Daytripping

Overview of Delos - the site is just massive with so much still not excavated

We had originally planned a couple of day trips, one to Naxos and one to Mykonos. With our lost first day and our pleasure at the relaxing pace of Naoussa life, we decided to just do one full day trip...sort of out of obligation, I think. We settled on a trip that first visited Delos, a now abandoned island that is covered in ruins and considered one of the most important archaeological sites of Greece. Inhabited over 5000 years ago, Delos was believed to be the birthplace of the gods Apollo and Artemis, and in later years (as in about 2500 years ago), the island was a religious pilgrimage site. Delos then became important on the trade route circuit, and I was particularly drawn to this information from Wikipedia:

"Before the end of the 1st century BC, trade routes had changed; Delos was replaced by Puteoli as the chief focus of Italian trade with the East, and as a cult-centre too it entered a sharp decline."

For those who have been reading this blog for awhile, you may remember that Puteoli is the ancient name for Pozzuoli, located in Italy and the location of our home back in Italy. An interesting coincidence for our trip.

Delos ruins

As we walked along the pathways, they were littered with terra cotta
pieces, remnants of ancient amphorae; here, we noticed quite a large
piece, just sitting on the path. Constantly seeing things everywhere that
Americans would deem museum protection worthy never got old.

From Delos, our boat headed over to Mykonos, where we had about three hours or so. Mykonos is quite popular on the tourist route and with cruise ships. And I'll be honest, our three hours there were two hours too many. We've heard from friends who've been to Mykonos how much they enjoyed their stay, so I think being in a hotel on the island and perhaps getting to know your immediate area (perhaps not staying in Mykonos town, but in one of the other towns) must be appealing. The water was absolutely incredible on Mykonos, too. But the main town itself seems to have given over to the cruise ship community. Shop after shop of T-shirts, magnets, and other cheap souvenirs. Shopkeepers who just looked bored out of their minds and/or disgusted with our presence, restaurants with prices that we could not even believe and menus full of tourist food, crowds everywhere, and on the "pedestrian" streets, we were constantly having to dodge into shops to avoid delivery vans going up and down the narrow lanes. For us, coming from Paros, Naoussa was the exact opposite of everything in that last sentence, so Mykonos was a big shock. We spent an hour covering most of the town, just to be sure we'd seen it all, then the crowds and traffic got to be too much. We decided to find a quiet place to settle down for our remaining time and eventually found a bar located in perhaps one of the top bar spots of the world. There, we settled into a comfy sofa to enjoy drinks while looking straight out at the gorgeous, Aegean Sea. Arriving back to Paros was a bit of relief, especially as we went out that night for dinner and walked through calm lanes, browsed the shops filled with unique clothes, jewelry, and gift items, and ate yet another excellent meal (at about half the Mykonos prices). I'm very glad we did the day trip, just so we could see a couple more of the Cycladic islands, but oh how happy we were that our week was being spent in Naoussa.

Mykonos Windmills

Our resting spot

This is some fish washing station!

Heading "home" to Naoussa

Turning 40

Now in my story of how we left our former hotel, I forgot to mention that the real final straw was our breakfast. Our previous trip to Greece, we'd stayed at a hotel with a nice breakfast, but the key was the most delicious yogurt we'd ever tasted in our lives. Drizzled with a little local honey, and let me tell you, the Greek yogurt we can get in our American grocery stores is nothing like the real thing. We'd dreamed of this breakfast for two years. So we did indeed spend a sleepless first night, then trundled down to the breakfast lounge at the time our hostess told us to arrive (8am) only to find no one about at all. Our hostess finally showed up at 8:30, took about 10 minutes to get breakfast set out, which included disgusting bread, deli meats (and not the nice ones), and really bad coffee. And keeping a baby who likes to eat happy for that extra 45 minutes was not fun. It was the straw.

Stelia Mare's breakfast was jackpot. Greek yogurt, honey, pastries, eggs cooked to order, granola, whole fruit, fruit salad, fancy desserts (like chocolate mousse filled cups), bacon, three different types of bread, local jams and cheeses, coffee, espresso, cappuccinos, hot tea, orange juice. Serious jackpot.  I think we might have spent an hour at breakfast every morning. And we may have scared Georgia with our weird and constant smiling. We were just so happy. The perfect place to turn 40, complete with dessert in the morning!

Monastiri Beach

We'd kept our car to visit another beach, this one reported to be the best on the island. We just spent a very relaxing day walking around the village in the morning, visiting Monastiri Beach in the afternoon, then a finish up of the day sitting by the hotel pool with fruity cocktails before yet another great dinner. The day was quiet, relaxing, and we just enjoyed being together as a family on this incredible island - one of the best birthdays ever.

Exploring Paros

One of my favorite Nora pics ever, on Secret Beach

Lefkes

Once again excited about our vacation, we quizzed Georgia on our options for the week. We knew we wanted to do at least one day trip on the ferry to some other islands, and we knew we wanted to rent a car for a day or two so we could explore the rest of the island. We decided to go ahead and rent the car immediately. So far, every local we'd met on Paros had told us that we "had to visit Lefkes," the one main village located "inland." Paros is only 10 miles wide and 21 miles in length, so inland is a loose term. Still, Lefkes was apparently a must see. We dutifully headed straight there. I think Lefkes must be a great little stop in high season. But two weeks before high season began, Lefkes was as dead a village as I've ever seen. Incredibly beautiful, but dead. We parked on the edge of town to walk into the pedestrian village, and in the hour and a half we spent in the village, we saw less than ten people, and two of them were the couple who ran the one open business in town. Thankfully, that village was a cafe. It was Africa hot in Lefkes without the cooling, sea breeze, so a stop for some cold beverages was a much needed break.

Lunch stop in Piso Livardi

We then headed around the perimeter of the island to check out all the beaches. We stopped at some for a look see, but our destination was a beach not really on our map. A couple we'd met at breakfast had told us about Secret Beach, which they proclaimed was the best secret on the island. Our plan was to take a look at the various beaches, maybe visit a monastery, have lunch in a fishing village on the south coast, then spend the afternoon lounging on Secret Beach. The plan went just as planned - nice when that happens - and 2pm found the three of us napping on the "secret" beach. Late afternoon was pool time at Stelia Mare before what was becoming our routine walk through Naoussa before dinner. We passed the same shopkeepers most nights, and we enjoyed being able to smile in familiarity or even stop for a brief chat.

Traveling in southern Europe with a baby generally means being
creative about diaper changes. Nathan found an icky surprise in
this less than ideal changing spot.

Lunch offerings in Piso Livardi

Cafe in Lefkes

Exploring Naoussa

After settling in at Stelia Mare, we headed out to explore the village. We were nervous. Before confirming our room with Stelia Mare, we'd quizzed Georgia on environment for the walk to town. Now was the test. Had we been misled again? Although I have to say that we experienced the nicest, friendliest culture in all of Europe in Greece. Even in crowded Athens. Almost every person we met went out of their way to be helpful and friendly. Time and time again we encountered gracious, friendly, gregarious, relaxed people. And our short walk into Naoussa confirmed that the village lived up to our hotel - all fabulous. We were there in mid-May, which we heard time and time again was the absolute ideal time. Complete accident on our part as we didn't even take tourist season into account - we just planned a trip over our anniversary and my birthday. The businesses and restaurants were open for the most part, yet the crowds were manageable. Naoussa is a small village, but there were enough tourists to keep it vibrant and interesting while not being so crowded that we couldn't get tables at restaurants or casually stroll the tiny lanes (with our stroller). Quite literally, every business owner we met in Naoussa, from our hotel manager to restaurant owners to shop owners, told us that we were there at the best time and that the village is not fun from June through August. While they expressed gratitude for the business during those times, they were still dreading it. Vacation saved!

We ate at this restaurant twice - Best.Grape.Leaves.Ever.
Those smiles are not just for the camera - we are really that happy!

Naoussa was just stunning. The Old Town is pedestrian only, and unlike some of the other islands (like Mykonos), business deliveries are limited to the night hours. Not once did we have to dodge a car or moped - what a relief for us coming from Naples! All whitewashed/blue trimmed buildings, stone lanes, bougainvillea, cats...everything off of the Greece postcard was part of our daily life for one, brief week. The restaurants were truly wonderful, and remember how I said that Naoussa is popular with the French tourists? Well guess what that means...shops filled with unique, beautiful things. All of this marvelousness leads down to a short walkway along the harbor, complete with the picturesque fishing boats and men working their nets. We spent our days either exploring the island or sitting on the beach and our late afternoons walking the lanes of Naoussa, shopping or just enjoying the evening, then settling in at a restaurant for a delicious dinner before retiring to Stelia Mare, where we'd put La Bimba to bed before sitting on our balcony and enjoying the restocked decanter of raki. Yep, Happy Place.

Nathan captioned this one: "White Wonderland of Naoussa"

Vacation Ruined?

Parikia Old Town

Paros can be driven around in half a day but is filled with little beaches for stops. In addition to a few tiny, scattered villages, the two main options for lodging are the main town of Parikia, where the ferry from Athens comes in, and the tinier, fishing village of Naoussa. Pre-trip, I spent hours upon hours trying to figure out which town and which hotel. Finally, with the ferry in mind, I booked us into a hotel in Parikia. Few of the Parikia hotels had a pool, so we settled on one that had good reviews but was a short walk into town, which reviewers said was not a problem. Our hotel host picked us up from the airport, and while she was nice enough, we didn't get the best feeling. Then we seemed to drive down a really busy road out of town to get to the hotel. Upon check in, the hotel public spaces were beautiful - stone walls, pool with a waterfall, view over the water, comfy lounge. Then we got to our room, and oh my goodness, it was so horrible. Out of date, cramped, the crib provided by request was about 50 years old with slats wide enough for Nora to get her head stuck, broken shower, the list just went on and on. After I had some teary moments and a long nap, we tried to salvage the day with a walk around town for the afternoon before dinner out.

Church in Parikia

Our hotel turned out to be an incredibly ugly walk to the beach, which was also pretty blah. The town itself was lovely to walk around, so things were kind of, sort of (not really) looking up...until dinnertime. Restaurants on offer were ugly, touristy, and nothing special...and we had seven nights on this island! We picked what seemed to be the best of the bunch, paid a huge amount for really bad food, even worse wine (I asked for the rose, got red, asked for the rose again and got my original red watered down with some white), and contemplated how we could turn this vacation around. Then things went from bad to worse. The walk back to the hotel in the dark was on what seemed like the island expressway - no sidewalk, no shoulder of the road to walk on, no streetlights. It was terrifying. We miraculously made it back without getting hit, and after a sleepless night in the room, Nathan told me to pack my bags because we were leaving. Except we didn't know where to go since we'd not seen any other appealing hotels in Parikia. The vacation was headed for disaster.

We eventually decided to first get a taxi and have the driver take us to the other village, Naoussa, so we could see if there was anything better over there. I spent the 15 minute drive to Naoussa quizzing our driver about various hotels we found on the TripAdvisor app I was frantically searching, and the driver took us to one of the options we discussed with him that he thought we'd like best (after he found out why we were unhappy in Parikia). As an aside, our taxi driver was such a gem. Nathan was so disgusted with our hotel and so set that my 40th birthday and our anniversary be a great memory, that he told the driver to take us to the nicest hotel in Naoussa. Period. (Note: I forgot to mention in the previous post that in addition to this trip happening over my 40th birthday, we would also be celebrating 17 years of marriage!). Our driver was great at taking the three hotels we suggested (via Trip Advisor recommendations) and selecting the one he thought we'd like best.

Our room is the top left - I wish I were there right now.

First stop, Stelia Mare Hotel, also now known as Heaven on Earth. You know how you carry around a Happy Place in your head, so when you are feeling rushed or overwhelmed or anxious, you can just take a minute and think of this place to relax. Stelia Mare is it. My Happy Place. It was gorgeous - whitewashed walls like all of Naoussa, red trim, gorgeous and fun artwork, and hands down the best staff of any hotel we've ever visited. Two clerks switched off the day and evening shifts, and they were very hands on involved in checking in with us, arranging anything we needed, even to the point that if we were at the pool deck located one level above the lobby, they would bring up the hotel's cordless phone and stay by the pool...just in case we needed anything - drinks, snacks, fresh towels, random questions, anything. Plus, the beach was just yards away out the front door, complete with clear water, comfy lounge chairs, and thatch umbrellas.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. We must have looked so pitiful to Georgia, the day clerk. She showed us a few rooms in a variety of price ranges, but because we were visiting in the weeks just before full season, the hotel was mostly empty. After consulting the manager, she offered us the nicest room in the hotel for a wonderful rate. I just about died when I saw it. Coming from our total pit of a hotel in Parikia, I seriously wanted to kiss that gorgeous, tile floor and hug the beautiful painting sitting above the sofa, then drink an entire bottle of wine on the large, covered terrace that looked out over the pool below and the sea beyond. I never wanted to leave. Except we had to go back to the Pit to pick up our luggage. But that made our return to Stelia Mare all the sweeter, like coming home...except in my home, no one ever sets out a plate of cookies and decanter of raki. Or stands around awaiting to fulfill my every wish.

This delightful tray was restocked each and every day. Happy Place.

Greece

Temple of Athena, on the Acopolis

 After five months of not posting anything, the time has come to finish up In Search of Gelato. I gave myself a tentative deadline of finishing up by Labor Day. Then by Thanksgiving. Then by New Year's. I'm hard fast on this new deadline because my goal is use one of the Blog to Book companies to print out this entire blog, giving us a nice, coffee table memory of our time in Italy. And for some reason, the tiny remnants of OCD I have left somewhere in this befuddled, tired brain of mine are screaming out that it is just not right to have posts written in a completely different year. So I have roughly 12 days to cover our final months.

Nora Visits the Parthenon

The posts I've been writing in my head recently are all about our last, big vacation before leaving Italy. I blogged a tiny bit on the go, but it was to Greece. Just a quick reminder intro:  Room With A View - blog post about our first day in Greece, an afternoon in Athens

Night View from our hotel room - it was so vibrant and such a great mix
of the masses of people in modern with the ancient world staring down.

Oh what a view that was! We could have spent another day in Athens visiting the museums, but it was hot and crowded...and it was Island Time! We headed back to the airport after our brief afternoon in Athens and got on a little puddle jumper to the island of Paros. Why Paros? Who in America has even heard of Paros? Not us. Figuring out where to go for our final trip was incredibly hard. The pressure of planning epic trips for every single holiday, both big ones and small weekend ones, had worn me down. Add to that the stresses of being a new Mommy, and I just could not even think of where to go. But considering this trip would take place over my 40th Birthday, I wanted it to be fabulous, darling. With wonderful memories of our 2011 trip to Crete, we eventually agreed on a Greek island. But which island? My long criteria list included family friendly, quick access from Athens, easy access to a beach, quaint town large enough to keep our interest for a week, architecture in the traditional white washed buildings from postcards, hotel with a pool, and access to ferries for day trips to other islands. I'd been to Santorini on a day trip from Crete, and while it was gorgeous and beautiful and amazing, the two most gorgeous towns are on the top of a dormant volcano rim with access to the water via a crowded cable car or a donkey. That is not a typo. After reading about every island option, Paros won out. Virtually unknown on the American travel circuit, it is quite popular with the Brits and French as well as being the island the Greeks visit when they go on vacation. Sold.

Paros airport - the tiniest "real" airport we've ever visited;
In Costa Rica once, we took a flight out of a one street town where the
airport airstrip was located a motorboat ride away. The airport airstrip
did have a building, but it was clearly unused. And our boat driver normally
stays until the plane arrives, but he had to get back to the hotel. Then our plane
didn't arrive. No phone, no boat, no way to alert anyone anywhere that we were
abandoned at the airport airstrip. Finally, from across the wide river, a staff member
from a fancy resort that we could not even see noticed us and brought a boat over to
tell us that the plane was fogged in back in San Jose. Since we had a connecting flight
in San Jose to get down to the south of the country, we were concerned. The staff member
said he'd keep an eye on us and come back if they found out the plane wasn't coming at
all. The plane finally arrived at the airport airstrip, took us to San Jose, and there, we
found out that although we'd missed our connecting flight down south, the airline
had arranged for another, unscheduled plane to take us and one other man.
Another plane! Not "Too bad, here are your options for tomorrow," but instead,
"Your personal plane will be here in one hour."
The Paros airport is indeed an actual airport, complete with two clerks who double
as Ground Control crew, and possibly Air Traffic Controller.

Wine Time

Fifteen months ago, we went on a driving vacation through Provence. We devoted one entire day to wine - visits to wineries and co-ops, driving the Cotes du Rhone trail, and buying up a few cases. Since I was six months pregnant, my tasting was limited to small sips, and my purchases leaned heavily on attractiveness of the label. I have been waiting a very long time to start enjoying our French wine. Tonight was my night. Our wine shipment arrived today! Woohoo! I promptly located a French Rosé to chill for tonight, and after La Bimba was down for the count, we opened up that first bottle. I took my glass out onto our back deck and thought many deep thoughts while sipping away. Mainly, though, I enjoyed the silence. It was 10pm, and I heard crickets, a gull crying, and the hum of the electrical transformer at the streetlight box, but very little else. The restaurants downtown close up around 9pm, so there was no nightlife noise. Very occasionally, I'd hear a car. When a couple walked down the street bordering our back yard, they were either silent or keeping their voices very low. When a business man walked down the same street, he walked silently, no cell phone or Bluetooth in sight. Just quiet and calm. The house lights from across the Bay reflect onto the water, a red light blinks down at the marina, and peace reigns. I am having trouble getting used to the quietness here. The calm. Internally, I am still on Naples chaos time. And Naples dinner time. Last week, we almost got caught out by showing up for dinner around 8:35, which seemed perfectly reasonable to us. We hadn't even gotten our food yet when the servers started doing nightly cleanup. On the plus side, I've found that this early night stuff means I get to sleep earlier. Considering La Bimba wakes up at the same time every day with absolutely no regard for what time I might have gone to sleep (used to be midnight or later), I am really enjoying this early finish to the evening. Except that now I have wine to enjoy on the back deck for the later hours.

Italian Connections

Back in Italy, I was in a Book Club. BN (Before Nora), I diligently read my books, although I didn't contribute much to the discussion and more often than not, I was the one bringing wine or a boxed dessert as my food offering, but nevertheless, I loved having a night out with the ladies, a lively discussion about our book, and almost always, the conversation somehow returning to Mad Men, a show I'd not yet watched (but have now started because clearly, I need to be able to intelligently discuss this show). Fast forward to America. We received delivery of our household goods on Friday. It was a long, tiring day. Our arrival time window was 8-9am, so at the hotel, we woke up the baby (naturally, the one morning we have to actually be somewhere, she decided to sleep in) and rushed over to the house. The movers showed up at 10:10. And the first load came off the truck somewhere around 11:30. They left our house at 7pm, and we promptly headed downtown to "treat ourselves." This is a phrase you should all learn, totally stolen from my friend who doesn't like to mentioned by name on the internet. "Treat yourself." It's my new favorite phrase, and I have used it daily since our return. As moving day wore on and on, I began preparing Nathan: "Tonight, we are going out to dinner. And we are treating ourselves. Big time." But by 7pm, we were tired, the baby was tired, and we didn't care where we landed as long as (A) we were sitting, and (B) someone was bringing us food. Somehow, we landed at the local fish shack. For my closest friends and family, you will know that this is the last place to find me "treating myself." Oddly, though, I was the one who suggested stopping when we walked past. In the last few months, I've had too many instances to count when I had an instinct, didn't follow it, and within hours or days learned why I should have listened to my instinct. I'm trying to do better. J.J's Fish Shack dinner was just such a time. We sat, and before we even ordered our food, Nathan saw a man leaving the restaurant and calmly commented, "Look, there's Dr. M-----. I used to have to go see him all the time in Naples for my Africa travel." Imagine a record scratching in my head. I loudly exclaimed, "Dr. M-----!!! Are you kidding! I was in Book Club with his wife. Call him. Call out to him right now!" Sure enough, somehow I completely missed the fact that one of my fellow Book Club members who'd moved just a few months prior had also moved to this area. She walked up shortly thereafter - how wonderful to see a familiar face from Italy!

In other Italian news on the home front, we broke down tonight and went to one of the two, local, Italian restaurants. One is super fancy and is right along the line of "treating yourself." The other has red and white checked tablecloths. We decided tonight was only a normal night, so we went to the less fancy of the two. And now I am completely certain that I do indeed love the American version of Italian food. Which resembles Italian food not at all. For example, we had as an appetizer a melted cheese concoction of gorgonzola and garlic with almonds throughout and served with small toasts. While this was so delicious, it in no way resembled any food I ate in any region of Italy. For our meal, we both had pastas in very heavy, cream sauces, which mostly just reminded us of something one of the local Neapolitans said to us shortly after our arrival in Italy, when we were discussing Italian food. "Who is this Alfredo all you Americans talk about?" And sure enough, an alfredo sauce is virtually non-existent. A cream sauce is sometimes possible, but a cream sauce in Italy is wildly different (much lighter - not nearly as much butter and the cream available is quite different) than what we find in Italian restaurants in the U.S. Regardless, I LOVE the American version of Italian food. I'm just not sure I can ever call these types of restaurants "Italian" with a straight face. Which really makes me wonder about the other ethnic restaurants I love. But in the end, I don't actually care how much or how little a restaurant's food resembles the nationality it claims. As long as the food is good and the experience is enjoyable...and I don't have to wash any dishes at the end...I'm happy.

Why We Are Loving Our New Town

Happy Almost America Day, Y'all!

We left Italy a week ago today. Despite our anxiousness about traveling for 30 hours with a baby, our fears were for naught. Nora having her own seat was absolutely key - she played and slept, and while I desperately wanted to sleep while she was sleeping, the allure of my very own movie screen five inches from my face was just too great. Do you know how long it's been since I got to see a somewhat recent movie? I started a blog post about a week before we left Italy, but since I wrote it at 2am, I decided that nothing good would come of it. Now that we are back in America, the land of milk and honey, I'm dusting it off. And because I got a special request for just such a post.

The original post was a two-parter, things I knew I would miss about Italy and things I was looking forward to in America. But for today, it's all about America the Beautiful. We were so excited when we landed at our first stop in the USofA, Philadelphia Airport. We had our camera all ready to take a picture of Nora in front of a big "Welcome to America" sign we thought would be in the International Arrivals hall. There was something small at Immigration that would have worked except for all the "No Photographs" signs posted everywhere. Our Immigration Man was so nice though and extremely competent at his job since he spotted us as a returning military family in about 1.8 seconds. I wanted to ask him if he would let us take his photo with Nora since it was her first time in her Homeland, but I thought that might get me locked up in a dark room for the next several days. Our layover in Philadelphia turned out longer than expected, but it was beyond nice to be able to communicate with everyone! We just chit-chatted away with about every person we saw. And when some man became incredibly irate and yelled at our gate agent for about 20 minutes (no exaggeration - he even left, then returned 15 minutes later to continue his tirade), we understood Every.Single.Word. Pure bliss. And a little scary, but at least we understood the situation. Never underestimate the power of clear communication.

So far, we repeat to each other on a daily, sometimes hourly, basis, This Land is so wonderful. In the last 34 months, Nathan has spent two weeks in the U.S., and I've spent five. And while we certainly weren't living in the depths of the wild, cut off from all civilization, life and daily sights/experiences were very different. Here are just a few of the things we have loved about returning "home."

We leave our GPS in our car! All the time! I am not joking!  And one morning, we returned to our rental house from the hotel where we are staying until our furniture arrives, and we found that we'd forgotten to shut the front door the night before. We'd left our front door not just unlocked, but standing open, with my laptop sitting on a built-in shelf about 10 feet away from the door. Nothing in the house had been touched. And people here are so nice. On the street, everyone says hello or smiles. Shopkeepers talk to us and engage in real conversation. Same thing at the restaurants. Speaking of restaurants, do you know what it's like to have such a variety? I guess my American readers do, but I'd forgotten. So far, we have eaten yummy salads, fantastic Mexican flautas, lobster ravioli, hamburgers, Vietnamese, and the list goes on. In just one week! The variety is unbelievable. We can have whatever we want. And that's been a lesson in itself. Whatever we want, we can have. One of my American friends in Naples used to tell me this when we talked about going home. She would tell me that if I could dream it, I could have it. And it is true. Just about anything I can think of that we might want or need is within a 20 minute drive. Which means that in America, we are incredibly spoiled. But that's a topic for another post.

We eat dinner now at 6pm. Tonight, we arrived late to our chosen restaurant, about 7:30. And when we walked home at 8:30 (dinner takes less than one hour! Can you even believe it!), other restaurants on our route were closed. At 8:30. And when we sit down at a restaurant and read the menu, we are sure that everything printed on the menu will, in fact, be available to order. I have not heard the words, "It is finished," a single time.

I desperately missed cutesy, artsy towns with markets and artists' coops and coffeehouses. Our new town has it all. Poulsbo is completely adorable with TWO, wonderful coffeehouses in three blocks. And an award winning ice creamery, several artsy stores, a couple of bookstores, restaurants, and more. I sat in a coffeehouse today for an hour and sipped on a medium, fancy coffee drink while reading. Again, pure bliss. Except for the resulting caffeine shakes after drinking a 12oz coffee drink - yowser...again, a topic for another post.

We both missed the quiet and have not been able to believe the peace here. The constant droning of motor scooters against a backdrop of nightly fireworks and pumping discotheques became such background noise that we forgot what quiet is like. Quiet is lovely. We sit in our empty rental house, look out at a calm bay filled with anchored sailboats...and hear nothing. Except one afternoon for a few minutes when we watched and heard a seaplane take off.

I am loving a fast, working washer and dryer. I think I'm going to be able to do my entire week's worth of laundry in about six hours now. Or what feels like six hours, instead of six days. And our refrigerator has an ice maker! We can get ice made for us on demand! This Land is just insane with luxury.

Oooohhhh, the driving. While I very much enjoyed the anything goes attitude of Naples driving, here in This Land, people stop at stop signs, stop for me to cross the street, wait patiently at traffic lights, and in general, drive in a polite, orderly manner. It's weird.  And if someone does do something that might be be considered ever so slightly rude, say pulling out of a driveway an extra two inches, acting like they just might turn in front of you, or so forth, they get extremely apologetic and starting mouthing "Sorry, sorry," and waving. Super weird. Also, Americans must not realize that these wide, two lane roads could quite easily accommodate seven or so lanes of traffic.

But most of all, the thing I complained about missing most in Naples, and that I'm now enjoying the most here, is the walking. I can easily stroll out of my driveway, walk down a nice sidewalk to town, walk along wide, clean sidewalks there, walk along a waterfront boardwalk and enjoy the quiet while watching the Bay, the trees on the other shore, birds swooping around, and other walkers out with their dogs. Safe, clean, walking. It's something I took so much for granted until I no longer had it easily accessible.

Naples has its own set of charms and things I am starting to miss, and like I wrote earlier, that will be another post. This post is not supposed to be all about how much better America is, but instead, just highlight a few of the things that I personally am so grateful to now have again. Things that are comfortable and are part of my home. And I think it goes without saying that being closer to family and friends is the most important of all! Enjoy your 4th of July. I, for one, will be viewing our town's Fireworks show on July 3rd while thinking that I am indeed Proud To Be An American.

Note: I'm sorry for no photos on this post. I took some great pics of our new town and waterfront boardwalk, and when I hooked up my new iPhone to the computer, I lost them all and haven't had time to do data recovery. So words only, for now.

Full Circle

View over Amalfi Coast as we started the walk from Ravello

Thirty four months ago, we crossed the Atlantic Ocean and took up residence in a hotel on base. We had no car, none of our own things, no friends, and no idea of how things in Italy work. We quickly realized that we needed wheels...and fast! We were stuck on the base with our only out in the form of a public bus which ran on its own, inexplicable timetable (despite there being an actual timetable it was "supposed" to run) and no way to purchase tickets for this bus anyway...no need to repeat all that - it's well documented in my early posts! We could see the car we had shipped over to Italy. It sat sadly behind locked gates while we impatiently waited for the day when we were allowed to take our Italy driving test. Passing that test felt better than any school test because it meant FREEDOM! Our first day trip other than driving around Naples with some new friends was to the Amalfi Coast town of Ravello: Amalfi Hill Town was the post about that day trip. Completely coincidentally, Ravello was also our final day trip of our Italian life.

Enjoying the vines along our path

We'd played around with an actual weekend away, but we are both exhausted. The moving out and checking out procedure to leave Italy is phenomenally painful. At every turn, we have had some type of problem or hurdle. We have sold one of our cars already and decided to ship home the other. Nathan is dropping off that car with the shipping agent as I type, and tomorrow, we leave Italy. We don't really have any leeway in the event we had a problem with the car on a road trip. I was very firm in my utter lack of desire to spend my last weekend in Italy in our on-base hotel, so Nathan suggested a day trip to Ravello. Then at dinner with our friends last week, they recommended a beautiful walk from Ravello down to the coast town of Atrani, then another five minutes over to Amalfi and an open air bus ride back up the mountain. Perfect. We were sold. And so, we have come full circle in our Italian adventures.

My re-entry into American life has already begun. Our hotel has laundry, and I have found that I can wash AND dry a load of laundry in only 75 minutes!!! There are no words. Actually, there are. What sort of magical wonderland is this? I'm working on a post that was full of things I miss about the USA and all the things I know I'll miss about Italy. Since I never got it finished, I'll post it later. Tomorrow morning at 4:45am, we will depart via taxi for the six block ride to the airport. With a baby, stroller, car seat, six suitcases, and four carry on bags, a taxi is the easier choice. And if all goes according to plan (ha, ha, ha repeated over and over), we will be in Seattle by tomorrow night...which will already be wake-up time on Thursday morning here in Naples. I will keep up with this blog because I have a number of posts I still want to include. And it will give me time to think about setting up another blog. Until then, here are a few more photos of our Ravello adventure:

Looking down into tiny, but charming, Atrani

Unseasonal rain and cold delayed our beach season, but it's finally begun

We ate lunch at the base of Amalfi's fabulous Duomo before catching the
open air bus back up to Ravello; the bus was my favorite part.

Last Links

Our Italian Villa by the Sea

We are officially moved out of our house and countdown to takeoff has begun. I'd intended to write several posts this week, but I'm running on about 15 hours of sleep in the last five days. I did write an entire blog post in my head last night at 3am, when I was up for an hour with La Bimba. I started the post at 11pm, then imagined some more of it at 12:30am, and finished it up about 3ish. That post didn't make it into the computer because my hands were full of a sweet baby who just could not settle down after so much frantic activity. It was a great post - my best one yet, I'm sure.

One last photo from our Lower Terrace of Pozzuoli port [ancient Puteoli]

Moving out was quite anticlimactic and incredibly surreal. Especially because our landlord met with the new tenants and a Housing representative at the house for lease negotiations while we were waiting on movers. It was a weird feeling to have this lovely family gazing about their new home and imagining all the great experiences they have before them while our time here is over. Movers showed up and quickly packed our few remaining belongings. Housing showed up and took away all our loaner items. We cleaned. Then called our landlord to return for key pickup. We thought he was also coming for a final walk thru - make sure the house was in order and such. So he shows up, we're showing around, room by room, and halfway through, he realized what was going on. And he said the sweetest thing: "Nathan, you are gentleman. But I don't want to see the house. Only get the key." I suppose that wasn't as sweet as telling us that his home is our home and he hopes we will bring La Bimba back to Italy to see her home.

 

With our landlord

Also, we had one final episode of not understanding a situation at all. I had asked if I could bring the baby to the swimming pool on Monday afternoon. "Yes, this would be wonderful," was his reply. Then I asked if late afternoon would be okay. Yes, it would be fine. Then my landlord said to come at 6:00. Nathan asked if this was for pizza. He laughed, and said yes. Then I asked if I could still come to the pool. "Whatever [I] want." And when we went downstairs for final goodbyes and to drive away, our landlord told Antonio, the electrician and handyman who was with him, that we would be coming to the hotel on Monday for spaghetti, macaroni, and pizza. So we have no idea what is expected of us. Which is how it has been for three years, so we're still on trend.

Gorgeous view from our friends' terrace

Generous friends offered to have us over for dinner after our long day, so we enjoyed a delicious dinner (and a yummy birthday cake!) with one final view over the sea and the island of Ischia. Then we moved into a hotel room on the base. We have two bases in Naples with hotels. One is far away from the city, but has all the support activities, such as hospital, personal property office, where we'll drop off our car for shipment back to the U.S., etc. The other base is next to the airport and where most people actually work, and it's where we are staying for our final five days. I was surprised to find that we aren't completely giving up a unique view when I looked out our hotel window and saw Mount Vesuvius, with all of Naples spread out below and a sliver of the Bay of Naples winking at me. So we're easing back into an American life with base living, but holding onto that last link to the ancient world.

Vesuvio standing guard

One Final Capri Getaway...Or 2nd to Final

View from our hotel's pool deck - love the lemon tree, with the
12th century monastery and the Tyrrhenian Sea beyond.

A friend and I were talking about how much we wanted to go back to Capri and when could we do a day trip and how we wished we could spend the night. Then we thought, "Why can't we spend the night?" and made a plan for the following week. This was back in May. Now you all know how much I love Capri. With every visit - has it been half a dozen now (!) - I return home and write a post on how wonderful Capri is. So here is yet another of those posts. Once you get out of the crowds and just spend some time walking, Capri is magical. Sweet smelling flowers line walls and gates that hide dreamy homes and peeks of sea views. Then you might reach a piazza or a viewpoint or a break in the greenery to see that gorgeous water, possibly the Faraglioni (the three, rock stacks off of Capri), or perhaps looking west to Monte Solaro, at the top of which is a viewpoint and seasonal cafe with world class views.

Lido Baby

My friend and I decided to go a little fancy and booked into Hotel Flora, located right near all the action in the town of Capri. The plan was walk, beach, eat in no specific order. To our delight, the hotel was incredible - hand painted tile work, a pool deck overlooking the 750 year old Certosa di San Giacomo and the ocean beyond it, and our room was a beautifully decorated suite. We set out for a favorite walk, going past the famous Hotel Quisisana and the numerous, ritzy stores lining the pedestrian path, then up a tiny dogleg before getting onto the flat, Via Tragara. Since we had our beach bags with us, once we reached one of Capri's best viewing piazzas, we then continued down, down, down lots of steps to the base of the Faraglioni, where my friend had gone to a beach club on a prior trip. Lunch at the Lido restaurant was delicious, but the view would have made anything we ate worth the trip. Spending a couple of hours on the "lido" capped off our sunny afternoon. I use the term lido loosely since there is no actual beach, more of a concrete slab with a ladder down into the still very cold water. Which didn't matter in such a gorgeous setting.

Lido view to the mainland, the Sorrentine Peninsula is peeking through

Knowing our time in Italy was drawing to a close, this trip was more about visiting old favorites rather than discovering new ones. Dinner was at Michel'angelo - a restaurant with no view, but the food is amazing, the restaurant has a nice feel to it, and it's about the only, decently priced restaurant I've visited on the island. We re-visited our top shop picks, including the Carthusia perfumery, Arte in Maglia cashmere shop (gorgeous cashmere scarves and wraps), and a bakery that makes the yummiest, local style cookies and gelato (wish I could remember the name of it, but it's located just below the Piazzetta, the little piazza connected to the big piazza where the funicular is located). And the next day we enjoyed a morning by our hotel pool, lunch at my absolute favorite restaurant, La Terrazza Brunella (delicious food, jaw-dropping views, expensive and worth it), and more walking before catching our ferry back to Naples. We didn't even make it over to Anacapri to enjoy the beautiful town there. I'd hope to get in one last Capri visit after this one, but with only nine days to go, I don't see it happening. Although writing this blog post did inspire me to stop halfway through and look into spending our final weekend in Italy on Capri. There is one hotel available in Anacapri only and a 15 minute walk from town. I have a room booked that I can cancel by Tuesday, so we have two days to decide just where we'll spend our final weekend in Italy. The other top choice is Gubbio, a hill town located in Umbria, staying in a Ducal Palace. Tough choice.

View from La Terrazza Brunella

Taking Our View With Us

We rented our house because of the view. For heaven's sake, who can say no to a Glass House on a Roof Terrace with a view of Capri! What a dream. The minute we set foot on the Roof Terrace, we both gasped and started murmuring to one another out of the sides of our mouths. "I love it. Do you love it?" "I want to live here." "We have to make sure they pick us as renters." "Don't mess this deal up!" And so on. Because see, our realtor had told us that Mamma Anna had to like us or she would not want us living in her house. This is the house she and her husband built as a young family and in which they raised their children.

For our first year, we used the Glass House almost every day. I spent hours up there just staring at that magical island, and watching the ferries pass to and fro. We'd have a cocktail or glass of wine in the evenings up there. On weekends, we would get a selection of meats and cheeses from Gennaro, down at the salumeria, throw in a bottle of wine and a bottle of frizzante water, and then while away the afternoon reading and napping in the Glass House. Our second year, I was pregnant. We used it, but not quite as much. We'd built more of a life, so we had more social obligations. We tried to travel on weekends a little more. And then, once Nora was born, I'd thought I'd resume use of the Glass House while La Bimba napped in the travel swing I bought just to have up there. Hah! I never did take her up there. I go up there now just to hang laundry or take it down...but what a view to have while doing such a mundane chore!

Last year at the International Festival held on the NATO base, we met a painter living not too far from us, originally from Germany, who will paint your view for you. We saw some samples of her work there, so I took her card then and always had in the back of my mind that I would love to have her paint our view. In getting ready for this move, I found her card again and decided to go for it. What a special memory for us. With Anja's permission, I am showing a photo of the painting here! I love it (I don't think my photo shows how pretty it really is). Anja included Capri, Capo Miseno, a little bit of Bacoli, and Baia Castle, with it's little beach and red lighthouse below (beach is only accessible by boat). It's everything I love about our view going home to the USA with us. I've started feeling a little depressed about leaving, despite everything I'm excited to be moving to, there is so much I'll be leaving here. I love that I can hang this beautiful painting on our wall and be able to instantly recall the special memories our Italian villa has given to us.

Note:  For anyone in Naples who wants to contact Anja Gemlau, just send me an email or post a comment below. I'll get her contact info to you. She provides such a unique memory of your Naples life for you to take home with you!