Belgium

We flew on Ryan Air from Italy to Belgium. Belgium is so much fun! We stayed in the coolest hotel in Brugge! Some people spell it Bruges but it is pronounced "Bruge".

We saw the Church that is called Our Lady of Angels. We saw Madonna and Child by Michelangelo there. We left to go on a boat tour after that. It was really fun. We saw lots of swans and old buildings. The boat tour guide was really funny.

After that we went to get chocolate! The shop was small but super cool. I got marshmallows dipped in chocolate. After we ate lunch, Vance and I got waffles. They had whipped cream and chocolate on them. They were super delicious. After we ate lots and lots of chocolate and lots and lots of "frites" (french fries), we got on a train for Paris.....the CITY of LIGHT.

The streets are made of cobble stone.

Here is a "Chinese" resturant. They spelled it "Chinees"

Lots of people ride bikes here! 

St. Mark's Square Pigeon Watch

My brother and me sat in St. Mark's square and put tally marks by different pigeons.  

Date -  April 25, 2013

Time - 2:15-2:30 pm

Area - 4 meter square

Place - St. Mark's Square in Venice

We looked for 8 different kinds of pigeons
Blue-bar
Red-bar
Spread
Red
Checker
Pied white
Pied splash
White

This is what I found:

122 blue-bar pigeons
4 checker pigeons
3 red pigeons
3 pied splash pigeons
2 spread pigeons
1 pied white pigeons
0 white pigeons
0 red-bar pigeons

There were so many more blue-bar pigeons than any other type of pigeon in St. Mark's Square. When people stand by an area there are not as many pigeons that come to that area. But when people feed the pigeons, lots of pigeons gather there to eat! 

Here are some of the photos.

St. Mark's Square

My brother and me feeding the pigeons

Blue-bar pigeon

blue-bar pigeon

Red pigeon

PIed white pigeon

Venice, Italy

This was my last day in Italy. Here are things I think about when I think of Italy.

Bread - Some places make their break without salt like in Tuscany. In Venice they make it with salt.

Pasta - Every restaurant makes their own fresh pasta. I ate a different kind of pasta every day. 

Pizza - Almost every restaurant has pizza. I never ate bad pizza......My favorite pizza is margharita. 

Gelato - Italian ice cream! Nothing else like it! Every street has a gelato place. My favorite flavors are mango & melon.

Meats - They use the weirdest meats like rabbit, duck, horse, and wild boar meat. I didn't try any of them! 

Pepper - They don't like to use pepper. They never put it on the table.

Here are some photos we took in Venice.

My brother and me waiting for a water taxi

Gondola

Canal in Venice with gondolas. A gondola rower has to be Italian born. 

Rialto Bridge with lots of people! 

Last Gelato in Italy! 

Lucca and Cinque Terre, Italy

Lucca

This is the train station at Lucca. 

Lucca is a town that is surrounded by a big wall that you can walk on. The wall completely surrounds the city. We stayed at a Bed and Breakfast in Lucca that had different rooms and good WiFi! 

This is a photo of my mom, my brother and me on top of the wall. A long time ago, people in Lucca built walls around the city to protect themselves from enemies. The picture below is of part of the wall. 

Cinque Terra
The next photos are of towns on the coast called the Cinque Terre. There are five towns that you can only get to by boat, train, or walking. The walking paths were closed so we had to take a train to different towns. The water was so blue! We stayed at the town called Vernazza most of the time. 

Anghiari and Pisa, Italy

Anghiari

We  went to a small town in the hills in Tuscany. It was called Anghiari. There was a lady there making hand-made lace. She was using pins to mark her spot and pin it down. It took her a long time to make the lace. It was very expensive because it took so long and it was hand-made. 

The walls around it were in the shape of a boat. There was stone on the walkways. There was also a well that went down really far to the ground. 

Streets of Anghiari

Looking over the walls of Anghiari

Lady making hand-made lace

Looking over the hill in Anghiari

My dad and I are looking from inside the walls of Anghiari. 
It was really beautiful looking down from the town. 

                            Pisa

Walking the streets of Pisa

We went to the town that has the leaning tower of Pisa. It is leaning because of the poor architecture and the land it was built on. 

Il Borro and Siena, Italy

I woke up and my mom told me we were going to go get breakfast. I was excited. This was going to be the best breakfast since Rome (we have been eating really light breakfasts in Tuscany). We ate breakfast and I remembered I was going horseback riding! My dad was going too. Il Borro has horses you can ride. My dad's horse was a palamino. She was 23 years old but she was super spunky. Her name was Blondie. My horse we don't know her age or her name but we know she was an ex-polo player. We went on a trail ride with a guy name Masamilliano. He was sort of like our guide. We rode all over Il Borro. When we got back my mom and my brother picked us up and we went back to our farm house to freshen up. Then we headed for Siena.

When going to Siena there were lots of windy roads (worse than the grapevine in California) that made my whole family feel sick. We finally got to Siena. We went  to Piazza Del Campo.We sat there for a while then we went to get gelato. I got melon.

Piazza Del Campo

After that we got into our car and drove to Nonna's house. Nonna means grandmother in Italian. She had some people over and was teaching us how to make gnocchi and pasta (along with my family). We made the pasta on her wooden table and ate there too. She had made Ragu sauce earlier and she mixed it with the pasta. It was really good! We said goodbye and headed back for Il Borro.

We got back and wanted to watch tv. In Italy The tv is called a telefunken ( pronounced tele- fun- kin. I think.) We gave up after 198 Italian channels. My brother laidd down on the bed for two seconds and the fell dead asleep ( he's a REALLY heavy sleeper!) I played my itouch for a few minutes and then turned off the lights.

Nonna Ciana

Florence, Italy

 We went to Florence on the train from Il Borro. My brother and my Dad went to a science museum while my mom and I went to the Academia Museum. We walked in and saw David. He was super big! But he was completely naked. We also saw Michelangelo's unfinished prisoners. The unfinished Pieta was also there.

Bronze doors of the Duomo

It is hard to find the names of streets in Florence.
They are on the sides of buildings.

Next, we went to El Duomo. My mom and I decided to climb up the dome. There were 463 stairs! It was so tiring. When we got to the top we could see the whole city. 

Top of Duomo

El Duomo

We went to the Ponte Vecchio. Ponte Vecchio means old bridge. We met my dad and my brother there for lunch. It had jewelry stores everywhere! My mom and I went and got some gelato.  We also went to the Uffizi and saw some famous paintings.   

Gelato on the Ponte Vecchio