Flashback: Claire and Adam in Italy, 1998
The first trip that Adam and I took together was very special, in many ways. Neither of us had never been to Italy, and we wanted to experience local living so we decided to find a quiet place to rent while we explored.
Even though the web was exploding in the late 90's, there wasn't much for finding vacation rentals by owner. There were no apps. No Yelp reviews. If you wanted to find a private residence to rent, you had to look in classified ads in travel magazines.
Sure enough, on the back page of a travel magazine, we found what we were looking for: a farm house in Tuscany that was converted to guest rooms with kitchens. That would be our base for exploring central and northern Italy by car and rail.
We arrived in Rome in March when the warm weather was starting to return and not rainy. We rented a car in the city center and quickly got stuck in a large, intimidating traffic circle that was six cars wide. It took a few laps around before we learned to go with the flow. Rome traffic is crazy, but almost no one uses their horn. Drive with confidence!
We did spend a few days in Rome, but were anxious to hit the road and we did. We respected the 130km/h speed limit along the Italian Autostrada, although it was clear not everyone did so. Soon we found the turnoff onto a country road up through a river valley towards the olive farm.
And there it was! Our private Tuscany farmhouse, nestled in a quiet valley of olive groves still sleepy from winter. From there we would explore various sites in central Italy: Florence, Milan and Venice.
The highlight was Venice, a magical and romantic city. Roaming the narrow streets, Adam was handed a flyer to a Vivaldi concerto in a small candlelit church off an old narrow side street. I was not feeling well , so I stayed at the hotel, while Adam was swept away by voices and strings.
Finally, we flew back to Toronto but told each other that we will come back to Italy someday … [to be continued]
