Vespas and Crazy Italians

Yeah, Joy eats Canoli. Got a problem with that? And look, mama and baby!

Joy gets a bite to eat at an ancient Roman cafeteria in Pompeii...served well-preserved daily!

St. Peter's Basilica in all its glory!

So, I must have inherited my crazy from the Italian side of the family - speeding vespas, cliff-side vineyards and houses, and cathedral domes larger than a football field! Joy and I spent four nights in Sorrento, a town on the southish west coast. You might say that this was the beginning of the end. Two of our three days we busied ourselves busing it to Amalfi: once to hang out and bake in the Mediterranean sun and the other time resulted in a failed attempt to hike the Footpath of the gods (and a jumbled Italian conversation with and old-ish Italian woman. Our middle day saw us traipsing around the dusty vehicle-free city of Pompeii during the heat of the afternoon. Did I ention that it was buried by volcanic rubble in 79 CE, so we didn't come across any gelato shops (or lunch for that matter) in the various piazze. Besides dodging a few buses and a multitude of vespas in Sorrento, we had a pretty uneventful three days.

Our last Italian stop was Rome! I was actually pleasantly surprised to find a friendly, quasi-walkable, and interesting, albeit crowded and bustling, city. We packed it in the first two days, starting with a night walking tour (thank you Ricardo) through some major social hubs. Roman Ruins day followed with a visit to the Colosseum, Palatine Hill, and the Pantheon (yay for ancient use of skylights). Our poor dinner marred the grandeur of the day - chef boyardi style gnocchi and instant-rice-like risotto - but the soy and rice gelato flavors picked us back up. Our religious sites day was next, during which we visited several richly decorated churches, did a Jewish Ghetto tour (with its very own Roman Ruin), and then ogled the Sistine Chapel and St. Peter's Basilica - the biggest in Christendom. We failed to find cheap tiramisu, so settled on gelato for dinner and called it a day. Last day in Rome, and the end of Joy and my European Tour, was low key spent shopping, bookstore perusing, church visiting, and garden strolling. We managed to spend a record low of 0.60 € each on lunch, and subsequently were ask to leave the Spanish Steps for munching away at our focaccia and cheese. I had a lovely chat with the restroom attendant woman in the Borghese Garden and ate too much dessert. Joy and I splurged on a vegetarian restaurant (baby zucchini risotto, mmm...) and semifreddo profiterole before feasting on our last gelato together (or what melted dregs were left after walking to the Trevi Fountain).

Tomorrow we part ways. It's been real, rapid, and rewarding...

...and now on to the farms!