Saturday 24th May

Up early on another beautiful morning. Said good bye & drove without problems, in 25 mins, to Perugia to return the car, heaving a sigh of relief that it & our marriage had survived the week we had it.

Had a snack & waited for the train to Florence, which we had been on last year but in an empty 1st class coach. After a pleasant & uneventful ride we arrived late & had to rush for the next one at Pisa, a double-decker which was pretty full. Finally we caught the Train to Genoa which was a great run passing the huge Carrara hills from where the famous white marble is quarried & then through miles of tunnels right along the coast with stations at irregular intervals with little harbours & beaches. Eventually, none too soon, we arrived at the station, only to find we were on the wrong side of the track but luckily the hotel was not too far away.

After a walk around the neighbourhood & an early scratch meal we found a wonderful food market hall full of a wide range of fresh foods beautifully displayed very much like in the Victoria Markets in Melbourne. d*** went to bed & Jane researched ways to get to Oldenburg in Germany, our next stop.

Sunday 25th May

Jane found a Ryanair flight from Milan to Bremen & we spent the next 2 hours trying to book it only to find that d*** has been issued a boarding pass as being from Afghanistan not the UK. We will just have to see if he will be able to catch the flight.

We then set off towards the old port, by a fairly tortuous route including some remarkable churches & a street of incredible palatial houses, opened only once a year to the public , including an impressive art gallery. Eventually we arrived at the old port to face a replica galleon & further around various displays of sporting activities. We settled for a sit down & lunch of Trofie al pesto, the favoured local pasta dish which we found a bit disappointing as it appeared to be fairly bland.
Returning we passed through the very narrow & tortuous alleys of the old town past the cathedral & back home down the colonnaded street for a well earned rest.

Monday 26th May

After breakfast we walked across to the main station & bought day tickets for the metro & buses before taking the metro one stop & visiting the quite extraordinary cathedral. Although the exterior is fairly conventional, apart from the use of black & white stone in its construction which has a liquorice allsort effect its interior is stunning. The main nave is full of Romanesque arches again done in black & white as are the pillars but the altar area is of 16-17th century baroque with the most elaborate gilded mouldings & painted ceilings & a series of ancient damaged frescoes interspersed with much later religious scenes. On the southern side is the most ornate chapel with fine statues all around it. In the museum they have a most ornate 11th century gilded arc, the plate on which John the Baptist's head was served up & what is reputed to be the glass chalice of the Last Supper.

Leaving there we ascended to another very elaborate Baroque church dedicated to the Jesuit order which was quite over the top to our tastes but included to paintings by Reubens. Finally we walked through one of the surviving gates of the old city walls & up to a relatively austere, by local standards Basilica.

Here we hopped on to a bus which took us out along the river into the suburbs. At the terminus we found a great pizza shop & had a great lunch. Re joining the bus for the return we stopped off at the Monumental Cemetery of Staglieno which was quite an eye opener. It comprised a series of covered arcades in which the dead are stacked in about 6 layers of niches many with very elaborate statues of all descriptions. The place is huge & we walked for miles but only saw about 1/3 of the place which extended up the hill side where there appeared to be huge mausoleums & a large Pantheon. It was all a bit much for Dick’s knees so we returned home again.

As before he had a rest while Jane processed her photos before we set off to find Christopher Columbus’s house, which, of course was closed.

We hopped on another bus at random & this went east along the coast. A lady tapped us on the shoulder & told us to get off at the next stop & turn right, much to our surprise. We did as we were told & came to a lovely church overlooking a small cove full of people & fishing boats, so she was right. Resuming our bus trip we ended up in a very nondescript area & returned back to town to get a drink & some food. d*** made a very poor choice so we ended up with a very ordinary pizza & a beer before returning home via the market with a couple of pastries.