Letter From Italy

Dear diary...

This was a letter I wrote about my trip to Italy when I was twenty one.

Luckily mum and dad kept hold of it and placed the letter in an album.

I thought it went well with the Inspiration Point.

4^th September 1975.

Dear mum and dad,

This letter may seem strange, but then I'm a strange person as you know. I think personally it's nice to receive a letter even if it does have a lot of spelling mistakes which you know I'm famous for, but I can say so much more in a letter.

One reason I'm writing is that me and Mike wish you both a Happy Anniversary and may you have many more and be as happy as me and Mike. The other reason I'm writing is to tell you all the news that we just don't have time to sit down and talk about.

When we were in Italy on the Tuesday, we had the chance of a lifetime to go up in a chair lift. Me and Mike watched other people go up to see how they do it. You have to stand in a square and as the chair comes around, it lifts you off your feet and off you go. On the way up it's so peaceful and we saw some really beautiful scenery. You could see over the mountains to the next village. We saw some cows with bells around their necks, the reason for this is because at the end of the summer, the men from the village take a week walking up the mountain to round the cows up, to bring them back down from the mountain ready for the winter, the bells are so they don't get lost.

We also walked down to Fleur valley which is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen, it's just like a fairy tale. There are tall trees growing all around you, and up on the mountains. Then you have the ice cold river running and rushing down from the mountain to the village, there was even a man trout fishing. There was a lovely spot on the river where Mike took a picture of me sitting on a large pebble in the middle of the river.

In the evening we went to this disco just down the road, it looked just like a cafe from the outside, but walking through the cafe you entered into another big room called the K U Stall, it's completely done out in their own timber. There were wooden ceilings, walls, floors and even wooden shutters to hide the light, in fact there were no windows just the shutters. Then of course there was a wooden bar, chairs and tables.

The music is English with a few Italian tunes, but people dress so differently, they wear the flat old fashioned shoes and knee length tight skirts, also the mini is popular, but they are certainly not fashion conscious like in England.

Before we went to the disco, we stopped off for a pizza, they eat them in the bar of a cafe like we have ploughman's lunch in the pub, but they are not as good as the pizza in Franco's in England, over here they are much smaller and the vegetables and meat are piled high on top of the pizza. It wouldn't be a meal for a celebration,as there's no atmosphere, but the disco makes up for that.

They have a great outdoor swimming pool just down the road from where we stayed, it was about 500 lira to get in and you could stay all day if you wanted. I took a picture of Mike diving off the board and then one of him swimming, then he took one of me swimming towards him. On Thursday we spent all afternoon in the pool and we sunbathed, what made it even better was that these two boys were playing the guitar. “Talk about being serenaded!” As soon as we got too hot, we would simply just go for a swim again.

Just before going back to the hotel we were able to have a shower, then come back and get changed ready for the evening meal, before going out for a drink. I have to say it's one of the best holidays I have ever had.

The only dispute I had, there was so much trouble on the coach going over and coming back. I think if I had been in the hotel down south where they were having so much trouble because the hotel was so stingy that it would have been a rotten holiday, but we were lucky to choose the best place to stay.

We were also lucky enough to visit Lake Garda. You know how the sun reflects off the water? Well we were queuing for half an hour to go on a boat ride and it was scorching. Ann our rep said it was quite cool for the time of the year, but I think it's the hottest day I've ever known.

Well I'll close now and look forward to seeing you soon.

Love and Peace,

from

Jenny and Mike.