So Long, Farewell, Auf Wiedersehn, Goodbye

We left Salzburg early on Tuesday, and I must say I was sad to leave. I really like that pretty, romantic Austrian city. But we had places to go, people to see. Well, no people really, but places definitely!

We wanted some road behind us, so we left without breakfast and then stopped for breakfast once we were on the road, but still in Austria. We stopped at a highway rest stop where we could get gasoline and some breakfast at the same time. The restaurant was very cute, and looked like a Swiss chalet. Not your typical gas station stop. The waitress spoke no English, but we managed to get close to what we thought we ordered. The best part of the breakfast was that we made friends with the table sitting next to us. They were a party of three older men (probably retired) on their way to play golf in Slovenia. One of them very kindly came over and introduced himself. We talked a bit about golf and about travel. I asked him if he was a good golfer or if he was a hacker. Bill later suggested I not use slang when talking to people for whom English is a second or possibly third language. He pointed out that I might have inadvertently said something like, “Were you a member of the Nazi youth?”

The drive to Padua was extraordinarily interesting. We must have gone through a total of (and I swear I’m not exaggerating) 15 to 20 tunnels as we made our way through the Alps in Austria and the Dolomites in Italy. The longest was 6.4 kilometers (which is over three miles), followed closely by 5.8 kilometers, both in Austria. The tunnels in Austria were well-lit, large, clean, and LONG. Once we drove into Italy, things changed considerably. The tunnels are just large enough, and not well-lit. Scary, in fact.

Driving in Italy is different from driving anywhere we have driven so far. When we got close to the turnoff for Venice, all of the sudden the trucks in the right hand lane (and there were many) were stopped dead, and we were still going along in the left lane at 70 mph. We couldn’t quite figure that out. In the meantime, cars were trying to pass us at I can’t even imagine how many miles per hour. But we made it safely to Padua, I’m happy to report. This is where we will be for the next six nights.

Our hotel is very nice, just outside of town. There is a bus that we catch right across the street that takes us into the city center for one euro. This afternoon we took the bus into town and walked around a bit and got our senses for Padua. We went and visited the main Basilica, and saw the tomb of my favorite saint of all time: St. Anthony (Dear St. Anthony please come round; something’s lost and must be found). I needed to use the bathroom, and had my first Italian bathroom experience. I walked in and found a hole in the ground, and they wanted me to pay 20 cents for that. Sometime soon I will have to resort to that because I’m in Italy. But I just wasn’t ready yet and elected not to do it. I spotted a full-habited nun going in after me, and would have loved to see how she did it. Well, maybe not.

We had wine on the piazza outside of the duomo, and then as we were looking for the bus stop home, we saw a pizzaria, where we stopped for dinner. Our dinner included gnocchi and pizza. So, we had dinner at a beer garden yesterday and pizza in a pizza garden today. Funny how time flies. Tomorrow we will play by ear. We have to get up our nerve to get on the roads again!