Day 14 - July 20, 2013 - Orvieto and back to Rome

     Today is the last day of our Globus Tour (Italian Treasures) - we need to drive back to Rome to fly home tomorrow morning. We followed the Tiber Valley in order to reach our one stop in Orvieto today. Orvieto is perched high atop a volcanic rock.  We had to ride a FUNICULAR to the top of this mountain town! We walked around - had tea and pastries at a local Pasticceria when we arrived, then a pizza lunch with our group (Marc, Kay, Mike, Vibbi, & Kelsey). In the late afternoon, we returned to Rome and stayed one more night at NH Midas. We had time to rest, shower, re-pack for tomorrow.  Our driver, Flavio took us to a really nice restaurant with four Opera singers entertaining us throughout the dinner! Excellent meal with wine and ending with Tiramisu and champagne!!  The show was very entertaining and they sang "Arrivederci Roma" as we all swung our cloth napkins around for our "Farewell Dinner"
    

 Hugs and kisses to our driver - Flavio and our tour guide - Aida! They were excellent!!
Kisses to the rest of the people in the group in front of our hotel.
Then about 17 of us went into the ristorante and ordered drinks - wine and beer for everyone!
Anne decided to get her bottle of Limoncello that she purchased earlier that day and everyone did a "goodbye" shot with all our new friends - We laughed and had a Blast until around midnight!! This was a great group of people from Australia, New Zealand, and North America! Hugs all around and off to bed because we needed to leave the hotel at 6:00 AM tomorrow morning for a shuttle to the airport! "Arrivederci Italia!"

Day 13 - July 19, 2013 - Ravenna and Assisi

Drove along the coastline of the Adriatic Sea to Ravenna.  Here, we saw the famous mosaics in the 6th-century Basilica of St. Apollinaris in classe. This was the 1st of the three cathedrals that we saw today...

The Basilica of St. Francis

What a day! Lots of driving, then lots of walking, a nice dinner in our beautiful hotel and then drinks outside in Assisi! We visited three very beautiful cathedrals today!  When we arrived in Assisi, we quickly checked into our rooms, and then met for a tour of The Basilica of St. Francis - the church has three parts: the upper basilica, the lower basilica, and the saint's tomb.  In the 1997 earthquake, the lower basilica — with walls nearly nine feet thick — was unscathed. The upper basilica, with bigger windows and walls only three feet thick, was damaged. Following a restoration, the entire church reopened to visitors in late 1999.

The Papal Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi is the mother church of the Roman Catholic Order of Friars Minor—commonly known as the Franciscan Order—in Assisi, Italy, the city where St. Francis was born and died.

Assisi reminded me of a small San Francisco! It's on the side of a mountain above the clouds~ We walked to both churches -  The Basilica of St. Francis  & The Basilica di Santa Chiara

- this was the first day it rained a little while we started the Tour in Assisi.  We had an hour & 1/2 to rest before dinner. Dinner was fun tonight! They served us - pork, tomatoes, mashed potatoes, caprice salad, dessert, cappuccino, white wine & water- About 12 of us had drinks outside overlooking Assisi ~ just beautiful!!

Basilica di Santa Chiara, Assisi

Our hotel

Day 12 - July 18, 2013 - Venice

Woke up in Venice - Room 503~  Great room - large room with a beautiful bathroom, large shower, and a walk in closet.
We were served a beautiful buffet breakfast at Monaco & Grand Canal Hotel with tables outside overlooking the water and regular coffee, not espresso (1st time).
We met our tour guide for a walking tour of Piazza San Marco (St. Mark's Square) She was excellent, very interesting and very funny! We toured the museum and learned about the history of the Venetians - so interesting! No one trusted each other in Venice, so someone was always in charge of watching over the Doges (their ruler). It was a Republic for eleven centuries, until Italy became a country in 1861.
We walked the world famous Bridge of Sighs, where the prisoners walked over into the cells (and so did we) Then we went into the Byzantine Basilica and the lavish Doges' Palace (24K. Gold) everywhere!! GOLD ceilings  - it was totally amazing and beautiful! In the Church, we saw the Tomb of St. Mark the Evangelist (one of the four people who wrote the Bible) The New Testament! Michael was blown away by that fact!

We continued on to the glass blowing factory where we watched the Master glassblower make two things - a vase and a horse, which was very interesting! We went into the store, and Michael decided that he wanted me to have a necklace for my upcoming birthday so he paid for it!

 We had a one hour break, then we met for our boat ride to Burano Island. (about 40 minutes) We had a fantastic lunch at a fancy Italian ristorante which consisted of wine, risotto, calamari, shrimp, fish, biscotti, cake, cafe and Sambuco! Boat was back around 5:30 and we had a free evening - Rest, shower and dinner at the Hard Rock Venice with Michael!We really enjoyed hearing American rock music and the food was delicious! We walked St. Mark's Square for the last time~

Day 11 - July 17, 2013 - Florence - Verona - Vencie Island

OMG!! We're in Venice!! BUT, we had to take a speed boat from the mainland (about 15 minutes) 12 people and our luggage! I was praying the entire time because I really don't like speed boats! It's unimaginable, very big, many tourists, very beautiful, surrounded by water and boats and canals - Our group gathered and we walked to our hotel.  Michael and I had a beautiful room - one of the best so far! Huge walk in closet and a huge shower in the beautiful bathroom - we we're happy!!

SIDE NOTE  - Michael's comment: I think you should never go on a speed boat ever EVER again!

This morning we drove to Savona - very nice town with great shopping.  We had lunch with Alex - Pizza and a greek salad in an air conditioned ristorante~

The Gondola ride was  a dream come true for the entire group! We had five boats, one accordion player and one singer - it was wonderful! In our boat - me, Michael, Alex, Jiselle and her Grandma - so much fun! It lasted about 45 minutes and we took tons of photo's and video.

Dinner was fantastic too~ We had champagne, wine , dessert & cafe, but we had tea.

We walked to St. Mark's Square and back to our hotel and called some family members (Free WiFi in the hotel)