Aperol and Campari spritzes at the Colosseum!

Top 10 Italy

ByCameron

We spent over a month in Italy, which is a dream come true for a lot of people. Is there any place on Earth as perfectly romantic? You can tell from my posts, such as where I gushed over Venice, that we found Italy magical in so many ways. But in other ways…not so much. Here are the things I loved and disliked most about Italy, in no particular order.

10 things I loved about Italy

  1. The food. Italian food has always been one of the easiest cuisines for me as a vegan, because the Italians eat simple, fresh foods, rarely include any hidden ingredients, and usually use olive oil instead of butter. Just leave off the meat and cheese and you’ve got a scrumptious vegan dish. I definitely found that on this trip, and when the food was good…it was really good. And the pizza in particular…oh, the pizza! Especially around Naples, it’s as legendary as they say it is, and I ate it almost every day. The wonderful poofy dough, both blackened and soft after 90 seconds in a 900° F wood oven, and that tangy San Marzano tomato sauce. (I hear the mozzarella is good too!) It’s to die for!
  2. The wine. I have pretty much given up on wine at home, because it always gives me an unpleasant allergic reaction. Not so with Italian wine, which doesn’t allow all the awful additives that American wine does. Our good friend Lindsay Gabbard, who moved from Santa Barbara to Rome seven years ago and now helps run a place that might be described as a wine lover’s dinner experience, got us pretty smashed on a half dozen delightful Italian wines at her establishment one night in Rome. No allergic reaction…just a good ol’ well-deserved hangover! Even the €3-5 bottles from the supermarket are deliciously quaffable (and almost cheaper than the mineral water!).
  3. The aperitifs and spritzes. I knew I liked the bitter Italian aperitifs like Campari and Aperol. But I didn’t know you could add a little Prosecco and sparkling water and turn them into the most gloriously refreshing adult beverage that summer has ever known. Spritzes are all the rage everywhere we went in Italy, and they’re spreading to much of the rest of the Europe, and the only mystery is why the rest of the world hasn’t caught on. I will be making a lot of these when I get home!
  4. Every bar is also a coffee shop. This is somewhat genius. In the States, we have coffeeshops that are open in the morning and bars that are open at night. In Italy (as in much of mainland Europe), they just combine them into a single establishment that you can visit any time of the day for the beverage of your choice, plus pastries and snacks. And they’re ubiquitous. Did I mention that an espresso shot usually costs just a Euro (or thereabouts) if you drink it at the bar? Needless to say, Starbucks and their fancy, overpriced coffees aren’t really a thing in Italy.
  5. The Amalfi coast. This coastline is justifiably famous—it’s stunning. Think Big Sur with picturesque little villages clinging to the hillsides, crumbling stone towers perched on every hill, and sailboats and yachts bobbing in the aquamarine water. I thought the famous fishing villages of Cinque Terre, which I visited in 2005, were unique, but turns out that Italy has several other equally amazing coastlines!
  6. The islands. Just a short ferry ride away from Naples and the Amalfi Coast, the islands of Ischia, Procida, and especially Capri are simply spectacular. There’s not many places on Earth that Mother Nature has blessed with so many treasures, including steep cliffs, caves, natural arches, crystal blue water, and even hot springs. Add to that the picturesque villages, castles, and Roman and medieval ruins, and you have some places that are hard to believe actually exist.
  7. The history. I love the fact that no matter where you turn, there’s evidence of several millennia of civilization here, often rubbing shoulders with modern development. There’s so much of historical significance that’s it’s impossible to rope it all off, because there would be no room for anything else. In Rome, great sections of the old Aurelian city wall still lounge about, and the modern city has simply gone around them. Some people live in apartments built right on top of it. Cobblestoned roads built by emperors two millennia ago are still used. On the Amalfi coast, homes have been perched right atop old defensive towers, and ancient stone retaining walls are still used to hold up modern buildings and roads.
  8. The art. I was an art major. But to be honest, I find most art pretty uninspiring and most art museums a bit tedious. (The Vatican Museums are positively mind-numbing with their sheer quantity of works.) But it’s impossible not to be blown away by the work of some of the Italian masters. I was particularly moved by all the sculptures by Bernini, who was considered the Michelangelo of the 17th century (though I’d say he’s possibly even better) and whose work is all over Rome. We saw some of his most famous works up close at the Borghese Gallery, including the The Rape of Proserpina and Apollo & Daphne, both created in his early twenties. They’re just stunning. And of course, we saw some mind-blowing architecture, including St. Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican, completed by Michelangelo.
  9. Leonardo da Vinci. Of course, this dude was not only an accomplished artist, but also a scientist and inventor, and he was my idol when I was a kid, especially after somebody gave me a build-it-yourself model of his flying machine. Apparently Amy is a fan too, and now Griffin has followed suit. We found a hands-on da Vinci museum in Florence where there were models of many of Leo’s inventions, and I could barely drag Griffin out of there after two hours!
  10. The high-speed trains. As backwards as Italy can sometimes be, their high-speed electric Ferrarossa trains are a delight and a far cry from their rather shabby regional trains. The only thing you miss when whizzing between Venice, Florence and Rome at 250 kph is the chance to really enjoy the scenery, which goes by pretty quick.

10 things I disliked about Italy

  1. The food. As much as I loved it…I also got tired of it real quick. In many towns, it’s nearly impossible to find anything other than…Italian food.* Restaurant after restaurant with almost the same exact menu. Do the Italians really have such a limited culinary imagination? Eating cheese pizza, pastries & ice cream every day is something most teenagers probably dream of, but here, it’s the actual adult diet. They just don’t really ingest vegetables that much. I begged and pleaded: please put some veggies on my pizza. But the only ones on offer, at least in June, were eggplant and zucchini, and I only ever got a tiny handful. Maybe a slice of bell pepper and a basil leaf if I was lucky. It became a running joke. The pasta was no better, and it wasn’t long before I started to feel like a poofy, white piece of pizza dough myself.
  2. And specifically, the salads. If they weren’t covered with eggs, meat or seafood, then all that was left was some anemic lettuce, cherry tomatoes…and maybe a handful of canned corn (?!?). And the only dressing option, ever, was balsamic vinegar and olive oil. Apparently, I am completely spoiled by the diversity and creativity of our spectacular salads in California!
  3. The bottled water. Italians lead the world in consumption of bottled water. There’s nothing wrong with their tap water; they just refuse to drink it, and whenever you ask for any, you invariably get an expensive bottle of fancy Italian mineral water instead. Somewhat ironically, Rome has more public drinking fountains (which look like big iron taps that are always running) than probably any city in the world. Many have been around since the time of Julius Caesar, and they’re supposedly all fed by spring water from the hills outside the city. At least the tourists take advantage of them!
  4. The private  beaches. Wherever we went in Italy, at least in all the touristy places, most beaches were not public; a spot for the day typically runs you €25 or more. To be fair, that spot includes a beach chair and sometimes an umbrella. But I resent that you have to pay to use the beach (unlike in California where the beach by law belongs to the public and nobody can charge for it or block access). Of course, once you’re there, you’ll want to stay as long as possible, so the beach clubs conveniently provide overpriced drinks and snacks, much like a movie theater or amusement park, to their captive audience.
  5. The toilets. Half the toilets, at least in the men’s rooms, don’t have toilet seats. Some are simply a ceramic ring in the floor. On one of the trains we boarded in Rome’s central station, the toilet was a hole directly onto the tracks…no wonder the station smelled like it did. All trains used to have toilets like this…a century ago. In the States, Amtrak trains stopped channeling human waste onto the tracks forty years ago. Even India is phasing it out. But things move…slowly in Italy.
  6. The motorbikes. Italy is obsessed with motorcycles and scooters, and they’re beyond obnoxious. They’re loud. They’re dirty. They’re constantly darting around cars, running stop lights, going way too fast, and flaunting every other traffic rule. How delightful could places like Rome be if all these motorbikes were replaced by bicycles? But the Italians would never give them up.
  7. The urban planning. In most places the sidewalks are shit, if there even are any. Streets that should be pedestrian thoroughfares, and are generally used as such, remain open to traffic, with taxis, cars, and motorbikes pushing their way through the crowds.
  8. The parks. What’s the difference between an Italian park and an empty lot full of weeds, trash, and stray cats? Absolutely nothing. Except one has a fancy gate and a plaque.
  9. The trash. The graffiti. And the stench of urine. Especially in Rome. It’s really strange how the inhabitants of such a glorious city really just don’t give a f––– about keeping it clean.
  10. The heat. At least in Rome and Florence, the June heat is insufferable, topping 100° F many days…which makes everything, including you, smell rather…ripe. It’s just not pleasant. And the lack of trees & public parks in cities like Florence means there’s little refuge from it. If you visit Italy in the summer, stick to the coast…which is where the Italians themselves go.

Okay, so these are my lists, full of gross and unfair generalizations, based on visits to a few places mostly in the middle of Italy when It was unusually hot and crowded. But it’s a diverse country (and nobody would think to summer in the middle of the U.S. and then make generalizations about the whole country based on that). But we did so much during our time there that I feel like I got a reasonably good feel for the country and its people.

Italy is incredible. It’s also frustrating. How is it that a people that forged a huge, powerful empire and a sophisticated civilization over 2,000 years ago now struggle with basic sanitation? As Amy has learned, Italy also has some serious problems with human trafficking and other human rights issues. A Google search for “is Italy a third-world country” returns a surprising number of results. (How refreshing it was to come to London afterwards, where things are just so tidy and functional.)

And while we met some of the nicest, sweetest people there, I also got the sense that a lot of Italians are possessed of an almost adolescent sort of temperament—passionate, impatient, self-absorbed, and somewhat lazy. Again, gross generalizations (and I wouldn’t describe most Americans as exceedingly mature either). But I’ve decided that the Italians are not really my people, and I missed the more relaxed and conscientious vibe I had felt in countries like Austria and Slovenia.

A month in Italy? Incredible. But a few days after we left, Amy and I both agreed that we got the full experience and probably don’t need to visit again. But…don’t hold me to that!

* To be entirely fair, I enjoyed two phenomenal vegan meals at some adorable restaurants in Trieste & Florence.