Trip report - Italy

Well unlike the last post I will this one is pronto...

Kids have their fall midterm break every year in the last week of October. The last Monday in October every year is a bank holiday, so kids are always out of school during Halloween. Last year we went to Wales pre-Halloween, came back for Halloween (Thursday) and then to Northern Ireland after.  This year I decided to book the whole week away instead of trying to constrain ourselves with Halloween  (kids not so happy with my ambitious idea).

After some research I decided on an Italian holiday. I was able to find flights to Rome and return from Venice for €160 per person. 

We landed in Rome Sunday afternoon. No big plans for the day, so we went to the Time Elevator. A 40 minutes movie with effects (moving seats, air jets, etc...) Not as good as the Gaudi 4D experience but kids enjoyed. We also had our first of many Gelato treats during the week. For dinner we dined next to the wall of the Vatican. Kids had pizza , adults pasta. I also decided to order some foccacia with rosemary and sea salt , this was spectacular.

Monday, we were off to the coliseum  We had pre-booked tickets (see lessons learned from Barcelona). Almost no wait and we were in. Spectacular views all around. After lunch (more pizza, pasta- best food hear was bruchetta with balsamic reduction, bacon, arugula) we were off to the forum. Audrey enjoyed this somewhat, Jack was getting a bit squirmy.  After the forum we were off to gladiator training. This had received mostly good reviews and we thought kids would enjoy. I'd say they would give it a B. Audrey thought instructor was a bit harsh. I enjoyed the comedy of the kids training.

The next day was our planned vatican day. The morning we spent wandering around. We went to the bone church where Cappuchin monks had made crypts with over 4000 bones

 In the afternoon it was off to the Vatican. We splurged on a private guide. It turns out if you have a guide you get to skip lines, so entry was painless. Guide was pricey. She did provide some good info, but a 3 hr tour through the Vatican was not Jacks idea of fun . There was tons of great artwork , but with so much to see 3 hours can end up feeling rushed.

Wednesday was our last full day in Rome. No scheduled activities, so a chance to see some of the stuff we missed. We wandered through Rome center to a great Gelato place I had read about (Fridgidarium) , it was as good as the hype. We then went to the pantheon where we ran into some people we had met on the airplane (with their kids). After the pantheon we went to a Leonardo DaVinci machines exhibit. Kids were excited for this after watching Sherman and Mr Peabody movie recently. The exhibit was quite good with many hands on exhibits.

We then went to Il Parco Scuola del Traffico (traffic school park) for the afternoon. This is a park with a full driving course with roundabouts, stop signs, cross walks, etc... The cars has proper accelerator and brake bedals and kids were taught to use properly with one leg. This was good fun and educational.

That pretty much wrapped up Rome for us,  

Thursday we took the high speed train (155mph) up to Venice.

Venice was a whirlwind trip. We stayed out on the lido, an island next to Venice island. We ended up arriving there late afternoon, so just had time to unpack then head out to dinner. The venice trip was full of water bus rides, walking, shopping and to finish a gondola ride.

Venice is truly a beautiful city. The gondola ride was a nice memory to close out the trip.

lessons learned in italy

-study menus before committing 

-portion sizes can often feed 2, we went from ordering 1 pizza per person to 1 for two, same with pasta.

-be watched for nickel and dime charges. A bottle of still water with dinner was €4-5. A basket of bread was €4 at one place and the would keep bringing more unasked. A single espresso shot cost anywhere from €0.80 to €2.50

-ask taxi cost first (we asked 2 different drivers a block apart the cost of a ride to the gladiator school. One driver €40 , the next €25)

-gelato is cheap (€2-2.50), but portion sizes are large ( would have been happy with half the size)

and there you have it Italy in 6 days. According to the phone that was 36 miles walked, and not a single complaint about walking from the kids. Maybe if you had gelato stops during a marathon people might do better

link to pictures

Google+ Italy Story

until next time

Rob