Apart from Easter in Seville – Santa Semana – we’ve not witnessed a spectacle quite as amazing as the Venice Carnival. Two years ago, we arrived in Venice on a cold, misty February morning, a stop-over on our way to take over our Istrian stone farmhouse. Because we were so consumed with the move to […]
The first time I visited Venice was on a school trip, back in 1977. We’d been on a ski trip and spent a day on the way back to the airport, in the city. It was January. It was cold. And, the city was flooded. St Mark’s Square was like a pool – I remember […]
We’ve just said goodbye to our second set of friends who’ve been staying with us for a few days. Amanda and Steve had a few days in Italy first – they flew to Venice Marco Polo from Manchester and then spent a couple of days 30km north of Venice, in Treviso and then took the […]
We are very excited that visits out here are being planned already for 2018 by family and friends. If you’d like to come out to Istria, here’s where we are currently: 18th – 22nd April – booked 22nd – 29th May – booked 29th May – 5th June TBC 30th June – 4th July – […]
So, here’s what happens when you get a bit cocky on your travels. This is a salutory tale, and if you ever come to visit us, we hope you avoid the rooky errors we made… We’d had two glorious days and nights in Venice, experiencing the festival and were due to collect a hire car […]
When we booked the flights to Venice, it just didn’t click that we were going to be there slap bang in the middle of the annual Carnevale. This caused a mild panic as we thought accommodation would be astronomical, but we were able to book again at the beautiful hotel we’d stayed in, in December […]
So, on February 22nd, we left our temporary West Didsbury accommodation and checked into an airport hotel, ready for an early morning flight on the 23rd, to Venice. Sounds very glam – but flights were cheap as chips and we thought we’d make it a bit of an adventure, travelling to our new home. And […]
It’s no secret that we adore Bergamo, in the Lombardy region of northern Italy. Easily accessible – the international airport is no more than 5km from the beautiful walled upper town – we try to escape here as often as we can. And in the coming weeks/months, we’ll be doing it even more so as […]
We’ve only fairly recently acquainted ourselves properly with Venice. We tend to try and avoid over-priced, tourist traps with street vendors waiting to pounce. Yes, it can be over-priced – but if you do insist on having a drink in St Mark’s Square, what else can you expect? It is very touristry in places – […]
It’s worth knowing, if you are holidaying in Italy, that on the first Sunday of every month, entry to many state museums, gardens, monuments and archaeological sites, is free. In 2014, the government introduced Domenica al museo, or Sunday at the Museum, to encourage more people to enjoy Italian culture and history. Not all are […]
One of the great joys of traveling through Italy is discovering firsthand that it is, indeed, a dream destination. – Debra Lavinson We are pulled to Italy, time and time again. In September – October 2013, we did quite an extensive trip, planning as we went along. This blog will set out to record where […]
Of all of the places we visited recently, Venice has to be one of the most memorable. We arrived on a cold, misty afternoon and were prepared for the weather to stay this way as we’d been under thick cloud all the way from Rimini… The lagoon, on either side of the road bridge into […]