Prego

Ciao from Sicily! We just arrived here this afternoon and what a splendid afternoon it is. Warm sea breeze, sun slowly melting into the sea, feral cats stalking the campsite, fat little Italian kids running around eating ice creams.
What a week it’s been! Either we are getting old or having too much fun, it feels like Cinque Terre was about 3months ago.
So…from Cinque Terre we went to Pisa, yes we did the cliché pics, it was such a beautiful warm afternoon, no queues or crowds. We really enjoyed Pisa but when the exhaust fell off from 7 weeks of cobblestones it was a good time to get out of there (well done to Lachie for fixing it on the spot)! Next day to Florence where we spent two nights and two days enjoying the city and the pizza. Ticked a few things off our list – David and climbed the Duomo. It was SUPER DUPER hot so we tried to keep site seeing and queuing to a minimum. From Florence we went to this beautiful lake right on the edge of Umbria/Tuscany called Lago Trasimeno. We felt like we had melted after Florence so spent two nights/days there seriously recuperating and working on our tans. It was so beautiful and relaxing and just what we needed. Onwards to Sienna where it was so hot we only spent an hour site seeing before jumping in our car and driving ALLLLLLL the way to Pompeii. 7 hours later…
Pompeii was HOT, but really amazing. A whole city over 2000years old in pretty good condition. The Amalfi coast next stop where we stayed for 3 nights. LOVELY! Amalfi coast is pretty spectacular; the roads are toe curlingly windy, steep and narrow. Tons of tourists. We actually got a bit stuck, driving too far along the road to turn around, too windy to keep going, we couldn’t make up our mind where to stop for the night and ended up driving for 5 unnecessary hours after a very sweaty morning at Pompeii so we spent the whole next day lying by the pool at our campsite (back in Sorrento – the beginning of the Amalfi from Naples). Did we mention that it was really hot?
The next day we went to Capri. Fabulous darlings. Also really touristy but we went anyway. We did a tour around the island and made a stop off at the ‘Blue Grotto’. Have you been? It was incredible! We got taken into a tiny mouth in the cliffs in little row boats by these crazy singing Italian men. From watching them they didn’t spend long in there and we had to pay 10euros each to go, our expectations weren’t very high but they were certainly exceeded! The sunlight bounces off the walls underneath the water which makes it luminescent inside. Magic. After Capri we caught a ferry to Positano where we spent the afternoon swimming, beer drinking and ohhhing and ahhing over where we were. Bello! Crazy bus ride back to our campsite with a storm chasing us. First rain in a while which was a huge relief! Met two girls from Victoria (Australia) who were driving around a campervan one of their Dad’s had custom made and had shipped over to Russia. Lachie was pretty ‘chuffed’ to meet them and hear all about the car.
From Amalfi we planned on staying a night in a little town before continuing on to Sicily. Again, no expectations of the area between and WOW! There is this area which is like the Amalfi (really dramatic cliffs, azure water, high mountains) but devoid of tourist build up. It was breath taking. We’d highly recommend the area to anyone. We stayed in a beautiful campsite right on a pebbly beach in Praia a Mare. And now today we are in Sicily! It’s only a 20min ferry across the water and we are in a town called Catania on the eastern coast of the island. We are going to hike up Mount Etna tomorrow! It’s a live volcano and we’ve read that it could erupt without warning so if you don’t hear from us again…
Piazza dei Miracoli
On top of the Leaning tower of Pisa
Hard work!

Mr. Muscles
Pisa river at dusk
Florence, Duomo
David in his finest attire
Lago Trasimeno at dusk. Bellisimo!

Mr.Love at Pompeii
Capri through the haze
Amalfi, note the bougainvillea everywhere?
Lachie getting ready to go through the little hole into the blue grotto - Capri
Magical water inside the blue grotto

Magical water everywhere!
Arches off Capri
Lachie chillin' on the boat trip to Positano
Happy campers in Positano
we stopped off at Paestum, some ancient Greek ruins south of Amalfi

The beautiful coastal road (ss18) Golfo di Policastro
looking down to the azure water
Playing with the pebbles on the beach and some sunflower seeds
On the beach at Praia a Mare
Lachie steering the boat over to Sicily.

Chinka terror

Bonjourno! Here we are, sitting right on the water in a little bay in the Liguria area in the North Western Mediterranean coast of Italy. Splendid! It’s definitely been an interesting few days what with a stop off at a dirty little hospital in the backwaters of Italy for false alarm appendicitis. Days of rest…just in case anything else might appear to be about to explode in Sal’s body. Extreme roads, coasts, cliffs, weather, landscapes. Because of the little ‘incident’ mentioned we so far haven’t done that much since we drove into Italy except a day spent visiting Portofino and Santa Margharita where we did some splendid people watching and lay on the beach all afternoon (well deserved!) and yesterday we went to Cinque Terre ‘five dramatically located villages cut into the craggy Ligurian coast, backed by steep vineyards’ to quote our trusty Lonely Planet. We had HUGE expectations of the area and we wondered if they were a tad too high for when we got there they seemed the same as the rest of the coast we’d driven through since Spain, except every shop was selling something aimed at the tourist. You can train hop between the 5 towns and by the time we got to the third we thought we’d have a quick look and head back to our splendid campsite but it was smaller and less touristic because of its location (up a VERY steep hill) and we got a very appreciative feel for the UNESCO world heritage area. We were supposed to be appreciating the back breaking work of the farmers who farm on extremely steep hills and we got that for sure. We spotted so many different things growing from – Basil, wine, roses, apricots, lavender, olives, and pine nuts…bello! The ‘slow food’ movement was started in Italy and we are happily living by that philosophy. It’s been such a pleasure to buy local produce and cook up storms in our little kitchen! Ohhing and ahhhing to the last mouthful. You should have heard us last night - we cooked a feast of fresh pesto (the pesto here is AMAZING!), pasta, parmesan cheese and beautiful olive oil (which we’ve plonked a whole heap of garlic into) and a salad with parma ham, boiled eggs, alfalfa seeds, cherry tomatoes and local cheese. YUM!
Today we plan on enjoying a bit more beach time before heading inland to Tuscany for 4-5days. First stop Piza – expect a cliché photo of us holding up the leaning tower of Piza in the next post!Ciao!
Driving through one of the many cliff tunnels along the med coast
Beautiful driving in Italy!
Portofino - the Italian St.TropezA crazy yacht with a helicopter and sailing boat on it!

Our campsite in Moneglia - bellisimo!A full moon from our van before we went to sleep...
Sally with ANOTHER Hello Kitty purchase...a mini notepad...

Cinque Terre - the hills where they farm grapes
One of the little towns in Cinque Terre - Manarola

Local produce - yum!

Côte d'Azur darlings

Bonjour Darlings! We are in Cannes at the moment. It’s been a week since we left Barcelona now and so much has happened we really have to sit down and think about it. Flashy boats, private jets, fast cars.
First stop after by-passing the truck strike just out of Barcelona was a little beach town 1 1/2hours north called Tamariu … Beautiful! Just what we needed. Few days in the sun, dramatic cliff top walks, exhibitionists and crystal clear (still cold) water. Next stop to Figueres to visit Salvador Dalis museum in his home town. Pretty cool, crazy, extraordinary. Then to Cadaqués and Port Lligat (where Dali spent his summers) GORGEOUS! The quaintest, most extraordinary place we’ve been to so far. We could totally relate to where Dali got all his inspiration from-the clouds, the rocks, the stillness and then the winds! We got to visit his beach house in the most peaceful serene little port which was pretty fun to see.
And then… the drive! From Mr.Dali land into France…the sheer drop off cliffs and winds like we’ve never experienced before…in a very tall van. We’d prefer there to be no more wind like that thanks Gods of the sky. But a pretty spectacular drive none the less. First night in France - a night we’d like to forget in a little town that we DO forget the name of, where I STILL have the nastiest mosquito bites ever…somewhere in the bottom of France.
St Tropez, darlings, is where it’s at. The insane amounts of cash being thrown about that port is…insane! We were in total awe at the yachts, expensive watches, and perfectly coiffed hair. And yet, it still had a nice intimate feel about it which we really liked, not that we could even afford a drink. We even drove the Van along the port with all the Lamborghinis, trying to fit in but not really getting much more then a laugh. Onwards to Cannes where we currently are for another few hours before heading into Italy.
Yesterday we went to Nice, not so nice, and Monaco, not as crazy, flashy as we thought. None-the-less it was fun to hear all the Ferraris hooning through the streets and tunnels. Last night we decided spur of the moment to jump off the train (back to Cannes) to have dinner in a gorgeous little coastal town called Ville-Franche-sur-Mer. Maybe not such a good, well thought out plan…a good indication was on realising I’d left a poster I’d just bought in Monaco sidling away on the train without me. As we tried to forget about the poster and enjoy our lovely dinner, we counted how long between trains (1/2hour) no problems…For some reason by the time we got back to the station there were no more trains for another 4hours…Go figure! Oh and the bus drivers were on strike. We ended up flagging a ‘luxury’ taxi back to Nice, 35€ later for a 15 min ride, we made it and from there back to Cannes. No problemo’s!

Hidden Coves on our cliff top walks

Looking over Llafranc

The crazyness of Dali

Port Lligat, where Dali spent most of his life

Dusk at Cadaqués

In the gardens at Dali's house

We made it into France! Amazing coastal roads

The biggest surviving roman aquaduct at Pont Du Gard

St-Tropez looking very lovely

And Sal joining in, me being paparazzi

Nice. Beautiful water colour!

At the world famous Aquarium in Monaco

Lots of BIG boats, fast cars and tall apartments. The mountain setting made it very dramatic

Off to Italy next stop, ciao bella's!

Happy Twosome in Barcelona