Italy

While Hanna was in Denmark we bought some cheap tickets to Italy and spent a week road tripping. Driving in Italy was a bit of a shock, the closest comparison I can make is that its like Mario Cart. There are pretty much no rules, it took a while to get used to but eventually I was racing along with the maniacal flow. We flew into Rome, grabbed the rental and headed for Florence. Somehow we made it onto the toll road with almost no cash, and there was not one ATM to be found at any of the rest stops. On top of this, I have had an extremely hard time getting any of my credit/debit cards to work in most of Europe. I was a little concerned about what was going to happen at the toll booth to get off the freeway. It ended up in a confused one way conversation in Italian where I got through the toll booth without paying 20 Euro, due to the growing number of rabid Italian drivers lined up behind me.

After a stay in Florence we headed to Venice. We had an extremely tough time find the hotel, eventually I stopped to ask for directions. After a store clerk and I spent some time looking helplessly at a map, an elderly man came by, whipped out his iphone, and then thinking about it for a second, handed it to me to figure the thing out. After some confusion due to language barriers he ended up driving  in front of us (he insisted and would not be denied) to show us all the way to the hotel, which was super nice, and one of our few good encounters with the Italians.

Venice was like being in a movie set, it was great. We had all day bus/water bus passes and just explored. Next we drove to Rimini, which is a beach town invaded by Russians. It was new years and there was a gigantic firework show. Finally we headed back to Rome where we spent the last few days seeing all the sites.

More pics here: https://picasaweb.google.com/103375821623178424943/Italy2012?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCIDXyPuD08mbVg&feat=directlink