Country Roads of Italy ~ 2005 ~ Infotrack

Part III - General Observations:

First, readers should bear in mind that this tour was taken in 2001. Insight continually makes adjustments to their tours, to include sights visited, hotels contracted, optionals offered, prices, etc. so do not expect that a current "Country Roads of Italy" tour will be exactly the same as what is written here.

Insight bills this tour as a "leisure" tour, a statement that might be true if one takes NONE of the optionals. However, if one takes most or all of the optionals, it is non-stop action all the way. We loved it. When on tour, we want to see as much as we possibly can, do as much as we can, and keep active. We'll take our leisure elsewhere.

A major attraction in selecting this tour is the predominance of the two night stays, and that turned out to indeed be a major benefit. My wife and I have been on tours with most of the stays being just one night, and this is MUCH superior. But, even with the two night stays, with the optionals, it is anything but leisurely.

The tour director was Mojca (pronounced Moy-tsa) Zdesar, who is actually from Croatia but has lived in Italy for many years and is married to an Italian. She was our "momma" while on tour (and we referred to her as "Momma"), and she did an excellent job. She has a great sense of humor and is highly organized. Our driver was Marco, who was also excellent. Local guides were retained for most of the sightseeing stops, and most of the local guides were also great, although one or two rambled on too much.

It should be noted that currency packs were NOT offered at the start of this tour. It is important for those taking this tour to either get some Euro at home before leaving, or find an ATM at the airport. We always get some local currency at home as we don't wish to bother having to hunt down ATMs while on the road. In this case, between my wife and I, we took $1,000 USD in Lira (now Euros) (a bit over 2,000,000 lira). For us, it worked out just right. For large purchases, we used credit cards, and for medium and small, we used cash. By the time the tour was over, we had enough for the tips for the TD and driver, plus enough to make some purchases in the duty free shops at the airport on the way back home. We left Italy with just $10 USD in lira. For others, that might be not enough or too much. 

We have taken several tours before. This tour included the most walking ever. LOTS of walking, with some of it up tons of steps or inclines or on uneven cobblestone streets. Go with EXCELLENT well broken in walking shoes. Many people had problems, and ended up buying Italian shoes (which were all very good, by the way, and resolved the foot problems they were experiencing with their old shoes). If one is on crutches or has serious walking problems, you might wish to consider a different tour. One lady on the tour walked with a cane, and while she was okay most of the time, she did elect to stay behind a couple of times. My wife and I are both good walkers but we both were tired from all the walking by the end of most days.

Prior to leaving for the trip, get a good map of Rome, along with a good guidebook that suggests walking routes in Rome. The reason for this I will explain in the daily journal section. Mark the walking route on the map in highlighter before leaving home.

Drivers in Italy are crazy. Pedestrians do NOT have the right of way, so always be on your guard...never step into the street without being extremely careful. The number one rule for drivers in Italy is: get in front of the vehicle in front of you by any means you can. They disregard lanes, they disregard lights, they disregard nearly all other rules. 

Pickpockets are everywhere there are lots of tourists, including in the Cathedrals. The Roman Forum area, St. Peters Cathedral, Spanish Steps, Trevi Fountain, are examples of prime areas for them. Florence is full of them. They are often gypsies or even children, but in Venice, pickpockets are more sophisticated, sometimes posing as tourists to get ones guard down. Always be on the watch-out...look for people that are more interested in you than in the sights. One man lost his watch (expanding strap type) right off his wrist. The lady with the cane was confronted by a gypsy at the Roman Forum who tried to make off with her necklace. She beat him with the cane, and got it back. Make sure that you have a hidden wallet for your valuables (passports, extra cash, extra credit cards, etc.) If you carry a purse, make sure it is one with lots of zippers or velcro, and that the strap goes over your shoulder. Never set it down on the floor while eating...keep it on your lap.

The included meals were mostly good, and there was usually a choice of two or three entrees. Keep in mind that this is a group tour, and unless one goes to a nice restaurant on ones own, you will not get gourmet food. In general, the included dinners were better than other tours we had been on. Unless one is planning on going to a nice restaurant on ones own for dinner, jackets or nicer evening wear is not required. Better casual clothing does nicely.

The passenger mix was very interesting....roughly half from the United States, several from England, a few from Canada, one from Scotland, and several from Australia. Everybody got along just great, with no "clicks" based on nationalities forming. There were two children (ages 5 and 8) as part of a family group from Australia, and the children were excellent.

My overall impression of the tour is this: the tour was excellent. You will see phenomenal things, you will be kept active, you will be kept interested, you will be tired at the end of the day, you will thoroughly enjoy yourself.

Day 3 - Monday:

We wake early for breakfast (the breakfast is good, and actually included scrambled eggs and boiled bacon, which we do not see often again). Leaving our rooms for breakfast, we put our luggage out into the hall for the porters to take, and the driver to load onto the motorcoach. After breakfast, the luggage is under the bus, and it is only a two-minute ride to the side entrance of the Sistine Chapel and the Vatican museums. We meet our local guide for the Vatican on the motorcoach. We walk from the drop-off point then up the long flight of stairs, bringing us to the entrance of the museum, where we stand in line with other tour groups that beat us there, until it opens, about 15 minutes after our arrival. By the time it does open, many more tour groups join the end of the line, stretching the line blocks long, thus the reason for our early start. The line moves fast, however. We think there must be a nun with a ruler at the entry, keeping us all moving fast.

The tour of the Vatican museums and the Sistine Chapel is awesome, although there are many rooms (such as the Raphael rooms) that we do not have time for in our hour and a half allotment. No picture taking or videos are allowed in the Sistine Chapel, but it is allowed elsewhere in the Vatican museums. In the museums, many of the sculptures are endowed with fig leafs. I have an urge to visit the restroom, just to check to see if a part of me has been changed miraculously into a fig leaf. How would I explain that to my wife and my doctor? Would I be subject to fig leaf fungal infections? Did the ancients have an herbal cure for that?

To be under the frescos painted by Michelangelo is very inspiring. I am surprised that it was done in distinct panels, rather than each panel flowing into the next. The colors are beautiful. The silence of the chapel is broken every few minutes by a loud public address system announcing, "Shhhhhh. Silence please."

Back to the motorcoach, and on up to Castel Gandolfo, outside of Rome. This is a very quaint village, with a "palace" that serves as the summer residence of the pope. The view of Lake Albano, in the crater of a dead (we hope) volcano, is terrific. Some guard inadvertently leaves open a door into the courtyard of the pope's residence, so we quickly run in and look around and take pictures before a horrified guard makes us leave. We tourists take advantage of opportunities given us! But, are we now doomed to a less then desirable afterlife? I shudder.

Next, farther south, to the Commonwealth Cemetery at the base of Monte Cassino, the site of a vicious battle during WWII to take the Abby of Monte Cassino away from the Germans. The cemetery is mostly of Australians and British and Canadians (and other Commonwealth nations) whose sons were lost during the battle. Then up the windy switchback road to the Abby itself, which was largely destroyed during the battle, but faithfully restored during the years following. The Abby is large and impressive, and worth the visit. The view from high up is incredible, which is what made it valuable territory for the Germans during the war, and why the allied forces needed to take it.

Then on to Sorrento, where the expansiveness of the grounds of the hotel, and the beauty of the terrace high on the cliff overlooking the Bay of Naples, is awesome.

The included dinner that night is again not at the hotel, but rather at a restaurant, this time high on a hill above Sorrento. The first courses of anti-pasto and the pasta are very good, and the entrée is average. It was here that we meet for the first time two ladies who missed their flight from the States (one of them forgot her passport so they had to go back home to get it, and thus missed their flight). They arrived in Rome a day late, and had to pay for their own transportation to Sorrento, although Insight made the arrangements for them.

Day 5 - Wednesday:

This is Capri day. Down to the wharf we go, each of us are given our jet boat tickets and the local guide leads us to the end of the line of people waiting to board. Since some cultures don't understand lines as well as we on tour do, the local guide has to "counsel" other groups on the etiquette of queues. While we don't understand the words, the meanings of various hand gestures are obvious. At the appointed time, we crowd onto the jet boat with 500 or so of our best friends whom we never met before, sitting knee to knee, and cheek to cheek, sharing in the odors of each others breakfasts.

Within 30 minutes, the boat captain gets lucky and finds the Isle of Capri, and we offload onto the pier, where those who signed up for the grotto & Anacapri option load onto a small boat, and those who didn't are given funicular tickets to go up into the town of Capri.

Off we go, around the island, but not to the famous Blue Grotto, which happens to be closed at the time due to tide conditions or some such. We visit the white and green grottos, and see the cliffs and seaside villas high up on the cliffs. The coastline is very rugged. At one point, we see an old Roman fortress, which has been converted into a resort.

We offload onto the same pier, then walk to the point where we meet the mini-busses that take us up the very steep hills to the top of the Isle, way up to Anacapri, higher than the town of Capri. Some of the road is extremely narrow, in some places so narrow that the road is built out over the side of the cliff, hanging in air, kept in place only by the strength of the concrete pavement. As we zip along these places, it appears we are leaving the earth, as on that side, we see only the inside of the mini-bus and the clear blue sky. As we hear some near-screams (thankfully none from the driver), and chuckles from the local guide, we swing back again to earth. We pass Cesar's Palace, which is neither a palace nor a casino, but rather a resort hotel hugging the top of a cliff, it's landscaped lawn falling right off into nothingness. We arrive at the top, at Anacapri, where most of us escape into a department store to go pee or to look at its wares. 

Anacapri is high up and very quaint, with narrow streets, cute houses and buildings, taxis that are made from Mercedes with their formerly hard tops removed, and the usual assortment of souvenir stands. We gaze around, drinking in the beauty if not a lemoncello with soda, before our local guide and Momma round us up and walks us down a narrow road to the restaurant for our "light" lunch. Light lunches in Italy are not light. They just call it that to trick the stomach. 

The restaurant is perched on a small knob of a hill, a shallow valley below which contains the restaurant owner's garden. Everything he uses comes from his own garden, he claims, including the pasta from special pasta trees, and the pork or veal or fish, even the wine. Nobody challenges his claims, but we all chuckle. The lucky ones, first into the restaurant, get to sit out at tables on a small terrace overlooking the garden, the deep blue of the Mediterranean Sea close by but far down. Those of us not as lucky see the same thing, but through the glass of the massive windows.

The "light" lunch is served over several courses, with wine flowing like water, and we fork in the delights as each is delivered. We are contented. We feel so contented, we could almost give contented milk. Not quite. But I can speak only for myself.

The mini-busses are waiting for us as we leave the restaurant, and we hop on. Before long, we swing out into the sky on the sharp curves taking us back down. Lunch stays with us, thankfully. The mini-busses drop us off in Capri town, and the cute local guide rounds us up and heads us off, walking a climb in the direction of the funicular. Once there, we all agree to meet back at that spot at a certain time for our funicular trip down the rest of the way. Some split off, for this free time, and go down a difficult path to see the Gardens of Cesar Augustus. The more sensible ones of us instead seek out cliffside vendors of spirits and gelato. The view from here is terrific, as I nurse my caffe latte. I see, on the side of the cliff towering up in the distance, the portion of road we were on just moments ago, seeing how the road actually comes out from the side of the cliff, nothing but air and disaster below, seeing mini-busses (so small from this distance they seem like toys) of unsuspecting tourists rushing to what they momentarily believe is their last moments before plunging to their deaths. Such fools, these tourists. I twist a little, and there is the blue of the sea, and look down, and there is the pier, and the boats, and the stands that sell everything and if they don't have it they will sell it to you anyway, and the sidewalk cafes, the people in them looking like ants from up here. Oops, that is an ant. But the people look very small, none-the-less.

Ahhhh, it is time to go, and we are given our funicular tickets and we herd onto this cable-train designed in steps, and we descend to the bottom. A little time for shopping, then it is time for our jet boat. We meet up with those that chose not to take the optional, and we board for our trip back to Sorrento. The boat captain is lucky again.

After a little Italian siesta, dinner is on our own. Some take a taxi for the short ride into downtown, a few walk, some walk a half-mile to some restaurants, and some wait for the hotel restaurant to open at 8:30. A few, like us, adjourn to the bar just outside of the hotel's restaurant and make ourselves comfortable, ordering sandwiches and a choice of drinks, then walk the terraces and grounds of the hotel.