a lot of it..

Posted by Ben on Jul 15, 2010 in updates | 1 comment

I know it’s been a long time since I posted; I’ve got a lot to catch up on. I’ve just been hell busy with other things so it was pushed to the back of the pile.

My last blog ended after Monaco Casino, where I woke up the next day and made my way over to Italy. More specifically we stopped off at Florence. Now I know I’ve left this late enough that most of you are already on your tour, but hopefully I can get these countries in before you go and visit them.

Because I visited so many different places in Italy including Florence, Rome, Verona, Venice, Pisa and Orvieto I won’t go into a whole lot of detail on each and every city otherwise you’ll be reading for the next couple of days.

Our stop in Florence was more about sightseeing and just taking in the great sculptures and statues such as ‘The David’. We stayed in a two man caravan which could hardly fit Donal sideways. The big man did me proud. We got so drunk that night in Florence that we were unable to go back into town the next day and instead just slept. It sounds like a waste but we really did get to see everything the previous day and anyway, we met some people the night we got obliterated and it was well worth it, trust me.

If I was to suggest going somewhere it would be the Galleria dell’Accademia. As I said, Florence is definitely no town to party. Its very tourist based and is therefore just somewhere to go to see all your old works of art.

Verona, Pisa and Orvieto were much the same. These were all day stops were we spent a few hours soaking up the sunlight and taking in the different sites. Verona is obviously the maiden town of Shakespeare’s ‘Romeo and Juliet’. They had a lot of smaller sites that were well worth seeing.

They were interesting but not really my thing, these included things such as a mini Colosseum, a wall with thousands of love notes posted on it asking Juliet to find them love and the balcony on which Juliet sang to Romeo.

Pisa obviously famous for its leaning tower was definitely worth seeing. Such a massive tourist spot as it’s completely in the middle of nowhere and would be extremely hard to reach without a tour bus; there are a lot of African guys trying to sell you stuff and even more stalls with bits and pieces of crap.

If with a bus, definitely try and get here, especially around now (being Summer) as it had a great stretch of grass where we laid out and relaxed in some awesome seventeen century castle grounds. Also, it’s pretty funny because the architects here must have buggered up massively, the tower is slowly moving millimetre by millimetre each year, until one day it will just collapse. However, if you go here take a look at the surrounding buildings and you’ll notice that they’re also on a slant. The architect must have been on shrooms.

Either way, I bet every other failed architect wish they were as famous as Guglielmo and Bonanno Pisano for fucking up a building structure that bad.

Orvieto was really a tiny town with nothing but a beautiful cathedral up the top of a huge stretch of road. It’s a very old town with narrow streets and great views of the countryside as it’s so high above sea level. I will suggest that you get a boar burger, it sounds gross and it looked gross but it was salty and delicious and was just as good as a quarter pounder for the hangover I was supporting. I think I may have even got two.

Venice was a city for you love birds, is anyone making their way here? It really is a strange place though. Unlike any other city in the world, obviously as you’d all know it’s completely broken up by small canals in which Gondola’s get you around. There are clothes shops and restaurants which you can pull your Gondola up to like a taxi in New York. They have tens and tens of shops where you can still buy those masquerades. It really is a city stuck in the past, but well worth grabbing a gelato (Italy has amazing gelato, just ask my American friends) and cruising around the place in a Gondola. Spend the money; it’s about 60 Euro for 30 min.

That night in Venice was yet another wild night, we had a toga party (the first one I’ve ever had) and let me remind you it was mid April and still freezing outside, so dressing up in nothing but a bed sheet was a task in itself. Again, we all dug deep and drank until we were a mess. The place we stayed at had their own brand of drink, I don’t remember what it was called but I do know that it literally had about 6 shots, a Bacardi breezer and some cordial, so after 3 of those I was a mess already, trying to play pool and darts.

Now I know things like this sound so repetitive but knowing that you are doing it in Venice, wrapped in a bed sheet with people you’ve just met is such a great experience. You can’t describe the feeling in writing to someone who hasn’t experienced it, so make sure that one day or another, you do!!

Our last city in Italy, Rome, is probably the most exciting story I have for you, but not a great experience in itself for me. To put it bluntly, I was robbed by the group of people I now hate (well close to) the most on this planet, gypsies.

Gypsy scum.

We got to Rome at about 2pm on the 11th of April where we surprisingly didn’t stop at the campsite like we had at any of the other cities before commencing our walking tour. Weird huh? At the time I didn’t think anything of it. Now I must admit, this city was absolutely amazing and it would have been, by far, the best city in Italy to visit had it not be spoiled for Donal and me. We saw all the amazing attractions that you want to see such as the Colosseum, the Parthenon,the Sistine Chapel and all the ancient runes from Julius Caesar’s reign. I was on a massive high.

After the tour ended, we got onto the metro and then a public bus for another hour to make it back to the campground where our bus was sitting there with the driver. We were all laughing and mucking about when the driver casually points out, “now guys I’m sorry to say but the bus was broken into while parked at a supermarket near a metro station and a few bags were taken.” My heart sank, why? Because I was a complete douc bag and had left BOTH passports, my camera and all my other worthy possessions on the bus. Of course, mine was one of the 12 bags that had gone missing. I was in agony for a few minutes, it’s not a pleasant feeling and I hope you never experience anything like it.

PLEASE take my advice and keep your possessions and especially your passport on you AT ALL TIMES when walking around Europe, unless you can lock them up in a high security safe in your hostel.

From here, I spent the night in a Roman police station giving them my statement and a list of the items that I had lost. Furthering this (which I’m still gutted about) is that I missed out on seeing the Vatican City because I spent the entire day in the British Consulate in Rome getting my emergency passport into order (which I still haven’t got my money back for yet!!)

I don’t usually get over things too quickly, especially when they tear at me, but I didn’t let this one get me down because I couldn’t justify letting those low life’s ruin the rest of my holiday which I had spent good money on.

Besides we were about to do the best part of Europe – the east coast! I didn’t need a passport; I had cancelled one card and had another with all my money on it. I cleaned my teeth with my finger for a few days and washed my face with shampoo, but now I look back and laugh and am cheering I didn’t let it get me down, because the next few days were going to be even better than the previous two weeks.

I’ll get the next post up quicker – I promise!!