Italy

[Dementor]

The sunny land of pizza, pasta, risotto, great wines, and beautiful music and arts. I used to travel there thrice.

Anyone else? Have you been to Italy? Where? What are your impressions, what advice can you give?
Or maybe there are some Italians here on the Forum?  I'll describe my travels in the next post.

[AquilaTempestas]

49 minutes ago, Dementor said:

The sunny land of pizza, pasta, risotto, great wines, and beautiful music and arts. I used to travel there thrice.

Anyone else? Have you been to Italy? Where? What are your impressions, what advice can you give?
Or maybe there are some Italians here on the Forum?  I'll describe my travels in the next post.

@Sakura Alexia is our resident Italian!

I've been to Rome, Florence, The Vatican and Venice. Venice was awesome, Rome was excellent and heaven for a history fan, and Florence was kinda dull. I didn't really enjoy Florence - a bit too 'artsy' for my liking. Renaissance isn't really my favourite time period either when it comes to history and Florence is basically the birth of this era.

I want to go back to Rome. I also would love to go to Sicily and Pompeii. Pisa too. Oh, and Milan of course.

[Dementor]

I only used to visit Genoa and surroundings areas of Ligurian Riviera all three times. Because I used to have a friend who lives there. Now she's not my friend anymore, but that's another story.

What can I say. Genoa is fantastic. Has lots of historical places too, and its more "modern" part is nice too. I liked the Porto Antico (with its amazing Acquario di Genova!), old town with its majestic palaces and churches, Piazza Principe station, Piazza di Ferrari and its fountain... Via XX Settembre is a great place to walk (during my second visit my hotel was located on this street). I also used to take part in some celebration once, forgot the name already, but it was about Saint Patron of Genoa or something, it took place a week after Easter. It was a beautiful procession around the cathedral, carrying flowers, statues, banners and stuff. Also masters came from Recco to make the original authentic focaccia - super tasty thing!

But even more than Genoa I loved the town of Rapallo. This town truly is a jewel of the Riviera, it feels like an old storybook. Beautiful streets with old buildings, and fantastic coast with a cool castle/fortress... To me Rapallo felt even more cool than highly-advertised Cinque Terre which I used to visit too.

Oh, and another beautiful place - Portofino!! I travelled there by the sea.

And about Cinque Terre what to say... If you saw Disney/Pixar's cartoon "Luca", you have the idea what it is like, Pixar showed Cinque Terre very authentically there. Even if it's a fictional town, I almost recognized some places!

And have some pics:

Piazza di Ferrari

Castello Canevaro in Zoagli. There a memorial of Greg Lake from Emerson, Lake & Palmer is located. I haven't seen it though - unfortunately it wasn't properly inaugurated at that time yet.

Piazza della Vittoria in Genoa.

Vernazza, Cinque Terre. A location from "Luca", isn't it?

A coast walk in Riomaggiore.

Via XX Settembre in Genoa.

The coast of Rapallo. Prototype of Porto Corsa from Pixar's "Cars 2".

The international company in Rapallo

...wow there's pretty many pics, sorry  

[AquilaTempestas]

12 hours ago, Dementor said:

I only used to visit Genoa and surroundings areas of Ligurian Riviera all three times. Because I used to have a friend who lives there. Now she's not my friend anymore, but that's another story.

What can I say. Genoa is fantastic. Has lots of historical places too, and its more "modern" part is nice too. I liked the Porto Antico (with its amazing Acquario di Genova!), old town with its majestic palaces and churches, Piazza Principe station, Piazza di Ferrari and its fountain... Via XX Settembre is a great place to walk (during my second visit my hotel was located on this street). I also used to take part in some celebration once, forgot the name already, but it was about Saint Patron of Genoa or something, it took place a week after Easter. It was a beautiful procession around the cathedral, carrying flowers, statues, banners and stuff. Also masters came from Recco to make the original authentic focaccia - super tasty thing!

But even more than Genoa I loved the town of Rapallo. This town truly is a jewel of the Riviera, it feels like an old storybook. Beautiful streets with old buildings, and fantastic coast with a cool castle/fortress... To me Rapallo felt even more cool than highly-advertised Cinque Terre which I used to visit too.

Oh, and another beautiful place - Portofino!! I travelled there by the sea.

And about Cinque Terre what to say... If you saw Disney/Pixar's cartoon "Luca", you have the idea what it is like, Pixar showed Cinque Terre very authentically there. Even if it's a fictional town, I almost recognized some places!

And have some pics:

Piazza di Ferrari

Castello Canevaro in Zoagli. There a memorial of Greg Lake from Emerson, Lake & Palmer is located. I haven't seen it though - unfortunately it wasn't properly inaugurated at that time yet.

Piazza della Vittoria in Genoa.

Vernazza, Cinque Terre. A location from "Luca", isn't it?

A coast walk in Riomaggiore.

Via XX Settembre in Genoa.

The coast of Rapallo. Prototype of Porto Corsa from Pixar's "Cars 2".

The international company in Rapallo

...wow there's pretty many pics, sorry  

Ughhh so lucky, wish I lived in Europe so I could visit all these places and then come back home again haha.

Looks like you had an awesome time though!

@Sakura Alexia So, as our resident Italian, where would you recommend tourists go?

[Dementor]

7 hours ago, AquilaTempestas said:

Ughhh so lucky, wish I lived in Europe so I could visit all these places and then come back home again haha.

Looks like you had an awesome time though!

@Sakura Alexia So, as our resident Italian, where would you recommend tourists go?

Yeah, I wish I lived in Europe too... these days going to the EU is almost impossible to me :-/

But indeed I've always had an awesome time in Italy. First time in 2011, then in 2017 when we gathered our international gang there (from Russia, Italy, USA, Malaysia, and UK), and then a weekend in 2019.

[Sakura Alexia]

15 hours ago, AquilaTempestas said:

@Sakura Alexia So, as our resident Italian, where would you recommend tourists go?

The answer is easy, anywhere you want.

You will not be disappointed.

[AquilaTempestas]

I do wanna go back someday and visit Rome again. I'd also love to see Pompeii - that's supposed to be awesome.

[RipplingLocust]

On 6/3/2023 at 10:45 PM, Sakura Alexia said:

The answer is easy, anywhere you want.

You will not be disappointed.

Any good beaches?

[Sakura Alexia]

1 hour ago, RipplingLocust said:

Any good beaches?

Well I mostly know a couple on the adriatic sea (the right side of the country that is), not the other one, but seems the southern you go the cleaner the water gets.

I mostly require beaches with sand due to my condition, but I know there are some with rocks too so it comes down to personal preference.

I wouldn't suggest going to Genoa or around there, they make you pay the air you breathe there.

[Dementor]

20 hours ago, Sakura Alexia said:

I wouldn't suggest going to Genoa or around there, they make you pay the air you breathe there.

Haha I've heard the stories of Genovese stinginess However I've never been to beaches there.

[Sakura Alexia]

1 minute ago, Dementor said:

Haha I've heard the stories of Genovese stinginess However I've never been to beaches there.

I think they should be mostly rocks over there, there's the aquarium in Genoa if you're interested, I've been there years ago, its very pretty.

For beaches I still suggest looking at the eastern coast, just because I'm more familiar.

Near where I live now there's Senigallia, I know it's very popular, and for like a lifetime I've been at places a bit further north than here near Rimini. All these places have what's called the blue flag which is a thing given to the cleanest beaches.

[Dementor]

3 minutes ago, Sakura Alexia said:

I think they should be mostly rocks over there, there's the aquarium in Genoa if you're interested, I've been there years ago, its very pretty.

For beaches I still suggest looking at the eastern coast, just because I'm more familiar.

Near where I live now there's Senigallia, I know it's very popular, and for like a lifetime I've been at places a bit further north than here near Rimini. All these places have what's called the blue flag which is a thing given to the cleanest beaches.

Oh I've heard about beaches of Rimini, my sister used to go there. And cool that there's blue flag, I remember going to a blue flag beach in Ventspils, Latvia.

I've been to the aquarium in Genoa, 12 years ago... very impressive!