ITALY!!!!! SANTA MARGHERITA

Day 62
Nuova Riviera, Santa Margherita Ligure e Portofino

Trains. The nightmarish part of our travelling...or is it travelling that is the nightmarish part? Anyway, the trains are known in this part of the world to be a little untrustworthy, in that the times...can change, at any time!

Which they did in Nice as we were leaving. There was an hour hold up, which caused us to be delayed at our stopover, Genova, so we ended up being at Santa Margherita 3 hours later than we intended...but 'them the breaks..eh'!

Weird...when..you cross a border..from France to Italy, there's nothing to say you're in another country...which for us Aussies is a bit strange seeing we have such defined boundaries when we go country to country! Anyway...as soon as we realised we were travelling on Italian soils we hip hipped horayed...haha...was so exciting. ITALY! A place i've always wanted to go!!! I decided to push aside the knowledge that Greg has been to Italy, 12 or so times in his life...such a small detail!

We arrived in Santa Margherita i felt so at home. It's a beautiful place! Pretty beyond words....and well, just so italian...advertising for Pizza and lasagna was everywhere...as was for brushetta and other italian breads...yummo, couldn't wait to sample..

And we noticed...all the coloured buildings!!! So pretty!!! So Italian, we thought! Very, very colouful. And sculptured...the streets are perfect....and instead of street sweepers, they have a man picking up leaves one at a time!!!!

BUT! Accomodation first. At the train station there was a list of hotels..we wrote down the one star hotels...because Santa Margherita doesn't have hostels!!!

We head for Anabella's..no one home. Head for Nuova Riveria...one star, and 75 Euro per night. 70 if we stay 2 nights, 65 if we stay 3. We opt for two and decide their talk of 'casha only...and nica rooma...cleana...newa...very gooda!" was ok for us!

And it was beautiful. We couldn't fault it. Everything was nice. So worth the extra money. Usually there's something wrong...crap shower, no shower in room, no shower curtain, no hook for shower holder, twin beds, dirty, or whatever. But nope. This was divine. It had towel warmers, a bidet, a balcony..and all the extras. We were going to have FUN Here!

Went to dinner at the local italian restaurant that i can't think of the name of, ordered dumplings thinking they were meatballs and got pesto pasta of a sort (they looked like worms!) but it was NICE. The next night we went to a fantastic restaurant called Columbo...(was a baroque restaurant opposite the CHristopher Columbus monument that was built in 1904 and was originally a pharmacy and all the furniture was walnut and even the original lollie jars were in the servery..so gorgeous) but anyway, had dinner there..ordered lasagna..got flat pasta with pesto..

What is it with pesto! Have had pizza...and it has pesto sauce on it!! Not that i'm complaining..i love pesto..ordering food in Italy is just like a pizza though, it's full of lots of wonderful and weird things!!

The lady at Nuova was a funny one....i thought of They're a Weird Mob when dealing with her (Nino Culloto) she was so paranoid...'noa...you can'ta leava luggage hera...noa...ohhh noa....!" I was going to leave my book I'd just finished..with her...yet another one of Mauve Binchy's epic's...of 762 pages (read the Circle of Friends last time) 'Firefly Summer' which i'd just finished (about the hotel Patrick O'Neil was building set in Ireland) but decided...no..she might panic about that too!

So! Here we are...Italy! Santa Margherita is so beautiful..hilly, green..and close to the Cinque Terre...

Which i will tell you all about next!!!!!!!!