Venice is...

.....sinking. Yep, the whole city. Not surprising though - the city is an island built on wooden planks sunken into mud 100's of years ago. The wood has petrified, and the mud below is slowing swallowing them. As a result, many parts of the city have uneven ground and frequently, the whole city floods. Even the main St. Mark's Square below has a flood plan. They put benches end to end to make sidewalks, and gondolas just stroll right on in.

Not today tho! It's HOT in Venice! Crazy humid too. Think Florida. Here in the morning, the miltary marched around shouting for over an hour. It was cool at first, but then all the tourists were basically over it. Even the soldiers looked preoccupied.




Here's my friends from Sacramento! L-R: Wayne, me, Ruben, Marie, (bottom row now) Kim, Jenny, Misty, and Joann. It was so good to see familiar faces.



I always like to follow up a regular picture with one of these. Long live the "thumbs up".



I hate the popped collar. Hate it. Can't stand it. I saw these two mannequins had them. Not anymore, jack.



Pigeons are usually pretty gross and annoying, but in St. Mark's Square, everyone just seemed to love them.



This picture is taken from "The Bridge of Sighs". On the left is the old government building. On the right is the prison. When criminals were convicted, they would take the short walk across this bridge, take one last look at freedom, and sigh. Notice the bars on the windows.



Here's a view from inside the bridge where the prisoners walked. Cool view, huh? Looks like Godzilla's eye, I think.



I'm in prison! (Many of my elementary school teachers' dreams, I'm sure.)




This is right before they turned on the country music. Ultimate torture.



In the prison, they had a collection of old weapons and artifacts. And this: a real life chastity belt. Wow. Good luck, dude.



I go from a chastity belt to a mosaic in a church. ::bowing:: This is inside St. Mark's Basillica. The mural at the top of this dome shows Christ's assension to heaven. Inside this church also, apparently, is the bones and remains of Mark, the Gospel writer.



Back out in the plaza, I mingle with more birds. The first one that landed on my hand to eat, no lie: part of its feathers and skin on its head was missing and I could see it's flesh underneath - probably the brain. Right after this, I pulled out the 'ol hand sanitizer.



A totally candid shot of Wayne and I, how we always look.



These gondoliers were everywhere. Know how much it costs to ride one? 100 Euro. Thats 150 dollars. And thats for 25 mins. You think they sing and do all that cool stuff? Think again. I saw many of them texting, talking on the phone, or just yelling back and forth to each other during people's rides. You'd get more of an authentic romantic experience at the Venetian in Las Vegas. For less that half the price, too.



Just enjoying the sunshine!



Wayne and I enjoying a much needed break from the blazing sun.



It only takes on hand to make my last name from trash cans in Venice. I saw "Vesta" everywhere.



This time, it's Bob and I who were caught off guard. I guess we just look this cool all the time.



At the beach, slides are fair game.



More time to relax from the sun. See a pattern here? Yeah. Hot in Italy in June.



Picnic time! We all hit up the grocery store and ate European style in the park.



Butt rubbin! First of the trip. This is a tradition, especially with targets like Bob around.



Later, Bob and I had a *very* romantic time of watching soccer and then eating gelato on the street. aaahahaha. Classic Bob face.



Now this is legitimately a romantic scene. Venice is place to dine outdoors, if you can afford it - but looks totally worth it.



I don't think I could have gotten enough pictures of gondolas going under bridges.




Sorry, no videos this time! Just loved taking pictures in Venice. Just got to Florence. Guess what - still as hot! Ciao!

Picture it: Sicily

Sicily. Pictures and videos. Enjoy. (So tempted to just write another "I Hate Computers" blog right now. It would be faster to deliever this blog if I sketched it on parchment, squeezed it into a bottle, and then threw it in the Mediterranian Sea than try to publish it on this islands' computers.)

My trip to Sicily was bookended by boat trips. I took an 8 hour train from Naples to Palermo, which is on the island of Sicily. Once the train got to the edge of the boot, it unloaded onto a boat in sections, and rode a boat over to the other side!

Starting off with a video: here we are loading the boat.




Leaving "the boot" behind.



Here's me being astonished that a train is inside a boat.




We're in! I travel to see the water:




That's Sicily behind me!



The captain takes a break and steers with his knee. (Ok, not really, but traffic is light on the sea.)


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I saw this dog right when I got there. Dang, I love dogs.



View from my hostel room. This was the party street. Live music till 3am.



One of many crowded markets I squeezed into. Anything you want - fresh fish, produce, even bootleg DVD's of current movies, all there.




It's hard work cuttting swordfish.




It's easy work serving calamari.




I found the coolest thing - a marionette puppet show!!! Before the show, here's the lady putting finishing touches on the evenings' performers.




Check out this army! One guy was doing the voices for all of the characters - you only really knew who was talking when they would jiggle their head and wave their arm.



This might be one of the best videos of the trip. I so hope this plays for you. At the climax of the play (all in Italian), the young hero defends the honor of who-knows and has this epic battle. Enjoy the brilliance of a The Greatest Puppet Battle of All Time.



I took another boat out of Sicily! This was basically a cruise ship without dancing shows. Mainly old people smoking and playing cards. But we all crowded into the on-board cinema to watch the soccer match between Italy and Spain.



Italy ended up loosing. Everyone crowded outside to smoke and curse




This was my boat - the Compania. "N" is backwards. I don't think that's the way its supposed to go....



In Venice now. It's hot! And the computers are as slow as the table service, but not nearly as charming. Ciao!

Coasting

Ah, the Italian Amalfi Coast. Everything is a bit slower down here by "the boot". Trains run on "Italian Time", pizzas are ready "whenever", and businesses stay open late it they want to, or open later than posted times, depending on the outcome of the previous nights' football (soccer) game. Either way though, it the resulting celbration/lament usually involves a lot of "birre".

I stayed in lovely Sorrento - a beautiful resort town reccomended by Rick Steves (great travel books) to make as your home base in the area. (Not dirty 'ol Naples, ugh. A trash strike? No thanks.)

This is one of the first sight I saw when I arrived in Sorrento. My host brought me down to the waters edge to show me the sunset. Cruise ships are regularly in the harbour here, and all the cruisers snapping pics of the coast line made it light up like It's A Small World Holiday. I love this picture. Look at that checkmark cloud - "beautiful sunset? check!"



I saw this mural of Jesus breaking bread on a church every time I left my hosts' house in the morning. Extra fitting for Europe - that's all they seem to eat here. When I get home, I'm gonna break a steak in two - and then eat both halves.



Pompeii! The city covered in ash my Mt. Vesuvius in 79 A.D. In this picture we're being covered by a menacing looking cloud - that eventually only turned out to be as dangerous as the Lakers in Game 6. Zing!



This is my guide for Pompeii. Might be my favourite person Ive met on the trip so far.





Load of crap alert: This plaster body cast below, is a total fake, as are all plaster body casts of people in Pompeii. My guide, an archiologist (not looking up spelling), said that the ash crushed all the people. The bones were left behind, but absolutely no 'cavity' for plaster to be inserted to create what the body looked like at the moment of the eruption. He said they were purposely put in these positions to 'get the emotion out of people'.



This is part of the main forum or sqaure, where all kinds of ideas, goods, and slaves were traded. Also where I left my sunglasses on a marble bench to take a jumping picture. Boo.



Not sure what's going on here: are these supposed to be Legos? When in doubt, take a picture with it.



I record videos from time to time for my show Big News back in LA. Here's a taste of the career in action, kids.




*Offical Candidate for Best Jumping Picture*

I only had one shot at this one. I decided to try and look like I was going to devour these tourists as they left this square. Forced perspective at it's best. Later, I decided my artistic interpretation is that I'm Mt. Vesuvius, and all these tourists are the hapless residents of Pompeii. Ah thank you, thank you.



Naples is stinkin gross. Both of those words are true. There's a trash strike going on, and has been for a while. I don't care if people say there's a hidden charm about Naples that you have to discover. This place was just noisy, gross, loud, and dangerous. In an out in a couple of hours.



Check out that trash!





Another nearby town affected by Mt. Vesivius - Herculaneum. (I could never pronounce this correctly). This was more upper class aristocrats, whereas Pompeii was working middle class. This town was covered by lava, not ash, so it was much more well preserved.



Crazy how that garden survived the lava, huh?

On the way up to Mt. Vesivius. This is the trail of lava that flowed out in the most recent eruption in 1944.



Im falling into the Volcano!!!! And apparenty having a good time doing it.



From the top of Mt. Vesuvius:




My bus driver on the way down the half of curvy Mt. Vesuvius that we didn't hike. Check out the rearview. He's totally on the phone.



Went swimming in the Medditerranian Sea. A new kind of jumping picture: no regard for landing. That's Mt. Vesuvius in the backgroud, btw.

My hosts and I got pizza from this cool joint. They were so cool to me even though I to order by pointing and smiling. Note: Pointing and smiling gets you pretty far in Europe. Winking doesn't hurt, either.



The beauuuutiful Amalfi Coast.

I love old brick bridges. I have so many pictures of the coastline from my bus.



The beautiful town of Positano. Kinda looks a bit like the Cinque Terre, huh? I love that they paint their houses with vibrant pastels.



I caught this guy delivering pizzas. Got a small round of cheers from nearby tourists for capturing this picture.



Do you think this guy needs a break? Or maybe his whole day is one long break?



Lemons are everywhere in the Amafi Coast. Sold in almost every doorway.

There's a sign nearby that says "In this orange and lemon grove, you're not allowed to act your age". Ok, there wasn't. But thankfully, I carry such a sign with me at all times for emergencies like this.



Im hiding. Find me. Go.



Third jumping pic in one post! This one is no-handed!

I almost forgot this picture! I had to come back and add it. I ate pizza almost everyday at this place. Check out the pizza delivery 'boy' receiving pizzas for his next delivery. He had a cell phone wedged into his helmet so he can talk and drive at the same time. Brilliant.

Just got to Sicily! As you can probaby tell, I don't get internet access as often as other countries. In many smaller parts of Italy, I've heard the internet thing is still catching on. More pizza awaits. Ciao!