Italy - Venice

The Grand Canal from Accademia Bridge

As soon as you step out of the main station you are blown away by the uniqueness of this floating city.. They sure made life difficult for themselves by building the city here, but what a creation!! Even in the stifling heat of summer, while the rest of Italy sweltered in over 40 degrees Venice stayed a mild 30 degrees thanks to the sea breeze.

Good nights on cheap wine

I checked into one of the best hostels of my trip called Foresteria Valdese, a brilliant 800 year old mansion run by nuns in the centre of Venice. The hostel was full of cool and crazy people, the first night I went out for dinner with Kat an American from Long Beach, Bec an Aussie from the Northern Territories and Nathan also from LA. We had a great meal sitting outside at a restaurant until it was cut short by a thunderstorm.

Nathan at the restaurant
At the bar after dinner Keen for a bit of night life we headed to the nearest pub. We had a few drinks there and cracked up at these crazy Italian guys singing to us through the window.

The crazy singing Italians
Piazza San Marco by night, our favorite hangout After the bar we grabbed our wine and went on a midnight mission through Venice headed for Piazza San Marco (St Marks Square), one of the biggest draw cards to Venice. It is a stunning square host to thousands of tourists and pigeons by day. By night it is a great place to hang out with fewer people and live classical music. We sat there drinking for a few hours soaking up the culture until everyone had gone to bed except Kat and I, we hung out until sunrise..

The leaning tower of Venice You do not need to go to Pisa to see leaning towers, Venice is full of them!

Colourful houses on the Island of Murano
The Aussies Bec and Mat

On the second night we went out to a restaurant again, it was Kat and I, Bec and Mat. We had another good night and once again ended up in Piazza San Marco.

The view from our hostel window

I have never been anywhere like Venice, it is so different. There are no cars on the island and the only way of getting around is by water or foot. The maze of alleys and squares means you can have a great time getting seriously lost. Venice was my favorite of all the cities I visited on my travels and I will definitely be going back.

The Grand Canal from Rialto Bridge

The start of a Romance

After a couple of days it was time to go, Bec was heading off to Croatia, Mat off to Rome and Kat to Sorrento. My original plan was to head to Salzberg in Austria after Venice, however lets just say I got a better offer and joined Kat on a train to Sorrento which was the beginning of an amazing and unexpected adventure. I guess it is true what they say about Venice being the romantic city =)

Italy - The Bridge Drop

Good spot for a drop

Just 5 minutes walk down the Cinque Terra from Monterosso al Mare I met some American guys hanging out by a bridge discussing whether it could be jumped. They had met some travellers a week before who had shown video footage of them jumping it. It was a pretty big drop and there was no way I was going to attempt it without checking out the landing first. So we climbed down the cliff and dived at the landing spot, it was about 4m deep so good enough for a flat footed jump.

Bombs Away The American guys were keen to jump first which was fine by me.. I stood by the landing and shot footage as they jumped. Then it was my turn, it was pretty freaky standing on the top rail of the bridge even after seeing the other two go first.

Walking on water, my jesus photo
Its hard to see on here but if you zoom in you can see this was a perfectly timed photo. You can see a tiny start of the splash just as my sandals touched the water. I decided to wear sandals as I wanted land with flat feet instead of pointed so I did not go too deep. The bad side of that is it would be a hell of a slapping to the feet without the sandals.

Heavy Impact The impact was heavy but the sandals worked well. I can't remember much from here other than it took a while to get back up to the surface. One of the American guys dived at the time of impact next to the landing site to see how deep we went, he said about 3m so we still had a meter to go..

What a ride!

It was a good adrenaline rush and it had to be done again.. and again.. By counting the frames in the camera I calculated the drop height at around 11m.

Italy - Cinque Terra

Riomaggiore in the morning sun

I took the train from Rome up to Genoa, it was a nice trip up the west coast. I went through Pisa and caught a glimpse of the leaning tower from the train. I stayed a couple of days in Genoa and used it as a base to explore the Cinque Terra which was the main reason for my visit. The Cinque Terra "The Five Villages" is an awesome 11km walk which links five of Italy's finest coastal villages.

The start of the trail from Riomaggiore
I caught a early train from Genoa to Riomaggiore where I started the walk. As soon as I saw the awesome rocky shoreline I knew it was going to be a great day and I went a bought some goggles as it looked like a top place for diving.

Downtown Riomaggiore

The towns hummed with all the tourists and locals. All the cafe's and ice cream shops were doing a good trade.

The second town, Manarola

The day started out hot and sunny and with the sea looking so inviting I could not walk for longer than 20 mins without climbing down to water and jumping in.

The diving was good with clear, warm water and plenty of fish

The first hill climb up to the village of Corniglia

The track was not a flat stroll, it did have some climbs in it. Normally they would not be too bad but in the heat they were a challange. The trail traversed cliffs for a while as well as cutting through vineyards and olive groves.

The forth town of Vernazza
The clouds came in after lunch and we had a period of heavy rain, which was refreshing after the sunny morning. The walk to the last town was the most challenging of the lot, the views were good though. Just before I reached the last town of Monterosso al Mare I came across a primo bridge to jump (see previous entry) which was a great way to finish the walk. It was an awesome day and I would definitely recommend it, bringing the goggles was really good and I spent hours during the day using them. If I was to do it again I would try and find accommodation in one of the middle towns like Vernazza as it would be great to spend a night and split the walk in two. It was still good to do it in a day but I could have definitely spent more time there.

Italy - Rome

First stop in Rome, Vatican City

I had a hell of a night train from Verona to Rome. The train was packed with people and the air conditioning had broken down, so it was hot, cramped and noisy. Needless to say my sleep was light and broken so I needed plenty of coffee to keep me going the first day in Rome. I arrived early in the morning and went straight to my campsite about 20 mins from town. After dropping off my stuff I headed back into town and made the Vatican my first stop. I had just finished reading Angels and Demons, the Dan Brown novel based in Rome and in particular, the Vatican. It was pretty funny to go around and try to find all the places mentioned in the book.

All style, the Swiss gaurd at the Vatican

The Vatican was pretty interesting but for me the highlight was the Swiss Guard.. Their uniforms designed hundreds of years ago by Raphael reminded me of a big pajama party.

The Pantheon was one of my favorite buildings in Rome

After the Vatican I jumped on one of those open bus tours which turned out to be a bad idea. It was really hot, up in the late 30's and sitting up top in the sun my water ran out quickly. It was close to wheather I would survive the tour without getting heat stroke. I was keen to check out the Pantheon for its engineering significance as one of the first ever dome structures. I was not dissapointed, it was impressive and in great condition considering it being over 2000 years old.

The Roman Forum

You can spend days in Rome looking at ruins and in particular the Roman forum and Colosseum. It was interesting to see the size of the Roman Forum which was the centre of ancient Rome but it had been reduced to ruins by centries of plundering. It was also interesting to discover that most of the original marble was taken to build the present icons of Rome including the Vatican.

The Colosseum by night
Rome was interesting but I would not recommend July as the time to visit. It was hot and busy with tourists and after two days there I was ready to head for the beach. I jumped on a train and headed back up north to the Cinque Terre.