*last italy post. you might not read much from me for awhile.

a slow and relaxed rest of the trip. was too lazy to take photos by the time the end of the trip came. so this last post is short and sweet.


nothing really much to do in florence anymore. we bought train tickets to pisa and according to what we think is on the ticket stub, we can take any train during the week to pisa. so since we have all day, we did a short walk around florence after checking out.

and we had gelato for breakfast. who eats gelato in italy? TOURIST. i dont think the italians eat icecream during the winter.

nothing much to blog about day 10 except that i went walking in pisa myself because ron was too lazy to move out of the hotel. coz there was ESPN.



last day of the trip. finally getting a little bit too tired walking and taking trains. so last stop was the leaning tower of pisa. half the morning walking 15 mins from the hotel to the tower. and you know what? it IS leaning.

and touristy thing to do?
push the damn tower.

everyone does it. as much as i roll my eyes when i see photos of it, i am still haunted by the tourist bug. guilty as charged as every one else. but that is really one pretty tower. dint want to pay to climb up. so just took photos from below. besides it was a cloudy day so the pictures are abit dark.




all packed to head back to loughborough. i never thought i loved UK that much. it really rocks to be in a place where you can understand people and people can understand you. im sick of trying so hard to pretend people are english speaking idiots.

the train station was only a slow 5 mins away from the airport. and it is the right airport. florence has two airports and i was so scared i was at the wrong one.

this is the view from the window

pretty eh. sunset from the plane with citiy lights.

that ends the trip. it was fun and the sights were very pretty, but the cities all look the same and the people all speak english like they never learnt it. im so happy to be back in loughborough.

remembered how some post ago i wanted to learn more about italian renaissance art? i just bought myself a book for sole personal interest. i realised that i havent been reading much apart from school work. and it is time for me to improve my interest in general knowledge. it is always good to learn more about things.

i see how uncle silas has a collection of many books and videos on random interest of his on his shelf in his living room. and i was thinking to myself it is time i try to start a shelf worthy of self interest.

so i invested 7 pounds for a brand new hardcover copy (amazon sale). arrived with free delivery within a day this morning at 9am.

amazon uk has so many interesting titles to choose from. from gospel figures in art, to angles and demon symbols in art, to symbols and allegory in art, to gods and heros in art. and all the books are relatively cheap if you get a used copy. in fact most of them you can get for less than 10 SGD.

most of these books will cost more than 30 if bought in borders or kino IF you can actually find them.

* warning. long post

italy is land of shopping, apart from paris. although on this trip we never got 150km radius of milian (shopping paradise) we still managed to find one whole day to delicate to shopping in florence (where the factory outlets are). so what is better than you go hunting for outlet steals?

it was nice and sunny in florence when we got up at 7 this morning. the owner of the hostel gave us an address for buses that runs to the outlet place. apparently the bus leaves at 8.30am. a bit too early for shopping if i get a say. but we went to the addresses she gave and realised it was a runned tour group thingy which costs like 21 euros!

and i was like 'WTF man, i have to spend so much to spend more?!?!'

so i told ron we could get around to asking the bus terminal if there are public buses running off to the location. we basically had 15 mins to hunt down a public bus (if there was any) before the tour bus thingy left at 8.30.

problem 1:

the bloody train station doesnt have an information counter!??! like seriously... what is wrong with all these angmohs. florence is such a big place for tourist activities and yet they do not even have a bloody information counter at the train station?!?!?!?! most tourist come in and out of the city by train

problem 2:

no bloody person at the train station speaks decent english. or at least understands enough to give us directions. since the train station is filled with people who practically do not live in florence we couldnt just simply ask people. have to ask the shop people who dont bloody speak english at all.

so we were running and getting frustrated. until i spotted the bus ticketing office and decided to ask them. heng lor i tell you, he knows where we want to go but it is the wrong bus terminal. so he gave us crappy directions by pointing

seriously. how much does pointing help

lucky i am observant and could see buses turning out from a hole in the wall. (yes. it was literally a hole in the wall. just big enough for the bus to turn out) and decided to walk towards in hope of a terminal and walah.

'shopping' Stop 1 : The Mall

i know it is like the lamest name for an outlet shop but that is what it is called. the bus cost 6.20 euros for a return ticket. (compared to the rip off 21 euros at the tour place) lucky we were in time before the bus leaves at 9.

up on the bus was full of asians. only chinese, korean and japanese are game for branded steals. and ron was totally speculating which ones were singaporeans. listening out for the singapore slang. ron spotted an uncle by his dressing. yup. typical old people on holiday dressing can tell the whole world you are singaporean.

and when we got off the bus, we heard a couple talk and yup they were singaporeans too.

anyway. it was so bloody foggy at the place and was freezing cold. only about 25 shops to shop but there are factory outlets of big names like armani, gucci, valentino, zegna... blah blah... cant even remember.


we even got a name for prada factory outlet. ron was looking for a certain prada wallet. so we decided to go hopping for more

anyway. the gucci bags were so darn pretty. although last seasons but pretty. the singaporean family just bought this bag i was staring at so much for their daughter. from the looks of her black face and young face i think she is no older than JC. and her parents just bought her a gucci bag off the shelf just like that. kids these days. super pampered. i want also dont have lor.

'shopping' Stop 2: cant remember complicated name

this place is for the locals. with very local brands even i have never heard of them. abit like bicester village. with about 100 shops all on a single street.

dint buy anything though.

yup that is how we spent the whole day running around on public buses trying to get fresh with things we cannot afford.


forecast was nice and sunny for the weekend. which was good since we were here for the weekend anyway. and i dint realise that florence was so compact you could see all street sights in a day.

'main' Stop 1 : the Duomo and Baptistry

i would think that this is the most famous sight in florence. it rises above the center of the city into the sky. highest landmark in florence. on first sight of this thing i was thinking to myself 'wah lao DAMN UGLY la' the whole building was like in some shade of white plus purplish and greenish colors. totally dont match at all.

although it is the 4th largest church in europe. it is probably the uglist church i have seen. from the viewpoint the other day it looked pretty FROM FAR. from near realy damn ugly.

but now that i look back at the photos i took. it doesnt really look that bad.


'lunch' Stop 2: Pizza off the street

we stopped by a pizza place by the side of the duomo and bought 2 slices of pizza. and nothing beats standing around. looking at the sights and eating pizza while trying to run away from hungry pigeons. i had this pigeon pecking about on the floor and probably thinking that it can fly into my pizza crust.

and as usual. we stopped by at cafe to have a cafelatte for me and a marochino for ron.



'main' Stop 3 : the Arno

arno is the river that runs right straight through florence and cutting the city center into half. since it was a pretty day, it was a pretty sight.


'main' Stop 4: Ponte Vecchio

the oldest surviving bridge in the city. it is like a shopping street that sits above the river. one of the cutest bridge i have ever seen.


'walking past' Stop 5: somewhere along the Arno

florence is the home to the oldest and most reputated art schools in the world. and there are many artists selling their works all over the city. from canvas oil, watercolor or sketching. i would have bought something if i could carry it back in one piece.


'main' Stop 6 : Piazza della Signoria

big square near where we were staying. suppose home to huge copy of david. but david was under restoration. so what was left was Fontana di Nettuno (Neptune), Perseus by Cellini, and the rape of the sabine women by Giambologna (blur photo below).


'culture' Stop 7: the Uffizi

ron dint want to go walk the museum with me coz he wanted to go back to use the internet. so i went alone. taking a total of 2.5 hours to walk the whole thing. we were not allowed to take photos in the museum. they even have special technology that can sense when a camera clicked. the system will beep when someone takes a photo, then the guard person will hunt whoever down.

so i only manage to take some out of the window shots of the exterior of the place. the guard allowed me to do so. (yes i actually asked)

pretty night photo of the ponte vecchio



could not take photos so i wiki-ed my favourate pieces for you people.


no people. im not encouraging porn. but this woman is painted beautifully. i was standing there and admiring this piece for a long time. staring at it from near and from far. not a single visible brush stroke.

the face of the woman is supposed to be that of the most beautiful courtesan at that time.


symbolism of many things. a pregnant venus? the three graces? the west wind? mercury?



i've seen this one for a long time. even learnt in greek mythology class that it is the symbolism of the sensual venus. behind is the story of the birth of venus from the sea after uranus was castrated by his son, and his genetils and sperm hit the waters and venus was born.



i dont know what is the name of the painting so i couldnt google for it. but i remembered clearly that it sat in a round frame. the figure that caught my eye was the face of an angle protrayed at the left most.

the most beautiful face i have in my memory.

'food' Stop 8: hostel Veronique WITH PIZZA

we stopped by to dapao pizza. and had them in our room. total of 6 pieces.

'night' Stop 1: Casa Sola Ticciaia resort apartment

this is the most expensive night in italy. and it is the only place we are staying that comes with a full kitchen and living room all just for us. this is actually a holiday resort in the summer where local italians come to the country to escape.

so i must take some photos of this place to make my money worth.


we made pasta for breakfast with mine and cured meat. the italians have really good cured and preserved meat. i saw a slab of preserved fat and meat. i think it is all the left over parts from their normal butchery and they preserve the lard, fats and meat into a nice piece of yummy tasting thing.

ron tried frying it and the fats taste really good when cooked. we has tortelloni mixed into meepok looking pasta.


the area around the house is pretty to take some photos. rolling hills and vineyards.

'main' Stop 2: Casa Sola Winery Tour

the guy at the office said that he could give us a tour of the winery and see their wine making process today. we even set an appointment for the tour plus a wine tasting session.

Casa Sola is one of the vineyards that produce their own chianti classico red wines, as well as other not so famous wines. and olive oil too. the guy in the photo is the guy from the office and he brought us around the place and explained to us the whole wine making process. cant remember what his name was but he was from america and he knows pretty much about wine making.

the main house

ageing room

this is one of the ageing room for the wines. the wine are stored in thick and hug barrels for ageing. there are the huge ones and the smaller ones. all for keeping the wine and giving them their flavour.

the process of wine making is very long and very complicated. i cant remember everything and i'm too lazy to figure them out to type everything down. so you guys are blessed with less text.

the modern heating room

these are the massively huge tanks for heating wine and mixing them. this is like the modern method where everything is practically monitored and control by the computers. we did go into their unmodern heating room and they use fire heating. and the heat is manually controlled. which was pretty cool.

they have to be kept at a regular temperature to ensure good fermentation.

underground celler : the olive vats

this is where they keep their olive oil for ageing. in hug vats in the lower celler grounds. this celler is really underground and because it is underground they have a constantly cold temperature throughout the year which is good for storing olive oil and oak barrels. the celler walls are 1metre thick for good insulation.

underground celler : the barrels

this is their in house wine oak cellers. each barrel is a few thousand dollars and only usable for about 3 years. so that is why you pay so much for your wine. because the barrels they use to store the wine are so expensive. they are specially ordered in for aging different types of wines.

we tasted their produce and even bought a bottle of olive oil and special desert wine to bring back. i learnt that fresh olive oil taste like shit, but if you keep the bottle for a year it will slowly age and it will taste nice and smooth.

we has a range of about 4 or 5 different types of wine to taste. all Casa Sola product. what we bought was a special white wine called 'vin santo' that is made of dried grapes. and it is to be eaten with Tuscany almond biscuits called Cantucci. it is the most traditional desert found in italy. and the wine has to be aged for 5 years before sale.

sidetrack 1: the chianti classico is banded by a pink seal with a black rooster on it. there is story on why the black rooster was choosen as the symbol of the chianti region. but im too lazy to type to tell you. VERY interesting story. if you interested ask me.

'on the way' Stop 2: Piazzale Michelangelo

it was an hour drive to florence and the view was great as it was from the hills down to florence. we followed the GPS this time and at least for once it got us to the right place, the right road and through a nice view of florence.

ron actually dint want to stop. he was scared of the whole left hand drive and just wanted to get to destination. but the road was clear and he manage to turn in. lucky he did coz the view was birdeye and pretty.

you can even see the famous duomo sticking out in the distance.



this is a copy of the Michelangelo statues, in fact this was the only one i have a picture of from the whole trip in florence because i dint want to pay to see the original and the fake in the florence square was netted up for restoration.

i dont quite understand why david is so famous. it is a pretty statue but not the best of Michelangelo ive seen. but i shall not complain coz the poor guy is dead for 500 years.

we took many turns around horrible downtown city streets before we manage to find the office to return the car. stupid GPS again, give us a non-existent address for eurocar return office. make us go round in circles with little scooters and motorbikes. and we had to carry all out backpacks down 15 mins to the hostel.

the hostel was in a very good location. right in the middle of town.

'dinner' Stop 3: Yellow

this is a restaurant that was recommended by the owner of the hostel we stayed at. we had anchovies pizza (which as gross as it sounds - salted preserved fish on pizza) it is like almost the best type of pizza i have eaten.

the spread for breakfast at the BnB was nice and simple. milk, toast and cereal. best of all for ron was the little cappuccino machine that dispenses cappuccino any time of the day. but since i am not a coffee drinker, i wasnt too happy with a lack of a hot water dispenser for me to make myself a cup of tea. i spent the whole time we were here trying to force the cappuccino machine to spit some hot water out. i think i almost pressed the buttons to death.

ended up making tea in the night (when no one is looking) with the microwave machine. too bad microwaved tea doesnt taste nice enough for me. funny how they leave tea bags out but with no hot water boiler or anywhere to get hot water from.

engrish 1:

the stupid sign behind the kitchen stove has caught our attention for two whole days. another horrible case of engrish. not that i am being mean but direct translation doesnt really work.


engrish 2 :

and i feel that the door behind the room was funnier. funny how italian-english translations sounds like some form of shakespear to me.

"it is forbidden to make noise by the night..." - wah poetry leh.
"...we have to respect the other people who live on this palace" - everyone apparently lives on the roof of a PALACE. wow. i took my holidays with kings and queens.
"it is forbiden to introduce no one inside the BnB" - so can i or can i not
"... please turn off the light and the conditionner " - how do you turn off conditionner?
"chek -out at maximum 11.."

their spelling worse than mine.


this time we got the stupid GPS right. we learnt our lesson and double check the map and since i had the postal code it was much easier to use the stupid GPS. half the time i was worried that we have to drive through mud paths to get into the ulu part of the wine country. vine yards are everywhere in central italy. up and down the tuscany hills and rolling along the motorway.

there are so many monster cargo trucks running up and down the motorways. and everytime we wizzed past one, i hold my breath everytime the drag hits our little car. it was hard to try to figure out what speed to go.

go at 120km/h we get tailgated and horned at.
go at 130km/h and the drag hits really bad i was feel the whole car swerve.


'room for the night' Stop 1: Casa Sola

i book an apartment on a winery for the night. and planning and getting this accomodation is like the hardest adminstrative thing i did for the whole trip. finding a place to stay in winter was hard. many places only take people who stays for at least 3 days. and most places only take rent by the week. i spent a good 1 month finding this place.

upon reaching, ron almost ran over the vineyard's dog. it came running and was in the front of the car when we turned into the vineyard. aint he cute? his name is Twongo. ron was telling it to "come" but i was telling ron that the dog is italian and only understands italian.

the place we stayed at was a second story apartment at the top of a hill that overlooks the whole vineyard. the owner of the vineyards stays just downstairs. this is a 1700s brick building. to think that it is such an old structure but yet it sat on the same hill for 300 years.

the house is very comfortable and very expensive night (the most expensive on this trip) photos on upcoming post.


'on the way' Stop 2: the hills of Tuscany

home to the famous chianti classico is the hills of inner greve country side. miles of winding turning roads and small narrow steep hill slope roads. the roads were a tourist scenic drive.



'main' Stop 3: Greve wine tasting

since greve was central to the chianti wine country. we decided to go for wine tasting trip in greve. and it was also suggested by the guy who ran the office at Casa Sola.


'dinner' Stop 4: La Topa

i dont have pictures but dinner was at this home cook restraunt that was recomended by the casa sola office guy. apparently the dishes at this place is cooked by the grandmother and it varies from day to day depending on what she wants to cook. we had duck pasta (nice to taste weird shaped pastas) with veal and wild boar (which are hunted in the countryside nearby) yum.

the day was short as most of the time was spent on the road trying not to get lost and trying to avoid potholes on the roads. (italian roads are in a horrible condition, if you do not pay for toll you are going to get potholes.)

since we have an extra day from the lack of venice. i decided that we should rent a car and drive around the outskirts of verona. there are suppose to be nice scenic drives around the area along the lake garda just a few km NW from the city. just that we ron had to do the driving on the other side of the road.
and the funniest thing is that we got lost thanks to the stupid GPS. irony right? you get a GPS and it brings you to roads that in no way resemble roads and a destination that is totally in another state.

that GPS is horrible giving directions. apparently there almost no fine line in 'right turn' 'turn right' and 'bear right'. but the stupid GPS keep telling us things that doesnt make much sense.

we were lost for 2 hours before i decided to take over the GPS and do manual directing myself. italy has by far the worse highway conversion systems i have ever seen in my life. you can go on circles in the right way just to get from one motorway to another. and the stupid directions and road signs were so small.

problem 2: Italain drivers

and italians drive like they are in germany. the speed limit is 130km/h and you can get horned traveling at 126km/h. and everyone else is just zooming past you like they own a car from too fast too furious.

'main' stop 1: Sirmione

problem 3: STUPID GPS

we went past the lake to the autostrada (aka toll) thanks to the stupid GPS. apparently when you type in a road name, you will realise that almost every major city has a name like it somewhere. so you have to be careful and make sure the map is telling you the right destination. i only figured it out after 4 hours getting the car.

we had to pay a 4euro toll for nothing just because the GPS told us to. STUPID GPS.

so when i took over map controls (yes jillian, your amazing race partner) i concluded that i am a way better direction giver than the stupid GPS. i decided to go find castles around the area. this part of italy has many very well maintained medieval castles from way back in the 12th century.

problem 4 : Parking space

first problem at the car park was finding a parking space. even though this was a summer holiday resort with hot springs, it was still pretty much fuller than i expected in winter.

and from the road signs. im like how the hell do we know if we can park here. the stupid sign reads parking and no parking on the same board.


problem 5 : Paying for Parking

i know it sounds retarded that you have no idea how to pay for parking in a european country when everything was from the little box you put money in. the problem was not figuring how to pay, but how to attempt to pay for parking.

every damn thing is in italian

you have to think so hard to figure out how much to pay and only after asking some uncle, we were told that it was free parking till the end of the year. and im like "HOW THE HELL AM I SUPPOSE TO KNOW THIS?!?!?!"



but right from the carpark we could see the lake. this little town of sirmione is actually a very thin 'peninsular' that sticks out at the southern most part into the lake. it was a foggy day but still i managed to enjoy the view.


'castle' Stop 2: Pacca Scaligera

this is the medieval castle that sits in the town of sirmione. knights and shining armour? it even has a moat and a draw bridge. and it has been converted into a museum which we dint want to pay to get in. so we just took photos from the outside

brings back all my trashy novels.


'around town' Stop 3: Sirmione

it is a small town that just has one main street that runs from one end to the other. narrow streets with gelato i couldnt resist.



'just for fun' Stop 4: Harbour

saw this place from the main street of sirmione so just walked over for photos. reminds me abit of NZ.

'scenic' Stop 6: somewhere past Garda

problem 6: sunset in winter

we took a drive north of the lake. suppose to have a senic drive but the sun was setting. if we dint have gotten lost trying to get here we would be able to enjoy it in sunlight instead of the setting sun.

we made a quick stop here before turning around back to verona. watched the sunset in the cold, while swans swam at our feet and italian boys playing soccer behind.

problem 7: fog

not a good day for lake garda. not only was the weather foggy, but due to the fogge weather we could not see the swiss alps at all. which was a huge pity. one of my aims for getting here was to enjoy the view of the lake with the alps in the background. and all i got was fog.


'dinner' Stop 7: Verona chinese restaurant

we had chinese. for not eating lunch, this was a probably the cheapest fullest meal we had on the entire trip. i had interestingly duck and onions which was SUPER YUMMY.

im thousands of miles from singapore and yet im hooked to some stupid mediacorp channel 8 show. all that stupid lynette's fault. tell me the show nice and also go and tell me where to find on youtube. thanks to you i just spent the whole of christmas and boxing day on my laptop watching 'little nyonya'. i crammed 22 episodes in less than one and half days.

but really ar. the show really damn nice. by far i think one of the better more dramatically beautiful tragedy script that mediacorp has. can be up there in my top 10 list. not bad. now im waiting for ron to come back from london so that i can use his laptop to mobtv the rest of the episode.

only have not seen ron for 2 days and i miss him (and his laptop) already.

dont ask me how long it took for us to take a train all the way from rome to verona. we were supposed to head to venice but i already cancelled my hostel bookings (refer to previous posts) but we still have verona's BnB bookings. so no choice, have to go.

lets just say it is a long ride. and i think we were totally sitting in the wrong cabin but on the right seats. we cant even read the damn train ticket to actually figure out where we were actually supposed to seat. everything is in italian.


we arrived one day earlier than i booked. i did not make a hostel booking for the night, so we had to cross our fingers and hope that the BnB i booked for the next night has a room. heng the information counter lady at the train station manage to get through to them and they had a room.

the BnB was a stunning town house. and i had a hard time telling the guy that we had booked the other night and he kept saying he wants us to check out the next day. funny i tell you the look on his face trying to understand me.

'exploration' Stop 1: Somewhere

we decided to give the town center a walk. i think the streets here look abit different from rome. a little bit more pretty dispite the heavy rain. i even had to keep my baret on to keep my hair dry.

'attraction' Stop 2: The Arena

there is this roman amphitheatre right in the middle of the town. apparently it has been converted into a modern concert hall. look like the smaller but a bit more intact version of the colosseum.

there are even old castle walls that go around the town center.



'around town' Stop 3: somewhere in town

we walked further into the town. and even visited some squares and random junctions of the shopping district. this place is a maze. even with a map it was really hard to read the road names.


we even stopped by at some shops just for fun to take photos.

what captures my attention is the meat store all around italy. espically in smaller cities they are more visible and more traditionally decorated with all their cured meat hanging all over the store. and refrigerated storage of multiple types of salami.

and italians also love their wine. they dont really drink beer in restraunts and bars but drink wine. and their wine stores by the road look so classy. ron could not resist but walk right in.


'end' Stop 4: Fiume Adige

since verona is not a big place with not too many things to see, we made the river the end turn about route. rainy skies plus a setting sun at 4pm do not really make a good picture.


'lost' Stop 5: San Zeno Maggiore

we were navigating to find juliet's house. yes. the very house that romeo and juliet the juliet lives. the famous story of Shakespeare came from verona. the actual story was actually very real. i have thought it was fiction out of shakespears brain. but we didnt find the house in the maze of streets and got to this square.

attracted by the christmas lights and fair.

ron finally found his mulled wine.


'dinner' Stop 6: some Cafe

we were hungry (almost dint eat the whole day) and we were trying to find a place to eat. and i tell you it is damn hard to find a decently priced place to eat in the town center. we had to get to the other part of the town center before we spotted a cafe.

we sat down, looked at the menu and decided to just have food there since ron's toe is blistering like mad. but this place had special northern italy dish called the polenta. so we ordered it with salami and a mix grill platter plus a pasta.

we were actually wondering what that polenta thing was made off. when we saw it on the menu we thought it was something like fried banana or pineapple. it was like cus cus squashed up into a pattee. as gross as it sounds, it tasted DAMN GOOD with the salami.


on the way back to the BnB we walk back past the arena. it is pretty at night. plus it is nearly christmas and all the christmas lighting makes the night so pretty. verona is so small you can walk everything in 2 hours. and when i mean everything i mean the whole town center.