Spontaneous Cumbustion . Venezia: The best experiences in Venezia are in the outer districts, away from The Rialto area and the Piazza San Marco. Just wander the side streets and enter any Bacari (wine bar). San Polo has the Cantina do Mori wine bar. As for restaurants, from my notes, “Osteria Bentigodi in Canareggio 39-041-8223714 was excellent. On the Piazza San Marco is the Caffe Florian. It’s the oldest coffee shop in Venice and, actually, in the Western world. I found it to be a special experience. The Venezia soccer team was promoted to Serie A this season. Their stadium in on the very eastern end of Venezia. If they have a home game during your stay it would be worthwhile and I would be forever envious.
Spontaneous Cumbustion . Roma. This is difficult. Of all the places I have been to in the world, Roma offers the most. I would like to live there. While maybe not “fun” as you describe it, the Pantheon is my favorite landmark. Having an apperitif, meal, and gelato in the Piazza Della Rotonda while looking at the purple beam of light shooting at the heavens from the oculus of the Pantheon at night is special. For nighttime experiences the Trestavere district is where to go. You can wander the streets and pick a place(s), but it might be better to make reservations.
I used Google Maps for planning and outlining purposes. Prob not exhaustive but it absolutely met my needs. I used it for actual navigation in Germany (throughout North Rhine-Westphalia specifically), since the municipalities had local trains tied into real time traffic (e.g. train on time, train delayed by 3 minutes, etc). I believe Luxembourg also had this same level of data available, but this was 2 years ago. And its likely improved since then.
Thanks for all the info xec. Any particular website better then others for getting restaurant reviews in Italy? Can obviously use google and yelp but didn’t know if Italy had a better site. Definitely want to have a couple nice dinners to go along with street food, markets, oaterias and trattorias.
Spontaneous Cumbustion before I went, I read up on gelaterias and the biggest tip I came across is that you’ll want to check their banana flavor to see if the place is legit. If it’s yellow, go somewhere else. If it’s a grayish color like an actual banana, it’s legit
Also, I looked up places and went to what some called the best gelataria in Rome as well as a decently priced restaurant but the best I had of gelato and food were just places that I walked to that were near our AirBnB
We had a pretty good dinner at Ristorante da Fortunato al Pantheon, it was right across the street from our airbnb. Ate at another place just north on the Piazza della Maddalena but can't remember the name and google isn't helping. Too bad, since I liked that place more than the more famouser Fortunato. Also ate at Gelateria del Teatro on the via dei Coronari - google says it's just an ice cream shop but it was a full restaurant when we were there. Felt like I had good food everywhere, but I'm not a foodie so what do I know
I try to find restaurants that aren’t too frequented by tourists, especially American tourists. In Rome that’s hard to accomplish unless you venture out into the neighborhoods like Testaccio. The Trastevere is different though, to me. It’s very lively at night. Although there are lots of Americans, many of them are students attending university in Rome. Lots of local folk too. I recommend making reservations if you want to dine in Trastevere.
This is a good rec and something we did by accident really. We were staying over near the university and wanted a quick drink and ended up hanging there for a while, nice casual atmosphere and you could tell they didn’t get many tourists. We were also there during high tide which was wild to see, had no clue we might need to walk on the risers they were putting in the middle of the streets
Well passport appointment made. Please pray for me that it'll come in 11 weeks. Booking flights to Costa Rica this week and airbnb in Nicaragua. First trip in 2+ years. First trip/flight with and 18 month old. Massive house just for 3 ppl with infinity pool overlooking the pacific
Venice might be the easiest city, that’s heavily touristed, to find excellent little restaurants and bars that rarely get tourists. The Dorsoduro and Cannaregio districts are perfect for this. Most tourists stay in the corridor: train station -> Rialto bridge -> Piazza San Marco. High tides can be a problem. Especially this time of year. I was there mid-October and one was predicted. They set up the risers and everything. But nothing happened. A month later parts of the city were under 6 feet of water.
42 days until Costa Rica here. Loose itinerary: -7 day aya trip -3 days in La Fortuna -2 days in Monteverde -7 days in Samara -7-10 days in Santa Teresa/Montezuma Will be doing the digital nomad thing so don't want to move around too much.
Wife wanted to go to Trastavere but we never made it over there, our airbnb was right next to the Pantheon and we ended up just traipsing that area pretty much the whole time (keeping it simpler with three teenagers in tow) when we weren't hitting the main tourist spots like the Vatican, Colosseum, and Capitoline Museums. Feel like we got to know the Navona-to-Trevi area pretty well. Wife concurs that the little restaurant on the Piazza della Maddalena was a more enjoyable dinner than the more famous Fortunato. Still touristy, but for the area it felt less so, quieter, sleepy little square across from yet another church, whatever I ate (Gnocchi? Prawns? fuck I can't remember) was bathed in garlic and it was delicious Not food-related, but want to give a hearty recommendation for taking a few quiet moments with the Moses statue in San Pietro in Vincoli.
So jealous. I fucking loved Santa Teresa. Make sure you're there on a Thursday. It'd the bug going out night. You'll be in the thicc of green/rainy season so it'll be a little quicker. Pls go to Product C for some bomb ass fish tacos/sandwich and Caracolas for some good true local food on the beach.
We ate lunch there like 3x the fish sandwich (almost like a poboy) and tacos are legit. Also the only bourbon served down there and have a great liquor lemonade or something
I can put you in a great tour guide in Monteverde. Let me find it edit: Nasua Tours where I shot this:
This is my favorite thing about this board still, after a decade or so. All of these recommendations and tips are awesome.
2 night stay for babymoon earned something like 26.5k Hyatt points. Go out and grab you some fellas, I think that's 7x the everyday rate between the current promos on my account which end very soon, but will probably pop up again.
We stayed in a 14th Century building on Campo Santa Margherita Square in Venice near the university. The last night we were there, the square cut loose and people were out drinking and dancing until 2:00 AM or so, largely spilling out from the wine bars at the top of the square. It was cool until it wasn’t, as we had a 6:00 AM flight.
First vacation in 2+ years booked. Had to change it up to a different house. 8 nights in one place in a foreign country. Not sure I've stayed anywhere more than 4 nights, usually trying to jump to a few cities somewhere. Pretty pumped to do absolutely nothing but surf, chill in a pool, and pray to fucking GOD my 17 month old child can be at least a little fucking chill. Don't fuck this up COVID This is for 2 adults and a toddler.
Is that the same as Campo della Maddalena? If so, that’s one of my favorite piazzas in Venice. It’s sort of tucked out of the way and not that many tourists visit it…even though it’s a half block from a busy shopping street. You might not be able to find your restaurant because it might have closed. I’m finding quite a few in Italy that either aren’t there anymore or have a new name.
I've never seen it as Campo, just Piazza. Just north of the Pantheon and the Piazza della Rotonda. Google Maps says there's now a bar there, Divinium Di Russetti Giuseppe Antonio. In other news, Cucina Del Teatro looks like it's still there, even though Google Maps only shows a gelateria. https://www.cucinadelteatro.it Edit: google maps shows the cucina, if you zoom in real close Edit edit: google street view shows that the restaurant is still there: https://www.clementeallamaddalena.it
have a wedding in SF to go to, using the amex plat credit to splurge on staying at the Fairmont, old weird hotels are great going to spend most the trip in Napa though, hotel prices have very much rebounded up there so going to do the same airbnb we've done before
This still in hacienda iguana? Playa Colorado? I stayed in that neighborhood with two buddies back in 2017.
Yeah. How did you like it? I've got a buddy that owns land in the development and hopes to build in a few years. He been a few times and like it. I just want to do nothing, surf, drink on the beach/pool, and check out for a week. Originally planned to go around 2017. But I think that's when all the civil war shut broke out before the election.
It’s great for disconnecting and just hanging out. We had a plunge pool at our place and also spent time at the neighborhood pool and bar on the beach. We got unlucky and the weather/waves were shit for the few days we were there. That’s when we realized how far away we were from anything and everything.
Yeah plan to hang out at Pili's some and the restaurants/brewery in the community center. What time of year did you go? December is probably on of the worst months for surf, so it'll be nothing amazing for me. Just hope it's rideable so I can have fun. Looked back a few years and see it's at least waist to chest
Fhr and hotels collection or whatever When searching on Amex site you can select to only show those two
yea so you're just referring to the $200 then I've been flirting with using it but always get gun shy when I realize how much I'm still spending (rather than just getting a cheaper room elsewhere lol)
Yes. The Plat really isn't worth it anymore as I hit the same wall. Probably wouldn't use this one if not for the wedding as every other option is nuts.
I want to say we were there in early to mid June. We had come up from Santa Teresa. They were just messy. Unridable. My two friends I was with who are big into surfing didn't get into the water once.
Interesting. I loved Santa Teresa. Wife and I were supposed to go back, but could never get the schedule worked out with the grandparents.
The waves were fine in Santa Teresa. Idk what happened with the weather between there and Playa Colorado.
heading to Croatia in 3 weeks- doing Plitvice for sure... is Krka still worth it even if you can no longer swim? I'm thinking yes, but wanted to make sure