Panoramas

Here's a panoramic shot of Florence from the Piazzale Michelangelo. It was a pain in the nuts to stitch them together but here's the finished product.

This one is from the Cinque Terre at the town of Manarola.

Eurotrip Pics Part 3

Part 3...

Grand Canal, Venice.

Colosseum, Rome.

St. Peter's Basilica, Vatican City.

Sagrada Familia, Barcelona.

Magic Fountain of Montjuic, Barcelona.

Guggenheim Museum, Bilbao.

The Wind Comb, San Sebastian.

Eurotrip Pics Part 2

Continued...

View from l'Aiguille du Midi.

Lyon.

Les Calanques de Marseilles.

Marseilles.

Gare de Monaco.

Manarola, Cinque Terre.

Vernazza, Cinque Terre. Sadly 2 months ago a terrible mudslide destroyed much of the town and rendered it a disaster zone. Find out more here.

Piazzale Michelangelo, Florence.

Italy: Florence, Venice, Naples

More goodies now from Italy! Unlike many romanticized impressions of Italy, I found that good food isn't as universal as they would like you to think - especially when you are a tourist and not familiar with the language. Rome and Cinque Terre were especially disappointing. Research in advance or regret.

I very much wanted to try a lampredotto (cow's stomach) sandwich from the market but I ended up with boiled brisket. Nevertheless, it is still scrumptious with the piquante sauce that is no slouch in the spice department!

I wanted to try Bistecca Fiorentina so I selected Le Mossacce. I must say I was not too impressed with the steak but the chunky minestrone soup was a hit with Dionne.

The trick in Venice is to venture far away from the well-trodden tourist hot spots. Ai 40 Ladroni is a 10 minutes walk from the main streets in the residential district of Canneregio. Their cuisine made every step of the walk worthwhile. These mussels were cooked to precise second. Reference material for any future mussels.

The Spaghetti al Nero di Seppia is also a success. The pasta absorbed the tasty sauce which, despite its colour, was light on its feet and fresh-tasting. It looked like a crippling portion when it arrived but everyone polished off their plates.

We liked Ai 40 Ladroni so much we returned for dinner the next day. This time I tried the Spaghetti alla Vongole which is also nice but not as sublime as the rendition in cuttlefish ink sauce. We shared a platter of expertly fried fish - prawns, baby squid, whitebait and sardines.

In Venice we also tried their version of tapas called cicchetti at All'Arco.

Baby octopus stuffed with fish roe - this is really good!

I felt like I needed some vegetables in my system and these really hit the spot.

We took a day trip to Naples exclusively for pizza. The original plan was to visit Pompeii but it was so baking hot it would have been suicidal to be out in the open. We made it to Pizzeria Sorbillo just before closing. The Napoli pizza is very different from what we have here. It is cooked very rapidly in the intensely hot oven so the rims are nicely puffed and charred while the dough in the centre remains very soft and chewy. I requested for a magherita with buffalo mozzarella and was surprised at how resilient the cheese was. I would have liked to try more versions to confirm if that is a norm or an anomaly.