Tuesday, September 10, 2013

En Route - Canada to Italy via Chicago

Welcome to all our loyal readers ... and the occasional readers as well. I love keeping a diary about our adventures in various parts of the world and am happy to share them with other interested people - travellers, vicarious travellers and anyone else who cares to read our blog.
This adventure will take us to Italy for 6 weeks. We will land in Venice where we will spend a few days (admittedly not enough time). Then we will rent a car and move west to Parma (home of parmesan cheese) en route to Cinque Terre on the northwest coast of Italy. In Cinque Terre, we will meet 14 friends from Australia!! We are very excited about that. Cinque Terre will be followed by a week in Tuscany, cooking courses and truffle hunting included. After Tuscany, we will spend almost 3 weeks exploring the west coast of Italy by car. We will drive as far south as time and activity allows us before heading back to Rome for a final week in Italy.
Currently, we are sitting in a comfortable airport lounge in Dusseldorf, Germany, waiting for our flight to Venice, the final leg of the journey. Our route includes three legs -  Toronto - Chicago, Chicago - Dusseldorf and Dusseldorf - Venice. Yes, a bit unorthodox but all in the name of maximizing the number of airmiles we collect so that we can take another journey soon.
We felt good about leaving Canada. Life seemed well under control. We are confident the students living in our house will take good care of it. Wesley, Karen and David have all settled into a new school year with ease and excitement. Edward is happy spending time with Grandma Wilson while Karen is working. And, after quite a saga of dysfunction and loss, Jim's brand new hearing aid was delivered to our hotel in Toronto at 8 pm the night before we flew. (A short version of this story is that the hearing aid malfunctioned last week; Jim took it to the local company that supplies them; unable to repair it, they shipped it by courier to the manufacturer in Toronto; it was lost en route; the manufacturer recognized the urgency of the situation and created a brand new hearing aid on Monday afternoon and a rep from the company delivered it to our hotel! Starkey's provides outstanding service in our view.)
And so we are all ready for our Italian adventure! Stay tuned!

1 comment:

  1. Sounds like an incredible journey! You will love Venice and the walking paths at Cinque Terre. If you are ever driving near Rimini on the east coast of Italy, take a day to visit the Republic of San Marino which is nearby and in the mountains. It is not far from the coast and unbelievably beautiful! Safe trip! Looking forward to following your adventure on your blog! D :)

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