Loving the TR so far, especially all the photos... green with envy at the moment!
Thanks Paddy55, It has been a pretty amazing trip so far. We are really not looking forward to heading back to reality next week
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Thanks Paddy55, It has been a pretty amazing trip so far. We are really not looking forward to heading back to reality next week
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Loving the trip report, bwhouse, and more than slightly green (like paddy.) I've never cruised -- the fear of seasickness has held me back! -- but am thinking a short Mediterranean cruise might be a gentle introduction.
The Mediterranean seems to be very calm seas, it was like a lake the whole time we were there. So probably a good introduction.
We had a fairly short day in Corfu, arriving at 07:30 and departing at 15:00. I am not sure if it was just because Corfu replaced Capri (which we really wanted to go to) in our original itinerary but we really didn’t find anything interesting to do or see in Corfu. I feel like this sign summed up Corfu pretty well. It was a town with an old fort on either side.
Corfu was again a similar town to Kotor in that it was cobble stone tiny streets that we mostly closed off to traffic, however it was much larger and just didn’t have the magic untouched feel to it. Every second shop was selling the same pre-manufactured souvenirs or knock off leather goods. Mrs bwhouse was not keen on me buying her a 100euro Chanel bag, I still don’t know why
Apparently there are some really nice beaches a short drive away, but as the weather was pretty average at ~20c with rain on the way we weren’t too enthused to make the trek to the beach.
Instead we wandered around the town and tried some of the local food before retiring to the port and back to the ship.
Sorry not many photos in Corfu for some reason, next up Messina.
Corfu was again a similar town to Kotor in that it was cobble stone tiny streets that we mostly closed off to traffic, however it was much larger and just didn’t have the magic untouched feel to it. Every second shop was selling the same pre-manufactured souvenirs or knock off leather goods. Mrs bwhouse was not keen on me buying her a 100euro Chanel bag, I still don’t know why
Apparently there are some really nice beaches a short drive away, but as the weather was pretty average at ~20c with rain on the way we weren’t too enthused to make the trek to the beach.
Instead we wandered around the town and tried some of the local food before retiring to the port and back to the ship.
Sorry not many photos in Corfu for some reason, next up Messina.
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We learnt our lesson with Messina in that it is important to research ports properly, as nothing at Messina had really peaked our interest we hadn’t spent much time investigating and just thought we would grab a tour or bus once off the ship. What we didn’t realise is just how far everything was. It was a 300euro cab ride to get to the Mt Etna volcano, so after scrapping that idea we just took a wander through the town. But as the internet had already suggested there wasn’t much in the town at all. We weren’t too bothered as this was a really short port day (8am-1:30pm).
The town did have a really impressive clock tower, I am led to believe it is one of the oldest astronomical clocks in existence, which once again as a clock / watch nut was fun to look at.
The clock tower was outside a massive church which was a different design to what we had seen elsewhere, it had these massive murals of what looked like coloured tiles instead of any stained glass.
For whatever reason (could have been due to the short downpour of rain) we were both getting eaten alive by mosquitoes - well we think that's what it was as we never actually saw any. So we headed back to the ship and had lunch on board and watched some of the on-board entertainment. We had a pretty great view of the harbour from our balcony as we departed the port.
After spending a nice afternoon in the sun on the pool deck, we retired to our cabin to get ready for dinner. Messina was the second formal night on the ship, which is fun to get dressed up and head to a nice dinner. It was also lobster night in the main dining room I could not resist and had lobster for mains and lobster for desert by this point I have lost count but I believe this was lobster 6 & 7 as I had a surf and turf with Lobster again on a previous night. Unfortunately I didn’t get a photo of the plate before the waiter de-shelled both the lobster and the two king prawns, which is why the plating looks a little messy. It is safe to say that many lobsters were harmed in the making of this TR
The town did have a really impressive clock tower, I am led to believe it is one of the oldest astronomical clocks in existence, which once again as a clock / watch nut was fun to look at.
The clock tower was outside a massive church which was a different design to what we had seen elsewhere, it had these massive murals of what looked like coloured tiles instead of any stained glass.
For whatever reason (could have been due to the short downpour of rain) we were both getting eaten alive by mosquitoes - well we think that's what it was as we never actually saw any. So we headed back to the ship and had lunch on board and watched some of the on-board entertainment. We had a pretty great view of the harbour from our balcony as we departed the port.
After spending a nice afternoon in the sun on the pool deck, we retired to our cabin to get ready for dinner. Messina was the second formal night on the ship, which is fun to get dressed up and head to a nice dinner. It was also lobster night in the main dining room
I could not resist and had lobster for mains and lobster for desert by this point I have lost count but I believe this was lobster 6 & 7 as I had a surf and turf with Lobster again on a previous night. Unfortunately I didn’t get a photo of the plate before the waiter de-shelled both the lobster and the two king prawns, which is why the plating looks a little messy. It is safe to say that many lobsters were harmed in the making of this TR Our last and final port call before disembarkment in Rome was Elba. Our limited research suggested Elba was a quiet little island with some spectacular beaches along with some interesting history. Napoleon was exiled to Elba in 1814 and lived there for almost a year.
Once again Elba was a tender port so we were anchored off the harbour, but had a great panoramic view of the bay.
To be honest we didn’t have high hopes for Elba, but it turned out to be the 'little port that could’, we were pleasantly surprised that upon disembarking the tenders we were handed a map but there wasn’t the usual group of people trying to hustle you into a taxi or sell you the ‘best’ tour available. In fact there was no one other than a large group of people from the ship all looking confused at the various maps available trying to determine where to go.
We decided, despite the weather, we were going to head for one of the beaches and go for a swim. After a fairly reasonable hike up and then down we arrived at this little tiny pebble beach at the bottom of a cliff. The water was fairly cold, but we went for a quick swim.
After our swim we headed back into town, to find some lunch. We couldn’t decide on what we wanted to eat so Mrs bwhouse suggested Gelato. After a confusing exchange with the lady behind the counter that really didn’t speak much english we had a giant cone of lemon sorbet - we now understood why she looked at us funny when we said we only wanted lemon. But, it was by far the best sorbet / gelato I’ve had before.
The day had disappeared and it was time to head back to the ship for our final night aboard. We were sad we didn't have longer to explore Elba as it looked like there were some fantastic beaches within driving distance.
Once again Elba was a tender port so we were anchored off the harbour, but had a great panoramic view of the bay.
To be honest we didn’t have high hopes for Elba, but it turned out to be the 'little port that could’, we were pleasantly surprised that upon disembarking the tenders we were handed a map but there wasn’t the usual group of people trying to hustle you into a taxi or sell you the ‘best’ tour available. In fact there was no one other than a large group of people from the ship all looking confused at the various maps available trying to determine where to go.
We decided, despite the weather, we were going to head for one of the beaches and go for a swim. After a fairly reasonable hike up and then down we arrived at this little tiny pebble beach at the bottom of a cliff. The water was fairly cold, but we went for a quick swim.
After our swim we headed back into town, to find some lunch. We couldn’t decide on what we wanted to eat so Mrs bwhouse suggested Gelato. After a confusing exchange with the lady behind the counter that really didn’t speak much english we had a giant cone of lemon sorbet - we now understood why she looked at us funny when we said we only wanted lemon. But, it was by far the best sorbet / gelato I’ve had before.
The day had disappeared and it was time to head back to the ship for our final night aboard. We were sad we didn't have longer to explore Elba as it looked like there were some fantastic beaches within driving distance.
We decided to use trains to get around in Europe, they seemed fairly economical if you purchased tickets online prior to arriving and were fairly fast. We did learn however that similar to most airline tickets, once you have purchased the train ticket and allocated your seat, you cannot move to an earlier departure, despite arriving at the train station early
After disembarking the ship we followed a very confusing set of directions that involved a lady pointing left saying, 'train station white bus’, although after turning left we were presented with no less than 4 white busses and a lot of confused tourists. I thought no worries the busses all have signs this can’t be too hard. Well not one of the signs said train station It turns out that we needed to get a bus transfer to the port gate where we could get on another transfer (and pay 2Euro) to the train station. After about 40mins (most of it sitting and waiting) we arrived at the train station. Our first train was a local low speed train from Chivincichi to Rome, where we transferred to a high speed train to Venice all up the train ticket to Venice cost 60euro for the two of us which seemed pretty economical. Of note on the regional trains the prepaid tickets are valid for 4 hours from the time you select, but not earlier than the selected time, however on the high-speed trains the ticket is only valid for the train you select.
The main train station in Rome has an interesting system where they don’t seem to allocate the platform for the departing train until about 10mins before departure, so everyone stands around this massive board waiting to find out what platform to go to. We also learnt that for whatever reason train stations in Italy seem to have very few seats, so be prepared to stand whilst you wait.
The trains offer two classes, standard and ‘first class’, when we booked the train online I noticed that ‘first class’ was only about 20euro more expensive, however I had seen several references that it wasn’t worth it so decided to stick with standard class and I was glad I did. From what I can tell the only difference was the ‘first class’ seats were upholstered in leather vs fabric and they were slightly wider with 3 across rather than 4, but the pitch seemed to be identical (see below standard on the left, first class on the right) and I guess you get a ticket saying you travel in first class
The seats were fairly comfy and offered power and a table as well as free wifi although you need to be able to receive an SMS confirmation number and provide a credit card that they pre-auth 0.01euro on to validate your identity apparently. We were a little disappointed that the seats we selected were facing backwards (which you couldn’t tell when booking), but half way through our journey after pulling out of Florence the train changed direction so we were facing forward for the last half of the trip.
After disembarking the ship we followed a very confusing set of directions that involved a lady pointing left saying, 'train station white bus’, although after turning left we were presented with no less than 4 white busses and a lot of confused tourists. I thought no worries the busses all have signs this can’t be too hard. Well not one of the signs said train station
It turns out that we needed to get a bus transfer to the port gate where we could get on another transfer (and pay 2Euro) to the train station. After about 40mins (most of it sitting and waiting) we arrived at the train station. Our first train was a local low speed train from Chivincichi to Rome, where we transferred to a high speed train to Venice all up the train ticket to Venice cost 60euro for the two of us which seemed pretty economical. Of note on the regional trains the prepaid tickets are valid for 4 hours from the time you select, but not earlier than the selected time, however on the high-speed trains the ticket is only valid for the train you select. The main train station in Rome has an interesting system where they don’t seem to allocate the platform for the departing train until about 10mins before departure, so everyone stands around this massive board waiting to find out what platform to go to. We also learnt that for whatever reason train stations in Italy seem to have very few seats, so be prepared to stand whilst you wait.
The trains offer two classes, standard and ‘first class’, when we booked the train online I noticed that ‘first class’ was only about 20euro more expensive, however I had seen several references that it wasn’t worth it so decided to stick with standard class and I was glad I did. From what I can tell the only difference was the ‘first class’ seats were upholstered in leather vs fabric and they were slightly wider with 3 across rather than 4, but the pitch seemed to be identical (see below standard on the left, first class on the right) and I guess you get a ticket saying you travel in first class
The seats were fairly comfy and offered power and a table as well as free wifi although you need to be able to receive an SMS confirmation number and provide a credit card that they pre-auth 0.01euro on to validate your identity apparently. We were a little disappointed that the seats we selected were facing backwards (which you couldn’t tell when booking), but half way through our journey after pulling out of Florence the train changed direction so we were facing forward for the last half of the trip.
We got off the train in Venice and walked out of the station to be treated instantly by the grand canal, breath taking is about the only thing I can say. I had a little chuckle to myself when google suggested the best way to our hotel was to take ‘Bus No.2’ from wharf C, the bus service was in fact a boat, which makes total sense but was still a little surprising.
We stumbled our way through buying a bus ticket at the ticket machines and made our way onto the bus. Our stop was just on the other side of the Rialto Bridge where we walked down several of the little alley ways to our hotel, Hotel Bella Venezia. It turns out that I fluked a hotel in a great location right smack bang in between Rialto Bridge and St Mark’s Square. The room was nice, spacious and had massively high ceilings with the decor in classic Venetian style. The windows overlooked a small canal which seemed quite popular with the Gondola boats.
After checking in and dropping bags off, we went exploring to find some dinner. After 5 minutes of walking around Venice we both fell in love with the place. It just has a certain charm about it that’s hard to explain. I mean I had seen the picturesque photos of buildings along the grand canal in Venice with the water lapping up against the front door, but I guess I wasn’t expecting the whole city to be like that! It was quite surreal walking around for 3 days and not seeing one single automobile.
We headed towards St Mark’s Square as it was still daylight and thought we would check it out, it was packed like crazy with people. But it was buzzing in a good way and a great spot to people watch. As we were so close we thought we would also check out the Rialto bridge.
By this time we were getting hungry, but didn’t really want to pay the outrageous tourist prices along with cover charge and music levy for the cafes in St Mark’s Square so went exploring for a little restaurant in the back streets to grab some dinner. After dinner we continued to meander around until it started to get dark. The combination of the boats, canals, stone buildings and street lights was a dream for night photos.
After awhile we were pretty tired after a long day of transit so retired to the hotel to rest up for a full day tomorrow.
We stumbled our way through buying a bus ticket at the ticket machines and made our way onto the bus. Our stop was just on the other side of the Rialto Bridge where we walked down several of the little alley ways to our hotel, Hotel Bella Venezia. It turns out that I fluked a hotel in a great location right smack bang in between Rialto Bridge and St Mark’s Square. The room was nice, spacious and had massively high ceilings with the decor in classic Venetian style. The windows overlooked a small canal which seemed quite popular with the Gondola boats.
After checking in and dropping bags off, we went exploring to find some dinner. After 5 minutes of walking around Venice we both fell in love with the place. It just has a certain charm about it that’s hard to explain. I mean I had seen the picturesque photos of buildings along the grand canal in Venice with the water lapping up against the front door, but I guess I wasn’t expecting the whole city to be like that! It was quite surreal walking around for 3 days and not seeing one single automobile.
We headed towards St Mark’s Square as it was still daylight and thought we would check it out, it was packed like crazy with people. But it was buzzing in a good way and a great spot to people watch. As we were so close we thought we would also check out the Rialto bridge.
By this time we were getting hungry, but didn’t really want to pay the outrageous tourist prices along with cover charge and music levy for the cafes in St Mark’s Square so went exploring for a little restaurant in the back streets to grab some dinner. After dinner we continued to meander around until it started to get dark. The combination of the boats, canals, stone buildings and street lights was a dream for night photos.
After awhile we were pretty tired after a long day of transit so retired to the hotel to rest up for a full day tomorrow.
The next day we got up and heading off again with the aim to hit most of the ‘sights’ on the map. We pointed our selves roughly in the right direction and went exploring! I just found the endless alleyways and canals of Venice fascinating and could have spent days exploring them. Before I knew it, we found ourselves buying takeaways slices of pizza for lunch and just sitting on the edge of the canal taking it all in whilst watching the water taxis and gondolas whiz by. We saw on numerous occasions what could only be described as the Venice equivalent of a traffic jam - how more accidents don’t happen on the canals is amazing.
We ticked off most of the main sights, to be honest I can’t remember the names and I have misplaced the map so I can’t list them, but everything was in walking distance which was great. And really, the best bit of it all was getting lost in the multitudes of tiny alleyways. There really was a surprise around every bend. Sometimes you emerged from an alley that’s the width of your shoulders into a antiques market in the middle of a large piazza… and other times you’re glad you’re paying attention or you’d have fallen into the canal that suddenly appeared in front of you.
Finally, on our last night, I decided to head out after dinner and grab a couple more night shots of the grand canal. This was one of my favourites.
We ticked off most of the main sights, to be honest I can’t remember the names and I have misplaced the map so I can’t list them, but everything was in walking distance which was great. And really, the best bit of it all was getting lost in the multitudes of tiny alleyways. There really was a surprise around every bend. Sometimes you emerged from an alley that’s the width of your shoulders into a antiques market in the middle of a large piazza… and other times you’re glad you’re paying attention or you’d have fallen into the canal that suddenly appeared in front of you.
Finally, on our last night, I decided to head out after dinner and grab a couple more night shots of the grand canal. This was one of my favourites.
TomVexille
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There really is just something about Venice. I really just love exploring the alleys.
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Wonderful photos, bwhouse. Took me right back to Venice for a few minutes and that is never a bad thing.
yld200
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The Venice photos look great!
My SO and I did a day trip from Milan a few years ago, decided on not taking any of the Buses or boats and wing it. Paid 2eu for a map and walked it - we got lost so many times and almost missed our train back to Milan but was one of the best days we've had.
My SO and I did a day trip from Milan a few years ago, decided on not taking any of the Buses or boats and wing it. Paid 2eu for a map and walked it - we got lost so many times and almost missed our train back to Milan but was one of the best days we've had.
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Great TR - where did you stay in Venice - I've got a couple of nights there after Christmas (hopefully I will be able to write my White Christmas TR)
I am not sure if it was because we were there over a weekend or what but Hotels in Venice were really expensive. We ended up staying in a place called Hotel Bella Venezia which was a 4 star place right smack bang between Rialto bridge and Saint Mark's square so the location was perfect. As per the photos it wasn't bad, the room was a good size and clean with good ammenities.
I don't stay in hotels enough to be loyal to any particular chain, I do have Hilton Gold from velocity, but the hilton in Venice wanted $800/night, from memory we paid about $300/night for Hotel Bella Venezia
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And so the holiday ends, we began our long trip home this morning, on the plus side we have a few more hours of F so we are ending things on a high note Currently sitting in the Senator lounge at FRA waiting for our next flight which has already been delayed an hour
Rome put on a great sunrise for our early morning departure
The last week has been pretty busy, so I am a bit behind in sorting out photos, but will hopefully get the Florence and Rome instalments up soon.
Currently sitting in the Senator lounge at FRA waiting for our next flight which has already been delayed an hour Rome put on a great sunrise for our early morning departure
The last week has been pretty busy, so I am a bit behind in sorting out photos, but will hopefully get the Florence and Rome instalments up soon.
After Venice, Florence had a lot to live up to. We arrived quite late into Florence and by the time we got to the hotel it was after 7:30pm and dark, so we really didn’t see much of the city on the way in. In Florence we were staying at the NH Anglo Hotel, we checked in and got a map from the front desk as well as some directions on where the main ‘things’ were. The room was huge in actual space, but nothing special at all. There seemed to be a group of light switches on every wall that, from what we could tell, did nothing at all. The bed was huge however, it looked like it was two king singles pushed together as it was significantly larger than a regular king bed.
By this point it was past 8pm and we were hungry and tired, so decided to try and find something close by for dinner. The lady at the hotel desk recommended a place that was about a 10-15min walk, but as we walked out of the hotel was ran in to a small little restaurant the next block over which looked quite busy and had an ok menu; as it was close and we were tired we just grabbed a table. It turned out to be a great little find. It was a family run business with local food that was both economical and really good. It also had great reviews on yelp and trip advisor. If you happen to be in the area I strongly recommend you give it a shot. It was probably the best Italian meal we had in Florence.
For our first full day in Florence, we did what we normally do in any new city and set out in the rough direction of the historic centre to walk around and check things out. I honestly believe one of the best ways to get a feel for any city or town is to just lose yourself in it and wander around. Once we orientated ourselves we headed to check out the lines for the Accademia and Uffizi, as we had heard they can be crazy and they sure didn’t disappoint. That photo with all the people was the line for the Academia (apparently ~3 hours long), we are not ones to wait in line so decided to give both a miss and attempt to book tickets online once back at the hotel. There were a bunch of pretty awesome statues in Palazzo Vecchio just outside the Uffizi, including a replica of David which sure beat the 3-hour line.
We decided to try our luck at the smaller DaVinci museum just around the corner from the Uffizi, which thankfully had no line. Whilst it was quite small (only took us an hour and a half or so to see the entire museum) it was really impressive and told a great story about the history of science. I would recommend it for anyone visiting Florence.
After the museum we continued exploring, did a little bit of shopping and checked out the Leather school, where you could watch the apprentices making all sorts of leather goods. I had to laugh at one point we were walking along one of the main roads and I realised that there was a line of almost identical scooters / Vespas parked that stretched along the side of the road for as far as the eye could see, they really do seem to love their scooters in Italy. We also saw heaps of really cool street art all throughout the city.
By this point it was past 8pm and we were hungry and tired, so decided to try and find something close by for dinner. The lady at the hotel desk recommended a place that was about a 10-15min walk, but as we walked out of the hotel was ran in to a small little restaurant the next block over which looked quite busy and had an ok menu; as it was close and we were tired we just grabbed a table. It turned out to be a great little find. It was a family run business with local food that was both economical and really good. It also had great reviews on yelp and trip advisor. If you happen to be in the area I strongly recommend you give it a shot. It was probably the best Italian meal we had in Florence.
For our first full day in Florence, we did what we normally do in any new city and set out in the rough direction of the historic centre to walk around and check things out. I honestly believe one of the best ways to get a feel for any city or town is to just lose yourself in it and wander around. Once we orientated ourselves we headed to check out the lines for the Accademia and Uffizi, as we had heard they can be crazy and they sure didn’t disappoint. That photo with all the people was the line for the Academia (apparently ~3 hours long), we are not ones to wait in line so decided to give both a miss and attempt to book tickets online once back at the hotel. There were a bunch of pretty awesome statues in Palazzo Vecchio just outside the Uffizi, including a replica of David which sure beat the 3-hour line.
We decided to try our luck at the smaller DaVinci museum just around the corner from the Uffizi, which thankfully had no line. Whilst it was quite small (only took us an hour and a half or so to see the entire museum) it was really impressive and told a great story about the history of science. I would recommend it for anyone visiting Florence.
After the museum we continued exploring, did a little bit of shopping and checked out the Leather school, where you could watch the apprentices making all sorts of leather goods. I had to laugh at one point we were walking along one of the main roads and I realised that there was a line of almost identical scooters / Vespas parked that stretched along the side of the road for as far as the eye could see, they really do seem to love their scooters in Italy. We also saw heaps of really cool street art all throughout the city.
Talking about street art, at some point on the first day we started noticing that a number of the street signs had been ‘modified’ to make them significantly more interesting. After doing a little research, apparently a french artist by the name of Clet Abraham has been at this on the streets of Florence for since 2010 and once we started spotting them we couldn’t stop - it became a bit of a game.
What still blows my mind about walking around these cities is the simple fact that you are wandering down a street lined with busy shops and cafes and then suddenly bam! straight ahead is some crazy building from the 13th century or some epic monument.
After a busy first day in Florence we decide to investigate some of the tours out to the country side or more specifically the Chianti region of Tuscany. We narrowed it down to two tours, one was a Vespa tour of the countryside and one was a shuttle tour with a 2 hour horse ride through one of the vineyards. As Mrs bwhouse has been keen to go horse riding for awhile back home, we thought why not kill two birds with one stone so locked in the horse riding tour; which also included a wine tasting and dinner at one of the vineyards. The tour departed at 2pm, so we thought we would use the morning to go visit the Basilica as we hadn’t seen it the day before. I'm not sure if it was temporary or permanent but there was what appeared to be a french street market setup in the Piazza right outside the basilica with an interesting array of street food. We got this magical potato, cream, white wine, cheese and bacon dish that could only be described as comfort food.
After eating way too much, we heading back to the hotel to get changed and head on our tour. I was so glad we decided to do the tour, it was great to get out into the countryside and see the rolling hills and vineyards compared to the hustle and bustle of what is a rather big city.
Our final day was only really half a day as we were on a 4pm train, but we did manage to secure an online booking for the Ufizzi for midday which worked out well. If you are into art the Ufizzi is certainly an impressive museum / art gallery. I never thought there could be so many interpretations of baby Jesus and mother Mary! Still not quite sure why everyone raves about the ‘Birth of Venus’ painting, but hey I got to see it. (Mrs Bwhouse is currently sitting somewhere shaking her head at me)
What still blows my mind about walking around these cities is the simple fact that you are wandering down a street lined with busy shops and cafes and then suddenly bam! straight ahead is some crazy building from the 13th century or some epic monument.
After a busy first day in Florence we decide to investigate some of the tours out to the country side or more specifically the Chianti region of Tuscany. We narrowed it down to two tours, one was a Vespa tour of the countryside and one was a shuttle tour with a 2 hour horse ride through one of the vineyards. As Mrs bwhouse has been keen to go horse riding for awhile back home, we thought why not kill two birds with one stone so locked in the horse riding tour; which also included a wine tasting and dinner at one of the vineyards. The tour departed at 2pm, so we thought we would use the morning to go visit the Basilica as we hadn’t seen it the day before. I'm not sure if it was temporary or permanent but there was what appeared to be a french street market setup in the Piazza right outside the basilica with an interesting array of street food. We got this magical potato, cream, white wine, cheese and bacon dish that could only be described as comfort food.
After eating way too much, we heading back to the hotel to get changed and head on our tour. I was so glad we decided to do the tour, it was great to get out into the countryside and see the rolling hills and vineyards compared to the hustle and bustle of what is a rather big city.
Our final day was only really half a day as we were on a 4pm train, but we did manage to secure an online booking for the Ufizzi for midday which worked out well. If you are into art the Ufizzi is certainly an impressive museum / art gallery. I never thought there could be so many interpretations of baby Jesus and mother Mary! Still not quite sure why everyone raves about the ‘Birth of Venus’ painting, but hey I got to see it. (Mrs Bwhouse is currently sitting somewhere shaking her head at me)
So it seems like my plan to write the trip report as we went was a good idea as we got back home on the 5th of October and I have been flat out since and haven’t had the chance to come back and write the last few posts I finally got a chance to finish processing the photos from the trip Today as I have a few days off work so will get the last few posts of the trip report up. Thankfully I wrote most of the posts on the plane ride home so I don’t have to stretch the memory too much except for the below post on Rome, which will be short and to the point.
Our last stop on the holiday before heading home was Rome. We caught the train down from Florence, overall it was much the same experience as the previous trains we had caught up to Venice and then between Venice and Florence. After the crazy hotel prices in Venice and Florence we had decided to stay in an AirBnB in Rome, the photos looked good and it was in a pretty central spot walking distance to both the Trevi Fountain and the Colosseum / Roman Forum. The place was small but worked perfectly.
After doing a lot of research on Rome before we left home we had decided to pre-book a tour of the Colosseum as we really wanted to check out the underground section and the top tier and it seems the only way to do that is on a tour. Whilst it wasn’t the cheapest tour in the world it turned out to be worthwhile. Our guide was fantastic and very knowledgeable about the entire area.
After the Colosseum, the tour continued to the Roman Forum
The next night we went for a walk around to get some dinner and check out the Trevi fountain and the Spanish Steps. To be honest we really didn’t understand the Spanish steps they are nothing fancy or overly spectacular. We did run into this pretty awesome buried ruins right in the middle of the city which we later found out is also a cat sanctuary, Mrs Bwhouse made sure we returned there during daylight!
We also did a bunch of shopping and eating in Rome, but I won’t bore you all with the details / I really can’t remember the details
I finally got a chance to finish processing the photos from the trip Today as I have a few days off work so will get the last few posts of the trip report up. Thankfully I wrote most of the posts on the plane ride home so I don’t have to stretch the memory too much except for the below post on Rome, which will be short and to the point.Our last stop on the holiday before heading home was Rome. We caught the train down from Florence, overall it was much the same experience as the previous trains we had caught up to Venice and then between Venice and Florence. After the crazy hotel prices in Venice and Florence we had decided to stay in an AirBnB in Rome, the photos looked good and it was in a pretty central spot walking distance to both the Trevi Fountain and the Colosseum / Roman Forum. The place was small but worked perfectly.
After doing a lot of research on Rome before we left home we had decided to pre-book a tour of the Colosseum as we really wanted to check out the underground section and the top tier and it seems the only way to do that is on a tour. Whilst it wasn’t the cheapest tour in the world it turned out to be worthwhile. Our guide was fantastic and very knowledgeable about the entire area.
After the Colosseum, the tour continued to the Roman Forum
The next night we went for a walk around to get some dinner and check out the Trevi fountain and the Spanish Steps. To be honest we really didn’t understand the Spanish steps they are nothing fancy or overly spectacular. We did run into this pretty awesome buried ruins right in the middle of the city which we later found out is also a cat sanctuary, Mrs Bwhouse made sure we returned there during daylight!
We also did a bunch of shopping and eating in Rome, but I won’t bore you all with the details / I really can’t remember the details
Our trip home started rather early, we were on a 6am flight out of Rome to Frankfurt, So it was up at 3am, I had booked a private transfer to the airport as it only cost 55euros (6 euro more than the fixed cab fee) but it could be pre-booked online which made it much easier than trying to arrange a cab for that hour of the morning.
We were flying out of Terminal 3 but gate lounge D so we got directed to one of the older Alicia lounges rather than the recently renovated Casa lounge. By the time the lounges opened (5am Italian time, so far closer to 5:30 than 5am) we couldn’t be bothered working out if we could make our way to the newer lounge, my limited googling suggested we would need to go through passport control. The lounge was nothing special at all and the food selection was very limited.
Our FCO-FRA flight was on Lufthansa in ‘business’ which as many know is identical to economy with the middle seat in the 3 blocked out. I won’t review the flight at all as it was short and nothing special. The crew were very attentive though. It did make me appreciate domestic business class in Australia though.
Once we arrived at FRA we began the long walk to gate lounge B and headed towards the Senator lounge. We had a 5 hour layover in FRA so we weren’t in any hurry. We did, however notice on the way to the lounge that our TG flight to BKK was delayed by 1 hour, this was slightly concerning as we only had 1:30 layover in BKK before the onward flight to SYD and I was really looking forward to making the most of the Thai first lounge and spa
The FRA Senator lounge is really nothing special. It is a large space with a self-service buffet offering a salad bar and some hot food along with drinks. There is also a staffed bar on the other side of the lounge. There was plenty of seating and they have some comfy reclined style chairs right by the window. My only complaint would be that the lamp next to the lounging chair doesn’t turn off and as it’s at eye level…it gets very annoying. I don’t have too many photos as one of the lounge staff got really grumpy with me when I tried to take a photo of the bar and insisted that I couldn’t take any photos as it was ‘private property’. I think he was just having a bad morning and for what every reason took a disliking to me as he had already come out from behind the bar and told me I wasn’t allowed to rest my foot on the edge of the little coffee table. One feature I really loved about this lounge was the large free lockers they offered, it was great to be able to lock up bags and go for a wander around the airport and lounge and not worry about them. As time ticked by, our flight was further delayed by another 30mins, the gate staff were helpful and said that depending on how the flight was tracking once we were airborne the staff at BKK would re-book us if needed and we would be kept informed.
With a new departure time of 4:15pm, I was starting to get sick of the lounge. At around 2:30pm we saw them towing our whale jet over to the gate
As mentioned a few times I have been really looking forward to trying Thai Airways A380 First Class and being able to compare it with our recent SQ experiences, so the excitement to board was building. We declined the escort from the lounge and walked to the gate slightly early as I wanted to board earlier rather than later. Which worked as we were the first people in the F cabin. Once again we were greeted by name and the crew introduced themselves to us and confirmed our meal orders as well as offering a pre-departure beverage (champagne of course!), It was a light load of 6/12 today in the F cabin. As we settled in with our pre-denature beverage the cabin supervisor came around and took the details of our connecting flight and promised to keep us informed during the flight as to what was going to happen.
As a side note, it looks like TG have swapped out their glassware, I love the new champagne glasses, they are much better than the old short stumpy ones they used to have.
More to come...
We were flying out of Terminal 3 but gate lounge D so we got directed to one of the older Alicia lounges rather than the recently renovated Casa lounge. By the time the lounges opened (5am Italian time, so far closer to 5:30 than 5am) we couldn’t be bothered working out if we could make our way to the newer lounge, my limited googling suggested we would need to go through passport control. The lounge was nothing special at all and the food selection was very limited.
Our FCO-FRA flight was on Lufthansa in ‘business’ which as many know is identical to economy with the middle seat in the 3 blocked out. I won’t review the flight at all as it was short and nothing special. The crew were very attentive though. It did make me appreciate domestic business class in Australia though.
Once we arrived at FRA we began the long walk to gate lounge B and headed towards the Senator lounge. We had a 5 hour layover in FRA so we weren’t in any hurry. We did, however notice on the way to the lounge that our TG flight to BKK was delayed by 1 hour, this was slightly concerning as we only had 1:30 layover in BKK before the onward flight to SYD and I was really looking forward to making the most of the Thai first lounge and spa
The FRA Senator lounge is really nothing special. It is a large space with a self-service buffet offering a salad bar and some hot food along with drinks. There is also a staffed bar on the other side of the lounge. There was plenty of seating and they have some comfy reclined style chairs right by the window. My only complaint would be that the lamp next to the lounging chair doesn’t turn off and as it’s at eye level…it gets very annoying. I don’t have too many photos as one of the lounge staff got really grumpy with me when I tried to take a photo of the bar and insisted that I couldn’t take any photos as it was ‘private property’. I think he was just having a bad morning and for what every reason took a disliking to me as he had already come out from behind the bar and told me I wasn’t allowed to rest my foot on the edge of the little coffee table. One feature I really loved about this lounge was the large free lockers they offered, it was great to be able to lock up bags and go for a wander around the airport and lounge and not worry about them. As time ticked by, our flight was further delayed by another 30mins, the gate staff were helpful and said that depending on how the flight was tracking once we were airborne the staff at BKK would re-book us if needed and we would be kept informed.
With a new departure time of 4:15pm, I was starting to get sick of the lounge. At around 2:30pm we saw them towing our whale jet over to the gate
As mentioned a few times I have been really looking forward to trying Thai Airways A380 First Class and being able to compare it with our recent SQ experiences, so the excitement to board was building. We declined the escort from the lounge and walked to the gate slightly early as I wanted to board earlier rather than later. Which worked as we were the first people in the F cabin. Once again we were greeted by name and the crew introduced themselves to us and confirmed our meal orders as well as offering a pre-departure beverage (champagne of course!), It was a light load of 6/12 today in the F cabin. As we settled in with our pre-denature beverage the cabin supervisor came around and took the details of our connecting flight and promised to keep us informed during the flight as to what was going to happen.
As a side note, it looks like TG have swapped out their glassware, I love the new champagne glasses, they are much better than the old short stumpy ones they used to have.
More to come...
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