While at Portovenere we spent a day exploring Cinque Terre. A day really isn’t long enough but we still managed to get a quick look at all 5 towns. We walked Via Dell’Amore (Love Walk) and the track between Vernazza and Montorosso, but the rest of it we went by train. A section of the track around Vernazza was damaged earlier this year by floods and landslides and still wasn’t open. Vernazza itself was damaged and they were still doing repairs and pumping muddy water when we were there. On the walk to Montorosso we found a little Italian man sitting inside a makeshift shelter selling freshly made lemonade, red wine and limoncello.  Needless to say, we nearly kissed the guy and the rest of the walk was made with lighter heads (and wallets!).

And what a night it was! Everything was perfect. Mel had made hundreds of paper flowers and transported them, and a multitude of other arty decorations, all the way to Italy. The flowers were used on the cake, as table decorations, as buttonholes and as boquets. Much to the boys’ delight, they were asked to make the lego decoration that went on the cake that was made by the bride and bridesmaids. A variety of food was decoratively arranged in the arches and everyone had a chance to paint part of a canvas with the outline of the town of Vernazza on it. Riley spent hours carefully copying the photo onto the canvas. Finn spent the night on the dancefloor and was a crowd favourite…as usual. I think his haircut had a bit to do with it as well. Thanks to Dao for all these photos. Only one of them is mine!!

Our next stop was Portovenere, where Dave and Mel were getting married (photos of this later). We had about a week in this beautiful part of Italy, just north of Cinque Terre (photos of this also later). Dave and Mel found us some gorgeous accommodation right on the water and a few hundred metres from the piazza. The town has an interesting history and several restaurants and cafes. It is a popular place for weddings and we saw one nearly every day we were there…but none as big as Dave and Mel’s. The wedding was in the castle, waaaay up on the hill. Yep, lots and lots of steps. Not so bad going up, not so great coming down after many drinks….

Riley joined the Tablelands Youth Orchestra this year and went on tour with them in September. One of the shows they did was at his school in Yungaburra.  He’s really enjoying playing with this band and they’ve asked him to join their jazz band as well.

On our way to Portovenere the train passed through Pisa so we hopped off, stashed our bags and walked the few kilometres to the tower. We didn’t get to climb it though. There was a 4 hour wait and we still had a bit of travelling to do.

A mixed bag of photos from ’round our ridges. There’s a few from the kids’ fancy dress masquerade ball. In case you were wondering, no, there were no other matchsticks at the ball. Then there’s a couple of sporting achievements. Finn won all his races at the school swimming carnival. There’s only 5 boys in his age group. Two are in Grade 2 and they didn’t compete in the races. The other 2 are in Finn’s class (Grade 3) but they didn’t turn up on the day. So….Finn won everything. He also won the monthly medal at their first month of golf. It’s pretty much even stevens with them at golf, both of them hitting around 50 for 6 holes. They competed in the Atherton Cup last weekend. Riley beat Finn by 2 shots and Finn won the least number of putts. I’ve also chucked in a couple of photos of my boys all dressed up for a wedding we went to in September.

Variety is the spice of life so I thought I’d chuck some non-holiday photos into the mix. Weekend before last the Salmons came to visit and Matt did the Atherton 8 hour mountain bike marathon. Riley, Finn and Toby had a go at the kids circuit. It was a fun but tiring weekend for adults and children. 

Our last port of call on the cruise before we disembarked was Naples. We opted again for a guided tour and boarded a bus for Pompeii. We spent 2 hours with the guide and I thought it was fancinating. I could’ve spent longer but I think 2 hours was just right for the kids. Pompeii was a very advanced city, especially given it was so bloody old (it disappeared under ash and pumice in AD 79). It was a central city for many cultures and languages, and this was especially evident in the brothel. To get around the language barrier, the “options” were provided as paintings on the walls (frescoes). All a gentleman had to do was point to the picture of the act/position he desired and the appropriate lady would be brought down from upstairs. The frescoes have been restored and the images are very clear. I didn’t include them here because they are fairly rude and I thought it might put some of you off your dinner :). The grooves from the chariots in the stone roads were mindblowing. To think that so many chariots over such a long time had worn these deep grooves, and here we were sticking our mass produced, synthetic footwear in them and taking digital photos!  At one of the public fountains (the one with Finn in the photo) there is a deep depression in the stone on the side of the fountain where people, for countless generations, had been putting their hand when they leaned over to drink. The groove was really deep…just worn out of the stone by hands. I could go on but enough of my ramblings. More info in the captions. Enjoy! (Oh, I forgot to mention anything about Naples….well, that pretty much sums it up. It really wasn’t worth mentioning!)

From Tunisia we headed back towards Italy, stopping at Catania in Sicily. We only had a short time in port, so organised to do a tour up Mount Etna. We travelled in jeeps (yep, as expected, one broke down) and drove quickly out of Catania, through the villages and up the mountain. We walked the last bit to ‘the top’. There were spectacular views all the way up, including the town of Riposto, where Terry’s grandmother was born. The trip back was very rushed. It was peak hour and Sicilians like to park in random places eg. the middle of the goddamn road, which means the traffic was horrendous. We made it back to the ship just in time for our ‘curfew’.