Rome, Florence & Venice Italy: The touristas hit with a vengeance

Well it’s happened. We’ve gone from being adventurers to being tourists. Part of it is a question of geography: Tibet, Malaysia and Korea are rarely visited and to us were exotic, while our experiences there seemed fresh and novel. But it’s also a question of time. Our visit to Italy coincides with the very start of tourist season, and it seems everywhere we’ve gone, hordes of grownups (mostly American) and school kids (mostly Italian) have taken to the road for the ultimate class trip. Rome, Florence and Venice anyone?




That’s not to say we haven’t enjoyed much of Italy. We loved seeing the sights in Rome, especially the ancient ruins of Palatine and the Coliseum.


And Venice is one of the most beautiful cities in the world.



But Florence just seemed like crowds upon crowds and unless you are really into art, there’s not much to write home about--we felt as if we were just another group of tourists needing to be fed and guided. I know other world travelers have had similar experiences, George and Sally wrote about it in their journals, and we must say we’ve noticed it as well.


We did have one minor adventure. I (Loey) was sitting on a bus and noticed that my pants were cut along the leg. Oh god, I thought, have I really been eating that much gelato? Upon further inspection I realized that it wasn’t a rip due to unseemly thigh growth, but that I had been intentionally sliced with a knife by a pickpocket who was sly enough to cut my pants without cutting me, or having me notice, but unlucky enough to go for the wrong pocket: my wallet was in my coat!


Venetian traffic jam


A bird’s-eye view of Piazza San Marco


It’s election time in Italy