Italy 2012

Warning - there are no pictures of people today, only places and things....

Sunday I walked the streets alone, then headed over to San Giorgio. 

San Giorgio was open when I got there before 8am.  One priest and one assistant were getting the church ready for mass.  The elevator didn’t open until 9:30, so I wandered the island to kill time.  There were booths and signs for a cooking contest the day before sponsored by San Pellegrino sparkling water.  Sailors were setting sail.  

I got back to the room, and Robby had decided we were having lunch at the Hard Rock café.  Something other than pizza was a nice change.  Before lunch, there were lots of tourists in gondolas right outside the Hard Rock.  After lunch, it looked like siesta time – still tourists, but no gondoliers.  We went back to the room for another siesta.  I went out and found the San Frari church, having a slightly easier time of it this time than in 2005.  

Relics in Frari Church

Canova's Monument in Frari Church

Titian's Tomb in Frari Church

CJ's Dinner

I got the 16 euro menu – spaghetti with clams, then cichiti – fried stuff – meatball, potato and speck (very good), olives (good if you like olives), fish.  Kathy got the 4 cheese pizza, Bob and Karin both got funghi pizza. 

We started to watch Italy vs UK in Eurocup soccer in the big square near our hotel with hundreds of local 20 somethings – after a while we gave up caring and went back to the room.  At about 11 CJ and I went down to see the end of the game – we couldn’t see the score, but it looked like 0 – 0.  Then the shootout started, and Italy won 4-2, sending Italy into the semifinals.  The crowd was thrilled, but the celebration was short lived.  I had assumed the crowd would party like there was no tomorrow, but they had been standing and drinking for 3 hours on a Sunday night, and the crowd dissipated fairly quickly.