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Thanks to a generous friend of Kate’s, we had tickets to see Madam Butterfly at the Coliseum theater in London’s West End on Saturday night.

The theater was amazing!  My knees weren’t a big fan of the “very little leg room” seats, but the spectactical was truely an experience.  Eventhough this production was in English, there was still subtitles.  It was entertaining actually reading the subtitles because you are surprised when they can sing something like “would you like a drink”!

We’ve also found out, that if you are hanging out in the West End of an evening, you can secure cheap last minute tickets to plays, opera and orchestras.  Yet another thing to do on a Saturday evening!

As for Sunday, we took the opportunity to enjoy an afternoon at our local “pick-your-own” farm Rectory Farm.

We are now the proud new owners of 5 large punnets of  raspberries, 2 of strawberries, 1 of red and 1 of black currents.  One good thing about pick-your-own is that you have to taste to ensure you get the berries that suit you.  Word of advice though, berries alone can’t be counted as a meal…

Lonnie thoughts

A couple of our day trips provided some intersting sights… the highlights as follows…

The bones of St Nicholas in the Cathedral in Trani.  St Nicholas (Santa Clause) was thought to be a fool, but eventually I guess they realised that he wasn’t a bad chap.  So, bones in box.  Lovely!

A Knights’ Templa Church in Trani.  Trani was one of several places used as a staging point for the Crusades – hence Kights needed somewhere to, reflect I guess…

Barletta was also lovely, here’s a 3 wheel “ute”

And the local turtles were doing an ancient ritual known as “a turtle stack”

Lonnie Travels

From Ruvo we made a trip further south into the heel of the boot that is Italy.  Lecce has a wonderful historic centre within medieval walls.  We holed up an a BnB and tripped around some of the Roman ruins of Lecce as well as checking out the amazing Baroque arcitecture that Lecce is famous for for example Santa Croce’s Basilica

More photos of Lecce start here.

Some things in Lecce were closed to visitors because on the weekend after we were here, the G8 summit was being held in the Castle.

I did, however, enjoy (as I do) the many Roman ruins. This place was littered with them like this one right in the town square

We also tripped down to Gallipoli, a lovely sea-side town right down the south.  We did some swimming here as it was getting hot.  BUT there was some time to checkout the local church.  The interior of the Church was full of lovely oil paintings.  The beach was also lovely with water so clear you could see your feet!

After three days down here, we headed back up to Ruvo. On the way back, we stopped into an enormous cave system, the Castlellana Grotte.  It was about a 3 hour walk down into this system of caves formed in limestone.  Absolutely amazing.  The tour guide was also amazing.  How one person could have three accents on top of her english had me bluffed.  I’m not sure how her geological knowledge was though, she spent the entire tour pointing out various rock formations that look like things… everything from a rabbit to the Madonna and child.  By the end, I think I was seeing animals, food and inate objects in every rock formation!  It was an impressive, deep and varied system.

Upon our return to Ruvo, we did one more day trip to Molfetta, another staging point for the crusades.  Given the temperature, we again hit the beach.  But there was a lovely port…

So that ended our two weeks in Italy.  Naomi and D saw us off at the tain station, which in true Italian style was pretty much marble wall to wall…

The complete photo set from Italy can be found here

It’s good to be home, but I will miss the pizza…

Lonnie Travels

Here is a fantastic video of Barack Obama swatting a fly, he’s quick!

Lonnie thoughts

A.k.a. “the bus from hell”
Following the wedding that D+N were here for, we all headed south. Italy is about 1000 km from North to South, we were heading almost to the very South some 800 km. We were told by the husband of one of Naomi’s cousins that the bus was the way to do it. The bus was supposed to be cheap (which it was), quick (which it sort of was- 11 hours) and finally the bus was supposed to be comfortable. The bus was not comfortable. Being an over night service was probably a contributor to the lack of comfort. On the trip we did see why so much marble is used by Italians, we saw entire paddocks full of 1.5 x 1.5 x 3 meter blocks of raw marble in many colours…
Upon arrival at our change over destination of Bari, we jumped a metro train to arrive bleary eyed at Ruvo.
Ruvo was to be our base for the next few days. It’s a lovely small town where a lot of Naomi’s relatives live. Of an evening the town commes alive in the most bizzare way. Young and old the inhabinants flock to one of the larger streets to promenade. Yes they walk up and down this particular street talking and walking. When they get to the end of this street they turn around and go back. It’s an amazing sight, it so social and friendly. Kate and I have sat and watched this practice a few times now, it is just amazing and also so nice.

Lonnie Travels

Thursday we headed to the world heritage region of chinque terra. It’s an amazing mountain-ocean area where steep hills meet the Mediterranean sea. The land is terraced and the resulting flat land is farmed. It is thought that if the land wasn’t farmed it would slip into the sea. That would be a pity… They grow a lot of grapes for wine!

We trained it between the 5 main villages to see what each had to offer. Each village was different but they all had spectacular views up into the surrounding hills and down into the Med. Due to the heat we also managed a swim. Swimming in June in the UK would require a 4mm wetsuit…

One problem i have as a tourist in places like this is every time you turn around i take another photo… Even if i’m standing in the same spot! Some of my many hundred photos can be found here (starting at Chinque Terre).

Lonnie Travels

While D+N did the family thing, Kate and I were left to our own devices. We wandered around Genoa using all means of transport – even the underground. It seems that the underground is a secret. I’m not sure if it’s under used because there is only one line, or because it doesn’t cover much ground. Either way, it is amazingly clean, frequent and newish. We found the aquarium, re-visited the mountain cable car and hit our first Italian museum. The museum was interesting, in the “more staff than visitors” way. The content was nice enough, lots of Jesus paintings and marble carvings, but given the abundance of staff, we were followed around like a novelty. Maybe they don’t get many visitors…

To finish off our day we did a bit ofshopping. The main purchase was some anti-histamines for kate’s cat allergy. Lucky the pharmist spoke the international language of medication so kate asking for something for
“meow, meow – achoo, achoo”
Got us what we wanted….

Lonnie Travels

We have been based in Genoa in the North for 5 days. Our inital plans to move about more were put aside for some in depth travelling. Not long after we arrived, D+N got us up in the mountians behind Genoa for a walk. We visited the forts that were built to defend the area about 300 years ago. While most are locked up, we managed to get in to a couple and look around. If they weren’t 3-4 hours walk, they’d make lovely homes!
We’ve also visited the abbey of San Fruttuoso, which is only accessable by either a 3 hour walk (which we did to get there) or a 25 minute ferry (which we did to get out!)… The views on the way in included some lovely coastline and some WWII bunkers with extensive underground tunnels.

San Frutuoso Abbey

We’ve also managed to eat quite well… Particularly with Naomi’s ability to find great local food. One highlight of the region is the foccacia, which is sold by weight. The foccacia is best bought and eaten hot and straight out of the oven- even though this usually means queuing behind a heap of locals who seem to know when the stuff is just about to come out of the oven (an Italian 6th sense?)
Another highlight has been the pizza. I wont go on, but let it be noted, I will return to Oxford heavier…

Lonnie Travels