Friends abroad

     Day and I would leave Venice and spend a day with S and P, before we headed to Milan, and then home. We had met S and P in Tuscany two years earlier, while having dinner. We stayed in a nice villa in Radda in Chianti, and an option was to have the proprietors cook dinner for us. There were six of us, Day and myself, our friends S and D, and a couple we had never met before. By the end of the night the couple, S and P, felt like friends, maybe, it was all the wine. We seemed to have hit it off though, exchanged contact information, and stayed in touch via email and texting for the next couple of years.

     Years and years of vacations, have left me with many great moments and memories. I remember sitting on the banks of Loch Lennhe in Scotland, remembering the stupid argument Day and I had before I left for vacation, and wishing she was there with me. Dinner at Patrick's restaurant in Grenada, is another great memory, and a good story. I look forward to writing about it at some point, with the hopes you enjoy reading about it, as much as I have enjoyed telling the story over the years. Meeting S and P, and keeping in touch, is one of those moments.

     So of course, when we decided to go to Venice, we had hopes of meeting up with them again, but what are the chances of that happening? Yes we had a good time at dinner, they were fun and friendly, yes we exchanged contact information, and actually kept in touch. We kept in touch, but that only means exchanging text messages a dozen times in two years. We enjoyed having dinner with them, but that was only a few hours, and now we are going to meet them somewhere in Italy? If I were being honest, I wasn't getting my hopes up, and if we did meet, would we really like them as much as we thought we did, or was it in fact, all the wine? Well, we did make plans to get together via Facebook and text messages. We would leave Venice by train to Mestre and spend the night. The following morning, Day and I would take a train to Bassano Del Grappa, where S and P would pick us up at the train station. We would spend the day together, with two people we had met two years ago, for just 3 or 4 hours, and have only chatted with via text messages since. What could go wrong?

     Apparently, nothing, the day was perfect! Day and I got off the train, and headed up the stairs to the street, to the call of, "Curly Due!" And there were S and P, with big smiles, ready to greet Day and I. We exchanged hugs and the niceties, and headed to their car. Niceties quickly turned to a genuine interest in what we were all doing these last two years, and it felt like, old friends catching up. They were as friendly, funny, and as easy to like, as we remembered. Great, that means we will not be having lunch with two psychos ( I am sure they were worried about the same thing ). Lunch was good, they took us to a very nice restaurant. S and the waiter were very patient as Day practiced her Italian, and we continued to catch up on the last two years, for the next couple of hours. We finished lunch and would continue our day in, Bassano Del Grappa, north of Venice.

Bassano is a great old town, with tons of history. Bassano del Grappa, named for nearby Monte Grappa, is a pretty medieval town on the Brenta River in northern Italy's Veneto region. Bassano del Grappa is known for its Alpini wooden bridge, grappa, and ceramics. It's a pleasant base for exploring the nearby Venetian villas, castles, towns, and attractions of the Veneto region, often overlooked by travelers heading only to Venice.

We wandered the streets, Day and S chatting and window shopping, P and myself bullshitting about work, investments and retirement, AND of course vacations. I call them S and P, for privacy reasons, the same reasons I chopped off their heads in this picture...

but there they are, S and P, and here we are...

Day and I on the Ponte Vecchio, (old bridge)

The bridge was a stronghold for allied forces in WWII, you can still see the bullet holes in the buildings on either side of the street. The bridge itself was a perfect vantage point for great pictures.

I can't decide which one I like better. Not bad pictures for my phone camera though.

The day was pretty normal, even uneventful for the most part. Day and I took a train ride to meet friends for lunch and a walk around town. What was not normal, S and P were strangers, other than a 3 hour dinner and a dozen or so text messages, who we decided to meet up with again, on the other side of the world. Day and I were not sure how this was going to go, but by days end, it was clear, we liked S and P.

     Day and I had a train ride to Milan to muse over our day spent with our new friends. The day could have been uncomfortable, awkward, like a bad dinner date that doesn't seem to end, but it wasn't. It was comfortable, enjoyable, and like I said, like catching up with old friends. By chance, a couple joins us for dinner in Tuscany, who has a friend with the same nickname I have, "Curly," we hit it off and exchanged contact information, and two years later, we meet them in Bassano Del Grappa. I like stories like that. One I will enjoy telling for years.

     Day and I are planning for Prague in March or April of next year, and we do love Italy, so we look forward to meeting up with S and P again.