June 12, 2015 - Happy 117th Grandpa, I celebrated in Italy!

When mom said I couldn't have a kitten, Grandpa got one that he needed help with. I know he would have taken me to Italy if I'd asked. :-)

Today was sunny and beautiful, in the 80's, low humidity, gorgeous morning for a ride across Italy. (Argh on bus window reflections)

You can take the girl off the farm...

We're heading south toward Rome with a stop in Assissi. On the way there we dropped in on a couple who made us the most fabulous fresh-made pasta lunch. SO GOOD!!

Eric. He loves all women, especially the ones who feed him.

Marc, Eric and Karen.

Eric learning how to make pasta. I hope he remembers for my next visit to florida.

My buddy Devon and our tour director John.

Back on the bus with beautifully full bellies and on to Assissi to climb steep hills and use up all those carbs!

The basilica at Assissi is actually 2 basilicas, one built right on top of the other, and the whole place is built on top of the tomb of St. Francis who died in the mid 1200's. There's also an old pagan temple here, circa 0 AD. Yes, ZERO AD. Here we learned that you are not allowed to take pictures inside a church if the pope has been there. Strange rule, but okay.

We stayed in this beautiful mountain top town for most of the day then headed to Rome where we learned what narrow roads really are and had an interesting bus ride up to our hotel on a bluff.

The big long building is the monastery.

 Eric, Jaxon, Kirsten, Cody and Benny

i love this statue. it looks so medieval to me.

this is the zero AD temple. and a nun.

 This is the pagan temple in the middle of town.

Crystal, I swear if I could have figured out a way to get this home, it would have been knocking on your door!

I love cool fences.