This kind?
Or this kind?
Both taken while window shopping in Bologna.
Roof top in Bologna
Bologna
Milano Centrale
when you have to ask yourself, while packing for a trip…
“Am I really going to use these running shoes if I put them in my suitcase?”
pspil asked: If you travel to Italy often, do you find good deals for flying? I'd love to go to Italy, but it's so expensive just to get there!
I’m using a buddy pass to fly to Italy this time. (My aunt and uncle work work for Delta and have very generously added me to their list.)
There are definitely good flight deals to be had! …. just not in the summer. From May to September, really, the prices sky rocket. (Also the hotels are sold-out/expensive, the piazzas are full of tour groups from cruise ships, the bars full of American college students, etc etc)
But starting in October the flights are like, half as much as they are in the summer, with some even in the $6— range. I just looked, an in January the NYC-Rome flights are as low as $612. When January rolls around, you might find some that are even lower.
And it may seem inhibitive to travel in January/February, but I think it’s really nice! I mean, yes, bring a scarf. But you do get to see sort of a more quiet, settled aspect of a city when it’s not the high season. The piazzas are full of actual Italians, the hotels are way cheaper, the lines at museums practically non-existent.
And the biggest reason to travel to go in January? “Sales racks” are non-existent in Italy, clothing only goes on sale twice a year, throughout the whole country. Once in July……….and once in January.
All those clothes!
First, to visit my dad in Bologna…
…which is the gastronomic capital of Italy. Where Italians go to eat well. I’m literally already planning exactly what I’m going to eat the second I get off the plane, and then what I will subsequently eat while changing trains in Florence, approximately two hours later.
In Italy, there’s this chain called “Autogrill” which exists at rest stops and train stations and airports. It’s maybe the equivalent of like, Au Bon Pain or something here in the US, except instead of plastic wrapped sandwiches there is fresh pasta.
Here is a picture of a meal I once had at the Autogrill at the airport in Rome:
8 Euro! Have you been to an Olive Garden recently? I have. The pasta duo there is like, $13.
Anyway, Bologna to see my Dad, and then later I’m heading down to the ancestral home (har.) in Umbria. (More specifically, near Perugia, of, ahem, Amanda Knox fame?) (Do not get people down there started on Amanda Knox.) (Actually, probably just don’t get me started on Amanda Knox? I feel like everyone else down there is over it by now.)
Here is a view looking out from the church where my parents were married, where I was baptized, where I had my first communion, and where, on my last visit to Italy, my god daughter (!) was baptized.
Pretty, right?
Anyway! I’m gonna be tumbling some stuff from Italy, mmkay?
In renaissance Florence, the Medici Family built a series of overhead passageways so they could traverse through the city without having to like, push their way through the seething, pestilent masses.
Walking through Times Square this evening, I can’t help but think they were onto something with that.
New high? or new low?
10 Reasons You Should Stop Being Stubborn and Just Try Online Dating -
For people who think, “Online dating is fine! Just….not for me.”