Ciao Bella Italia

Even short people are allowed to be nuns in Italy

Greetings all from Bella Italia, home of the best food in the world. Our travels in the last week have carried us across three continents and the same amount of countries as we now seat here in Cinque Terre.

Our time in South Africa passed by in a flash compared to our 5 month stint in Asia, but in order to end our time, we had to leave. We thus began a lengthy 28 hour travel marathon. Instead of bussing it up to Joburg from Cape Town, we paid the money to save 26 hours of being on a bus in exchange for 2 hours on a plane. Great deal. The next flight was the nicest one we've had on the trip, an United Emirate plane to Dubai stock full of free drinks, video games, and all the music you could want, and this all includes leg room.

We touched down in Dubai as the onset of fatigue from a sleepless night playing Tetris crept up. I sleptwalk onto our next plane headed for Milan and slept a solid 2 hours on the 6 hour flight, a rarity. With one last flight, we were in Roma . . . but only long enough to catch a train on to Florence where we were set to meet up with Nadine's mom, Clare, and sister, Susie.

We walked across Florence feeling dead to the world, but still with a bounce in our step. Italy is an easy place to navigate compared to our last 6 months of travel. This is with public transportation leaving on time and clean 2,000 year old surroundings. When we found the hotel, we were amazed how nice our room was looking over the Arno River, but that was nothing compared to Nadine seeing her mom and sister and them seeing Nadine's every growing belly. From that point on, it was chat, chat, chat, chat, and chat.

How many Peppers does it take to climb Il Duomo?

Over the next couple of days, all four of us made the rounds at the major sites, the Duomo, Michelangelo's David at the Galleria dell'Accademia, the Ponte Vecchio, but it was spent among the constant happy chatter of Nadine, Clare, and Susie.

Ponte Vecchio. You can find at least 5 gelaterias here

From the fine views of Florence, we traveled onto to some even finer views in the region in Pisa with the Leaning Tower of Pisa, excellent calzone in Lucca, and the region where 5 small villages perched on rocky picteresque outcrops make a national park, Cinque Terre.

Obligatory photo by each tourist, hold up the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Doesn't seem to work that well though

Among the activities to do in Cinque Terre is the popular intercity hike. That was the activity of choice among 3 Bissonnette girls, and being outnumbered, that is what one White boy had to do. We jumped on the path and began our hike. We walked from Vernazza to the small village of Corniglia with the ocean waves crashing below us. Along the way, we stopped for an excellent lunch of meat and cheese sandwiches, then we continued to Manarola by train, because of a rock slide, and finally to Riomaggiore. It was some easy hiking with great views, definitely worth 3 Bissonnette girls dragging me along.

Great views along the way

We stayed in the town of Vernazza, and home to one of the best Italian restaurants in the world, La Sandro. After a packed house left us literally out in the cold Saturday night, we made reservations for Sunday night. We returned promptly at 7 that next day to begin a feast. We all indulged in a perfect meal of pasta, ravioli, penne, and house red wine. Every bite was followed with a healthy "mmmmm" and "can I have a bite of yours?" We left satisfied. If you ever think about going to La Sandro in the near future, let me know, I will meet you there for dinner.

Good morning Manarola

That leads us to our next topic, a very important one for that matter. In life and in all our travels, we have come across some great food. Mexican. Tex-Mex. Indian. Thai. Vietnamese. But they all come in for a distant second to Italian food. As Nadine said, "All meals are either good or great." It's amazing what Italians are able to do with a tomatoe, pasta, olive, a few spices, and tahdah, perfection. And to top off the perfect dinner, you can pick one of the 10 gelaterias on every street serving creamy Italian ice cream, gelato. Now if you love food, this is the place to come to indulge and then walk it all off. Back home, you find all types of restaurants. Here, you only find restaurants serving Italian food. What does that tell ya?

Ok, time to finish this blog entry as I slip off into food comotose.

Question of the week: Every week in the blog entry I make a joke about New Mexico, New Mexicans, or a set of twins from New Mexico, but not this week. What is your best joke about New Mexico, New Mexicans, or a set of twins from New Mexico? Best one received in the next three days will receive the last postcard from outside the U.S.

JW

Taking you back to Hogsback, South Africa. This is what happens when you set the camera for video rather than photo and everyone sits and smiles.