Return to Italy - Rome, Naples, and Sorrento Part 2

Hello everyone, welcome back to part 2 of this adventure in Italy. If you missed part 1 you can read it here. So we left Rome and went down to a place called Lucrino, which is round near Naples. The area around here isn't very clean. The train stations are really dirty covered in graffiti.

Local trainline

However the hotel here was lovely it was called, Villa Luisa. It had a beauty treatment room which had a small pool area, sauna, spa, and steam room. You could also help yourself to tea. I really enjoyed this we spent each night in there, just relaxing after long day of walking about places. We also had a lovely breakfast at this hotel, the room was also very nice, double bed plus a single bed, with a little balcony. I think this was the best place we stayed in out of the 3. I would give it a 5* rating.

Villa Luisa

Breakfast Buffet

Beautyroom

The first evening here we went in a pizza restaurant, lovely food as always. I really enjoy Italian food (we had Pizza again). Very nice restaurant, there wasn't a lot of places around near our hotel to eat. This one was just round the corner.

Next day we went and visited Solfatara, this is a shallow volcanic crater at Pozzuoli, which is not too far up the train line from where we was staying. This is part of the Campi Flegrei volcanic area. This is the first place where I got to see not only 2 cats, but about 10. I had never seen so many cats together before it was so cool.

 

Solfatara was very interesting place for people who are interested in volcano's it's a nice place to visit, it didn't cost too much either. The area is very dry and rocky and there is places on the ground where steam with sulphurous fumes come out, the steam is pretty hot. It doesn't take long to walk around here, though we didn't stay too long since it was raining and we got pretty wet.

 

After going back to the hotel we then went for a walk to a lake which I believe was Lago di Averno just to have a look around, it was pretty big lake there wasn't much life around there saw a few geese and coots that was about it. It was a nice walk though. This was about 20 mins walk from the train station. Didn't manage to walk all around as it was getting late, I did how ever manage to get some nice photos though.

Other places we visited while here were an American diner & bar which we had dinner in, as we had eaten a lot of pizza, thought we should have something different, another good place to go for evening meal.

We also went down the end of the train line to Torregaveta. I think some of their lines weren't working as the place we wanted to go to we couldn't get there. But we stayed here for a while had a wonder about, saw lot of people fishing at the end of the pier. There was a small beach here too.

We then got the train back and went to Pozzuoli again but got of at another station and walked all the way back to the town centre which was a nice walk took a good hour or so. I'm not sure which stop we got off at now but walking along the coast back to Pozzuoli's town centre we came across all these stray cats again, they seem to be sleeping in the rocks on the coast it was crazy. Cats right by the sea, I was having a great time taking loads of photos of them, so many different cats.

Once we walked all the way back to  Pozzuoli, we had a wonder about, looked at the boats that were docked there. We did go find out how much it would cost to get a boat to one of the islands, but the person in the information place wasn't very helpful at all.

This was the last night staying here, the next day we had to go back to Naples to get our boat to Sorrento. Read all about that in Part 3, which will be coming up soon.

Again Thanks for reading, let me know what you think and if you enjoyed the read.

Thanks Aimee

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Italy - Lake Garda. My First ever flight!

So this post is going back to the beginning of the year. On the 28th February to the 4th March I went to Italy, my first holiday aboard on a plane. This was the first main adventure of the year and it was an amazing experience, I loved every minute of it.

Me and my boyfriend flew from London Stansted airport on Ryanair, I was really excited about going on a plane, I had wanted to travel on one for such a long time, It had finally come. We landed at Bergamo airport then caught a coach to Milan.

We walked around Milan for a bit doing a bit of sightseeing we didn't go too far, just around by the station. Then we took the train to Desenzano del Garda, and then walked to Sirmione, where our hotel was. This took around a good hour or so, but it was a enjoyable walk along the lakeside.

on the way to Italy travelling over the mountains.

Milan train station

Tram in Milan

In Desenzano del Garda.

Our hotel was lovely, it was called Albergo Maruo. The hotel looked like a big house, we got breakfast each morning, which was a lovely continental breakfast. We tried to speak some Italian but we weren't very good, and the man started talking in English to us. The room was also really nice.

Albergo Maruo, our hotel

Later that evening we went and visited the Castello scaligero which was a bit of a walk from where we were staying but we got to see up the other end of Sirmione. We had dinner up there in one of the restaurants (pizza).

Round abouts in Sirmione are nicely lit up at night.

Castello scaligero

Castello scaligero

Pizza for dinner

 The next day we went on the bus to visit Garda.

At Garda.

Narrow street in Garda

Sparrows in Garda, Italy

Garda is a very pretty town, with lots of little narrow streets, which we had a walk around, then decided to go up a big hill. The old rock of Garda was a fairly pleasant short climb, apart from the rain and getting wet. There are some dug out caves on the way up to the top, but don't look in them, because a sign says not to, I only had a quick look.

The cave climbing up to the top of the hill in Garda.

View from the top of the hill.

View from top of hill, at Garda.

Later in the day we got back on the bus to Verona. 

The Verona Arena (Arena di Verona) is a Roman amphitheatre in Piazza Bra. It was interesting walking around this large historical site. I for one enjoyed pondering what it would have been like all those years ago to be in the middle of the Roman crowd.   

In the city I found a Disney store and bought a Stitch mug which I was happy about.

Verona Arena.

The walls

Another day and another part of the lake to explore - Malcesine, at the base of Monte Baldo. We got the cable car to the top of the mountain, and after travelling through the cloud base, found the top covered in snow. We played around in the snow a bit, it was really cold and windy up the top, so wrap up warm if you go up there. The view you could see was stunning (once the cloud cleared). 

There is a lovely little cafe up there with a view all the way down the bottom. You can also do skiing up the top, which we saw only a few people doing. Back down in the village of Malcesine, there was some kind of carnival on, I believe it was the Gran Carnevale 2014 which was on the 2nd March there was some parade wagon with people dressed up as native Americans. There was confetti all over the floor. There must have been celebrations all around the lake and maybe Italy cause there was confetti in other towns too, which brings me to the next place.

More views, was cloudy.

View of where the cable cars come up.

Cold

Venice. Had to get the train there from Peschiera del Garda which cost around 45 euros return and took around one hour and a half to get there, on a high speed train. The place was completely patched with tourists, it was strange cause all the other places seemed quite for this time of year but Venice was packed. Some kind of festival was happening in St Mark Square I believe it was the Carnival of Venice which is once a year festival, ending on Shrove Tuesday (Pancake day) the Christian celebration of Lent. Lots of people were dressed up in elaborate costumes, and masks.

Italian train at station.

In Venice

We bought some masks to join in.

St Mark Square

Lots of different costumes.

Venice bridge.

View from the bridge

So there we go that was the main places visited while staying at Lake Garda, I know Venice isn't part of that area, but It's a must see place to visit. I'd definitely go back there to see more of the areas. I hope you found this helpful and enjoyable.

Thanks Aimee

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