Monumental Vienna

Vienna is nothing if not clean and orderly and you’d better follow the rules or risk reprimand by either your peers or those in charge. Yes, Italy’s motorini have disappeared, the chaos has calmed and graffiti is nowhere to be found, but neither is the warmth.  

Our hotel was a good long walk outside Vienna’s famous Ringstrasse, so on our very first outing into the city center, we were quickly schooled in the art of walking the city and picking a lane. Trolleys, busses and cars share the broad, busy boulevards and bicycles and pedestrians share the sidewalks. And as we’d quickly learned in Innsbruck, no one jaywalks or double-parks or disobeys the traffic signals in Austria. Ever. You walk when the little green man invites you to walk and you stop on a dime when he turns red and tells you to halt. Walkers stay in the clearly marked pedestrian alleys and do not stray into those marked for bicycles. Don’t get me wrong, order can be nice and the contrast with Italy was evident, but the extent to which the Viennese obeyed the rules was astonishing. At one particularly complicated intersection of trolleys, cars, bike paths and pedestrian ways, a woman in front of us stopped in her tracks, hugging her purse to her chest. She appeared genuinely confused because the pedestrian path had ended and it wasn’t immediately apparent how to proceed. She needed to be told where to walk and didn’t carry on until she’d found the stenciled guidelines on the pavement. That seemed to us to be taking compliance a bit too far.

Later that day, we’d made it to the ever-crowded Stephansplatz in front of the famous cathedral with the iconic gold, black and green geometrically patterned roof. A man dragged behind him a big black lab that started to relieve himself on the plaza. The master allowed the droppings to fall as they might and continued tugging away as the poor dog was forced to poop in transit. Several onlookers stopped, turned and stared with mouths agape, not at the insensitivity of the master but at the audacity of not cleaning up the mess. One older, well-dressed gentleman was among the moat astonished and after building up a head of steam shouted “scheisse f**ker” and then repeated it even louder. He was outraged that the rules weren’t followed and his city had been sullied. There are signs all over town demanding that owners clean up after their pets and plastic bag dispensers are available for the unprepared. We were later startled by colossal full-color public announcement posters with a huge pile of steaming feces in the foreground, which dwarfed an innocent dog and the guilty owner standing close by. It was difficult not to notice the disgusting image accompanied by the slogan, "Du hast es in der Hand – bau keinen Mist!" (It’s in your hands – don’t mess it up!). Sanitation is serious business in Vienna and I definitely wouldn’t want to try to defy this clean-as-you-go mandate.

I’m certain there are nice people in Austria, but none of them work in transportation. First there was the train fiasco in Innsbruck and then we had a run-in with a ticket collector on a Vienna trolley. As in so many European cities, individual tickets must be validated with the time and date at a franking machine just before boarding or on the bus or tram itself. We’re more than familiar with the process and took great care after buying one-day passes to determine if they needed to be stamped. The tickets clearly stated the date and we thus decided that no validation was necessary. We hopped on a trolley, headed into town and flashed our passes when the ticket collector came by. You would think we had just robbed a bank by his reaction. Apparently we’d guessed wrong about the validation process and the awful mass transit official was determined to make us feel bad about it. He brashly scolded and grumbled and gesticulated as he stomped off to stamp our tickets in the machine. Fine, I understand, we’d made a mistake, but did he have to be so gosh-darned mean about it? As in Innsbruck, I again felt the heat of anger flush my face. The effort it took to be civil in response to someone so abrasive and disrespectful was wearing but an aggressive response was beyond my emotional ken at that point. Would it really take that much effort to show just a little kindness to visitors not indoctrinated in the country's severe ways?

Vienna is laden with the legacy of the once powerful Austrian Empire and Hapsburg Dynasty. Monumental buildings appear around every corner and titanic statues on massive pedestals dominate almost every public space. For the most part, all are lovely and work well together along with the many wide-open lawns that surround them. But we couldn’t shake the sense as we walked for miles in and out of the Ringstrasse and around the palace grounds at Schöenbrunn that all the grandeur was simply an ever-present reminder of glories long gone and an Austrian empire that will never again be such an important player on the world stage. This was my second trip to Vienna and as in 1977, the grandiosity failed to provoke an emotional response; much of it just left me cold, but there were two notable exceptions. The first was the Stadtpark on the east side of town -- a delightful green space built on a human scale that very much reminded me of a lovely London park. It undulated gently and was filled with flowers, blossoming trees and plenty of seating on which to relax. At the top of the park, the Vienna Kursalon, the glowing, Italian Renaissance palace built in the mid-1800s as a grand venue for waltzing balls and concerts, continues to welcome audiences for a variety of musical pleasures. We decided to pass on a concert to save our resources for a morning practice with the famous gray stallions at the Spanish Riding School, the second Vienna attraction that moved me. Joe and I were both children of the 1960s who anxiously awaited Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color every Sunday evening and fondly remember the 1963 installment about saving the Lipizzaners during World War II, Miracle of the White Stallions, starring Robert Taylor. It was such a singular thrill to set foot in the hall where much of the movie tool place. A horse lover from an early age, I took riding lessons when young and thus it was especially enchanting to watch the trainers in their dashing empire-style uniforms (golden ribboned bicorn hats, brown frock coats, yellow-tinged breeches, buckskin gloves and high leather boots) and the handsome horses with their beautiful white coats go through their classical paces. The long, white baroque riding hall, completed in 1735, is encircled by two levels of visitor galleries and lit by three enormous crystal chandeliers that sparkle above the ring and are suspended by chains wrapped in rich burgundy velvet. Viennese waltzes played while the stallions performed their exercises. Surely this is the most glamorous practice ring in the world and training cannot get more elegant. I was fascinated by the horses and their moves -- the delicate trots, athletic balances on their hind legs with forelegs tucked, cross-stepping, high stepping and lead changing every two strides such that they appeared to be dancing -- and Joe was intrigued by the historic location, beautiful building and classic cultural event. Four to six horses trained at a time for about 25 minutes of exercise and then a fresh set entered the ring with their trainers. I fell in love with a darling dappled grey stallion with the most beautiful face and whose coat had not yet gone white. I followed his every move until it was finally his turn to leave the ring. We thoroughly enjoyed our morning at the Spanish Riding School and witnessing the miracle of the white stallions for ourselves.   The Third Man was our choice for a movie with local color to watch on Joe’s computer while in Vienna. Its dark, atmospheric scenes on the famous Prater Ferris wheel and in the depths of the sewers, the jangling zither playing all the while, certainly put us in the proper Viennese film noir mood. We enjoyed seeing the movie scenes in the Sacher Hotel, where we’d stopped one afternoon for coffee, apfelstrudel and a delicious slice of the celebrated, original recipe chocolate Sachertorte. We capped off our visit to Vienna with a quick 50-minute train ride over the Slovakian border to Bratislava. The capital cities of Austria and its neighbor to the east are apparently the closest in the world at just 40 miles apart. We had absolutely no expectations about what we would find and were pleasantly surprised by Bratislava’s pretty old town center that was buzzing with activity. The compact cobblestoned area is eminently strollable, filled with pedestrian plazas and alleys, dark medieval and pastel 18th-century buildings and open-air cafés along every street. One of the first things we noticed was a preponderance of tall, pretty women à la Paulina Porizkova, all with too much makeup, long legs in tight skinny jeans and stilettos to finish the picture. Bratislava appeared to be a hotbed of supermodels. We hiked up the rocky hill to the white rectangular castle with its four corner towers and distinctive orange-tiled roof that overlooks the old town and shares the skyline with the ugly, gray institutional housing blocks of the Soviet era and the cold communist constructions beyond. Several times over the course of ambling the streets we crossed paths with a motley crew of loud, rowdy rugby players (are there any other kind?) from the UK. They were clearly dressed for drinking and having fun (certainly not to meet the aforementioned women) with their outlandish mismatched ensembles of short shorts, bright tees, kooky hats and wacky hair. It was a cool 55 degrees and definitely not shorts-and-T-shirts weather by my estimation but they were having a good time on their rugby tour to Slovakia. After a late lunch of schnitzel and salad in the warming sunshine outdoors and served by a gracious, accommodating young Bratislavan gentleman, we headed back for our final night in Austria. Five nights in Vienna proved to be more than enough. Austria was definitely not the apfelstrudel of my eye – at least not as far as some of the people and their brusque attitudes were concerned. We were happy to be moving on to Hungary and the Czech Republic and hoped for some kinder, gentler treatment.

Pictures of our adventures:  http://gapyeargirlgoestoeurope.shutterfly.com

Austria Ain’t Italy

A rude response can sour our mood but three mean-spirited brush-offs in a row turn a good day bad. Our hostel duvet cushioned our entry to Innsbruck but insolent, unaccommodating staff at the ÖBB marred our exit. The one-night stopover in the Alp-ringed outdoor sports town in western Austria allowed us to split the long train ride from Bolzano to Vienna into two. We enjoyed an overcast afternoon wandering the town center and along the river that runs through it (Innsbruck means bridge over the River Inns) and then an evening meal in a beer hall with typical Austrian fare (schnitzel, wursts, potato salad and red cabbage). The next morning dawned drab with a chilly, soaking rain as we tackled the two blocks to the Hauptbanhof. The five-hour ride on a warm train to Vienna was a welcomed prospect on such a dreary day although the low clouds were likely to obscure any dramatic views of the snow-topped mountains. Just one simple obstacle stood between us and two comfy, upholstered seats on the train: a one-page printout of our RailJet ticket voucher. Such a seemingly simple task turned out to be a formidable opponent, which left me in tears of anger and frustration.

The national railway system of Austria, the ÖBB, needs a customer service makeover. There are certain people who simply shouldn’t be in the client services industry as we confirmed firsthand. How can some people be so darned good at being helpful and others just downright awful? For three months in Italy, we’d been able to either print the ticket at a station kiosk or simply provide our confirmation number (the almighty PNR), which we dutifully wrote down on a post-it note to hand to the train conductor on every journey. If the Italian system for train travel can handle electronic tickets, certainly the all-efficient Austrians must be up-to-date with online technology, right? Wrong! We arrived at the train station an hour early with plenty of time to spare. Just in case hard copies were required and to hedge our ticket printing bets, we headed to the automatic ticket dispenser to see if we could get it to spit out our vouchers. “Nein,” responded the machine, ever so definitively. Not willing to take the word of a machine, our next stop was the information office to confirm exactly what we needed on board. When our turn came up, we received another “Nein,” this time from the officious clerk behind the counter, “You must print the ticket.” But of course, he couldn’t help us. We were down to 45 minutes until departure.

Joe crossed the main station hall to the ticket office given the printing verdict and was rudely and summarily told that he could either pay five euros to have them print the ticket or go upstairs to the Internet Point and print it himself. He came out to me with the choices, furious that the ÖBB representative had been so abrupt. The only Internet access we’d seen had been outside the station and not wanting to once again brave the rain, I decided to go back into the ticket office to try my luck with a different agent. It would have taken much more than luck and my best, imploring smile to elicit a kind word or gesture from behind that counter. The woman I approached turned out to be even worse than the stout, stern-faced matron Joe had encountered. My adversary confirmed the five-euro printing price but said I would have to send her an email with the ticket attached in order to print the paperwork. When I asked if she could access the ticket directly through her system, her retort was something similar to, “It’s your ticket, not mine! You need to send it to me.” She appeared to take pleasure in scolding me and when I dared to ask where I might find Wi-Fi, she scowled and then added, “You don’t have it on your machine?” When I shook my head in response, she directed me down the hall to the McDonald’s, her tone implying, “How stupid can you be?” She wrote her email address on a scrap of paper and when I questioned whether one of the letters was an <r>” she snapped back, “No, can’t you see” as she redrew it, “it’s a <p>!” Apparently it was an Austrian <p> because it still looked like an <r> to me. “How many rude employees does it take to get us on a train in Austria?” I barked at Joe as I headed to McDonald’s. Thirty minutes and counting...

If I hadn’t been on the verge of tears already after being chastised by Clerk Ratched, the fact that the McDonald’s wireless was on the fritz sent me over the edge. I furiously tried to connect and after multiple attempts, finally asked for help. The fresh-faced, braid-bedecked girl behind the counter informed me, “No Internet today; it is finished.” We were back to square one and now down to twenty minutes.

While I had been squandering precious time under the Golden Arches as the clock ticked away, Joe had managed to locate the sole ÖBB employee who appeared to understand our plight. Joe must have flashed his finest please-take-pity-on-me look because when I arrived, the courteous gentleman was on the phone to “ask the authorities for permission” to print our ticket. It took him a full ten minutes to get through to the ultimate printing power and be granted the authority to produce our bloody ticket, our temperatures rising and American expletives flying all the while. Eight minutes remained before the train would depart.

A frenzied sequence of orchestrations that involved the two of us behind the counter, multiple fumble-fingered attempts to enter my password correctly (while some function well under pressure, I find it impossible to remember to breathe) and a thumb-drive file transfer from my Mac to their desktop terminal finally yielded the precious document with three minutes to spare. We raced from the office down under the tracks to the final insult: two minutes prior to departure and the up escalator to our track was geschlossen -- closed for repairs. Adrenaline pulsing, sweat pooling and (my) tears pouring, we stumbled up the stairs laden with 160 pounds of luggage and collapsed in two steaming heaps on the train. It immediately started to move and we were on our way to Vienna.

We were barely able to speak for many minutes but when we’d finally caught our breath and gotten settled, Austria and the ÖBB did not fare well. I had a hard time wrestling with the pent up emotions that had swollen and left me feeling sick as we’d boarded the train. We hadn’t felt such frustration since we’d almost been barred from boarding our flight to Milan out of Fes. Over the course of three months in Italy, we can honestly say that we never met one rude or disrespectful person, but in less than a day in Austria, we’d already encountered three! In the end, we agreed, we were no longer in gentile Italy and we’d better get used to it...schnell. Austria was a new country with different procedures and a whole new attitude. Its sense of order, respect for the rules and belief that those in authority hold sway constituted the new paradigm and we would have to adjust. But the hurt still lingered from how we’d been treated by not just one person, but a string of them, and I once again harked back to Maya Angelou’s wisdom: we never forget how people make us feel. My natural inclination is to kill offenders with kindness as a means to making peace, but that strategy made little difference in Innsbruck. I always do my best to be nice to people and they generally respond in kind, but it completely knocks me off kilter when that formula doesn’t work. What are the odds it will pay off in Vienna?

Pictures of our adventures:  http://gapyeargirlgoestoeurope.shutterfly.com

The Perfect Hotel Room

There is one distinguishing factor among hotel rooms from which all else flows: there are those with duvets and those without. We’ve stayed in a multitude of accommodations over the past seven months from five stars to no stars, downtown moderns to country B&Bs, plush villas with every amenity imaginable to cigarette-burned, greasy carpeted roadhouses with threadbare sheets. But at the end of the day, tell me if a hotel has a duvet on its beds and I can predict the comfort level of the place, just as I judge a restaurant by its bread. Fresh slices of a crispy-crusted, warm, steamy loaf mean the food will be delectable as well. But break into a basket of unremarkable rolls that crumble to the touch and yield little taste and the meal will follow suit. So it is with hotels and duvets.

We land in each new destination with the eternal basic questions: Will the place we booked be convenient and easy-to-find? Will our room be bright and inviting or drab and dreary? And of course, will our bed be graced by a warm, fluffy, down duvet? Hours spent on Hotels.com and TripAdvisor often yield remarkable places to stay at just the right prices, in perfect locations and with surprising touches that make all the difference (free mineral water in the mini-fridge, extra pillows in the closet, plenty of soft white towels in the bathroom or solid Internet throughout the building). But sometimes the research disappoints and we end up in a room with a thin, shiny, polyester bedcover that slips to the floor with little provocation, underneath which is a flimsy, pilled blanket that provides little warmth and earns a zero on the cozy scale. On one recent stopover, the bath towels were like sandpaper since they’d never made it into the warm air of a tumble dryer; they managed to do the job and caused no bodily injury as long as we kept them away from our faces. Whenever possible, we book rooms with our morning meal included since to meet the breakfast hour deadline gets us up, out and on the road with bellies sated. And just like the assortment of places we’ve stayed, our breakfasts have run the scale as well. They’ve ranged from being individually served plates of bright fresh fruit, yogurt, bread, cheese and croissants along with steaming cups of cappuccino on a sunny outdoor stone patio overlooking the sea, to a paltry Formica buffet table adorned with dusty plastic flowers serving up stale rolls, bruised fruit and weak coffee in a charmless room reminiscent of a Balzac boarding house.

In my perfect Gar Year world, all our lodgings would be equipped with duvets. They would serve a balanced breakfast with platters of fresh fruit, deep bowls of yogurt and strong, decaf coffee. There would be piles of extra pillows for easy reading in bed, plenty of hooks in the bathroom for drying wet towels (the ones they ask you to keep for a second and third use in order to help the environment by conserving water but for which they provide no means to easily hang). Bidets would be nowhere in sight since the space could be much better used for something more essential, like an extra shelf for our toiletries (how often we’ve draped towels over the bidet to create storage space for our essential emollients and grooming gear). The shower need not be fancy, but since I like my water scalding, it would immediately fill the room with thick steam. The bathroom would also include a large heated towel rack for efficiently drying our daily sink-washed laundry. There would be wastebaskets in both the bathroom and next to the bed (not supplying a place to put trash in the bedroom is a big hotel pet peeve; if you don’t give us a handy receptacle for all our bits and pieces of rubbish, how do we easily keep things neat and tidy?). When we travel by rail, having our hotel walkable from the train station is a big plus, although, in the midst of the hurly-burly, it would have to have double-paned windows for a good night’s sleep. The Internet is our link to family, friends and the world and our nexus for all travel logistics, so free Wi-Fi with a strong connection and a password you enter only once are essential. And finally, my perfect hotel room closet would make it easier to settle in by being filled with hangars that actually come off the rod with their fully rounded hooks intact and not just those with straight notched tops that won't work on regular rods and that I can never manage to reconnect properly.

We’re just arriving in Innsbruck where we’ll be staying at a basic, budget hostel two blocks from the Hauptbahnhof. The traveler reviews say it’s clean and spartan but for one night, the basics are all we need. The anticipation mounts; we drag our bags up the steps, check in, cross our fingers, hold our breath, open the door and yes! Our bed has a duvet – two in fact. I’m sure we’re going to like this little place.

Pictures of our adventures:  http://gapyeargirlgoestoeurope.shutterfly.com

Softly, As We Leave You

We sprinted to Italy after our unsettling experiences in Morocco back in early December, but we reluctantly eased out of this wonderful country, taking as long as possible to let go. We hung on with our fingertips, not wanting to leave her warm embrace as we prepared to head north and east. After our stay in Chianti and a few additional days in Florence, we took the train north to treat ourselves to a second dose of fairytale Val Gardena in the Dolomites, stalling our departure with a final few days of skiing. Rather than abandon Italy cold turkey, we decided to spend a few days in Ortisei, Italian on the map but Tyrolean in language, culture and demeanor, to temper the shock of heading straight into Austria. The bus ride to Val Gardena from the Bolzano train station confirmed that we were indeed venturing back into the Italian Tyrol. A beaming, burly-bodied woman boarded the bus and sat in front of us. She was perfectly coiffed with a 1-1/2 inch crown of a salt-and-pepper braid affixed on its edge such that it stood on its side encircling her head like a halo. She sported a traditional black wool vest and long skirt, both brightly embroidered with multicolored flowers and black boots that laced up to the middle of her shins. She and the other locals chatted with each other -- and occasionally threw a comment our way, not realizing we were “outsiders” -- in Ladin, the uncommon language spoken in only a handful of communes of the Dolomites. Yes, we agreed, it was definitely a good decision to return to Val Gardena – the perfect path for tiptoeing into Austria while still enjoying Italy.

Our days on the slopes were blissful. It was spring skiing at its best with sunny skies (and the inevitable raccoon tans from our sunglasses), the thermometer at close to 60 degrees (no bulky thermal layers needed), nonexistent lift lines (we were consistently alone on the quad chairs) and the snow rather slow towards the base (I can deal with the mashed potatoes stuff as a trade-off for the magnificent conditions on the summits). Red was the color of the season as the lion’s share of parkas, pants and related ski paraphernalia were crimson, scarlet and ruby. We marveled at the number of older people – those who’d already celebrated their 70^th birthdays – who schussed down the trails around us, every one of them in incredible shape and all accomplished skiers. On several occasions we pointed out graceful, controlled figures weaving down difficult terrain and discovered as they zipped by that they were senior citizens. We can only hope that that will be us in twenty years, we agreed, fingers crossed. Being among the international ski crowd with such a mix of languages on the slopes, hearing not a word of English until we got to the lunch hütte to order a mug of beer and a glass of wine to accompany the sandwiches we’d packed from the morning’s breakfast buffet was an experience we relished. At the end of each day on the mountains, we had the incomparable Hotel Gardena Grödnerhof, the inn we’d fallen in love with on our previous visit with Chris and Caroline, and the nicest people in the world to return to, including Angelica, the loquacious ginger-haired 6-year old from Rome assigned with her family to the dining room table next to ours. Angelica was a bundle of enthusiasm at every meal, chatting away with her parents in melodious Italian punctuated with dramatic hand gestures and animated expressions across her freckle-sprinkled face about her day, the food and how she was feeling overall. She was the epitome of what we’d come to love in Italy.

Joe and I spoke at length on chair lifts, over drinks, at dinner and after coffee, about all we’d experienced and loved best over the course of our three months in Italy. We’d learned to relax about things that drove us crazy at home (like unexpected signs announcing sudden closures), doing our best to emulate the Italians who are patient, forgiving of delays and gracious about mistakes. They appear to recognize that people are human and not automatons of daily perfection. We continue to repeat our favorite Italian words: la macchina (the car), andiamo (let’s go) and allora (the equivalent of “alors” in French or “so” or “well then,” in English). The first is simply so melodic and pleasing to the ear when pronounced by an Italian, the middle word is essential (who doesn’t need to be able to say “let’s go”) and the latter, another lovely-sounding word, is the perfect conversational segue.

We assessed our Italian eating experiences and tallied a new reckoning. Coming into Italy, the rankings on the Gap Year Culinary Scorecard were as follows: France in first place by a considerable margin, Morocco in the number two slot and Spain a distant third. Our appetites were ready when we’d arrived in Italy and as expected, the fabulous food did not disappoint. The old favorites provided familiar delight (lasagna, pizza, pasta fagioli and insalate miste), but we developed brand new appreciations for newly discovered Italian tastes. Tender, olive oiled Roman artichokes; gnocchi swimming in creamy Sorrentina sauce; pan-fried scamorza cheese; arancini (fried rice balls with a variety of flavors inside); pasta arrabiata (pasta with an “angry” spicy tomato sauce); bruschetta smothered with all kinds of toppings like olives, eggplant and anchovies, not simply tomatoes; saltimbocca alla Romana (sautéed veal that “jumps in your mouth, Roman style”), with its savory sprigs of fresh sage; all were among our favorites. Is it any wonder we never tired of Italian food? I will readily admit, however, that the buffalo mozzarella (which we’d never realized is actually made from the milk of a water buffalo) never tempted my taste buds (it was just too bland and the texture didn’t appeal) and the bread is only occasionally as good as what we consistently found in France. For special, gourmet, celebratory meals accompanied by delectable wines, France wins the trophy -- hands-down. Any country that came up with the notion of combining creamy goat cheese with a crisp salad or creating a surprising foie gras crème brûlée simply has to be awarded the haute cuisine cordon bleu. However, when it comes to delicious daily fare that one can find all over the country at almost any ristorante, trattoria or tavola calda, Italy takes the prize. We enjoyed so many meals in so many terrific, comfortable eateries up and down “the boot” and each one confirmed what we’d read about dining out in Italy. People don’t go out for a unique or different dining experience. They go out to eat for more of what they have at home on a day-to-day basis: food that is basic, delicious and familiar but without the long hours of shopping, preparing and cooking. The updated tally on the Culinary Scorecard has been rendered: Italy is at the top, France is nipping at its heels and then come Morocco and Spain.

We’re finally, slowly, half-heartedly saying arrivederci to our good friend, il bel paese, since Austria, Central Europe and Holland await us. (I can only guess how the cuisine of these countries will score, but who knows, a juicy wiener schnitzel may surprise us...) Italy, you were a warmhearted winter companion and we’ll always remember your kindness. Allora, andiamo -- it’s time to move on, so softly we will leave you.

Pictures of our adventures:  http://gapyeargirlgoestoeurope.shutterfly.com

Chianti Classico

Our foremost stopover on our way to Chianti was the Florence American Cemetery and Memorial. The 70-acre site sits in a wooded bowl at the top of the Chianti Valley just south of the autostrada. It includes a symmetrical array of 4,402 headstones that march up the hillside to a white marble World War II memorial on which are inscribed the names of the missing. The aggressively pruned plane trees that line the central pathway and were still stark and bare in early March, adding to the air of melancholy. Many of the U.S. Fifth Army’s military dead were originally buried between Rome and the Alps. Most died in fighting after Rome had been captured in June 1944 but many were casualties of the heavy fighting in the Apennine Mountains just before the May 2, 1945 German surrender in northern Italy. We wandered among the uniform Latin cross and Star of David white marble gravestones, carefully reading the names and dates of death and imagined every one as an individual – each with a family, each with a story, and each of whom died for his or her country. We’d been watching the Ken Burns documentary, The War, the account of the Second World War as remembered and recounted by individuals from four American towns and their stories were fresh in our minds. About half the size of the American Cemetery in Normandy and the final resting place for just under fifty percent of the number of dead on the bluff above Omaha Beach, the Florence American Cemetery was deserted the day we visited. We appeared to be the lone callers that morning, in contrast to the cemetery on France’s northern shore, which draws almost a million and a half visitors every year. Perhaps it is overlooked as tourists flock directly to the vineyards, thirsty for wine, but we were indeed honored to have been able to stop and pay our respects.

Justifiably somber with tears in our eyes and lumps in our throats, we left the cemetery and drove south into the heart of Chianti, the wine-producing area between Florence and Siena. When we’d asked directions after lunch in Greve in Chianti, the principal town in the region, to Tavarnelle, the location of our hotel, we were directed well back north, almost as far as the cemetery to a main road since the local passage was “difficult.” Such an admonition had never stopped us before so we searched out the route used by the natives and once we found it, almost immediately started climbing. The “thoroughfare” alternated between mostly paved and barely navigable, but after a few rough spots, it took us uneventfully to where we needed to go. We passed by the walled village of Montefioralle, reported to be the birthplace of Amerigo Vespucci, and then tiny Passignano in Chianti with its 11^th century Benedictine Monastery. Neither hamlet generally makes it onto a tourist map since they are little more than clusters of buildings, but they both cry out for photos and the landscape in which they’re found is classic Chianti. Dirt roads behind us, we continued to Tavarnelle, just outside of which our hotel sat on a hill facing west, overlooking a broad valley: perfect for gorgeous sunset viewing. Over the next three days we got a good feel for the area by visiting several wine villages including Radda and Castellina, each with the suffix “in Chianti,” just so you remember where you are. We traveled the backroads of Tuscany, up vineyard-covered hills still in drab, late-winter brown (it was hard to believe that in six shorts month the gnarled black vines would be filled with red and green leaves, heavy with ripe fruit ready to harvest) and through lush pine dales.

Our brief time in Chianti included visits to two fortified hill towns: San Gimignano, famous for its medieval towers of various heights and Volterra, with its 1st century BC Roman amphitheater. The Etruscan mystery people (the origin of the appellation Tuscany), who existed prior to the Roman Empire and about whom little is known, originally settled the two towns in the 3^rd century BC. We had an interesting visit to San Gimignano’s main basilica, the Collegiata di Santa Maria Assunta, and received a lovely entry coupon in exchange for three euros fifty. One side was graced by a full-color image of a medieval painting, thus winning the most beautiful ticket award; it was ready for its very own miniature gilded frame. The church interior was richly decorated on every available inch of space. Frescoes of Old Testament scenes filled one side, the life of Christ covered the other and the most graphic -- a horrific depiction of the Last Judgment with deformed nudes committing or on the receiving end of all variety of violence – was reserved for an elevated back wall; it was a ghastly visual interpretation of Dante’s Inferno. Volterra was the quieter, and for us more appealing, of the two walled towns with its 13th century Palazzo dei Priori town hall of crenelated stone (the oldest in Tuscany), thick Etruscan walls and dramatic cliffs. Important scenes from the Twilight series vampire novels take place in Volterra and it’s understandable why author Stephanie Meyer chose the location. It’s easy to imagine walking in the footsteps of Bella and Edward as they make their way through the dark, narrow alleyways of the ancient town.

Tuscany is known for its dry red Chiantis, but Joe and I may have been the only people in the valley drinking white. The warmer weather made us thirsty and after all the reds we’d enjoyed in southern Italy, our palates needed a change. We discovered the deliciously refreshing Vernaccia di San Gimignano, the star of Tuscan whites, and now have a new favorite Italian wine. We went into our Chianti visit knowing little about the wines of the region but came away with a much better appreciation of the nectars it produces. We learned about the different appellations and disabused ourselves of the misconception that Chianti Classico (usually identifiable by a black rooster, the gallo nero, on the label) is necessarily a better wine than a plain old humble Chianti. It’s simply a different terroir and designation, like Chianti, Chianti Rufina and Chianti Montespertoli, with no indication of quality inherent in the name.

Chianti was indeed lovely and I suppose I shouldn’t feel guilty for having my viticulture favorites, but the vineyards of France, the Loire and Cher Valleys, Chablis, Châteauneuf-du-Pape and Saint-Émilion, just to name a few, and those in Napa and Sonoma in California, remain at the top of my list.

Pictures of our adventures:  http://gapyeargirlgoestoeurope.shutterfly.com

Divestiture

Well into our year, we decided to significantly lighten our luggage load. On the way back to northern Italy through Sicily, we packed one of our two large duffels with everything we deemed non-essential and left it behind at the Taormina train station, “for donation.” All along, we’ve been leaving a Hansel-and-Gretel trail of bits and pieces across Europe: a t-shirt here, a pair of khakis there; the extra box of Band-Aids and the threadbare pair of hiking shorts went by the wayside. But six months into it, we were finally inspired and mustered the courage to do some serious unloading. Traveling with four overstuffed bags literally weighed us down and had simply become too onerous. To be fair, however, we had packed for four seasons, marathon training, skiing, hiking and some nice meals out. But it was at long last the beginning of March and with most of the cold weather we expect to encounter behind us, we decided to divest ourselves of our warmest layers and everything else we could make do without.

Our resolve was further bolstered by a chance encounter on a train. On our way south from Naples, we’d met John and Connie, a retired couple from Colorado who looked and acted much younger than their 65 years and who were 10 months into an extended five-year adventure around the world. All they were carrying was a backpack and medium-sized suitcase each. Once they saw our bags, they good-naturedly chided us that we hadn’t exactly “left it all behind.” Their comment sealed the deal: one of our Ogio millstones would be staying in Sicily. We attacked the pruning with a vengeance and were brutal about what we eliminated. If Joe can live without that pair of jeans, I can get by just fine without my travel blazer. No need for that second white shirt – I’ll just wash the other one more often. It’s amazing the difference our bold move has made; we’re just one bag lighter but so much less burdened. We’d drastically simplified our stateside possessions before leaving on our trip and now we’ve stripped down what we’re lugging behind us. The duffel divestiture is already paying dividends. Fewer bags and much less weight have put an extra bounce in our step, lightened the psychological load and will actually save us a significant amount of money. It will be easier to take busses rather than the occasional cab, we can rent smaller cars with smaller trunks and the exorbitant luggage-by-the-kilo fees charged by the discount airlines we patronize will shrink. Our goal, which surely we can meet once we leave Paris, the marathon and the requisite running gear behind us, is to be down to just two bags in addition to our packs. We’ll then be heading far to the south and fingers crossed, will only have need for our lightweight summer essentials. Simplifying is always good for the soul.

Pictures of our adventures:  http://gapyeargirlgoestoeurope.shutterfly.com

Golden Malta

Not content to rest on our travel laurels, having ventured as far as Sicily, we continued our southern trajectory and journeyed an additional 50 miles to the Republic of Malta. After several bag drags, two bus rides, a two-hour high-speed ferry and an even higher speed taxi trip to our hotel, we arrived safely in St. Julian’s, Malta.

The Maltese archipelago of seven islands, three of which are inhabited (Malta, Gozo and Comino), is stuck in the middle of the Mediterranean due south of Sicily, to the north of Libya and east of Tunisia. For such tiny islands (the largest is just 95 square miles), they have witnessed more history than I’ll ever have time to digest. The country’s crossroad location has long made Malta strategically important, from the time of the first Phoenician settlements through today. During World War II, the islands played a key role as an unsinkable aircraft carrier for the Allies since from their shores they were able to disrupt critical Axis supply lines to Northern Africa. For its assistance, Malta paid the ultimate price; it lost thousands of lives and sustained serious damage all over the islands from German air attacks. A procession of powers (the Greeks, Romans, Arabs, Normans, Spanish, Knights of St. John, French and British) all laid claim to the islands at one time or another with each individual culture leaving its mark such that Malta became a uniquely Mediterranean microcosm. Finally, in 1974, the little island nation that could gained full independence from the UK and became part of the European Union thirty years later. Malta’s official languages are Maltese and English, the former of Semitic origin (as are Arabic and Hebrew) and many citizens also speak Italian. I naively expected the residents to speak with a British lilt, but perhaps because the UK arrived late to the game after so many others (it took possession in 1814), Maltese English is heavily accented with an eclectic mix of difficult to discern pronunciations. If you listen closely, their speech is laden with Arabic, British, Hebrew, Italian and Northern African influences all mixed together into a charming amalgam.

Our ferry from Pozzallo, Sicily arrived in Malta’s capital, Valletta, well after dark. The imposing walls of the fortified harbor were so thick you could drive a car atop them and, along with the city that rose up the hill behind them, were clad in enormous slabs of taupe sandstone. Given its vulnerable position in the heart of the Mediterranean, Malta’s busy port of Valletta was built and rebuilt, buttressed and bolstered, to always be on the defensive since it has seen its share of attacks over the course of its storied millennia. I almost expected to see the Knights of Malta standing watch over the harbor, arms at the ready, as we disembarked from the ship. We opted to stay in St. Julian’s, a bustling coastal town with cafes galore a few miles west of Valletta. When we awoke the next morning, the view from our upper story hotel room confirmed that not only was the main harbor a bastion of stone, all the construction along the northern coast was much the same. In the brilliance of the morning, however, what had appeared an infinite accumulation of drab beige and taupe in the dark blended into a golden ochre glow in in the sunlight. It was a perfect day for outdoor exercise, so we took advantage of the cool coastal breezes and wide waterfront walkway and did a long marathon training run. We hadn’t been in the company of so many walkers and runners since we’d left the States; clearly, Malta is a land of health-conscious enthusiasts like us.

Hoping to see as much of Malta as we could quickly, we took a hop-on/hop-off bus ride to visit the major sights. The all-day excursion took us across the main island’s low, rocky hills, terraced fields, shoreline cliffs and a few pebbly beaches. Officially Roman Catholic, Malta’s landscape is filled with churches, all of them prominently displaying twin clocks on their towers: one with the correct time and one the incorrect hour in a quirky effort to trick the devil and keep him away from the celebration of mass. Somehow I can't believe that wily Lucifer would be so easily fooled, especially by the old double clock trick. We walked through Mdina, the country’s former capital, a peaceful, stylish town still sequestered behind its medieval stone walls and set high on a hill in the island’s center. Every town we passed through was filled with residential buildings, each floor graced by distinctively Maltese loggia – shallow, window-lined front porches that must provide welcome drafts during the scorching island summers. Around the northeast corner of the big island, we passed by a rocky bay, the site where the Acts of the Apostles reports that St. Paul and his ministry were shipwrecked. Our bus ticket included an hour-long harbor ride on a colorfully painted wooden fishing boat the following day. In the few minutes we had while waiting to board, we enjoyed frothy Burger King cappuccinos on a sunny outdoor terrace overlooking the harbor, surprisingly the best and biggest coffees we’d had on our trip. As we sat sipping our frothy drinks and the seagulls swooped and screamed, I recalled the graffiti that quoted from Charles Baudelaire’s poem, Man and the Sea, and adorned the wall of the tavola calda where we’d eaten at the ferry port in Sicily, “Uomo libero, amerai sempre il mare!” – (Free man, you will always love the sea!).

Malta was as far south as we would venture until mid-April when Chris and Caroline make their encore Gap Year appearance. They’ll be with us for five days in Paris to cheer us on at the marathon, and then we’ll all fly far to the south to our next island destination: the Greece isles. In the meantime, our brief three-day visit to Malta complete, we needed to leave the fascinating melting pot of cultures to retrace our steps and head back north. Our island-hopping visits to Capri, Sicily and Malta had far exceeded our expectations but there were bottles of wine in Tuscany with our names on them and we were anxious to pull the corks. It was time to trade golden-hued Malta for the reds and whites of Chianti.

Pictures of our adventures:  http://gapyeargirlgoestoeurope.shutterfly.com