirut. It was Eid and everyone was on holiday so it was great to find somewhere near Hamra Street.
Before describing our wonderful visit I will share a lesson we learned. We had booked a transfer  to our hotel from the airport. As we came out of customs we looked for a sign with our names on and spent the next hour trying to contact the company and find out where our driver was. Eventually an airport worker rang the number on his mobile and found out the driver was parked outside the terminal door. He had been inside and was looking for two "tourists". He didn't have a sign because he thought he could pick us out. I suppose it was a compliment, looking like locals, but it wasn't funny at the time.
Getting back to the trip, the hotel was five minutes to Pigeon Rocks and a couple of cool cafes with awesome views of the rocks. We spent the first afternoon / day wandering the corniche and came across a carnival. We couldn't resist the ferris wheel ride which gave us wonderful views of the surrounding area. Dinner was at a cafe, mezze and wine while watching the local football on TV.

The following three days were booked for tours. "Golden Holiday Tours" provided us with the wonderful Oxana, our tour guide, and Nasser our driver. The first day we headed off to Baalbeck via Zahle, where Tony's grandfather grew up. The mountains in Lebanon are amazing, very steep compared to NZ, and numerous. We saw our first statue of Mary, with her arms outstretched, overlooking Zahleh as we drove through the area. Christianity is alive and well in Lebanon! Baalbeck is known for it's temples, which are still in great shape considering they have endured earthquakes and civil wars. On the way back to Beirut we stopped in a Anjar, a city from the Omayyad period. I must mention that while we had lunch near Baalbeck we were entertained by men speeding past in car shooting their rifles in the air. We were told by Oxana this is normal as it is a Hisbollah area.

Finally found a street sign that said Zahleh

Baalbeck ruins were great for rambling around

The crossroad at Anjar

View heading back to Beirut from the valley floor

Day two's tour took us back into the mountains to Geitta Grotto. If you don't see anything else you must see this place. It reminded me so much of Waitomo, without the glow worms. Byblos was our next stop. Built over centuries, it includes a port, a citadel and many temples. Outside the citadel the municipality have made it law that all buildings should be in keeping with the crusader type buildings. We found a wonderful shop which sold fossils so we bought a 100,000,000 year old ancestor of the salmon - very cool! Last stop for the day was a gondola ride up to Harissa to see the Virgin of Lebanon. Beautiful views back towards Beirut and Jounieh!

No photos were allowed inside the grottos.

Iti found a cannonball to play with at Byblos

Several sarcophagi were found buried in a very deep pits

The souk at Byblos

The view from our gondola heading to Harissa

Tony on his way up to the Virgin at Harissa.

Day three was back to the mountains, in a different direction again, to the Chouf Mountains. Oxana, being the wonderful guide she was, filled us in on the history of the area and of stories of locals who still live there. We visited Deir El Qamar, a small village with narrow streets and a beautiful church of St John. Not far away was Beiteddine, the palace used for the President's Residence, which we were able to wander through at our own leisure. I loved the simplicity of the place, not as ornate as some of the other palaces we have seen in the Middle East but just as beautiful. The mosaic exhibition was huge, as were the mosaics. I thought the mosaics in Jordan were impressive but these are far better preserved. Our final stop was the cedar forest, a reserve in the rocky mountains where the cedars are looked after by local rangers. Many of the trees date over 200 years. If you're looking for tour guides in Lebanon I'd suggest you have a look at Golden Holidays. They worked out the cheaper than the hotel's tour operators and were very reliable and friendly.

St John's Church.

One of the many mosaics at the palace

The palace court

Oxana, Tony and I at the Cedar Forest.

Day five was left to us so we headed off to the National Museum for the morning. The government has done an amazing job restoring the building after the war. I hope when Egypt has the new museum built they take a look at the Lebanese museum displays. The headsets and apps for laptops were free too. It took us about an hour to get back to our part of town as we had decided to walk. Didn't lose any weight though.
The food was wonderful, the shopping in Hamra St was okay and the tours were well worth booking. If we ever get back to Beirut again we will head further south to areas we missed. Five days was plenty to get a taste of "Paris".

The ground floor of the museum

Artefacts found in the obelisk temple at Byblos

Tony & Iti outside the museum.