It was 11pm and I was standing alone outside the Lecce train station with two luggages, two bags, no ride, no money, and Lecce’s Wikitravel entry loaded on my iphone, warning me about Lecce’s rip-off taxis. Well, thank heavens. I had phone service.
I had just endured three days and two nights of continuos travel to get to Lecce, Italy (in the region of Puglia) from San Diego, CA, for the wedding of two of my best friends: an Italian bride from Lecce, and an American groom from Buffalo. They met on Valentine’s Day at a party at my apartment in Bologna, years ago. I couldn’t wait for the nuptials, and the celebration, but mostly to be reunited with some of my best friends.
So despite obvious fatigue and ambiguity about the next few hours of my life, and the lack of fairytale charm that was driving my current travel story, being back in Italy after five long months away and the promise of what was to come was enough to keep my spirits up.
I was the first out-of-town guest to arrive in Lecce. I made it to the B&B in an overpriced cab (Wikitravel is always right) and slept in a damp cave-like hallway of a room in a bottom bunk. Still unfazed, I woke up the next morning and tried my best to play host to the string of foreigners arriving by bus and train, depending on whether they flew in on a budget flight to nearby Brindisi, or endured a long train ride from a major airport. We were stuck like sardines, eleven of us, in the small B&B with two bathrooms with no central access. But we were happy nonetheless to be reunited once again. Many of us had studied arts management together, while others were students or teachers in other capacities. But we all had at least three things in common: the bride, the groom, and we weren’t from Lecce.
That evening, in the absence of the tradition of a bachelor/bachelorette party, the bride had organized a pre-party to celebrate with friends. I’d been tasked with preparing a “Bologna style gag” for the occasion. Meaning that, because Bologna is a university town, it is famous for graduation traditions involving a significant level of public humiliation, such as printing out bad quality, embarrassing pictures of the graduate, writing funny captions on them, and posting them on the streets for the public to enjoy. When the groom did this for my Bologna graduation, my landlord sent me a congratulations. “How did you know I graduated?” I asked him. “Well, I saw your pictures on the street of course,” he responded. Eeeek.
So this was my natural choice for the gag for the “quasi bachelor/ette” party. Three of us from the “foreigner” cohort spent nearly an hour plastering Lecce with embarrassing photos of the couple on this busy Friday night in town.
We died of laughter as the pedestrians accepted our “art” with gusto, tourists and locals stopping to enjoy the photos as they headed out for the evening. The public humiliation continued as I managed to get the bride and groom to cross-dress during a “soon to be newlywed” game (photos not included for the sake of the long-term reputation of the couple, sorry guys ;)).
We made it to bed at a fairly decent hour in anticipation of the big event. Venturing out the next morning – the Saturday of the wedding – in the heart of wedding season in gorgeous, baroque Lecce, we seemed to run into a wedding around every corner.
Due to this competitive wedding season, our bride had “settled” on her third choice for the wedding ceremony: Lecce’s duomo.
Let’s just say Lecce’s duomo is not your average duomo, and not your average place to get married, especially by American standards. It is, for lack of a more sophisticated word, immense, and usually packed with tourists. I was dumbfounded that it was even an option to get married in a place of such beauty and history.
We arrived early for the ceremony, dwarfed by the scale of the duomo, and feeling as though we had finally stepped into the pages of the fairytale. Except, are grooms actually nervous in fairytales? We tried our best to console him. The bride was on time, but the organist was late.
Other than the late organist, they managed to get hitched without a hitch. The American “assistant priest” even offered comic relief for all as he embraced his big moment on the duomo altar by taking pictures during the ceremony.
After the ceremony, the bride and groom greeted their adoring family and friends on the steps of the duomo,
tossing the bouquet into our crowd on the edge of the immense piazza,
which ended in a surprising steal by one of the guys, who was teased endlessly after by the bride’s brothers. More priest photo-taking,
and a long string of well-wishing and congratulations, during which the bride’s nana (grandma) took a breather in the coveted limousine (not such a common car in Italy).
We got our pic with the beautiful bride, and then we finally set out for the reception.
The party took place in a castle called Castello Monaci on a piece of country land outside of Lecce. As we pulled up at dusk, it felt like we were arriving at Cinderella’s castle set on the backdrop of the beautiful Pugliese landscape.
First wine tasting in the museum foyer (another building on the estate),
followed by an antipasto buffet in the castle,
complete with all of the bride and groom’s favorite things,
and a few of our own too. 😉
We foolishly thought the antipasto buffet was dinner, but our plates were soon pulled away and a several course wine paired dinner began.
We were all feeling well taken care of.
As we savored the last tasty morsels of dinner, we were beckoned outside for the cake cutting happening in tandem with traditional Pugliese Pizzica and Tarantella music and dance, complete with a traditional band.
Tambourines were ringing as women threw off their heels and ran for the improvised dance floor in the damp grass, everyone trading partners and teaching the little guests and foreigners how to join in.
And just as we all imagined that life couldn’t get much better, we were ushered into another wing in the castle, and greeted by a dessert buffet that could only be matched in my wildest imagination by a scene in Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.
Off the dessert bar was an enclosed glass patio where the DJ, the official dance floor, and an open bar awaited.
The grappa was amazing.
And then, just as the clock chiming midnight snuck up on Cinderella, before we knew it 4am had rudely arrived and ended our magical night. The bride and groom retreated to their castle chambers, and we headed off in the Volkswagen of one of the waitresses, as the last taxi in the region had already called it a night. Not exactly a magical carriage ride, and returning to our damp and dark B&B wasn’t so magical either. Reality had arrived, but that was ok. We can’t be too greedy about our special experiences…we got enough of them tonight to even stow some away in reserves for awhile.
And that, my friends, is the end of this fairytale, at least for now…
I’m on a train bound for Kufstein, Austria. I’ve made the trip once before, in the winter, and it was a magical winter wonderland. Now it is an Eden of vegetation as far as the eye can see. Payoff for the long, wet winter. The train conductor is inching along and honking at some miscellaneous intruder. More time to enjoy the scenery…
This is almost the last leg of my whirlwind trip from California to Southern Italy, to Bolona, up to England, back to Bologna, and now on to Austria. I have so many stories to share with you, but I find it difficult to do this from the road, as I focus on living the stories that I write about later. I do manage to get a “pic of the day” posted on my Instagram account, but I often think I would rather post the pic to share with all of you, but I guess I just find the Instagram platform easier to use on the go. Please do find me Instragram so we can also connect that way.
This post is a check-in that I am, in fact, still alive. And it is a promise of some good storytelling to come when I get back to Bologna next week and can get settled in for the summer and can start focusing on other things I love in my life, like blogging with you all!
In the meantime, back I go to looking out the window on this beautiful ÖBB train. I love train rides – they offer such great opportunity for reflection. Maybe too good – I often see people crying on the train. I can’t say I’ve never done it!
We are about to start weaving through the Italian alps, so my phone service will go away. I will be left to staring at mountains and wineries and church steeples with the most particular architecture. So many cultures converge in these parts…borders have always been my favorite places to be.
Hope you all are well! A presto!
A few weeks ago I came back to this blog after nearly a year away, wrestling with my recent transition back to living in the United States from Italy, and the milestones that I’ve traded in for my experiences. It is a topic that I ponder often, and I appreciate any outside sources of wisdom I can find on the topic. Here’s an article that addresses this very issue. Since you all are lovers of traveling and experiences, I thought you would also find it interesting.
The Science Of Why You Should Spend Your Money On Experiences, Not Things.
You don’t have infinite money. Spend it on stuff that research says makes you happy. By Jay Cassano
Just as Siena is stuck in time, I wish I could have gotten stuck in time in Siena. Like in Groundhog Day, I want to be living that weekend over and over. But unfortunately it didn’t hit me how special my weekend in Siena was until I was actually gone, so I was not able to inquire as to how to stop time when I still had the chance.
So instead I rely on blogging, so at least we can relive it…together.
I had been wanting to go to Siena for years, and years, as I had heard so many bits and pieces of wonderful travel stories from friends who had been lucky enough to travel there. There’s a great blog called “Just Visit Siena” that I’ve been following for a long time, and I even shared a video about it here on the blog a few years ago. But Siena can be tricky to reach, due to mundane logistical challenges called mountains. Pesky details. An eight hour round trip train ride wasn’t worth it in relation to what I envisioned to be an overnight trip.
But after much anticipation, I finally got to go last April with my boyfriend at the time, who drove us. The approach into Tuscany was undeniable and fit perfectly into the stereotype – the road was smaller, the grass was greener, the sun was brighter, and the soft hills curved into infinity. We parked just outside the city, and walked in with our luggage.
I was a bit worried that I would be disappointed with all of my high expectations about Siena. I mean, at this point, I’ve been to a lot of Italian cities, and I’ve found that many of them are alike, or are not necessarily unforgettable. But I shouldn’t have worried. Siena is a place all its own. Siena is, for lack of the creativity to come up with a better word, gorgeous.
There are heart-stopping Tuscan views surprising you constantly, and each perspective is just as memorable (if not more) than the last. And as cliche as it sounds, it is totally true: walking the narrow, winding stone roads feels like it must have hundreds of years ago.
Wandering Siena is a constant visual delight, so walk slowly and indulge in reality, which we did as we toted our luggage and stumbled upon hidden courtyards,
mysterious wells, and other fascinating historical remnants.
We were walking around with our luggage for an extended period of time because we had a small snafu with the hotel we booked on Booking.com. Keep in mind – last minute bookings for Italian hotels via third party booking agents are never a sure thing due to communication challenges, a lack of a customer service initiative, and small hotels. But we found another average, affordable hotel, so the crisis was averted (I never expect much from Italian lodging, but I never have to pay much either). And Booking.com handled the “crisis” well.
Our first night in Siena was a bit quieter than either of us are used to, as we weren’t visiting Siena during the high season of their incredibly famous annual Palio Horse Race in July, and we are both used to the nonstop nightlife of Bologna. There is no nightlife in Siena, so it is a good place to practice “early to bed, early to rise.” There are a ton of interesting events, though, so do your research and plan accordingly.
We joined the crowds on our first morning just walking and looking, relaxing and people watching the never-ending characters in Piazza del Campo, where the Palio Horse Race takes place (in our case the most entertaining animal was pizza-loving dog),
checking out the Duomo,
the neighborhoods proudly displaying their flags supporting their horse,
the famous Museo Civico, and an occasional unexpected attraction like a tiny church we found full of wonderful art and architecture.
We didn’t do the Duomo tour because it was a bit pricey, but one of my English students highly recommends the tour and I definitely regret not doing it.
It is quite easy to eat well in this city without paying a lot, but it is also easy to eat an overpriced, mediocre meal. We used a phone app, maybe yelp, to help us wade through our lunch options after eating an overpriced meal the night before. We ended up at a modern family-run restaurant perched at the top of a hill at a beautiful outdoor table called Zest Ristorante and Wine Bar.
The tiny street it was on stretched ahead, sharply curving down and up another hill, nearly giving me vertigo until I was distracted by spotting the special flags for the neighborhood horse flying proudly and colorfully ahead, and my potential vertigo was replaced with a sigh of appreciation for finding myself in this one-of-a-kind place. As I write this, I am remembering for the first time in a long time that I stopped to think and look around me for a moment, giving thanks to the universe to be able to experience this moment. It sounds corny, but Siena really is that special.
After our amazing lunch, we relaxed again for a bit in Piazza del Campo trying to decide if we had it in us to do the big climb to the top of the Torre del Mangia, the major tower overlooking the piazza that is attached to Palazzo Pubblico, Siena’s City Hall. It cost a bit, and the day was already winding down. But, we decided to go for it.
It was unforgettable. The climb went round and round…the steps were ancient, and we all were forced to cooperate as a group to get to the top.
But it wasn’t overly strenuous, and there were more than enough stops where we could take a rest and breathe in the amazing Tuscan air.
It started raining on the way up, but somehow hiding from the rain and checking out the dramatic storm clouds just added to the drama and adrenaline of the experience.
We finally got to the top, and our reward was a nearly unobstructed 360 degree view of Siena and its surroundings.
By the time we got down, we were so elated, there was nothing else we needed to do to improve our weekend. We returned to a small bar, called the San Paolo Pub, with a balcony overlooking the Piazza del Campo smaller than my closet.
The beers were affordable, and how much space do you need to enjoy a view anyway? It was perfect. We sat there for hours. Couples came and went around us. One was “like us” as my boyfriend had said. “Whose English is better, his or mine?” he asked me earnestly, as he recognized the couple next to us was also an Italian guy dating a young American woman.
It was getting to be that time, but I wasn’t ready to go home. “Let’s go back to the restaurant where we had lunch, please??” I asked him. After all, we hadn’t yet had any of Siena’s famous Chanti. He graciously obliged, and back we went to the same restaurant where we had lunch. The young waitress and the manager, who appeared to be father and daughter, recognized us and greeted us warmly. This is something I love about Italy – people are nice and gracious to you authentically. They were genuinely happy to see us.
Coincidentally, we discovered that the young waitress comes fairly often to the small suburb outside of Bologna where I lived at the time. Apparently she likes a restaurant in my neighborhood (ironically). We talked about where I lived, and that I would be returning to the United States soon. Suddenly, she gave us a worried look. “But what about you guys? What are you going to do, so far away from each other?” she said it in Italian.
Good question, ha! I guess her question could have also been about our trip to Siena. What were we going to do so far away from it? It was just a moment in time, that now I have the vibrant memories from. Hopefully they won’t fade anytime soon. Anyway, most of life is memories, really, isn’t it? What more can I ask for.
This post is my latest in a short series celebrating the success of my random and wonderful traveling adventures with friends over the last month. This adventure in particular is not a typical travel story – not at all glamorous, with minimal photo ops. But before you wonder why you are bothering to read this, give me a moment to explain…
As an ex-patriot living in Italy, I have a distinct need to really understand this country and the people in it. The more I get out of my bubble of American white girl, the richer my life becomes. So my recent work trip with a fabulous group of fellow non-American teachers to a not-so-vibrant suburb of Milan called Cassano D’Adda was exactly the kind of trip that shows me the side of Italy that most foreigners don’t experience. Full immersion in Italian culture brings me that much closer to understanding Italian life, and my fabulous friends. So, here it is.
My friend, Vale, the head of a Bologna school of English, is a bottomless resource of fun, and also my boss. A few months ago she asked me to be one of the three performers in her English Quiz Show for children on this special trip to perform in Cassano D’Adda. She made a clear point of telling me she wanted me to come because I am “fun to travel with.”
Despite the inadvertent non-acknowledgement of my actual pertinent skills for the job (performing and English teaching), I was flattered. So, naturally, I accepted the invitation.
I walked up to Vale’s house with my co-worker Martine at 5:45am on a damp, dark Monday. She was sitting in her idling, heated car ready to go. We jumped in and picked up the missing member of our team, Giulia, a few blocks away, who was armed with coffee and croissants. Mix Giulia’s offerings with my own bag of Italian style chocolate chip cookies (delicious and way less sugar and fat than their American counterparts) and we were pretty much our own traveling cafe. Let me tell you, there were a whole lot of crumbs in laps on that particular drive.
On the road to Milano we went…well, ahem, Cassano D’Adda to be specific. We had a long day ahead of us – at least a two-hour drive, then set-up, and finally two performances of our Quiz Show for young English students. And we did it with gusto. Martine, Giulia and I performed and sang our hearts out while Vale took pics and networked with the teachers. We were a great team.
We wrapped up our workday by pre-setting for our next show at 8am the following morning and then headed out in search of lunch in little Cassano D’Adda, proud of our work, relieved to be done for the day, and absolutely famished.
We pulled up to the restaurant recommended to us for lunch by the teachers at the school. It was so closed, there wasn’t even a soul remaining inside other than a waitress who was peacefully eating her lunch in the dark.
We were baffled. In Bologna, the lunch hour is 1pm to 3pm. It was currently 2:30pm. How could this be possible? The Italians never cease to be a mystery.
We got back in the car and fired up our smart phones, following Tripadvisor suggestions and the Google map to the nearby center of the city where there were a cluster of recommended restaurants written into the Google map, meanwhile debating the mystery of the lunch hour. We decided the issue with finding an open restaurant was that Northern Italians eat their meals earlier, combined with the fact that we were in a small city.
After several more failed attempts to find a restaurant, a whirlwind tour of the small typical Italian city, and a few run-ins with local characters, we ended up at the last Google recommendation, i Satiri, with an open kitchen. The environment was comfortable and we were relieved. Our waitress ended up in somewhat of an argument with their frustrated cook who wanted to close the kitchen. She returned to our table with an apologetic look and an announcement that the compromise was panini.
We could order any panino on the menu, and that was all. Well, I took two. 🙂 The rest of my team had a panino and a dessert. Everything was delectable. And I’m not just saying that because, despite my vegetarianism, I could have eaten a horse I was so hungry.
After lunch we followed Vale’s iPhone and a random man biking with a stick to our hotel, the surprisingly large and modern Park Hotel, most certainly serving business travelers in the Milan area. Cassano D’Adda is a bit too close to Milan to have its own identity, and yet a bit too far to really reap the resources of Milan. The hotel is perfect for salesmen traveling to and from the Milan.
We reached our room, a huge room with four beds (a typical solution for European travel, rather than taking two rooms with two beds each). After some delirious laughter, we all konked out.
Disliking naps, I got myself up after a cat nap and headed out in search of a café in which to do some computer work. I strolled around the nearby industrial shopping area, and found my way into a small, typical, Italian café. Despite the café’s lack of apparent identity, I liked the music and decided to stay. The music reminded me of home. I quickly forgot my plans for tea and decided on a glass of prosecco instead, and sat there for a few hours on my tablet, waiting for the gals to wake up, and making friends with the owners of the cafe who had dreams of moving to America. We danced, talked sports (there was a big soccer game), and had a great time. Finally, my phone rang. It was Vale. “WHERE are you?” she asked in disbelief. She and the rest of the team were already in the car, en route to dinner. “Ok, I just pulled up outside,” she said.
I said a hurried goodbye to my new friends and ran outside and jumped in the car.
“Peggy!” my team laughed at me. “WHAT were you doing? How many proseccos have you had?”
“Just two, I swear!” I defended myself, laughing. “It was a great place!”
They teased me all the way to the restaurant, a pizza/pasta place the hotel had recommended called Pizzeria Il Birbante. I was thrilled upon arrival. The environment was lively and comfortable, and they had Brooklyn Lager on draft – this was my kind of place. I exclaimed enthusiastically to the bartender, and he chuckled in surprise when he figured out what I was so excited about. In Italy, the little things like this that bring you a little bit of home are something to be revered.
Being the truly awesome team they are, Vale, Martine, and Giulia all ordered the Brooklyn Lager with me. Ordering dinner proved more difficult – the selection of pasta on the menu was so different from Bologna, as Italy’s cuisine is so regionally centered, it was hard to choose from all the interesting options.
I ordered the gnocchi. Everyone loved their dinners, the beers, and the company.
It was an all-around fabulous day, and we slept hard and peacefully that night at the Park Hotel.
The next day was a work day. We woke up early and enjoyed being the lively table of women at 7am sharp at the hotel breakfast, surrounded by a sea of serious faces and grey and black suits slightly diffused by our colorful clothing and happy conversation. We performed three shows that day at the school, said goodbye to the satisfied teachers, packed up the show, and jumped back in the car.
For lunch we had finally learned our lesson and ate fast food, then headed back to Bologna, leaving little Cassano D’Adda behind. The car trip was just another opportunity for some heart to hearts – culture, Italy, America, English, guys, work, you name it, the topics with limitless. Smiles to the end, it wasn’t until we reached Bologna that I realized I had never had such a successful trip with a group of people who weren’t best friends. A combination of simply being nice and gracious people, the team was also well-balanced personality-wise. The experience was awesome…one that will remain fresh in my mind for a long time.
There’s nothing like spending a little quality time with someone who just “gets” you. Double that pleasure when you can spend time with them on the backdrop of one of the most intriguing cities in the world.
That golden opportunity came to me in the form of a surprising Facebook message from my American friend Clint in February. Simply put, his message went something like this. “Peggy, me and a friend are meeting in Rome for a vacation in March. Want to join us?”
Well geez, he didn’t have to ask me twice. I booked my train ticket to Rome immediately. I couldn’t wait.
Clint is one of the few people in my life that has seen nearly all the homes I’ve had as an adult. A feat in itself, he’s joined in my adventures coast to coast in the US, and even across the pond in Italy. He meandered into my life ten years ago carrying homemade banana bread, and the rest was history. He had just moved to San Diego and wanted to get involved in the arts, so he signed up to volunteer in the marketing department of the Old Globe, where I worked. After a significant amount of homemade baked goods, he had permanently won a spot in my heart as a wonderful friend. We share a love of art and people and traveling, and are somewhat of a pair of lost souls. So naturally, an invitation to travel with Clint couldn’t be turned down.
I arranged my schedule to spend the weekend with Clint, and on Sunday his friend would join us after his flight arrived.
I was thrilled to have a sleepy but happy Clint all to myself on that rainy Saturday we spent meandering around the center of Rome with no particular agenda,
interspersing glimpses of architectural wonders and warming up over tea and wine (in no particular order, depending on how the mood struck us).
Clint has a way of truly savoring the moment, and when I spend time with him, wherever we are, he always manages to get me to look at things differently.
He spotted a balloon horse stuck in the ceiling of the Pantheon, which we stood and giggled at for what seemed like an eternity.
And despite myself, he managed to convince me to take a silly picture with Pinocchio (photo not included, sorry guys 😉 )
We proudly relished our tourist status that night when we went to Ristorante Alfredo for dinner (the home of the “American” pasta dish, Alfredo), which was actually on the recommendation of my student, who grew up in Rome. It was delicious.
The next day David woke us up upon his arrival from the Rome airport after his red-eye from Denver. David is a history buff (although the term doesn’t do his knowledge justice) who can’t get enough of historical cities, and our first introduction was that sleepy Sunday morning in the hotel in my pajamas. I had no idea what to expect from a day with David and Clint. Despite his long flight, David was already ready to start exploring. Poor guy, it was no easy task to get me and Clint dressed and out the door.
Being quite the gentleman he is, David deferred to my wishes for the day, knowing I had a shorter time to explore than he did. I was armed with a little wish list for sight-seeing in Rome, a list that I owed to an improvised english lesson with a student brimming with excitement about her recent weekend in Rome spent with her sister, a local. I was thrilled I had managed to find the list and had such a supportive crew with me with which to enjoy it.
We started out the day in classic Clint/Peggy fashion, just meandering.
But now we had David, the perfect addition, who was able to legitimize our disorganized approach by explaining the history behind every random architectural ruin we stumbled upon in our meandering.
Which, in Rome, are about a dime a dozen. In between our history lessons and my photo ops, David managed to charm me with the sweetness that he is.
After a long trek to Piazza Santa Maria in Trastevere, highly recommended by my student, we needed to rest and eat a bit. David was more than content to stop and enjoy the area a bit longer, announcing it was his favorite neighborhood in Rome. Clint wasn’t in the mood for eating, but David enthusiastically copied my order for a Roman specialty (the dish even inspired him to learn how to make pasta by hand back home in Denver!), cacio e pepe with a splash of pistachio. Heaven. Over devouring each of our plates, I discovered how much we have in common, from blogging to traveling to friendships, David was one of us. A lover of people and places, and definitely someone I would make room in my heart for.
After an unexpected and truly impressive stop at St Maria in Trastevere Basilica,
we continued on foot to a less widely known tourist destination called Piazza dei Cavalieri di Malta. I knew nothing but what I had heard from several students: you go there, you look through a key hole, and you see the best view in Rome. Sounded promising.
Amidst more history lessons and lots of laughs, we made our way to the Piazza dei Cavalieri di Malta,
which we found at the top of a hill in the center of an entourage of churches and gardens with seemingly limitless exploration potential.
But where was the keyhole?
The keyhole was at the front of the long line of people. Why is it that the most obvious of things are sometimes the most evasive? We got in line and waited about five minutes (there were no other Americans in line), and sure enough. The view from the keyhole was beautiful.
But so was just about everywhere on this beautiful hill…each garden, church, and view seemed to surpass the last. And we even caught the sunset. It was the perfect way to end the day.
My train departure was impending, unfortunately. We grabbed a cab, enjoyed a whirlwind tour of the city amongst the craziness that is Roman traffic,
and ended up back at our hotel in time to enjoy a drink at the rooftop bar. If it is possible, Rome at night is even more impressive. The city was like a sparkling wonder…
I hugged the guys a hurried goodbye and ran to the station. It should have been a somber train ride home, but my disappointment over my short visit was quickly overridden by my giddiness over acquiring a fabulous new friend, seeing Clint again, and, well, being in Rome. Enough said.
I recently spent a weekend in Kufstein, Austria. Which is a pretty small town. According to recently garnered information, it is located between South Tyrol in Italy and Bavaria in Germany, and is right around the corner from SkiWelt Wilder Kaiser – Brixental, which is Austria’s largest interconnected ski area. I don’t ski. And I didn’t study geography in school (unfortunately). So when I went, I really had little to no idea where I was actually going. My goal was simple: I was going to meet some old friends. The actual location of my friends was just a minor detail. I had a feeling we would have fun wherever we were. And thankfully, I really turned out to be right.
My great friend Timo, a fellow arts management nerd and a friend I made while studying at Carnegie Mellon in Pittsburgh, PA, has a teaching gig at a university in Kufstein and invited me out for the weekend. I am always looking for an excuse to travel, and I had never been to Austria, so why not? And to make matters better, a wonderful mutual friend of ours was working in Munich, only an hour train ride away. Two countries and two friends to explore with promised to be a fantastic weekend
Now, an important side note. I had no idea how to track down the train to get to Austria from where I live in Bologna, so I asked my friend Timo to do the research. By going directly to the Austrian ÖBB train website he was able to find me a round trip fare (not listed on the Italian train site) for a mere 60 euro. The train ride was not only totally economical, but it ended up being one of the highlights of the trip. Riding through the Italian Alps defines the term “eye candy.” Views rivaling Yosemite or Rocky Mountain National Park are just whizzing by like, no biggie.
But as wonderful as the train ride was, the real highlight was the hospitality of my friends. As the true gentlemen that they are, they had every moment planned, and still managed to let me pick my favorite parts of the trip. Timo met me at the train station, gave me a whirlwind tour of Kufstein, and brought me home to drop off my bags and to have a relaxed at-home happy hour.
Then on to an amazing Austrian meal complete with a character of a waitress and a huge fireplace in the middle of the restaurant, and not a tourist in sight. Nothing better than an Austrian salad and some potatoes and cheese. Yes, I’m easy to please.
The next day involved a superb Austrian brunch with endless scrumptious bread and cheese, a tour of his university, and a hike that straddled the border of Austria and Germany (he was looking forward to making free calls to Germany when we got to that part of the hike).
And a giant lake. It was overwhelmingly beautiful. In my life, not a typical day. But the Austrians seemed pretty nonchalant about all the grandeur and such.
We topped off the awesome day with a sushi dinner of all things at a boisterous local hangout. I was thrilled.
Last but not least. Our day in Germany. After a train we nearly missed (running after trains is not sexy, I really need to start planning more appropriately), we met our friend Thomas for lunch in Munich at Prinz Myshkin, a restaurant they let me choose in the historic Altstadt neighborhood. And the restaurant was vegetarian, no less. What more could I ask for? Then, as the arts management nerds we all are, our next stop was the modern art museum, Pinakothek der Moderne. We sauntered our way to the museum after lunch with a brief delay by the Carnival parade that intercepted our walk.
Adults dressed as jungle animals? I was interested.
Once in the museum, I managed to set off several alarms in my picture-taking gusto as we casually took in the spectacular architecture of the museum, and the awesome Jeff Wall exhibit.
Followed by a great coffee break at the bar and a late Indian dinner when we got back to Austria. It was a successful day, I would say.
I left the next morning, and my disappointment about my short stay in beautiful Kufstein was short-lived, as once again the spectacular scenery of the ride through the Alps captured my devotion for a few short hours.
Back at home in Bologna, I was newly enlivened with the spirit of my awesome weekend, thanks to the amazing gentlemen hosts. The first of a series of smashing successes with friend related traveling. I highly recommend it.
Yes, I’ve cried on friends’ shoulders, shared laughs, graduated, shopped, worked, participated in weddings…the normal life stuff. But ten years ago I never would have anticipated that I would be crossing Europe with my friends, and it would be thanks to them that I can experience Europe in a way that far and away surpasses your average tourist experience.
I’ve lived in Bologna, Italy, for three years, which is a big university town. Here I have been lucky to meet people from all over the world. Among my best friends are a Russian and a Serbian, and between the two of them we have heard a lot of Cold War and Bill Clinton jokes, which I am more than willing to suffer in exchange for the unique opportunity to see the world through their eyes once in a while. And even the Italians that I am drawn to seem to have the traveling spirit and have spread all over Europe.
So, luckily, I seem to have a friend wherever I want to go. And my mission is to take advantage of this as much as possible. In the last month I have been to Austria, Germany, and within Italy I have visited Venice, Treviso, Cassano D’Adda, Dozza, and Rome. Exhausting, but awesome.
My friends have brought me to these cities in different capacities – as tourists themselves, companions, hosts…and each trip was a pleasure. I have the karma gods to thank for this, because, well, let’s face it. Traveling with friends can be overwhelmingly awful as often as it can be wonderful. I’ve had my share of the awful – from my friend loosing his pre-paid credit card on the way to our vacation in Stockholm, leaving me to underwrite his trip. Or the evening a friend and I chose different adventures for the night, and thinking he would get home before me, he took the keys to our shared apartment from my purse without telling me, and never arrived at home, leaving me to search for an available hotel room in the wee hours of the night on foot in Hamburg, Germany.
But, despite my past challenges, I can still whole-heartedly recommend traveling with friends. The lighthearted, more outward focused energy between friends usually leaves us more emotionally open to meeting people during our adventures, which I believe is the true spirit of traveling. Traveling with friends can be a nice break from traveling with your family or significant other in that it allows you to escape the normal role you play within your family unit. And when you visit friends in their cities, you couldn’t ask for a better way to experience a new city.
I only hope you can learn from my utter failures and keep in mind a few of my tips: Try to travel with friends that have at least an equal amount of travel experience as you, and friends that you have traveled with before (at least a little bit) – i.e. don’t go to East Africa with someone you’ve never even left your own city with. The more they love to travel, the better. And if you aren’t completely flexible in every way along with your friend(s), the more you have in common economically, habitually, and with your goals/interests, the less conflicts you will have. Which, in the end, I guess is just basic logic.
Logic?? What’s that???
Stay tuned for my series of posts about my trips this month with my fabu friends. And the pics!! Oh, the pics. Several thousand of them. But don’t worry, they’ll be edited. 🙂
A presto!
The view from the Rialto bridge in Venice is – in a word – indescribable. Yes, you are submerged in tourists. But if you can just face forward and take a deep breath and let the beauty of Venice pour in, you will never forget the moment. The curve of the Grand Canal teeming with activity just below your feet, the pastel painted buildings lining the water with bobbing boats parked steps away. Yesterday was a warm, sunny day, and the canal was gleaming with energy. Even the birds seemed to know this was the place to be.
A country as beloved by Americans as Italy means there are a lot of tourists here. And while there’s technically nothing wrong with lots of tourists, the general consensus would be that high ratios of tourists greatly diminish the potential for experiencing a country as we dream of, stepping out of the predictability of our lives into a temporary, magical world where everything is different and fascinating. I’ll never forget the American woman who unknowingly cut into all of our “magical” experiences when she loudly announced at a restaurant in Venice, “Hey, y’all got somethin’ ta eat ’round here?”
I can’t tell you how many times I have been to Florence or Venice or Cinque Terre and felt sorry for some of the tourists. Now, don’t get me wrong – a trip to Florence is amazing no matter what. But an Italian vacation hitting only the most famous cities means never truly touching the spirit of the Italian lifestyle, which, technically, is what brings us here to begin with, right? Instead, I recommend with gusto – even if your next vacation outside of your country is short – scheduling in some time in a city off the beaten path, no matter how small and insignificant that city may seem. These are the places that incubate those travelling moments you’ll never forget.
Take Treviso for instance. With a mere 20 minute time investment on a train leaving from Venice every half hour or so, you’ll be so far from the crowds of tourists that you’ll think your train crossed you into some sort of other dimension instead of just transporting you 25 miles away. Impeccably maintained with remains of frescos adorning many buildings,
and lazy art-filled canals cutting through the center of town, dotted by chic cafes and high quality osterias,
surprisingly even many other Italians don’t give this beautiful city its due credit.
My conversation announcing my trip to Treviso to my Bolognese English students went something like this:
“I’m going to Treviso Sunday!”
“Treviso? Why??”
“Because I want to go someplace new!”
“There’s nothing in Treviso. Don’t go there.”
But still itching to get out of Bologna and not wanting to spend a lot of money, I went anyway, inspired by the advice I found in the blog, Around and About Treviso. But because of my friends’ bad advice, I was so disillusioned about Treviso’s potential before I even arrived that I only scheduled about five hours of time to explore the city, thinking that would be more than enough time. Fortunately, I was quite mistaken.
Instead, what I found in Treviso was an afternoon of nothing but pleasure. The center of the relaxed city is mostly closed to traffic. I let out a sigh of relief as I slowed my normal pace to stroll Treviso’s clean streets under the mini porticos, enjoying the beautiful architectural touches of the thoughtfully updated medieval buildings.
And most of my day continued like that. I followed all the instructions on the blog except taking advantage of the nature trail because I ran out of time. I went by the three beautiful churches. I had the best tiramisu I’ve ever eaten at Antica Pasticceria Nascimben, which is only fitting, being that Treviso is considered to be the home of tiramisu.
I checked out the exhibit at Ca’ dei Carraresi, beautifully positioned with picture windows along one of the main canals. But the most important “attraction” in Treviso is that the city shines so much with the beauty of the unmistakable care that it has been given over the years, and I was content just to spend the day walking the streets and people watching.
No travel guide would ever put this on the list of “must-dos” in a city, but in Treviso there’s nothing better than an afternoon of petting happy dogs (and children dressed as dogs!) on walks with their families,
resting a moment on a park bench to enjoy an outdoor sculpture bathed in nature, or buying a two euro glass of local prosecco to sit and enjoy the beautiful canal view for just a bit longer.
I hope to go back soon, this time for a weekend. And in the meantime Treviso stands tall and proud among my memories of my Italian adventures. In my opinion, we spend too much time focusing on seeing “the sights.” We are determined to have the best vacations, and I guess that’s the simplest strategy to achieve this. But to have the opportunity to be a quiet guest in a foreign, beautiful world and just to watch, and to learn, those people’s lives…that, I think, is the best. I hope you can someday make it to Treviso, and if not, that you find your own Treviso soon. There’s probably one closer than you think.
