One of our extemporaneous plans was to visit our friends Betty Lacey and Josh O'Shea in Dublin, Ireland. After a fun-filled birthday week in Bolzano, back in late September, we could not resist an invitation to explore a fantastic country with lovely locals. Thusly, we flew from Milan to Dublin on the same morning that Nickie left us (Flights were affordable and quick), and Josh kindly "collected" us at the airport. Betty and Josh were gracious in hosting us a...

We (including Nickie) left Roma in our rear-view mirror and embarked upon the next leg of our journey...Firenze (Florence), Italy! Firenze at Christmas-time is filled with happy shoppers, bedazzled streets, and a blessedly marked absence of tourists. We stayed in our host, Lorenzo's, beautiful two-bedroom apartment with a living room and balcony right in the center of Florence. From our window we could see the market (that was completely set up and taken down ...

The Adventure Continues…. Whew! Our trip to Sorrento and Amalfi was a whirlwind three days! Upon this trip's heels, we headed back to Eternal CIty of Rome to celebrate Thanksgiving with Steve’s wonderful mother, Nickie, who was flying in to meet us. We jumped on two trains (both delayed) to hurry back to Rome to meet Nickie on Wednesday, November 22. However, although we expected her to already be at the hotel when we arrived, we discovered she was instead ...

The remarkable Sorrento peninsula lies about 1 hour south of Naples, Italy and can be reached by regional train. The ride was in a bumpy, circa 1975, highly graffitied, train. We passed the stop for the infamous Pompeii on the way (yes, that Pompeii:) After 36 stops, our Sorrento digs were about a ten minute walk from the end of the train line, and right in the center of town. Lovely spot with an amazing breakfast every morning. We checked out Sorrento that day, ...

Croatia is fantastic...we simply loved it. Like her northern neighbor, Slovenia, Croatia is gifted with tremendous natural beauty. The Dalmatian coastline never tires, no matter how many turns of the head. We did not have time to see all that we wanted to, as seven days is not enough to experience all that Croatia has to offer...we will most definitely be back. What we did have time to see were the cities of Dubrovnik and Split (Please see photos). Dubrovnik ...