Italy By: Mr. Church

This past June as most of you already know, I took a trip to Italy.  I have a few pictures of things I saw while I was there.  This will be the only picture of pizza I share.  We all know what pizza looks like, but this gem was a fresh pizza made right in front of my table with fresh mozzarella and goat cheese.  It was the first thing I ate after arriving in Italy on the 7th of June.  The weather was phenomenal, and the food was spectacular.  The pasta and pizza was nothing like I have ever tasted before.  This was sure to be a magnificent two weeks.

 Our first destination on our travels brought us to the ruins of Pompei.  The tour guide, Fernando, was so knowledgable of the ruins and the civilization that lived there before the volcano erupted.  He helped to dispel many of the myths that surround Pompei.  One of the most common myths revolves around the plaster shapes that were created from open space beneath the ash that fell on the city.  The early archeologists did not find anything organic below the ash that fell on Pompei.  In fact it was not until many years after Pompei was discovered that an archeologist stopped all digging at the site, to look for and locate the empty spaces that existed in the ash.  These empty spaces were then slowly filled with a plaster to create the reliefs that have been highly publicized in national magazines.

One of the most remarkable things we discovered while in Pompei was their ingenuity and progress.  The city of pompei developed and perfected many of the traditional things we can observer in many metropolitan cities around the world like: subway and rail line tracks, citywide sewer systems, and street systems.  Pompei was by far the most incredible thing we had seen so far.  Monte Vesuvio is still considered a active volcano today.  The heat and dry temperature in the Bay of Naples is un-real.

 Our next destination would be the city of Naples and a boat trip to the island of Capri.  On our way to Naples we pulled our tour bus over to get a view of the coat line we had been warned about.  The site was breath taking.  From this small two lane road we got out to take in this thing of beauty.

Although we took the chairlift to the top of the island, I have no photos to show for it.  The battery died on the ferry ride over to the island.  The memories of this beautiful island will be all I have to remember Capri.

The fourth day on our tour was just for traveling.  We had a long ride ahead of us.  From  the city of Naples we would make our way north to Florence stopping in Tuscany to visit a second century castle that is today, a private vineyard.  Once in Florence we spent our afternoon visiting the main square.  Leonardo and Donatello were there, but apparently they were not the Ninja Turtles that I had expected. A warm meal at my Aunt and Uncles house in Florence was just the remedy we needed for the journey we had planned for tomorrow.

The three buildings in the picture to the left are all part of the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore in Florence.  The red dome in the background of the picture is called the "Duomo".  It literaly means dome.  This structure was something we had been waiting for since we left the Island of Capri.  Atop the "Duomo" you could see a three hundred and sixty degree view of Florence.  The 463 steps to it's peak are well worth the heat and exhaustion you will feel upon reaching it. This was the view from one fo the four sections of its balcony on the top of the dome. I seem to be repeating myself, but the word "Breath Taking" just seems to fit perfectly.

The next stop on this tour took us to Verona.  While in Verona we spent time at the house of the Guilietta Capulet.  Verona's most infamous family.  Although we never saw Romeo his hold on Juliet is strong to this day.  Hundreds of tourists, including the group I was in, rubbed the statue of Guilietta to receive good luck.  Along with the house of Guilietta, Verona is home to four landmarks that determine the worth of a man.  There is a whale rib bone that has been suspended above a main street for more  than 1000 years.  The legend behind the bone is something like this: " The bone will not fall down until the moment, that a person walks under it, who never told a lie. Kings and popes have walked beneath the bone with nothing happening"(a local from Verona).  It seems that you would live a long and healthy life if you tell fibs more than tell the truth.  Death from a 1000 year whale bone seems not worth it for telling the truth.

Venice was the next stop on our tour.  We stayed outside the city, and took public transportation into the transportation outside the floating city of Venice.  Out water taxi took the whole tour to, Piazza San Marco, the main square in Venice.  A glass blowing tour and a architectural tour let us gave many of the group members free time to walk around the city, and see the many different sites.  After a thrilling gondella ride with our Gondolier "Mario" was crazy.  A group dinner at a local trattoria let us sample some fo the local wine and cuisine of Venice.

The only drawback that I noticed was the amount of illegal vendors trying to peddle their wares on the streets.  This might been the only crummy thing we encountered on our tour.  I don't think that any of that could ruin what we have seen thus far.

 The last day of our tour landed us back in Rome. Our morning began with a visit to the Roman Colosseum, and our tour guide Pedro.  The colosseum was gigantic.  There are artifacts and pieces of artwork in display around the outer ring of the colosseum.

The Colosseum has been repaired many times, and you can see the different time periods that it was fixed.  I can not believe the brutality that this arena has seen.  It was remarkable the design and building of the colosseum.

Following our guide around the colosseum we traveled to the Roman Forum. This plaza was surrounded by the ruins of several important ancient government buildings at the center of the city of Rome. Citizens of the ancient city referred to this space, originally a marketplace, as the Forum Magnum, or simply the Forum.  Within the Forum was the burial ground for Caesar.


One of the last stops on our tour of Italy was the Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi or "Fountain of the Four Rivers", located in the urban square of the Piazza Navona. It was designed in 1651 by Gianlorenzo Bernini, for Pope Innocent X whose family palace, faced onto the piazza as did the church of Sant'Agnese in Agone of which Innocent was the sponsor.

The base of the fountain is a basin from the centre of which travertine rocks rise to support four river gods and above them, an ancient Egyptian obelisk surmounted with the Pamphili family emblem of a dove with an olive twig. Collectively, they represent four major rivers of the four continents through which papal authority had spread: the Nile representing Africa, the Danube representing Europe, the Ganges representing Asia, and the Plate representing the Americas.

Italy was truly amazing.  I think in total I took over 2400 pictures.  There are so many pictures, that it was hard to choose a few to help me describe my adventure.  I hope these let you know a little bit about what Italy is like.