Museum Entrance

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Museum Entrance
Our Trip to Italy - 2007
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My Night at the Opera

• On our second night in Rome, our tour group was
  taken to an Italian restaurant for an evening of
  great food, fine wine, and intermittent opera
  sung by four resident (and very talented) opera
  singers. They sang between each course and after
  dessert. For their last number, the ringleader of
  the singers (the guy in the red vest) selected
  two of us from the audience to join him on the
  stage. We were then instructed to lip sync the
  opera while he and the other singers sang. It
  was my finest hour.

3
Ponte Vecchio

• Ponte Vecchio is a bridge standing in the old
  section of Florence, Italy. Its a major shopping
  area during the day and a major focal point of
  tourist night life in the evening. We were
  warned that pick pockets were especially rampant
  in this area but, in spite of pressing crowds, we
  didnt have any trouble. The picture at left was
  taken as the sun was setting and the charm of the
  city was at a peak. The picture below shows a
  local street performer who was really quite good.
  He sang a lot of American songs and I bought one
  of his CDs, only to realize that not only did the
  CD only have 4 songs on it, they were all
  original songs sung in Italian, not the
  recognizable tunes I had heard him sing.

Image acquired athttp//travel.yahoo.com/p-trave
lguide-2783551-ponte_vecchio_florence-i
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Tuscany

• Ive always wondered what the big deal was about
  Tuscany and why people who seem otherwise normal
  seem to almost swoon when Tuscany is mentioned in
  conversation. Ive seen Under the Tuscan Sun and
  I vaguely remember a Seinfeld episode that had
  something to do with Tuscany, but I still didnt
  see why Tuscany was so special. Then we visited
  and had time to wander and appreciate how
  beautiful the countryside is. I could see myself
  living there. Now, whenever I look at the
  pictures we took, I get positively all
  swoonyfaced, and its all I can do to stifle the
  palpatations of my trembling heart. Yeah, right.
  Still, its a really cool place.

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Venice

• I wasnt sure what to expect in Venice. I had
  heard it was dirty and smelled bad. Instead it
  was clean, gorgeous, and a lot of fun. Its
  impossible to walk around and not get lost, but
  there are signs to make it easy to find your way
  again. Food was overpriced, but the shopping was
  fun and it was every bit as quaint and charming
  as one might imagine. We took an over-priced and
  not quite satisfying gondola ride, because it was
  unthinkable not to. Still, there are lots of
  great ways to spend your time (and money) in
  Venice that have nothing to do with gondolas.

6
Rome

• We spent our first three days in Rome, sometimes
  with a tour guide, sometimes wandering around on
  our own. Our local guide was a woman named
  Marisa. She taught us how to march boldly into
  Romes crazy traffic, trusting drivers to stop.
  She also had genuinely interesting insights and
  stories related to the sites. We visited the
  Coliseum, the Fountain of Trevi and, of course,
  the Vatican. The Pope was in residence while we
  were there, but he must not have known we were in
  town, because he didnt come to his window to
  wave.