Brown Nuggets

Great Italian Railroad Adventure

I have been travelling and sightseeing so much. Too much?

Great rosters with long flights that take me away from home for long periods of time - Copenhagen, Rome, Christchurch, Adelaide, Hongkong/San Francisco, Milan, Osaka, Nagoya, Dubai/Istanbul...

Haven't had a chance to catch my breath since March. Spent way too much recently but I guess sightseeing is costly and you know you can't put a price tag on experience. Anyway, my bank account is not exactly suffering so I shouldn't complain.

From Rome, I travelled to Pompei, Naples, Siena, Pisa and Florence. Burnt about 1K for the entire trip. I bought a 5 day rail pass for 183 euros from the Trenitalia website and collected it from Dynasty Travel. According to a colleague we can get a 10 or 15% discount if we buy direct from Dynasty. Anyway, I had to top up 10 euros for reservations whenever i wanted to take a fast train. It worked out to be 50 euros a day for train travel. I called that trip my Great Italian Railroad Adventure and was glad I was able to persuade many of my colleagues to join me. Decided against going on the night trains cos it seemed too dangerous. We also returned to the hotel everyday instead of staying overnight in the cities we visited. Accommodation would have cost at least 50 to 80 euros a night.

In Christchurch, I went horseriding, skydiving and took a day trip to Mount Cook. Spent almost all my allowance. Horseriding at Rubicon Valley was the best trekking experience I've ever had. The view was magnificent and the couple who took us riding gave me tips on cantering. Skydiving was something i knew i had to try at least once in my life. It wasn't as scary as I thought it would be and I was glad I tried it. View was supposed to be grand from Metven which is right beside the mountains but because of bad weather, we had to jump somewhere near the coast. Perhaps I'll try bungee next time and I definitely want to go horseriding again!

Did plenty of shopping in Hongkong, Shenzhen and San Francisco! It is fairly easy to get to Shenzhen from Hongkong via the MTR. After crossing into China, their subway gets you to the popular Dongmen shopping district. Macy's in the US was having a huge sale. I never knew shopping malls in the States could be so much fun. Also visited the Winchester Mystery House at Santa Clara.

I'm in Milan now by the way. Yesterday, I travelled to Verona on my own and visited Juliet's house, a couple of chapels, the Arena (a Colosseo type building which is still in use), some tower (i cheated and took the lift) and a Roman Theatre/Museum - All for just 10 Euros! Actually I also paid 35 euros for the train tickets. But all the places I visited in Verona were covered under the 10 euro Verona Card! I only had 3 hours but managed to visit 6 out of the 15 attractions. Exciting day...

Today, I went to see Leonardo Da Vinci's Last Supper and also went to the Brera Gallery - I paid 22 euros for the tickets which I booked online a month ago. The actual price is only 13 euros but if I had waited until I got here, tickets for the Last Supper would have been sold out. Shopping in Milan is not much fun for me so I came back to the hotel early. Planning to go to Lake Como, Bergamo and Bologna next time I get a Milan on my roster.

So, what do you think? Too much?

posted by Pocahontas @ 11:19 PM