Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Adventures in travel

View from the breakfast table, near San Gimignano
We recently returned from a long trip visiting family in Switzerland and hanging out like Eurotrash in Tuscany. There’s too much to tell, but I’ll try to hit a few highlights.

Turns out renting a GPS from Hertz at the Zürich airport costs a completely ridiculous 30 euros a day. In retrospect, that would have been cheaper than the divorce that would have been imminent had we traveled with only a map. Thankfully, my cousin ripped his GPS off his dashboard and handed it over just as he was dropping us off at the train station the evening before we left.

We named her Inge. It was a love-hate relationship from the start. Her best lines included, “Sie befinden sich in einer Sackgasse,” (You are in a dead end.) while we barreled happily down the Autobahn. Also, she regularly chirped “Achtung! Gefahrstelle!” (Careful! Dangerous area!) for no discernible reason. And you haven't lived until you hear Inge say, “Poggibonsi,” which is a small Italian town.






Lastly, here's some very old artwork (1500s? Maybe earlier.) we saw at Florence's Duomo.

Apparently this Disney shit is much older than I thought.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

look here:
http://www.denkmalpflege-hessen.de/Keltenfurst/keltenfurst.html

disney was born 2,500 years ago, scroll down to the bottom

OPA

arlopop said...

I once spent a week in San Gemignano. Sadly, most of what I remember involved a solo picnic whit a whole roast chicken and a bottle of the local vino perched just outside the city wall. Lovely place once the tourist buses leave for the day.