So, here's the timeframe at this point in our story (that being the time of publication, just after the weekend in question). This coming weekend (July 17), I have tickets for concerts as part of the famous Jazz a Juan festival, so I won't be leaving town, and the weekend after that, I fly back to the States. But, this weekend, I had nothing better to do than travel.
This was my last hurrah.
So, Lake Garda is a sizable lake in the northern middle of Italy. I figured if I was repeating one country I've been to this year, Italy probably deserved it most.
"But," perhaps you ask, "Why not Venice, Andy? Why not finish what you started last time?" Eh, I don't know. I've heard some less-than-flattering things about Venice since the volcano flummoxed everything up back in April, so I wasn't as excited to see it anymore. But I should probably answer the question behind that question, which is, "Why Lake Garda?"
This is gonna' sound stupid - and a little weird coming from me - but I wanted to see Garda because of a video game. For those unfamiliar, Pure is quite a good ATV racing game. Novice-friendly, fun stunts, but best of all, it has taken the Playstation 3's graphics capabilities to the limit. The environments are all very well-rendered, but the first level, set in Lake Garda, is simply stunning.* When I realized early last week that I was relatively close to this place, I thought: "You know what? I could go there!" So I did. Also, my folks were there years and years ago and confirmed that it is, in fact, very nice. Hopefully, after looking at my pictures (warning: there are many), you'll agree as well.
(183) is Thursday, 8 July 2010.
I spent the afternoon doing train patchwork, including four hours in a distinctly uncomfortable Trenitalia 6-seat cabin. I really don't know why these exist; I cannot think of a single advantage to designing a train car this way.
I debated titling this entry "The Kindness of Strangers" just because I met so many nice people this weekend. The first was Rolf, a Swedish guy singing in a men's choir for a single gig that night in Sirmione, the peninsular town where I was staying. When I didn't have enough change for a bus ticket, he just paid for it and, once the bus was moving, refused my persistent requests that he let me reimburse him.
I'm so not used to hotels. I had to consciously stop myself from packing flip-flops for the shower and my own towel and washcloth on Wednesday night. The Hotel Corte Regina was nice-- clean, good location, decent breakfast, very nice family running the place-- but I have gotten so used to hostels that the niceties (like my own bathroom, a TV, and clean towels every day) didn't seem worth the extra money. I also missed meeting fellow travelers, but it was nice to have my own private space (not just a locker) to come back to whenever necessary.
(184) is Friday, 9 July 2010.
At breakfast, I met Balazs, Balazs, and - depending on whether you're referring to father or son - wife/mother, Helen. They were a Hungarian family staying the weekend, and they offered me a ride to GardaLand, my destination for the day. Once there, they also offered to take me back if our schedules worked out. Very nice people.
But anyway, GardaLand is a sweet theme park... They have a few solid coasters, incredibly short lines, and a decent entry price. Best coasters I rode:
--The Blue Tornado. This one's a big feet-dangler... very fast, although a tad too wound in upon itself.
--Mammut. More traditional wooden-coaster style, though all metal and new this year. It's slower with fewer pure thrills, but makes up for it by playing really well with your expectations; each time you think it's about to end, something else cool happens, which instantly dispels the "that's it?" feeling you often get on coasters after waiting a half hour on line.
--One other coaster whose name I can't remember... it was more swooping-- just what I was looking for-- but way too short. If the Blue Tornado and this one had a baby, it would have been my ideal.
But then there was this little guy. No way was I getting on this silly, stupid, slow, sad excuse for a roller coaster:
I then took a wrong turn trying to get in line for a different one and ended up getting on this silly, stupid, slow, sad excuse for a roller coaster.
Change of subject now. The park had a whole section about the wild west and, having taken a film westerns class, I was actually impressed by how many references they nailed (the whole park was actually very well-maintained and not tacky at all). I chuckled at one stand playing the theme music to Sergio Leone's epic The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly.
Which just punctuated the fact that this section took the phrase "spaghetti western" to a whole new level.
GardaLand was good, but the fact is, nobody does theme parks better than America. The common stereotype among Europeans that everything's bigger in America is true here: even the Blue Tornado (there's a picture of it in the album) is a big coaster built on small-scale design principles (winding in on itself instead of looping). Also, the entirety of GardaLand is pretty small compared to most American parks.
BUT there is one awesome thing that they have and most American parks don't, which is a SWEET aquarium. I killed my camera battery taking pictures of fish and urchins and manta rays (they have faces underneath that freak me out a little). If you go to GardaLand and they offer you the combo ticket for an extra 4€50, DO IT.
So, if you're using local buses and trains in Italy (which is kind of a stupid idea to begin with), never try to get anywhere between the hours of 4 and 6 pm. Not only is there an inexplicable vacuum in that time window of the schedule, but even the buses that are scheduled to run don't help matters. This sign makes the point unintentionally well:
In musical terms, a fermata is this symbol:
...which, when written over a note, means the musician (or driver?) plays the note for as long as they see fit. Which means, theoretically, everybody else could wait a very, very long time. Also, I heard after the fact that there was a transit strike that day, so that might explain why I had to take the most circular route possible:
(185) is Saturday, 10 July 2010.
2 weeks left now.
I got up at 4:30 to watch the sunrise... Such a good decision. See pictures. I sat on the water's edge with my feet in for about two hours.
Then, the second biggest event for the day was the ferry to Monte Baldo, a big mountain on the upper right side of the lake with a gondola ride to the top and panoramic views of much of the lake and surrounding mountains. This is why I'm here.
Here's the problem: it's summer, and the lake is kind of hazy. So the view wasn't everything I'd hoped, but the haze did make the surrounding mountains look really cool and mysterious. The other neat thing I didn't count on seeing was a steady flow of people para-sailing. Just... walking off a hillside and flying over Lake Garda.
I want to do this before I die.
So, I walked around the hilltops (often without my shirt, so as to balance the fearsome farmer's tan I've developed) for about two hours and went back down to Malcesine, the cute little town at the foot of the mountain. I found pizza and gelato and waited for my boat.
But I got on the wrong one.
I caught a boat in the next town that would take me back. But what followed were 4 1/2 hours (instead of 2, if I'd been paying attention) of cruising around the lake, stopping at virtually every town around it. It's a big lake. There are several towns. And taking up one of the two air-conditioned areas of this ferry - a mode of public transportation I should remind you - is a party which I can only describe as The Italian Bar Mitzvah From Hell.
First you've got the DJ, who is himself singing the Italian words to songs that are at their best poorly performed and, at their worst, poorly performed and recognizable. And of course, this ferry has the acoustics of a hollow concrete block, a fact punctuated (with several exclamation points) by the five or six thousand Italian kids running crazy and screaming over the entire boat, parents making no effort whatsoever to stop them. So, I listen to my iPod and take many, many photos of windsurfers and coastal towns.
And, as I do this, I can't shake this feeling... that the party's over. Garda's really nice and I'm glad I took my last opportunity to travel, but I felt like it was time I spent time with people I really like again. I've mastered traveling by myself and enjoyed doing it, but... I'm good for a while.
And I don't mean to end this on a downer note; I think that it's good I didn't feel this way sooner, and plus, a desire to get home will take the sting out of having to leave this wonderful continent. Two weeks. Good number for a countdown, I'd say. And the format of this blog makes the counting exceptionally easy.
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Footnote
* This is what I'm talking about. The game footage doesn't actually start until 1 minute in, and some of the scenery that hooked me first shows up just after time 1:24.
