September Trip – Fabric Shopping!!

We are back in London after 2 x 8-hour red eye flights. It’s lovely to be back, but sad to leave all the great food in Taiwan and Hong Kong.

Ever since I’ve started sewing my own clothes, I rarely buy ready-to-wear (RTW) clothes. The only time I’ll buy clothes are when it’s more time-effective to do so. Like needing new tank tops that I can’t be bothered sewing and are fairly inexpensive at Uniqlo. Even before I started sewing I wasn’t a huge shopper, and that extended to shopping when on holiday. Now, it’s fun to explore the fabric options at places that I go to. We made 4 stops on this trip: Dubai, Taipei, Hualien and Hong Kong. I’ll break down the experience and some of the stuff I bought!

Fabric shopping in Dubai
From reading blogs, I saw that the places to go were Satwa and the Textile Souk in Bur Dubai. People had said that the Textile Souk was mainly for wholesalers and so I thought perhaps Satwa would be better. I asked the concierge at our hotel and he said that the Textile Souk wasn’t just wholesale, so since it was across the river from the Gold Souk, we decided to go there. Getting to the souks were a bit of a challenge. We opted for the metro way and the walk to and from was a bit confusing but also sweltering hot. If you plan to go, bear in mind that the fabric places don’t open until 1pm. We got there early and all the shops that had “textile” in their name were closed. I asked a wholesale shop owner who happened to be open, and he said they would open later. We wandered around the different stalls (they don’t just sell fabric) and it was tiring getting propositioned as we walked by every store. By the time the textile shops did open, I had lost the will to browse. I found a piece of fabric at 1 stall and was able to haggle for 10 dirhams per meter instead of 15 (which I was jazzed about) but after seeing that everywhere was basically wholesale, I called it a day. I was disappointed, but at the same time, knew I’d have the opportunity to shop in Asia.

This is the fabric I bought it Dubai. The colours made me happy 🙂

Fabric Shopping in Taipei
The place to go is Yongle Fabric Market. It’s a building just chockablock full of fabric.

This is me in front of just 1 stand. 1 of…A LOT

One of the big questions I had was how willing they would be to bargaining. Some websites said no, some said yes but only 10-15% less. I’m not as comfortable using mandarin so my husband helped test the waters. Turns out, they don’t bargain at Yongle anymore. Maybe if someone bought massive amounts of fabric, but from our experience and the fact that no other customers tried to bargain, we basically concluded that they didn’t. It was fine, since the prices were already amazing when converted to GBP. Bargaining also makes me nervous, and having to do it in mandarin was seriously stressing me out. It was much more enjoyable after that factor was taken away! I found some amazing stuff there: sweatery knits and jerseys for some long-sleeved projects. We’re approaching the colder months in the UK so I need to get cracking on some warmer clothing! I also found a lovely teal plaid that I want to make a pencil skirt out of, a lovely creme cotton that I’ll probably use for a long-sleeved button up shirt and a poly-cotton mix houndstooth fabric. The cost for all 7 fabrics (and I bought between 2-3 yards of each) was around £40. Pretty amazing, even without bargaining! Incredibly happy with my purchases here.

Fabric Shopping in Hualien
Hualien is a small coastal town on the east coast of Taiwan. We’d chosen to go there because of Taroko Gorge – a beautiful park with lots of hiking trails. We figured it’d be our bit of nature for the trip, since the rest were all cities. Little did we know that a category 4 (and then upgraded to 5) typhoon would hit when we got there, so that basically washed out our chance of hiking since all the trails were closed both days we were there. I hadn’t intended on doing fabric shopping in Hualien because it’s a smaller town and any searches I did for fabric shops there came up empty. Our first night walking around, I saw a fabric store not far from our hotel. They were having a sale on pre-cut fabric. They were 6 chi (30 cms or 1 foot) or 1.8 metre long pieces of cotton fabric. I ended up finding some really pretty fabric and it was only £3.80 per piece. We ended up discovering 4 fabric stores, all on Zhonghua road, or not far off of it. It’s difficult to put in names of the shops because they’re in chinese.

I’m not sure what I’ll do with each of these pieces as some of them are fairly heavy cotton, but I know I’ll probably use a couple for projects that will be gifts. I am really happy with the selection they had, and I think these will make some lovely items!

I took a photo of the shopping bag for one of the stores if someone wants to translate it into pinyin.

Fabric Shopping in Hong Kong
Hong Kong…our final stop on the trip, and I was already really happy with what I found in Taiwan. I figured if we had time, we’d go to the fabric market, if not, no biggie. I’m really glad we ended up going because I found some really great stuff. The area is called Sham Shui Po and there is all types of shopping, not just fabric. The fabric stalls and stores that I went to are towards the south side of Ki Lung Street. I’m much more comfortable speaking in Cantonese (despite my nervousness for bargaining) so I thought I’d give it a go. Unlike Ladies Market, Sham Shui Po is not an aggressive bargaining market. You might be able to get 5-15% off, if you can really charm them, but they don’t hike up their prices to overcompensate for tourists. Because…let’s face it…how many tourists (other than fellow sewists) will fabric shop on their holiday.

I bought these two pieces at a brick and mortar store (not a stall along the street). I love stripes and dots and knew I had to get this black and white polka dot crepe. The second piece is silk and isn’t something I’m normally drawn to, but the pattern really intrigued me. Both are 3 yards long (the silk fabric is quite narrow). The silk cost 85 HKD or ~ £7 total and the crepe was 75 HKD or ~£6 total. Literally a STEAL. I did negotiate a little. I think the silk was supposed to be 95 HKD and the crepe was supposed to be 85 HKD. She called me pretty girl and kept telling me how cheap it was compared to other places and it wouldn’t even be as good quality as hers 🙂 It’s also the first time my cantonese has been complimented (it’s really not that great). But I think it’s because I told her I was visiting from the UK.

These next two pieces of fabric I also bought from a brick and mortar store in the area. I had gone in at first and thought it was a bit pricey, but the quality was really good and I knew I couldn’t get the equivalent in the UK for as cheap as it was here. They weren’t bargaining friendly, but I didn’t mind. The first is a boucle-like fabric that will be great for something long-sleeved. I bought 2 yards for 90 HKD which is ~ £7.50.

The second is a black and white paisley print medium weight cotton blend. It’s not slippery but it is drapey, which I really like. This was also 90 HKD for 2 yards.

Last but not least…the fabric purchase I am happiest with. I bought this wool fabric from a stall on Ki Lung street. The reason I was drawn to it is the pattern but also the colour. When the weather gets cold, it’s so easy to pick and wear clothing that is black or grey. It’s a winter wool so it’s definitely warm, but it’s also a nice colour to offset the more drab pieces in my wardrobe. The original piece he held was 7 yards long (and 160cm wide, so it’s really a lot of fabric). It was 35 HKD per yard if he had to cut into it, or 200 HKD for all 7 yards (a discount from 245 HKD). I considered the full 7 yards but thought “Deb…realistically speaking, what will you do with 7 yards of this fabric?!” I made it clear I didn’t want the full 7 yards but wanted 4 instead (which would total 140 HKD). I said I’d pay 100 HKD. He kept saying how it’s real wool and how beautiful it is. I won’t find another like it. So, I was polite and said thank you for his time, and continued down the street to browse. I then came back up the street and lingered at stalls near him. Then I heard him say “Ok, I’ll give you 4 yards for 120 HKD”. 4 yards of wool for £10 is a no brainer and a 15% discount…not bad 🙂 I was pretty happy with the result, and super happy with this fabric! Chalk up 2 successes for bargaining in Cantonese!

I’m grateful that I have a husband who is supportive of my fabric purchases and never rushed me once when I was looking in all the stores. I think he knows there are more expensive things I could be into and is probably glad that I’m not! The fabric ended up being extra useful as we bought one of those self balancing boards for his brother at Ladies Market (he’s a great bargainer and negotiated hard for this and a fake designer watch) and my fabric was used for padding the bag and board so that it wouldn’t get damaged on the flight back to London. The picture is really blurry, but the only one I could take during the repacking process.

I think holiday fabric shopping is the best because it pretty much guarantees that I’ll have at least a few things to remember the places we visited by!

Dubai Aquarium

I am literally never this fast at updating my blog. There are trips and sewing projects that I have yet to write, let alone publish. There are a couple contributing factors to why I’m a bit faster with my trip blogging. First, I discovered that I can use a link from my flickr site to insert photos into wordpress (old news for many I’m sure, but a revelation for me!) and secondly, we’d been in Hualien the last couple days and had a typhoon come through that basically kept us indoors for almost the entire time we’ve been here. May as well take hold of the opportunity to blog and keep up with photos!

So, as promised in my last post, I’ve dedicated an entire post to the Dubai Aquarium. As I mentioned before, I LOVE aquariums, so I thought it fitting to share them here. The aquarium itself isn’t huge, but we took our time and enjoyed it. It also wasn’t that busy, thankfully, so it made it that much more enjoyable. The highlight for me was the otter feeding. I’ve never seen them this interactive with a trainer before! It was really incredible to watch. They are such smart creatures and it’s neat to see how they’ve been trained.

At this point, the trainer came out and proceeded to demonstrate things with them. He got them to wave to us, would also use his relationship with them to check their health and then reward them for good behaviour. It was really neat to see a couple of them paint as well.

Checking their hearts

They’re painting! The gift shop actually sold artwork that the otters had painted.

A tank dedicated to all things Finding Nemo 🙂

The resident salt water crocodile

In the shark tunnel

That’s it for now. Hopefully Taiwan and Hong Kong won’t take as long to follow 🙂

September Travels: Dubai

A while back I’d told my husband that I wanted to do a sunshine/beach trip. Most of our travels end up being city breaks and a lot of hiking/exploration. So, I started researching places to go for a week-long trip. At the top of the list was Sardinia. Gorgeous landscape, clear blue water…basically ideal. But as I looked into it more, I realised that we’re the type to get bored and not want to lay by the pool/beach day after day. We’re also massive foodies and I knew that we’d want great food, no matter where we went.

As we discussed Sardinia a bit more, it started feeling like it wasn’t the place for us. Then, out of the blue, I suggested Taiwan. He looked at me and said…”Ok”. Don’t ask me how this came about, because I have no earthly idea. I think I was thinking “food” and we love Chinese / Taiwanese food…so why not go to Taiwan. It then turned into Taiwan + Hong Kong (both countries that our parents grew up in) and instead of 1 week, we made it a 2 week trip. We then booked our flights and the cheapest flights ended up being on Emirates with a layover in Dubai. I’ve always wanted to go to Dubai, but mainly for the sake of curiosity whereas Joe has had no interest. With a layover in Dubai it seemed like the perfect opportunity to spend a couple days there (at no extra cost with the flight) to get it out of my system. I think the convincing factor for him was that we’d spend a day at the Atlantis Resort Water Park – Aquaventure. A bit of background…at the ripe age of 28, I introduced Joe to waterparks. He’d never been (despite living in California) and has loved them ever since. Living in the UK means not very hot summers, so we actually haven’t been since we moved to London.

So what started out as a week-long trip to Sardinia, turned into a Dubai / Taiwan / Hong Kong trip. The Dubai leg has been completed so I thought I’d share some photos from our time there. We are currently still in Taiwan having waited out the typhoon that headed this way.

We stayed in the Jumeirah Beach Residence area, which thankfully was quite accessible by metro / tram. I can’t say the same for all of Dubai though because we tried to take the metro to as many places as possible but because of their locations and the lack of walkability of most areas of Dubai, getting around was a bit of a challenge. We’d been told that taking the taxi everywhere is normal, but we liked the flexibility of not having to queue. The times we used the metro was great. They’re spacious, air conditioned (VERY important) and clean.

The view from our hotel was of part of the Palm and the water.

We also visited the Dubai Mall and grabbed a snack in their massive food court.

They had a dunkin’ donuts and Texas Chicken which was pretty much Church’s Chicken (same logo and everything!)

We then went to the Dubai Aquarium. I LOVE aquariums so this was kind of a no brainer. It’s not huge, but it is interesting. We took our time walking through it and the absolute highlight was getting there in time to see the otters being fed. I am fascinated by otters because they’re really smart (and cute!). At seaworld and the other aquariums I’d been to, I hadn’t ever seen them interact with a trainer as much as we did here. Because of how many pictures I took, it’ll need to be a separate post… 🙂

I think the thing we most looked forward to, was the food. We wondered how their restaurants and buffets compare to places like Vegas. We first went to Asado which is an Argentinian steak house. We ordered their variety meat grill which was huge. Their speciality is slow cooked baby goat. The meat was really good, but we found that some of the steaks were overcooked. The sirloin was perfectly cooked (by our medium-rare standards) but by the time we got to the tenderloin, it was almost at medium-well. We mentioned it to our waiter, and he promptly had another one brought out. Sidenote: the service we experienced in Dubai was AMAZING.

On the way back to the metro, we walked past Burj Khalifa. It is really pretty at night!

We also went to Aquaventure, which was really fun. Joe took video of the rides on his gopro here. We’d originally considered staying at the Atlantis hotel, but I’m really glad we didn’t because it would have made getting into different parts of Dubai a lot longer.

The next night we wanted to explore the Madinat Jumeirah area so we asked our hotel for a restaurant recommendation. They suggested and Italian place called Segreto which was a fabulous suggestion. My seafood soup and cannelloni was probably the best I’ve ever had.

The next day we went to the Bur Dubai area to visit the Textile Souk. I actually didn’t have much luck with fabric here – I ended up only buying 1 piece of fabric. I don’t do well with extreme temperatures and it was really hot. Also, the men from the different souks would call out to us, follow us around trying to get us to come into their store etc. I know this is normal, but with the heat and not having much luck with fabric, it didn’t put me in a very good mood. I don’t know why, but when they bring my ethnicity into it, it really annoys me. Yelling “Ni Hao! Ni Hao!” at me is not going to make me want to talk to you. Or we would get “Konichiwa!” We took a water taxi over to the gold souk and then headed to dinner, which made the whole day much better.

My one fabric purchase.

On the water taxi

Dinner was at Yalumba‘s Tuesday night seafood buffet. Note, this is at the La Meridian near the airport, so quite far from where we were staying. We had such a hard time getting there from the airport metro stop, that we ended up taking a 5-minute taxi ride there. Joe found a way to walk back (thankfully) because the taxi driver wasn’t happy he had to get out of the queue to take us less than 1 km. If you’re in Dubai on a Tuesday night, and you love seafood, then you must go to Yalumba. The seafood was SO fresh, and there was a lot of it. They had the cold seafood, as well as hot cooked dishes with fish, crab etc. Joe’s favourite were the small dishes of whole scallops.

Spain: Madrid

Sorry for the delay! I’ve been busy and it’s been hard to update the blog 🙂

The last stop on our Spain trip: MADRID! When we were planning this trip, for some reason, both Joe and I were more excited about Barcelona and Valencia than we were about Madrid. Not because of anything we’d heard, but because the sights and things to see in the other two cities seemed to outshine Madrid. It turns out, that we both enjoyed Madrid the most. There was an energy about Madrid that we liked, even though we didn’t really take in as many sights as we did in the previous two cities.

When we arrived, it was Thursday evening. We checked into our hotel, rested up and decided to go out and find a place for dinner. As we were navigating through the Sol area, we noticed it was absolutely rammed with people. We tried to cut through Plaza Major but it was exactly the same. I had no idea why it was so busy. Then we realised that everyone was waiting for a procession for Holy Week as it was the Thursday before Easter! It was all pretty neat.

While we were in Madrid, we encountered some fairly aggressive pickpocket schemes. I’d heard and read about how much worse pickpockets in Spain were, even more so than Paris and Rome. I have a messenger bag that fully zips and both Joe and I are fairly aware tourists so we don’t usually get targeted. Whilst in Madrid, we were around the royal palace area and these 2 girls came up to Joe and I with clipboards asking us to sign some petition. Most people who come up to you and try to sell you stuff or give you stuff to get money in return just move on when you say no. But these girls followed us as we tried to walk away, and one of them even grabbed Joe’s arm. This made me very suspicious. Joe signed the petition and they asked for ID which he refused. We figured if he took out his wallet, they’d grab it. We started following them and saw the harassing other tourists. I was covertly taking photos of them but Joe went off piste and was super obvious. They noticed us and started following us trying to take our cameras, which we of course refused. They realised we wouldn’t give in so they walked away. We saw a police car as we were leaving the area and showed them the photographs of the kids. Realistically unless the police actually catch them doing anything, they can’t do much. We noticed later though that the “petition” method is a common pickpocketing method. Usually while the person is busy signing the clipboard, someone else is trying to take their wallet or something. Something to watch out for if you’re visiting Spain.

The crowds on the Thursday before Good Friday

One of the floats coming down was of Jesus carrying the cross

The bear and the strawberry tree

In front of the palace

In front of Parque del Retiro

The weather was perfect for our outing

Spain: Barcelona

I love that Easter weekend is a 4-day weekend here. Last year we were took advantage of the extra days and went to Italy. This year, we went to Spain. We decided to do 3 stops this trip: Barcelona, Valencia and Madrid. Our first stop was Barcelona. Barcelona is a vibrant city, with a lot to see and do. The main touristy/sightseeing places are Gaudi, which I will blog about in a separate post.

Travelling in Europe can be a bit risky. There are horror stories about people being detained or arrested for not showing proper ID in Greece, and all types of mugging / pickpocketing stories. In our time in London and travelling in Paris and Rome, we’d been warned about pickpockets and heard stories, but thankfully had never been targeted. We had an interesting encounter in Madrid, but I’ll get to that in a separate post 🙂 I don’t think I have heard or read of as many warnings about pickpockets as I had for Barcelona and Spain in general. Apparently, Barcelona and Madrid have some of the higher rates of pickpocketing in Europe. If you’re considering travelling to Barcelona/Madrid, a messenger type bag that you can wear to your side or in front of you is important. A bag that fully zips shut is a must, and keep your valuables (like money and what not) in an inside pocket, so even if someone gets into your main compartment, they can’t easily access your money. Don’t wear fancy jewelry, in fact I left my engagement ring in the safe at the hotel. I probably should have just left it at home before we left. If you’re carrying a camera, and wearing comfortable walking shoes, you’re going to look like a tourist. Even though people say not to look too much like a tourist, sometimes it’s inevitable. Just be aware of your surroundings and your valuables! There’s my 2 cents. Now onto Barcelona!

We arrived in Barcelona and were able to check into our hotel a bit early. There is a main area called Las Ramblas where a lot of vendors, bars and restaurants are. Our hotel was really close to a metro station (Paral.lel) which made it very easy to get around the city. The city itself has a lot to do, but it’s worth going to the beach area as the feel and atmosphere is very different. It was really nice to get some warm sunshine and take in the beach area since London has been so cold these days.

The main street in Barcelona with lots of shops, restaurants and vendors

In the mercado area there are places like this dispersed between vendors selling fresh fruit and meat. Great place to pick up some tapas!

An example of the fresh meat available. If you look closely, there’s a skinned goats head with the eyeball still in, and a brain next to it. I don’t usually get squeamish but the head gave me goosebumps

Later that evening, we walked around the Gothic Quarter, or Barrio Gotic. It was actually one of my favourite places to walk around and explore. There are placas (like the one below), restaurants, dessert places…just lots to see and explore.

Panorama of Placa Sant Jaume in Barrio Gotic

Cathedral in the Gothic Quarter

Dotted around are these snack shops that Joe had to frequent. Nothing like a nice sausage sandwich before dinner 🙂

View of Barcelona from Parc Guell vantage point

On our last day in Barcelona we went down to the beach area for an amazing seafood lunch and explored the area. The weather was perfect and warm.

Structure by the beachfront

I miss palm trees

Awesome gelato place that was recommended to us by a friend who studied abroad here! It’s by the beach so grab your gelato, find a place by the ocean and enjoy

That is a medium cup with 2 flavours piled in. They give very generous portions and it is GREAT stuff.

Edinburgh Panoramas

When it comes to photography, I’m still very much an amateur. Having learned photography in high school using a 35mm film camera and developing them in a darkroom, I was reluctant to take up using Photoshop. I have started using it a little now but it definitely doesn’t come as naturally to me as it does to others (and I’m considered part of the digital generation). One of the things I’ve discovered that I enjoy a lot is taking panoramic photographs. For those of you who follow my blog, you may have seen the photographs I took in Santorini. These days, point and shoot cameras and smart phones have software built in where users can create panoramic photographs. It’s such a great way to capture the beauty of a landscape or vista. The photographs below are individual photos stitched together using a software called Hugin. Here are 2 panoramas taken from Edinburgh castle. The first is from the walkway up to the castle and the second is taken from a higher point in the castle area. Enjoy!

Castle walkway panorama

The view of Edinburgh from the top of the castle

Santorini Panoramas

We were in Greece last week and the weather could not have been more perfect. Late October with warm summer weather and gorgeous views. Taking panoramas is one of my favourite things to do. I take individual photos and use a program called Hugin to stitch them together. What I’m going for is the hope that a photograph can capture the view and splendor seen by the human eyes (as much as possible anyway). I would suggest clicking on the picture to view it fully.

The view of the caldera and volcano islands from a walkway between Imerovigli and Fira.

The view from the tip of Santorini of Oia and the Aegean Sea

The Harry Potter Studio Tour

I am a huge fan of the Harry Potter books. I’ve watched up to the 4th movie, but haven’t really caught up after that. It’s not that I haven’t really wanted to see them, but I just prefer the books so much more. They’re so rich in detail and leave more things to imagination. I’d been wanting to go to the Harry Potter Theme Park in Florida but just haven’t had the opportunity to. When I saw that this studio tour was opening in London, I thought it’d be a great opportunity to have something like the theme park, but cooler since it was the actual set that the movies were filmed on.

I don’t think I realised how well made and creative the movies were, until we visited the Harry Potter Studio Tour in north London. My sister and brother-in-law came to visit us and my sister is also a big Harry Potter fan (she was actually the one that got me into the books!). I thought it’d be neat to go check out the tour together. I booked the tickets early so that we could be guaranteed a spot. We took a day off from work, and went together. By public transportation, it’s a bit of a trek, so we decided to rent a car. The studio itself is quite easy to find by car as there is good signage as soon as you exit the motorway.

The nice thing, is that there weren’t many people there. We were one of the first groups let in in the morning, and as it was a Monday morning, it ensured we had the time and space to explore at our leisure.

I absolutely LOVED the studio tour. It is amazing how creative they had to be in order to create the film. Sets were created from scratch, artwork was painted (all the paintings on the walls of Hogwarts needed to be created), sculptures created. One of the most amazing parts was all the artists renderings of what certain scenes would look like. The level of hard work, artistic ability and imagination that went into creating the films really impressed me. If you’re in London, it is DEFINITELY worth a visit!!

The room under the stairs

Welcome to the Harry Potter Studio Tour! 🙂

The Gryffindor costumes

The teachers’ costumes on display by the head table in the Great Hall

So pretty! From the scene at the Yule Ball

Also from the Yule Ball

The Leaky Cauldron

The hallway of the Leaky Cauldron

The potions classroom. It was really neat how everything to the last detail was there.

The boys’ Gryffindor dorm room

The griffin to Dumbledore’s study – “acid pops!”

The Gryffindor common room with some of the casual clothes of the characters

Dumbledore’s study

Some of the props from the movies

The sculpture in the Ministry of Magic

Death eater costumes

The Knight Bus

The Dursley house

My sister and I with Fawkes

Diagon Alley!

Gringotts

The store front of Ollivander’s

“WHY ARE YOU WORRYING ABOUT YOU-KNOW-WHO?
YOU SHOULD BE WORRYING ABOUT U-NO-POO
THE CONSTIPATION SENSATION THAT’S GRIPPING THE NATION!”

One of the best parts of the tour. A miniature of the entire Hogwarts castle

The detail in the recreation is incredible!

My sister and I with the castle

All four of us with the castle

Italy Trip: Last stop, Venezia

Apologies on the delay on this last Italy post. To close out this 4-part blog on our travels in Italy, here is Venice. One of my favourite movies is the Italian Job, where the heist at the beginning of the film is done in Venice. It was neat to walk around and see reminders of the film.

Upon arrival in Venice, it was wet and quite uncomfortable. Getting used to a new location, getting our bearings, and wanting to take in the coolness of Venice but feeling kind of damp made it a bit difficult to enjoy at first. Also, the narrow twisty streets of Venice are hard to navigate when you have no idea where you’re going, when there are people everywhere and when you’re carrying luggage. Once making it to our hotel, we rested and decided to venture out when the weather cleared up. Thankfully, it did clear up and we were able to take a stroll around Venice in the evening.

The streets of Venice turn at every point possible. The street names changes at each turn, and it’s really hard to know where you’re going. It may seem a bit silly, but in the evenings, it can have a bit of an eerie feel to it. It made me think that you could have some really interesting and creepy ghost tours of Venice. Once you get used to the layout, and can properly read a map, it gets a lot easier.

We made use of the vaporetto system as the water buses are a great way to see Venice. I even listened to some of the Rick Steves recordings for Venice.

Braving the weather in front of St Mark’s Basilica

These made me think of the part in Italian Job where Donald Sutherland’s character says to Mark Wahlberg’s character “See those pillars there? That’s where they hung people who felt fine.”

St Mark’s square in the evening

St. Mark’s square

Night shot of the Basilica of St Mary of Health, or Salute

Night shot down one of the main canals

The main elements of a Venetian life brought together. The homes, docks and boats.

A quick snap over the canal. It surprised me how expansive some parts of the grand canal were

In comparison to the above, there were also tiny side canals like small alleyways in a traditional city

One of the things that Rick Steves mentions in his audio guide, is that with the high cost of living, the fact that everything needs to be brought into the city, and it’s costly to renovate the aging homes, most locals are moving out of Venice. Imagine having to carry a child or even groceries across small bridges, narrow paths and windy streets – it’s quite difficult and can be a nuisance. He said that it may become a bit of an “amusement park” in the sense that no-one really lives there, but tourists go to see it, stay in the hotels and visit the restaurants. It’d be sad if that happens, but I can understand, especially considering how expensive it would be to live there.

Italy Trip: Firenze

The train from Rome to Florence only took 1.5 hours. Upon arrival we found our hotel (Hotel California). It is very centrally located, very comfortable and with breakfast included. We dropped off our bags and went to get lunch and walk around the market. Florence is definitely more compact than Rome. It is very pretty and laid back. After attempting to haggle for some scarves (without any luck…) our room at the hotel was ready. We got settled and decided to visit the Duomo and climb the 400 some steps to the dome. Included in the ticket was a guided tour of the Duomo. It was interesting to get the story behind the Duomo as after a while, churches and Basilica’s start to look the same. What’s neat about this church is the decoration on the outside. It’s decorated in white and green marble which makes it look like a mosaic. The baptistry and the bell tower are separate buildings, but all clustered together.

The climb to the top was tiring. Definitely do take breaks if you get tired. The views are worth it, but take your time as you aren’t rushed to leave. After the climb, we treated ourselves to some gelato and sat on the Duomo steps to enjoy it. For dinner we went to a restaurant called the Yellow Bar. The food was really good, quite affordable and the house Chianti was great.

Day 2 in Florence we went to the Galleria de Accademia where Michelangelo’s David is. After visiting the Vatican Museum, Joe and I were kind of “museum-ed” out. I do appreciate art, but prefer architecture. Unfortunately you’re not allowed to take pictures of the real David. It is very strictly enforced (unlike the Sistine Chapel). The statue truly is beautiful. I’d seen pictures of it, but there’s nothing like seeing it in person. First of all, it’s really big. Second, imagining trying to sculpt something like that from 1 large block of marble is mind-boggling. Everything, from the posture, the stature, the detail, is well thought out. You can even seen the veins in his right hand. After resting, we went to Ponti Vecchio, walked around the area and went to dinner at il Pizzaiolo. We each ate a massive pizza, freshly baked in their open stone ovens.

The streets of Florence

The Palazzo dell Signoria

The Piazza in front of the Palazzo della Signoria

The Bell tower of the Duomo in Florence

View from the top of the Duomo

View from the top of the Duomo

Ponte Vecchio

My yummy seafood spaghetti dinner at Yellow Bar

Next…Verona