‘Lo and on the fourth day they left the property. Who would have thought when we arrived in Italy for a mild Mediterranean winter that we’d end up snowed in, unable to get the trusty (but automotively, fairly pathetic) Yaris up the snow and ice covered goat track to the main road. Fortunately we had a trip to the supermarket on the Saturday for a few bits and pieces - though not a stock up by any means. Seeing snow was forecast on the Sunday night I even b...

What a stunning day! And what amazing weather with 2 days to go until it’s officially Spring in Europe (apparently...) The Beast from the East, as this particular Siberian blast of arctic weather has been christened, arrived last night and the snow was just starting to fall when we went to bed - with no expectations of much really - though we knew it would be a cold night. It was -3 degrees (C) when we woke up with the wind chill factor taking it down to -11....

We ventured to Rome on the 16th for one reason only - the weather. It’s been rainy or drizzly or showers or forecast as such for the last couple of weeks and today was supposed to be brilliantly sunny all day. Plans were made, train tickets bought and the alarm was set ridiculously early. We aimed for the earliest train possible (for us at least), leaving the countryside at 7.26 am. Even had the car defrosted by 7.05 and there well in time for the train (this ...

When we visited Rome 5 years ago, we thought we had done well and hit the high points - The Colosseum, The Forum, St Peter’s, The Trevi Fountain, The Vatican Museums, The Pantheon, Circo Maximus, numerous churches, the Bocca del Verita and of course, a day down the coast to see Pompeii (plus going out every evening to see the monuments by night as well as an opera concert in a church). From memory we spent 4 or 5 days here before continuing on to Florence and V...

In the blink of an eye, three weeks have passed - including a day in Rome and the last week being devoted to the avoidance of homelessness (AKA: travel planning). So - what have we been up to. Well to hear expats talk you'd think the Italian postal service was staffed solely by deviant snails who hate delivering mail on general principle. However, this would have to be offset by Italian pharmacies charging illicit drugs prices for vitamins! I require a couple o...