After 16-days, I get to jump-start a cold blog. It shouldn’t be too hard considering I’m bursting with stories about our adventures in Italy.

Today I’ll set the scene. Plus I have a few cell-phone pics to get the ball rolling before I begin to share the AMAZING photos sitting on my Nikon D3100 (the high-resolution pictures should start with tomorrow’s post).

SELFIES! I know, my daughter has already told me I sound like a teenage girl when I use the word “selfie,” but Rebekah and I tried for a daily self-portrait – in context – to run as a consistent place-marker throughout the adventure. The idea turned out to be a lot of fun.

So here’s our Italy-Adventure itinerary, with a few place-markers along the way:

PLANES: The first of our six flights (Delta, Air-France, and HOP), took us from Raleigh-Durham to Philadelphia. We snagged a Philly Chesse-steak, overnighted our way to Paris, then took the long hop to Naples where we found a city bus to take us downtown to our hotel on the traffic nightmare known as the Piazza Garibaldi.

Over the next couple of days we hoofed our way around the medieval maze that is the old city, took another bus to Pompeii, and climbed up to look into the caldera of Vesuvius.

TRAINS: Our Trenitalia ride to Rome notched a cool 300-km-per-hour, then the regional took us to Assisi and we boarded a rattly local bus for the ride into the old city. Trains in Europe are wonderful, and once you figure out the intricacies of ticket machines, validations, transfers, and train-station cappuccino it’s a great experience.

What helped was our commitment to limit ourselves to carry-on baggage. A large backpack for me and a smaller one for Rebekah. No checked luggage, period.

Assisi is a super-cool city, and you’ll hear more detail – along with some vivid photographs – in an upcoming post.

After two-days of great exploring we took another series of train rides from Assisi, to Florence, to Padova, to Vicenza, where we were met on the platform by Andrew and Alicia.

AUTOMOBILES: We’d been looking forward to seeing Drewski and Alishka in their own home and we weren’t disappointed. Sure, we took a few train rides over the second week, but mostly we were tour-guided in the VW-Golf-GTi by our local connection.

Seriously, friends, if you’re going to head into Venice it’s a good thing to bring along a son and daughter who can find their way around, speak Italian, and know all about the good local food.

Our stories from week two will include Vicenza, Venice, the most amazing opera experience imaginable, wine-tasting at the vineyard, motoring to the Adriatic coast, Revenna, and the incomparable San Marino.

PHOTOGRAPHS: And, yes, in addition to the series of place-marker selfies, I’ll be including some of the best travel photography I’ve accomplished to date.

So tune in for the next two weeks for a mixture of travel and inspiration. And share with your friends. You won’t be disappointed.

Peace, Promise, Blessings… and ADVENTURE! – DEREK

(Below: the “almost complete” self-portrait collection)