Italy: Day 4 - Lake Garda 9/08/05

Luckily for me and Jennie, Thursday was some special local holiday. People who lived in Verona did not have to work. So, for the day, Lorenzo took us to Lake Garda where he did some windsurfing while Jennie and I sunbathed. Lake Garda is the largest lake in Italy. Most of the beachcombers were German tourists. The beach was small and did not have any sand at all, only rocks that were quite painful to walk on without shoes. Not the nice smooth round rocks but jagged ones. Thank goodness we brought a chair. Jennie, however, did not mind laying down. Theraputic maybe. Windsurfing seemed to be a popular sport at the lake. Kite surfing, says Lorenzo, is also becoming a trend. Unfortunately, I did not bring my camera so I don't have pictures of the lake.

After an hour of windsurfing, Lorenzo came back ashore with blood dripping down the side of his face. Apparently, when he fell off his board, the wind picked up the sail. It swung around and smacked his noggin. He had a small gash right above his left eyebrow. Jennie and I found the local pharmacia and bought him some antibacterial wipes and the sticky tape that holds wounds close. To my surprise, there is no such thing as Neosporin in Italy. Such a shame. I've already bought Lorenzo a tube of Neosporin and will be sending it him shortly.

We drove around the lake, found some excellent gelato and then headed to Verona. By this time, Jennie and I were positively starving. We finally came to notice that Italians eat lunch around 2pm and eat dinner after 8pm, sometimes even at 9pm! This was not working well for us. Looking forward to dinner in Verona, we were surprised when dinner consisted of a calzone looking thing about four inches across while standing at a counter with Lorenzo's friend who was wearing bright green pants. Yes, bright green, like the color of Wrigley's Doublemint Gum. Our whirlwind tour of Verona did, at least, allow us to visit Juliet's (as in Romeo and Juliet) balcony. There stood a bronze statue of Juliet. The boys convinced Jennie it was good luck to rub her right breast and she did! HAHA! But, no, the rubbing of the breast for luck is well known.

After the calzone mini dinner, we had to run home for Lorenzo to change and get to football practice. When asked if we wanted to join him, of course we could not turn down a chance to watch hot Italian men sweat on the field!





This was a real treat! They were very serious about their training. The short scrimmage ensued was also quite fun to watch. After returning home for a short shower, Lorenzo finally fed us! It was nearly midnight but we found a pizzaria willing to serve us. Lorenzo got a tuna and onion pizza. I got a ham and arugula pizza. Jennie got something strange involving small shrimp. I can't say it was my favorite but definitely was good to try. Although the restaurant staff was annoyed that we stayed much past their closing time, they were generous and even offered limoncello after dinner.