Resting in Torino

After all the traveling in the last days (and especially snowboarding) I was kind of tired, so I went back in Torino.

In the way back to Torino, I stopped in Verona, just to eat and visit the city (don't know exactly what was the right order for priorities). I was almost tempted to stay one night here (because the city has a very nice atmosphere of "old", very quiet, peaceful, and not very stuffed with tourists), but the hotels were curiously expensive (more than Milan !?).


House of Juliet

In Torino, I visited the Mole Antonelliana (probably the only purely touristic place around) and sleep. Yes, a lot of sleep. Waking up mainly to eat, so, no stories for this period, sorry :)


Mole Antonelliana

On 30 Paulina took the plane for London, so I met my sister in Torino, my new traveling partner for the 4 days left. I had some professional lunch at her'husbands'parents'place, including a lot of typically Italian well prepared food, ~4 wine types, and some "digestives" made from plants. The first one was called Latte di Suocera (Milk of mother-in-law) and has 75% alcohol. I made the mistake to tell them is the strongest beverage I ever tasted, so they gave me another one (that is poured on a sugar cube) - 90% alcohol (simply cannot feel your mouth for 5 minutes - don't understand why is called digestive).


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Snowboard in the Dolimites

This year Trentino didn't saw any snowflake, and this is apparently a big problem for tourism (the main money source for the local people). Is also true that the "economical happiness" of the people living here doesn't have a great impact on me, but my problem was snow. Coming from Seville to the Alps, was the main thing I was searching for...

So, to find the snow we went on a very popular downhill in the Dolomites (Val di Fiemme Obereggen). This region is very popular for ski, and also very well known because of 2 cable car disasters: one in 1976 (when the cable broke - 42 deaths) and in 1998 (when a plane from USA army accidentally cut the wire by flighting at a very low level - 19 deaths). I was happy to see now there is no cable car, but only very new gondolas that seem to work well :)


Map of Val di Fiemme Obereggen

It was a hard decision if to ski or to snowboard, considering I didn't tried anything like that before. I remembered what Marius, one of my colleagues, used to say... that you can learn to snowboard from the first day (apart from ski). So, I decided to go snowboard. Rented the equipment, bought the ski pass (I think is not more expensive than Romania - 33 euros for one day - access on all slopes, swimming pool and ice skating ring - for more days, bigger discounts of course - for example for all season is like 350 euro, or like 450 if you want the skipass to work on all the reasorts in Dolomites, including the famous Cortina d'Ampezzo).

Let the fun begin. First, one hour of professional traing with a snowboard instructor, just to get the basics (I would certainly took more hours, if the instructor wouldn't want 35 euro for hour :P). The lady manage to teach me all the basics, but couldn't call my name by any means, so at some point she decided to call me Ron :)

After this I exercised like 2 hours on the Red Slope (with all the grandfathers, kids, invalids, infants and of course, me). Everything seemed fine... Then I moved to the Blue one that was like 3 km long and very steep (not as steep as the Black slopes, but still, I bit too much for me). The most annoying thing on a snowboard is that you cannot rest while standing, so when you are tired you have to sit, and the guys skying can go over you, and is quite a problem for both of you).

To go downhill I had two main methods: either try to brake very very often with the plate perpendicular on the slope direction) and my knees were screaming after couple of minutes...or try to go with the board parallel to the slope...speed...more speed...very high speed...crash and lot of snow :)

Anyway, the experience was very nice, just that all my body was hurting. I had to sleep like 18 hours after this...


© http://www.scuolascicermis.it


© http://www.scuolascicermis.it

Treated as a King - Lunch in Castle

24 December - a bit home sick (hard to say exactly home much). Santa didn't come this year for me, but the day was quite interesting anyway.

For the lunch, we were invited together with Max to the biggest Castle in Trentino - Castello Beseno. Yes, sounds a bit funny. The idea is that the Castle keeper is a friend of Max, and he leaves in the castle for 10 years already, writing books about Mexicans. Yes...again, Mexicans. The surprise was that at the lunch we meet another 3 Mexicans girls (starts to be weird, they are everywhere you go). One of them is helping Max for some projects, and the other two are her sisters (that are in holiday in Italy). Anyway, the food was great, and I think I never ate so much in lunch (again, I looked like pregnant in the 3th month - don't ask me how I make the estimation). On Christmas, the Italians usually have Panettone for desert (taste very like Romanian "cozonac").


Opening the gates


View from Bastion Sud


View over Val d'Adige



In the evening, the Mexican cooked, so we felt a bit more like Christmas (it was a must to cook something in the oven so we feel the nice smell spreading in all the house). I ate (and curiously, I was also very happy with it) pork & roasted potatoes & salad & peanut sauce & pomegranate. And some ice-cream, fruits, panetonne and others for desert.


Before...


After...


And a close-up :)

Yet, I miss Romanian food so much (sarmale, carnati, racituri, cozonac, etc...), and the Christmas tree, and Santa...and surprisingly, the snow - this is weird, in Iasi it was snowing, and in the Alps no snow in the city, just on the downhill slopes).

Merry Christmas :)

Going to Sudtirol

Leaving from Spain... Let me translate: wake up in the morning, pack with very high speed (curiously in all this days I didn't lost anything, or maybe I didn't yet realized), take the bus, go to the airport...and all the usual...

In the airport I just realized that I forgot to do one thing in Seville: eating Tortilla. So I had a piece of tortilla for breakfast, grab a juice, and wait for the plane. As always, the plane was kind of late on departure (by the way, Ryan Air has to slogans: when they are in time - The On-Time Air Line, and when are not on time - The Low Fares Airline). I had some perfect seats in the airplane, between some babies (one screaming in an Asiatic language, another screaming in perfect British). So not so easy to sleep (neither for me and neither for them as I supposed).


Flying over Cote d'Azur

In Milano I went to met my sister to take back the luggage I let at her place (in the Metro, as usual, full of Romanian Gypsies singing Christmas Songs - theoretically).

From Milan I went to Trento by train (some wierd experiences on the train with some black immigrants that I don't feel the need to detail :P), where we stayed at Max (an old friend so kind to host us :P)...

Adios España! Hasta la vista!

After all this warm days in Spain, we reached, surprisingly, the last day on the Iberic Peninsula. Looking back on the schedule for the last days, we realized that some things remained "unchecked", so we had to check them before leaving.



First of all we went for lunch, and tried (only the Mexican, for me it was oviously too much) the traditional Paella (a mix of rice, chicken, beef, vegetables and of course... sea food). I just had a small spoon, just to taste, but the shrimp was starring at me from the plate, so I decided to have some chicken :)


Paella - focus on the shrimp

Then we went to El Corte Ingles, the Spain's biggest department store. Looks very likely to the Romanian's communist store (like old Moldova in Iasi) - comparing the structure, and not the presentation of course. The prices are very similar to Romania, but there are also a lot of promotions, so overall I think is cheaper than Romanian market. Nothing special overall...

In this holiday I did a lot of sport by carring a 21-22 kg luggage in a lot of cities, railway stations, airports, hotels, etc. At this point I felt like I want to try something different. So we went (accidentally, because we didn't planned this) to an ice skating park (that was hosted in a huge mall). The ice was slowly melting, the skates were not so good, too many little kids (of maybe I was the one too old for this), but overall, a very pleasant experience (I'm a true ice'skating'hoolic).


Ice skating in Seville

In the evening we went to a Flamenco show on Tablao El Arenal. Is hard to describe in words the atmosphere, so I will upload some little movie :) To enter the show you have 3 main options: just the drink (~35 euros), tapas - the traditional snacks (~55 euro) or full dinner (~65 euro). I happilly chosed the first one, and I was so happy with the decision, because the dinner, as always, was 95% sea food...


El tenor

The show consists in a mixture of guitar, voice an dancing that can make anyone happy (doesn't matter what kind of music you like to listen in general). Flamenco first started in Andalusia, so in Seville there is a great culture for it. What impressed me was the age of the performers, that varies from 20 to 65 (after my estimation :P). You can find more details about Flamenco here.


Nice girl on Flamenco show - from close it was even nicer :P

On the way back to the hostel, I realized that we saw the big catheral in Seville (just next to our accomodation) just from one side (yes, after 5 days I finnally realized), so we made a night tour round the place. A funny thing is that the Spanish shut down the Christmas lights on streets after 23 PM - very strange way to make economy on power consumption.


Seville Cathedral


Seville Cathedral Tower

This is how the Spanish experience ended... Very warm for December, very different arhitecture style, hard to find good food from a Romanian perspective and nice people that don't speak English (but when they are giving you directions, they all speak very loud and in exactly the same time). I would gladly want to come back in this region, especially to see Cordoba and Malaga (maybe next summer hopefully).



Adios!!

Seville and it's bridges

Today I went to see the famous Seville bridge (yes, the one that appears on all the post cards). The structure looks very impressive, and seems to challenge the laws of physics. Moreover, I tried to visit Isla Magica (a thematic park) but surprisingly it was close (at this point I realised that with all the 20 degrees, it is still winter for the local citizens).


The bridge - east part of the river


On the bridge


The bridge - west part of the river

For returning in the downtown, we chose a different way, that goes into the area used for Expo 92 (more details here). All the pavilions are deserted and nobody seems to visit this dead area. Probably they should found another use for all those buildings that cover a very big surface (without any use now).

In the evening we went on a traditional cerveceria, for some tapas and sangria. I have to mention that in Spain food comes on 3 "sizes": tapas (the smallest one, one is good for dinner, one and a half for lunch), 1/2 portion (for lunch you cannot finish this one, maybe just 3/4), and full portion (two people can eat the lunch from one of this). So, don't get scared that food is expensive, 1/2 portion is more than enough for everybody. The problem with the tapas in this location was that the Mexican didn't understand exactly what she ordered (probably small differences between Spanish in Mexico and Spanish in Spain), and she gave me to taste something weird that she said is pork. This is how I end up by putting in my mouth what the bar man explain later is some "relative" to calamari. Some bad words followed :) Sangria was kind of expensive, a full can (like 5-6 glasses) is 13 euro.


Tapas with sangria

Cadiz or "Romanian meets the Atlantic"

I woke up in the morning to go to Cadiz. Theoretically this should mean a relaxing 2 hour trip with the train. The only problem on this morning was that we meet the two Mexicans exactly when leaving, and they decided to go with us. So...the relaxing 2 hours trip turned into...let's say something different. I also slept in this time, but I could hear the enthusiast Mexicans also in my dreams. The good thing was that as soon as we reached Cadiz we decided to split, because we had slightly different plans. The weather was very good, just like Seville, but the ocean breeze was kind of chilly, so we had to follow the sun all the day (never stay in the shadow :P).


There are a lot of cats near the coast - didn't find out why :)

Cadiz is a very small city placed on the coast of the Atlantic Ocean, to the west of Gibraltar. Is was founded by the Phoenicians in year 1100 BC (so it is said to be the oldest city still standing in Western Europe). Also, Christopher Columbus left from the port in Cadiz in four of his voyages. For me it was also interesting because was my first "encounter" with the Atlantic Ocean (so far i only saw the Mediterranean Sea).


The Atlantic Ocean

We went to see the Cathedral and I was surprising that is not built from rock or bricks, is made totally from corals. From the tower you can have a very good panoramic view over the city. After, we went is a park very close to the beach, to have another long meeting with the sun :)


The Cathedral in Cadiz - outside view


The Cathedral in Cadiz - inside view


The Cathedral in Cadiz - tower view


Park very close to the coast

For lunch we chose a traditional restaurant (recommended by the Mexicans we left in the morning). The Spanish don't usually eat soups (in fact I think they never do). For example for first dish they have some kind of beans, and for the second, if you are lucky you find pork (Lomo Iberico), if not, you have to eat calamari, shrimps, octopus, etc... This time I was partially lucky, so I ate the beans and some beef for the second dish (along with sangria of course).

After some extra walks in the city, we went to say bye bye to the ocean, and returned to Seville.




Saying bye-bye to the ocean

Seville in T-shirt

The second day in Seville I slept like until 1 PM to recover all this hard travelling days. Taking all your home in the luggage is for sure not the best hint for travellers. Maybe next time I will get a backpack, and not a hand luggage (but is so frustrating to take everything out when you are looking for something :p).

Anyway, going back to te subject, we visited the city with three main ideas in mind: to see Plaza Espagna, go to railway station (Santa Justa) to find more details about the train to Cadiz (nice place on the Atlantic Coast) and of course to have lunch until the happy Spanish close the kitchens again.


Famous Seville orange tree - free food for immigrants

Plaza Espagna is a huge semi-circle close to the city center, so is very difficult to actually miss it. You can take a horse-powered vehicle from here (usually 1 to 2 HP) and have to city tour (apparently is not the best experience, and is also very expensive). Moreover, a lot of streets in Seville are closed because they are lunching the first tram line (it was supposed to be lunched in summer 2006, but will take another 2 years - anyway), so a lot of touristic objectives can be reached only by foot. Ah, by the way, if you take the bus in Seville be advised to enter the front door! They are so obsessed with this rule, and if you don't obey they ask you to go down and enter by the first door again (curiously).


View from Plaza Espagna


And the panoramic one

For lunch we found a very nice restaurant near Macarena (a neighbourhood in Seville) with great food at great prices. By great food I personally understand the fact that I found pork here (not only see food - that I hate so much). We were in time for food this time, but too late to catch the traditional Paella. Anyway, I was happy with my pork and sangria. Another thing to mention is that apart from Romania, in Spain, only guys are waiters (and usually are over 30-40 years, and quite fat too).

Going back to the hotel, the Mexican (the one travelling with me) was told by the other Mexican (the one working in the hotel) that other two Mexicans are in the hotel. As usual, you don't have to try hard to find this kind of people, because they will get to your door and start speaking a lot (by this I understand exceeding the standard of 40 minutes). Of course this thing happened, and I found the 2 new tourists (mother and daughter) hitting hard in my door, surprisingly, asking for a "tequilita" because of the old (they asked this after 10 minutes of discussion; outside were over 20 degrees, so not so cold, and truly, this is not a joke).


Was not so cold outside :)


Seville buses advertise Romania (Sibiu as Europe Cultural Capital 2007), and I advertise the buses :P

I went to sleep early because next day we should be leaving for Cadiz early morning...

Seville. Olé!

Seville was the chosen a-bit-exotic destination for this winter. The decision was so good. The only problem is that we had the plane at 7 AM from Bergamo, this means check-in at 5 AM, that actually means leaving with bus from Milano at 4 AM, that implies leaving the hotel at 3:30 AM (yes, more that a bad joke to "wake-up" at this hour). After swearing all the possible causes for not sleeping any minute so we are able to catch the plane, we manage to get on the airport (with some "destroyed" faces - like truly immigrants from Mexico and Romania). Happily, it was no passport control, because we went in the European Union. We flew Ryan Air (and won a sangria because I bet with the Mexican that we will fly over the sea), and the British pilot manage to get us on the destination 10 minutes earlier (this was to appreciate, even if I could really sleep more minutes in the airplane, it was quite comfortable, although it was low-cost), but the landing felt like a pudding that is thrown on the carpet (with a terrible ammount of hate).


Sunrise from Plane


Seville Cathedral

Seville...so different from anything I ever see before!! Both me and the Mexican were so happy at this point (me - because of the green life and warm weather in December - over 20 degrees; and the Mexican because it felt just like home). So...very very warm (also walked with a T-shirt), palm trees, different architecture (with Arabic influences of course), a lot of orange trees (you can find this absolutely everywhere, and can pick up oranges - yes, in December) and also very crowded city (don't know exactly if there were mostly citizens or tourists, hard to say...). So the main problem in Spain is the look of women, that is so...let's say "special" (if you don't have a piercing somewhere on your face you are totally uninteresting).


Torro del Oro


And again...

We found a nice hostel very close to the center (and all the important things to visit). Spain is usually cheaper than Italy (in fact you pay nearly the same, but the conditions are much better). The girl on the hotel was Mexican - so imagine another precipitate, dramatic, sometimes a bit pathetic discussion between the two Mexicans). Although I didn't sleep at all the night before and I was planning to do this is the day time, Seville was so warm and interesting that we went directly to visit the city. At barely all the street corners (and not only) you will find a "Cerveceria" (place to drink beer). I think the Spanish (at least from south) drink even more beer than the Germans (the beer tastes a bit different that what I am used to drink in Romania). Cruzcampo seemed the most famous local beer brand (advertising in absolutely all the bars).

The worst Spanish habit is that they close the kitchens somewhere after 4 o'clock in all locations. In the first day, we weren't advised about this issue, so we were so close to starve (walked like 10 km to find a place to eat something). Usually, near 1 PM a lot of Spanish go to eat in the city. They have a lot of small restaurants with predefined menu for one day (you can chose between 6-7 types of food), and you pay like 6-8 euros. Finally, we found a place to eat, were we had "Plados Combinados" (they seem to love this term) and of course, the traditional local beer.

After all the walking and the good food, I was so tired that I slept until 1 AM, when we decided to visit the city again. Without knowing the exact hour, both me and the Mexican were very intrigued by the fact that the streets are so empty and there is no place to eat something. Later, we found out why was this happening, and we bought some food from a supermarket :)

Milano - Second Day

This day in Milano started a bit late, because I was so sleepy after all this travelling. When I finally managed to open my eyes, we went to see the Duomo again. It looks more impressive in the day (yes, so surprisingly :P). Now we could also manage to enter (curiously without paying anything). Inside it doesn't look so impressive like the outside (not so many sculptures), but is incredibly big (probably is hard to make a wedding here, too much to walk to the altar). The windows are also very nice, filtering the light in many colors.


Il Duomo di Milano - by day

Outside the Duomo there are a lot of bars where you can stay outside (they have some smart heaters - a concept that was not imported in Romania yet - maybe because in the winter in Romania is really cold). Anyway, the prices are not a bit too expensive, are really *way* too much. So no Italian coffee here :(


Christmas Tree decorated by / with Swarovski Crystal

In the market near the Duomo, the Mexican manage to find other two Mexicans, so they started a funny conversation (like from immigrant to possible immigrant). After this, we walked a lot in Milano, almost crossing the city from one part to the other. Sometime I am really curious how can I walk for so long (ah, I truly miss my car in this kind of moments). The impression on the city is that is very active (apart from Torino), but not so touristic. Maybe is nice if you are the fancy trency type and want to go shopping, but for me wasn't so impressive. Is kind of funny that in Milan they have two types of trams: in the historic centre are some that have like 40 years (after my estimation), and for the rest some new ones that looks inspired from Star Trek).


Old tram running in the historic center


The modern tram - you can see a small difference :)

In the evening, I met my sister and we had dinner in "theoretically-the-best-pizzeria-in-town". Surprisingly, the price here were not so big (so again, for eating or hotels is great if you can ask somebody that lives in the city, you can get a lot of good suggestions like this). Then I also visited the hospital she works on (kind of impressive, is almost a whole neighbourhood - with Metro station; a bit bigger than my office in Iasi, but notnecessarily more fun :P). And last but not least, I let at her home like 12 kg of luggage (because the flight restriction to Seville was 15 kg per person). Happy to lose the extra kilos, I went to the hostel...

Milano - First Day

Having in mind that we will the return to Torino, we decided to go in Milano, looking for more things to see. We had some transportation tickets (with two ways - as we thought), so we decided to take a tram to the train station. Good... In the tram, the guys from the transportation company controlled us, and told us that the tickets were not valid (there are two ways, but should be in less than 70 minutes). All this discussion was in Italian - English (some weird dialect of English that is incredibly hard to understand). After we tried to explained them that this information was not written on the ticket (in an international language) and saw our passports (we were for only one day in Italy, they let us leave). Having this Italian-bitter-taste in the mouth, we went to the train station, and booked our tickets to Milan. All was nice until now... Then, while we were in the train, they announced us that because of a strike, the train will stop inNovara, and not in Milano. A very good news of course, because we had to change trains (and carry our 20+ kg luggage on the stairs).

Finally, we reached Milan, that looked a bit more impressive than Torino (but nothing surprisingly - I was here one year before anyway). Looking on the hotels near the railway, we decided that are way too many starts for us, and to quote theMexican (we're searching for the last class hostels). So, we searched some hostels on a Internet Cafe, and found something near Loreto . The hostel was the only one with prices to fit the budget, so we took it. The room was for sure not recommended to claustrophobic people, but we manage to survive here. My sister (she lives in Milano) told me that Loreto is a very unsafe area (with Romanians, black immigrants, drug dealers, etc) - but at least is more active than Torino :P

Then we went to see the "Duomo", that is still in being reconditioned (for some years already by now). The look is impressive, even if you can't see all the facade. At this hour in the evening, the place was closed, so we decided to go back the next morning for more visiting).


Il Duomo di Milano

To complete the evening, we visited the Galleries, and the commercial district (here I realised that I am totallyunfashion -able - all those pink suites for men doesn't fit me at all). The Christmas decoration were very nice anyway (probably sponsored byDolce & Gabana in this area :P).


Galeria Vittorio Emanuele II




Dolce & Gabbana - temporarily bankrupt :P

The departure

So here is how the experience starts... In the night before leaving I didn't have any time to sleep, because I had to pack - as always, too late. So, because of that, I experienced every possible position for sleeping in the Blue Arrow train. My back still hurts I think :) After I got in Bucharest and successfully reached our wonderful airport Baneasa, I had two main surprises. First of all, the Romanian company decided to change the gates to embark after the lines were created, so it was a very big mess. Secondly, the plane that we flew, was rented from a Bulgarian company, and it resembled very good a bus with wings. Cuneo, the destination "airport", is a very funny thing (smaller than the one in Iasi, the only flight from here is the one to Romania). First impression on Italy, was, as always, kind of bad. Looks very like Romania, and this is not usually a nice compliment. Anyway, some friends gave us a lift from the airport to the railway station (because, of course, there is no connection - so theoretically you have to walk like 10 km - also, I didn't see any taxi there, I think is a "just for friends" airport). From the railway station it took one hour to get to Torino.


The traveller's kit

Torino by contrast looks very nice. I think this is mainly because of the Olympics in 2006. I bought a map from the railway (Porta Nuova) that was showing that the Metro (underground transportation) is going from there to the place we needed. I was happily looking for the entrance, but after 10 minutes I decided to ask some guy for extra details. He told me that it should be metro, but starting from Porta Susa, because the one to PortaNuova is still in construction (so I have to take the bus until there - a replacement for Metro). Finally I found the Metro (that is very cool, the railway is covered to prevent any accident on the stations, and the wagons have no driver, are controlled automatically - this was build for the Olympics).

From the point were the Metro left us, we had to search for the Hostel - and it took a while. No Italian knew where to find the street, and after we finally found it, we realise why was that happening (two cats couldn't pass simultaneously on that street). The streets in Torino were very very empty, seemed like a very silent city - that kind you want to leave in when you retire). We decided to go to Milano the next day...

Holiday Plans

Some days ago I booked my ticket to Italy for quite a long period (14 Dec - 2 Jan). Going to Italy, I managed to make an Italian planning for the whole trip (Italian planning is a very deep concept that implies the fact that you don't have to think before acting), so I actually decided to go after a half an hour discussion with Paulina, my Mexican colleague at Grapefruit (with some beers in front too, as I recall).

I feel kind of awkward being my first Christmas away from home, and moreover because lots of things changed since last year (hard to tell what was good and what was bad, but for sure, many things happened on every possible plan).

Leaving in 9 days makes me a bit scared, because I have so much things to do in the meantime (starting from packing, medical insurance, finish some work for my job, have some exams, solve some financial issues, and so on and so forth).