The Suttons

We slept pretty well in our weird parking lot. More campers joined us today but we didn’t see anyone. I’m sure they’re like us, just using this place to sleep and enjoying all of Rome during the day. We could have ridden the bus into town but since we’re saving so much money staying there, we decided to splurge and do an Uber there and back each day. That was so much simpler and got us to a prime location in about 15 minutes.  Today’s prime location was Vatican City. The boys count it as our 9th country to visit on this trip! We took our time at a coffee shop in that area and then walked to St. Peter’s Square. It was so impressive. We had 2:30 tickets for the Vatican museum and Sistine Chapel so we wandered around that part of Rome, enjoying gelato, shops, and a unique stuffed pizza pocket for lunch that what was described as Roman street food. We didn’t see many street food vendors, this one was at a restaurant, but it was delicious all the same! We’ll definitely be trying to repl...

We made it to Rome and to our motorhome stopover very quickly! If we thought yesterday's campervan parking lot was weird though, today’s was much weirder. It was the closest to the city center we could get, and much more affordable than big campsites, and since we figured we wouldn’t spend a lot of time there, we thought we’d give it a try for at least one night. The man running the place was very nice and we could tell would be attentive to everyone who was coming and going. Feeling safe, we parked and got ready to head to the center of the city!  We started our tour of Rome by getting some quick pizza and doing one of the walks recommended in the Rick Steves Italy guidebook. We strolled through open markets, plazas with stunning fountains, and into churches open to the public. This walk took us to some of the most famous sites, including the Trevi Fountain, Spanish Steps, and the boy’s favorite - The Pantheon.  We got lots of gelato along our walk. And took tons of pictures....

On Day 18 (June 23) we drove a lot so there’s not much excitement to share. We left our beautiful campsite and set our sights on getting as close to Rome as we could. Italy is ready for campervan-ers and has a lot of “Camper Sostas” (motorhome stopovers) along the autostrada so I knew we would be fine not knowing exactly what our destination was.  The drive was pretty with lots of vineyards, olive groves, and castles in walled hilltop cities. We were still able to appreciate the beauty of our surroundings, even driving by quickly.  We made it to a motorhome stopover an hour and a half from Rome, putting our travel time today at 8 hours. David is thankfully a great driver! He’s made our drive a smooth one on all kinds of roads. This one was fast and stressful, with Italian drivers who evidently don’t care about lane lines, speeding around us.  Our stopover was a weird parking lot situated close to two train stations. There were other campers there and a friendly man who gr...

It’s been super busy here in travel world, and I have gotten very behind in writing on the blog. I’m going to try and catch up so forgive the posts if they get shorter and simpler as the days go by.  Today (June 22) we got up early (early according to our vacation schedule of 9:00) and headed to the water taxi at our campsite port to go to the city of Rovinj. This city was fascinating! From the sea and from the streets, it looks like one of the cities in Cinque Terre, Italy. The colorful houses are closely nestled next to the ocean and there are narrow cobblestone streets that dart this way and that. It was a magical place that, in the boys' words, seemed like a Disney world themed area but was real life made obvious by the laundry strewn from windows and the delivery people hauling packages by bike. We ate gelato right away since it was so hot. And soon found ourselves in a shop selling locally made products and being helped by a nice man named Fabio. He gave us tastings of truffl...

We were all so thankful for a nice long untimed shower last night! This campsite resort is so nice! There are people cleaning the bathrooms all day. There are childrens shower areas and the boys had their own stalls. The bathroom facilities feel very fancy compared to other places we’ve stayed that have been well kept but not this nice or this clean. The whole campsite is pristine and was quiet last night. We woke up to beautiful views of the ocean and took our time enjoying our coffee and catching up on the blog…although you wouldn’t know it because I am behind in posting yet again. After our slow start, we ventured out to one of the shops where the campsite resort sells water shoes. That’s something we should’ve packed, the beach is pebbly here like it is in much of Croatia, so we definitely needed them. We also headed to the check in office to ask about laundry tokens and get Croatian Kuna (cash) since a lot of places don’t take cards. Before walking there we noticed a camper leavin...

Today we drove to Croatia. Our plan was a brief stop in a hilltop town renowned for their truffles and vineyards, and then on to the beach from there. After changing out the van’s water and a stop at the grocery store, we were on our way. Traffic getting out of Bled was awful since there are not many roads in or out of there. A two hour trip ended up taking four, but that was to be expected. The roads through Slovenia were lovely but not as scenic since we stayed on the major highways. Once in Croatia however, our road to the city of Motovun was narrow and windy. We passed vineyard after vineyard and couldn’t believe that this one lane road was actually two lanes and the way into a town. Once again, the boys all thought I had gotten us lost but I hadn’t and we ended up in a lovely hilltop town. The truffle store I found was not all the way up in the town so we walked to it from the parking lot. Most of our journey to find weird and little known places has worked out great, but even I c...

Our motor home parking lot was the best night sleep we’ve had in a while so we will definitely stay here another night. We end up saving around $50 a night and it’s just as crowded but we think probably quieter than Camping Bled would’ve been. We don’t have a large shower or bathroom facility to use, but the van will do just fine. We are getting more in need of laundry though, so hopefully when we leave here we’ll find a place with that. Fingers crossed! After a slow morning, we walked to the lake and started our stroll on the path that goes all the way around it. There are no bad pictures around this storybook-like place so we meandered our way around, taking a ton of pictures as we went. As we strolled and took pictures, we also looked for a picnic spot and a place to swim. We ended up in a little park area with sunbathers, swimmers, hammock readers, and picnickers. It was a delightful little spot to eat and wade in the water. The water was cold but the boys didn’t care. It was clea...