Italian Riviera

Actual Dates: July 31-August 3, 2013

We decided to take the kids to the beach at least one time this summer:) what could be better than swimming in the Mediterranean Sea!!!
We drove through the Swiss Alps for a bulk of our drive, beautiful!! Interesting fact about Switzerland , when you enter their country they stop you at the border and you are required to buy their sticker. This sticker is 30 Swiss franks, pretty close to the dollar, and it must be on your windshield in order to drive through their country. You will be fined without it???
Anyway, beautiful scenery and yummy chocolate.
When we arrived in Italy the first stop was Milan (Milano). Everything in Italian ends in a vowel. I liked the city feel here but it was overwhelming, this city was like New York Times ten. Shopping and people EVERYWHERE!!!! Mopeds EVERYWHERE !! There are no lines in the road and mopeds are exempt from stopping at red lights in Italy, very very chaotic. Especially because everyone in this town drives a moped.
We shopped, had pizza and gelato and visited Il Duomo, a beautiful cathedral. Ground broke on this cathedral in 1386. It has 3500 statues and is the worlds third largest church.
Funny fact:::: billy dropped me off to get beer and wine at a store and because the roads are so crazy, he lost me:) it took him 20-30 minutes to find me again and according to the kids he was FREAKING out. Sometimes it's nice to hear how much they really care!!
We arrived at our apt around 11pm and it was on a pitch black road going up a mountain with one lane, scared! We were staying in a town called Moneglia, very Italian, pretty much nobody spoke English:(
We sat outside and had wine, so nice! The only thing we really did our whole trip was swim because it was truly to hot to do anything else. Nice beaches but very rocky.
We had to get gasoline while we were there and we know see why everyone drives a moped, a tank of gas cost us $150!!!! We are spoiled in Germany because we are given a special card to swipe that gives us US rates.
We ate a very authentic Italian dinner, delicious and family style, we all shared everything.
Only downfall was , like everywhere, no AC!!! The difference was how hot it was here, we opened everything possible and the only thing that did was let in bugs....lots of them! Next time I need to go here in June when it's a bit cooler.
On the way back we stopped in Como, Italy (Lake Como). We shopped around the lake and ate, pretty happening town.
We also stopped in Switzerland and had dinner at a restaurant in the heart of the alps in a hotel. Not amazing but loved the view and the ambience of the place.