3rd to the 8th of January 2012

Sadly, on Thursday the 3rd we took a cab along with the little bit of luggage we have been traveling with for the past 3 weeks over to where our rental car had been parked while we were in Rome.  I found the car in the garage and we loaded up and headed out of town to begin our move toward Milan where our flight home would originate.  Since we had a few days we decided to keep our travel mode and look at a few more towns on the way north.  Our first stop was the Cinque Terra area on the western coast of Italy.  This is a series of 5, hence cinque, very small little towns perched on the steep slopes of the coast.  They are very separated from each other and can only be visited either by connecting trains of via walkways  through the terraced landscape.  The only glitch was that the walkway between towns was closed for some reason and we did not have enough time to get into the train mode.   Therefore we had a nice lunch in the town of Riomaggiore and decided to then head to the north to the city of Genoa.

Genoa was pleasant surprise for us.  It is a small city, sandwiched between some impressive coastal mountains and the sea.  We stayed in a wonderful historic hotel in town and spent a couple days of looking at the numerous palaces and a maritime museum in the city.  The palace architecture was beautiful.   Long ago the city of Genoa decided that the rich ruling families of the city had to build palace residences that were of a style and beauty so that visiting state dignitaries would be able to stay in them.  The resulting buildings still look beautiful and now used for offices some retail and municipal buildings.  They are certainly not to be missed.

Back in Milan it was sale season at the retail outlets.  Just about every store had mark downs of 50% or more.  Interestingly, the city was full of Russians and eastern Europeans who travel to Milan to take advantage of the mark downs.

We had noticed both in Rome and in Milan that there often were images and dolls of witches in the markets at Christmas time.  In Milan there was a very large witch “doll” in the piazza del Duomo and we still were scratching our heads as to the meaning.  A little bit of Google searching and here it is: Christian legend had it that Befana was approached by the biblical magi, also known as the Three Wise Men (or the three kings) a few days before the birth of the Infant Jesus. They asked for directions to where the Son of God was, as they had seen his star in the sky, but she did not know. She provided them with shelter for a night, as she was considered the best housekeeper in the village, with the most pleasant home. The magi invited her to join them on the journey to find the baby Jesus, but she declined, stating she was too busy with her housework. Later, La Befana had a change of heart, and tried to search out the astrologers and Jesus. That night she was not able to find them, so to this day, La Befana is searching for the little baby. She leaves all the good children toys and candy (“caramelle”) or fruit, while the bad children get coal (“carbone”), onions or garlic.

 

Not to be outdone by the other foreign shoppers in town Laura and I did our best to find a few things that just had to come home to Texas.  My bride did well for our efforts.  With each of four suitcases weighing right at 50 pounds we called it quits and decided a nice dinner and then to bed.  Well…… almost.  I was going through my camera gear and came to the realization that my passport was missing.  Uh Oh!!!  It took me about 5 minutes to also further realize I had left it in the hotel room back in Genoa.  That is two hours south of Milan.  So at 10:30 at night it was time for a road trip.  Sure enough we found it, and made it back to Milan for a now VERY short night of sleep before getting up to head to the airport.  The timing could have been far worse for sure.  I could have found out at the check in line.  Then  I would have had to stay in Italy for another day or two!!!  Hmmmm????  I am writing this “forget the passport idea down on a piece of paper for the next trip s that I don’t forget the idea.  Not the passport.

This is the last post that follows the sequential daily events and travels of this trip.  It has been extremely enjoyable to have done and is a great resource for Laura and I to be able to look back and relive the entire experience so that our brains do not begin to delete small portions of it.  Thank you to every one who has commented along the way and have expressed their enjoyment of following along as we have put the day to day happenings out there for all to see.  There have also been many others who silently followed along and have let me know via emails.  I will post a few more “theme specific” topics that will continue some that you are already aware of and have seen a few versions of.   I am also working on a representative map in Google Earth that traces the major portions of travel for the entire time we have been here so that you will all have a visible idea of the scope of the trip.  Lastly, I am going to look at the possibility of having the entire blog produces as a table top book so that we and the girls can have an easy reference copy without having to worry about keeping it active on line.  A few folks have mentioned an interest if I were to do so.  I will let you all know how that project progresses.

The Maritime Museum was really done well but it did come up a bit short on the amount of information that was presented in English.  Genoa has an extremely rich maritime history and it is well represented.