It's February. It's cold and rainy. I know our shed is going to have mold in it when we open it up in the spring. It needs to be rebuilt. But rather than push for a new one, I've taken my mom's advice and suggested to my partner we should travel while we're still young enough to do it. Who's going to care if the shed has mold when I'm dead? I won't ever have grandchildren so really I just need to spoil my adult children and that's it.
Today, Robert finally takes the bait.
"We should go to Italy. They have pasta." he says, with zero expression on his face.
"Really? Who knew." My guy is a goof. It's part of what I love about him. He keeps me from taking every damn thing too seriously.
"Yeah. They have spaghetti with clams."
I'm not a clam person so I ignore that and we start discussing where we would go, which cities would be best, and what time of year we should go. Robert says at the end of the tourist season would be good, like into October. That way the weather is still nice but the bulk of the tourists are gone.
We aren't even sure if Italy is opened up yet, after Covid. Italy was hit hard by the pandemic and you're still required to have your vaccination card with you to travel into Italy, not to mention Germany or New York, common stops along the way.
So we start planning. We buy tons of books and maps and my mother buys us the Rick Steve's Italy book. She's nearly as excited as we are. She went to Florence and the Italian coast with my middle sister, Deanna, a few years ago. She's bursting to tell me the things we need to see.
I start learning Italian on Babbel and Robert starts with Duolingo. Eventually I switch to Duolingo because he's learning faster and I'm salty about it. But he's already a month ahead of me. I may or may not sulk silently when he speaks Italian at me TWENTY FOUR HOURS A DAY.
We decide to take large 80L backpacks because you can't roll luggage in Venice and getting luggage into a gondola is ridiculous. That idea lasts all of about five months. We buy gorgeous packs at REI for like $400. They got returned two weeks ago. We've decided to use one peice of luggage each. Robert has the biggest one and I have the next one in our set.
Robert has purchased tuxedo jackets and Tommy Bahama shirts for the trip, but refuses to take any of his Fluevog shoes because he says taking care of one's feet is top priority when traveling. He walked 2600 miles of the PCT so I'm not going to argue.
I've hand picked every single item I'm taking for clothing. While Robert is learning Italian TWENTY FOR HOURS A DAY, I'm studying clothing sites and reading reviews and ordering, testing, returning, packing. I've chosen a blue & white palette with black and brown for formal items. It's all interchangeable and I'm proud of the entire wardrobe.
We've added heavier, more rigid packing cubes to our packing and it's paying off. We've gotten so much clothing in our bags. I have 6 formal style dresses, alone. But we plan on eating out every night over a nearly 3 week trip (I think it's 18 days) so 6 dresses is pretty good, imho. We also have two other pairs of shoes each, other than what we'll be wearing. I'm convinced the airlines will lose our luggage. The summer of 2022 has been the year of lost luggage. They even flew an entire plan from overseas to the US, filled with nothing but lost luggage
At one point, Robert wanted to invite his parents. We talked about the best way to bring it up. He asked them finally but they declined. Robert was heartbroken but we understood. Traveling at a certain age can be very complex. I made an offhand comment on social media about them not going, and said if any of my friends wanted to go, they should consider it. My reasoning was that I'd already set up the Airbnb's with at LEAST 2 bedrooms, so why not share?
My best friend texted me a day or two later and mentioned she would love to see Italy. I felt like an absolute idiot. Of COURSE she would want to go. She was a medieval history major in college and it's what she has her degree in. I've rarely felt that oblivious. But I talked to Robert about it and gave an enthusiastic thumbs up, and so she's going too. I'm ecstatic about it.
I do worry a little about her going. She's strong and opinionated and so am I and once in a while we butt heads. Robert says we're adults and we can figure it out if it happens, of course. He says it's bound to happen on a trip this long and complex, with him and I even. I'm hoping we can all avoid that. Confrontation puts me into irrational fight-or-flight. That's a leftover from a childhood filled with abuse and an ex husband who was a severe narcissist who gaslit me 24/7. Thank goodness my doctor gave me some great drugs to cope.
Speaking of. Last weekend I started having panic attacks. Saturday I ended up in a field next to the freeway, dealing with it. Sunday it happened again near the same area. I almost threw myself out of our moving vehicle, feeling I needed to get out of the confinement of the truck RIGHT NOW. It was irrational and weird. Lucky me, my doctor set me up with the chemistry I mentioned earlier. It's supposed to help. We shall see. I've been testing them this weekend.
Our plans for our trip are done, at this point. We're starting in Venice for a week, then going to Florence for a week, and ending in Rome with a day trip to Pompeii. We'll travel on the bullet train from town to town, including a whole day of bullet train travel back to Venice from Rome for the flight home at the end.
Here's a list of everything we're doing:
St. Mark's Basilica night tour
Tour of the Standing Capuchin monks
Acqua Alta bookshop
Ca'Macanna carnivale venetian mask-making factory
Rialto Bridge
Doge's palace
Correr Museum
Climbing the Torre dell’Orologio clock
Torcello Cathedral (built in 639 AD)
Murano island
Burano island
Traveling Opera in a castle in Venice
Uffizi gallery
Accademia
Pitti Palace
Boboli gardens
Museum of costumes/fashion
Basilica of San Miniato al Monte
Santa Croce Basilica that hosts the tombs of Machiavelli, Michelangelo, and Galileo
Climbing the Duomo
3 hour hot air balloon ride over Florence
Visiting the Medici chapel
Seeing the Palazzo Vecchio
Visiting Church of Santa Maria Novella
The Colosseum, Forum, Palatine
The Pantheon
The Roman catacombs
The APIAN WAY
St Peter's tomb
Basilica di San Giovanni in Laterno "the mother of all churches in Rome and the world"
Private tour of the Sistine Chapel
Vatican Museums tours (there are 26 museums)
And a private tour of Pompeii with a meal on the Amalfi Coast in Positano
Ciao!!
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