Picturesque Places in Italy...

We managed to get out of town again this week - to the hillside town of Assisi. Anyone who remembers anything about saints will know that this was the home of St Francis, the patron saint of animals (as well as others). We managed to pick one of the best days of good, sunny weather yet - perfect to poke around the town in.





We walked and explored through the winding streets, ate pizza and drank wine by a fountain, and of course visited the churches of Assisi.



This week saw us eventually visiting the Vatican museum and the Sistine Chapel - we couldn't leave Rome without stopping by here. Our favourite room was probably the 'Map Room' where they had maps of Italy painted all over the walls. Pretty amazing.



Jane also liked all the sculptures of animals.



The Sistine Chapel was fantastic, but would have been more fun if we weren't squashed in with hundreds of other tourists talking and stumbling into each other as they looked up at the ceiling. But perhaps that's what tourists do best. We are pretty sure that we've seen more tourists than Romans here - which can be quite a shock when you think you've eventually found a true Roman and they start speaking in a broad American, British etc accent.

Other highlights of the week included:

*Cam's haircut. It had to happen. Jane found it quite fun to watch Cam (with no Italian) and the little old Italian barber (with no English) communicate about how he wanted his hair cut. When the barber said "Si, si. Normal-ly!" we weren't sure whether to be nervous or relieved.



Anyway, the haircut was a success, and Cam even enjoyed an old fashioned shave with the straight razor and everything (there are no good piccies of this as Jane didn't want to distract the barber too much).

*Revisiting the Trevi Fountain - both in the early morning (the guy on the fountain had just turned it on),



and at night. It's such an amazing place, and probably one of our favourite monuments/fountains/sculptures.



*Visiting the Leonardo Da Vinci exhibition where many of his drawings had been built and could be played with. Very fun, and of course, educational...

*Going to the Non-Catholic cemetary in Rome. This is where Keats and Shelley (the English poets) are buried. It was a beautiful place, and very well-looked after.

Of course, there were many other cool and interesting things, and we obviously enjoyed spending time with Cam's family. Big thanks must go to them for their hospitality, good company, and of course great food! And tomorrow we are off to Venice!