Euronating III

When I arrived in Venice at 2pm on Thursday I asked at the tourist office for available hotels. The cheapest they had was a three-star €120-a-night affair a minute's walk from St Mark's Square. The hotel was slap-bang in the epicentre of the action, but I couldn't believe cheaper hotels didn't exist, so I quickly set about finding one. I still stayed at the expensive place for one night but my last two nights were spent at a cheaper and more relaxing hotel towards the east of the city. At first I found Venice rather intimidating. Even with a decent map I got lost all the time. Things improved towards the end, but I would still walk for miles without really going anywhere. The boat - or vaporetto - was a life-saver for me, and I had almost perfect weather all the time I was there.

I tried to speak as much Italian as I could in my time there, but when they insisted on replying in English I began to think my lessons had been purely an academic exercise. In Venice, where it's almost expected that Italian won't be your first language, I virtually gave up with the whole Italian lark. And I certainly would never dream of using a public toilet in Venice:




Just like every country, Italy is full of graffiti, but as graffiti is an Italian word, maybe it originated there. Whatever, the graffiti I saw was very different to the stuff I was used to. The main difference was that I could actually understand it. A lot of the messages were a simple "I love you". I saw this one in Pisa:

In Italy I saw an impressive collection of clocks. I like clocks, or indeed anything with a nice analogue display. Some of them had only one hand - presumably they pre-dated the invention of the minute hand - and the single hand would waft around, pointing at nothing in particular. Others would have a face with hours numbered all the way to 24. But there were two clocks that for me stood out:

The one at the top is from the campanile in St Mark's Square in Venice; the bottom one is from the Piazza di Garibaldi (of course!) in Parma.

Euronating II

From Lucca I spent a very pleasant four hours or so on a train through Tuscany and up to Parma. It's an inexpensive and relatively stress-free way of getting around the country: a ticket to get from London to Huntingdon cost me £21; getting from Bologna to Parma - almost the same distance - set me back just a fiver.

In 2008 I visited Bologna and I liked the place a lot. I thought of going back there this time but went to Parma instead, another city whose name screams food. And I have to admit I pigged out a bit. Pizzas, pasta, gelati, plates of ham and cheese. I also bought ham, cheese, salami and balsamic vinegar for Gran who turns 88 on Friday, and (now this is a real rarity) a few items of clothing for myself. I even managed to find a cheap hotel, a place that did have two stars but one of them had been Tipp-exed out. It was only €35. I made a note of the hotel in case I ever visit Parma again.

My first taste of Parma wasn't so good. When my train pulled into the station I was dying to use the loo, but the station loos cost 70 cents. That's $1.30 where I'm from. A dollar thirty to have a pee! As they say, in France or Italy you don't spend a penny any more, you euronate. In fact in Europe it's very easy to piss money away full stop, especially if you're a one-man band like me. The cost of accommodation for a single person is a real killer.

A couple more hours on the train and I was in Venice, which was like nothing I'd ever seen before. A fantasy land. If it was simply a giant water maze covering a few square miles, with none of the history, Venice would still be incredible. But around every corner there was a photo opportunity. I found it hard to believe that people actually lived there.

Euronating I

In the last ten days I've been busy travelling, so I've had very little access to a computer. I'm back now, so in theory I have unlimited access, but in reality I only get a decent run when my gran decides to take a nap.

On the 15th I flew from Stansted to Pisa where I spent two nights. The city is world famous for its Leaning Tower, which I climbed at a cost of €15. In the past there were no railings at the top, so scaling the tower would have been something of an adrenaline rush, but when it reopened in 2001 safety was made much more of a priority. I'm glad I went up, just so I could say that I had, but my favourite attraction was the Camposanto, a large cemetery that was destroyed in World War II and later restored. I spent a good hour looking at the frescoes and inscriptions, trying to figure out what all of it meant. There was also a statue of Leonardo Fibonacci, the famous mathematician.

I didn't have great weather in Pisa, but there's not much you can do about that. Pisa has quite a large student population, and it made a welcome change on Sunday night to see crowds of students in the Piazza di Garibaldi (doesn't every Italian town have one of those?) eating their gelati. When I was at university various substances were consumed at weekends, but I don't remember gelati being on the menu.

From Pisa it was a short train ride to Lucca, an ancient city with a wall surrounding it. I spent several hours walking around the centre of town, ending up at the stunning amphitheatre. Lucca was a great town - if anything it had more to offer than Pisa - but like on many occasions I could have benefited from having someone with me.