Travel
to Italy – Rome and Venice
by: Rick Chapo
Rome, Italy
Perhaps you’ve heard of
it? It goes without saying that Rome has a
rather prominent past. Lets see, in Rome you
will find…[deep breath]…the Vatican, Coliseum,
Pantheon, Piazza Navona, Church of Saint Agnese,
Trevi Fountain, Spanish Steps and a guy name
Allassandro. Just making sure you’re paying
attention. Indeed, Rome is filthy with
historically significant attractions. It seems
you can’t turn around without bumping into
something an Emperor built, captured or
destroyed. For those willing to risk potential
wrath, there are also the new Divinci Code
tours, which take you to the locations found in
the book.
In all serious, Rome is a
city you should visit at least once in your
life. No article could ever do it justice, so
I’ll just stop here.
Venice, Italy
I fondly refer to Venice,
Italy
as the floating city even though it is
apparently sinking. If you’ve seen Venice is
movies or televisions shows, the depictions are
accurate. Piazza San Marco looks exactly the
same, birds and all. The Grande Canal is, well,
a grand canal with incredible houses lining it
and boats putting up down this water way. Built
on mudflats in a lagoon, the city doesn’t really
have much room to grow. It just seems paralyzed
in time.
Once you’ve conquered the
tourist attractions, it will be time to get
serious about Venice. The best way to do this is
stand in front of your hotel or hostel,
determine which direction the tourist
attractions lie and start walking in the
opposite direction. While you may feel like
you’re driving the wrong way on a freeway for a
few minutes, you’ll eventually start getting
into real Venice.
An entirely different side
of Venice will appear and you’ll love it. You’ll
find little cafes with locals happy to talk to
you [and non-tourist prices]. In fact, the
Venetians will tend to hold you in high regard
since you’re a tourist who is bypassing the
tourist areas. This, of course, will logically
lead to a whirl of introductions to this nephew,
that son of a brother and so on. Next thing you
know, you’ll be complaining about Italian
politicians and how things used to be better in
the past.
While Rome and Venice
Italy are
excellent travel destinations, you can’t really
go wrong in Italy. For the adventurous, set your
itinerary with the old map on a wall and dart
technique. |
