BENVENUTO and PRE-TOUR

Benvenuto! Welcome!

Mark and I invite you to become pleasure activists with us on this Rick Steves Best of South Italy in 13 Days tour. I heard the term pleasure activist on one of Rick's radio shows and it grabbed me. His guest, Fred Plotkin, explained that it's about supercharging experiences by activating your five senses. Let your senses infuse the experience, instead of just wandering through it.

Being a pleasure activist isn't hedonism, Fred said. (That's a relief to this Midwestern girl!) It’s allowing your five senses to deepen a moment, living life awake to experiences. We're off to a country that's known for its sensory delights so we decide to give it a go! We hope you want to come along and we encourage you to explore what being a pleasure activist means to you!

Our Tour Group

Positano

Pleasure Activists in the Making

Jana exploring Paestum.

Mark is my husband and travel partner who knows how to read a map, knows when it’s time for a gelato, has a keen mind for history, enjoys almost every food put before him and is a good sport about squeezing his 6' 4" frame into the typically tiny Italian showers.

I’m Jana. A travelholic, a woman who laughs loudly, is directionally challenged, is always ready to step into a pasticceria (pastry shop), likes wine, food, and learning about different cultures.

To prepare ourselves to be worthy pleasure activists once in Italy, we immerse ourselves in Rick’s Italy guidebook and his radio and TV shows before the trip begins. Listening to his radio shows we learn about the “gelato experience," educate our palate on southern Italian cuisine, discover how southern Italians differ from their northern brothers and sisters, and chuckle with Rick as he imparts his first encounter with Naples, as a young traveler. We even meet Caterina, who will be our guide.

Mark listening to a Rick Steves audioguide.

Want More Rick?

We do! This is our sixth Rick Steves tour. It’s easy for us to decide that we want Rick to take us around southern Italy. (When we are independent travelers in Europe we want Rick, too. His guidebooks are like travel bibles for us.)

When friends ask us why we love a Rick Steves tour we say there are so many reasons. Let me sum it up this way. It has to do with jambon (ham) and Mont St.-Michel. It’s July, 2007. We’re on our first Rick Steves tour, Paris and the Heart of France, and our guide, Arno, has arranged us into teams. We’re to go to the morning market, find the items we’ve been assigned to buy, and do our best to ask for the items in French! It’s hilarious as we go about looking for jambon and trying to get the man in the white butcher apron, standing behind his counter, to understand us. I look around and see some of my tourmates doing their best to order the correct amount of olives, the perfect cheese that will complement the wine Arno is buying (he said he didn’t trust us to make that purchase!), the ripest plums, and various pastries. It’s a comedy of errors and laughs!

Once we arrive at Mont St.-Michel, we picnic on its grounds. This stunning site and this delectable food, found in the market that day, lay before us. Our newfound travel partners are pouring wine. I am smitten. My husband is smiling. We have found another way to enjoy Europe!

Fast forward to 2018 and Rick’s The Best of South Italy in 13 Days. We know it will be full of WOW moments, just like our first tour!

If you decide to come along, get ready for water buffalo kisses, blue grottos (but not Capri's), the art of "getting your Italian on," and amore! It's Italy, southern style.

Click on picture to link to South Italy Tour on the Rick Steves Website.

Boxed In: In this scrapbook you will find three types of boxes.

Italian 101

Bits about Italian culture, traditions, psyche, food and, in general, the things that make southern Italy so fascinating.

History Bite

A small taste of the long and varied history of this country.

Pleasure Activist Tip

Tips on how to awaken your senses and partake of the magic of Italy.

We Arrive: Ambling About Rome

The Big Nose

Friday, April 20

Before the Tour Begins

“Where's a Big Nose?” I ask.

We're off! It's late in the afternoon and we've checked into the Smeraldo Hotel and now it's time for wandering around Rome. We're equipped with our Rick Steves water bottles and on the lookout for A Big Nose. It’s 78 degrees and sunny. We’re doing our best to stay hydrated as we trek from the Smeraldo to striking piazzas and across the Tiber River to St. Angelo Castle (commissioned by Emperor Hadrian as a tomb for him and his family and later used by the popes as a fortress and castle). We come upon a Big Nose and I bend down to fill my bottle with clear, cool water. I marvel at how the Romans simply stop and drink from it, having perfected the process of shooting the water up and outwards to their waiting mouths.

This is our second trip to Rome, so we're skipping many of the top tourist sites. This time around we want to explore a more intimate Rome before the tour starts.

Trattoria Moderna, close to our hotel, offers us a quiet al fresco experience after we're done ambling and a chance to see the Italians’ love of children. A young couple and their young child dine at the next table. The happy parents enjoy the conviviality as the waitress and passersby engage with their bambino. We enjoy the scene, too, as we dine on an antipasto of buffalo mozzarella in a scrumptious sauce, warm focaccia, and pastas.

Italian 101: Due to so much governmental bureaucracy and frustration living with bella chaos, Italians have perfected the art of making moments pleasurable. When they greet someone they say “it’s a pleasure to meet you.” They create moments and evenings of intimacy and socializing. I learn from listening to Fred Plotkin that their philosophy is: “We merit time together." When they dine out, they allow all their senses to take it in: the adorable children, the beautiful women, the handsome men. The food, the aroma of the food, the touching of the woman's arm as the man leans into his bella donna. It’s all part of sensual living.

St. Angelo Castle: equipped with a secret passage for the popes to use.

Trattoria Moderna: antipasto

Church of Santa Maria

Prayer Requests

Trastevere and Rome's Birthday

Saturday, April 21

Before the Tour Begins

“This walk is to train your eye to see Rome more intimately,” Rick whispers in our ears.

Rick’s audio guides us to begin the Trastevere walk at the island in the Tiber River, crossed by the bridge Ponte Cestio, and finish at Santa Maria in Trastevere. Let's go, Rick!

We step into the Church of St. Cecilia and are able to visit the crypt and the loft, too. It’s in the loft that we see the Cavallini frescoes. (Photos not allowed.) We linger over the frescoes that are from around 1300. There are fragments of The Last Judgment fresco showing the apostles and Christ together. Only later would I read that these images are described as "pulsating with truth." If you go, time your visit to see these frescoes. They are worth it!

In the Church of Santa Maria Rick tells us to grab a pew. Most of what we’re seeing is from around the 12th century. We also meet Cavallini again with his mosaics of the life of Mary from the 1300s. Before we leave we seek out St. Anthony and look at the prayer requests people leave on bits of paper. It's touching to see this.

Now, we take Rick’s advice and venture farther from the square to see more of the neighborhood.

The Game of Where’s Rick?

When in Europe I like to spy all the people who have a Rick Steves guidebook. It makes for an easy conversation and it’s an easy game to play because Americans are devotees of his guidebooks. (In Ireland, a guide at a museum actually stopped me and asked about the guidebook I was carrying because he sees so many people carrying "this Rick Steves book." "Who is this Rick Steves?" he asks.)

So, at lunch at Rugantino in Trastevere, we sit next to Americans who have the oldest guidebook we have ever come across: Rick Steves' Italy 2000!

History Bite: We learn that the island was once the site of a temple and ancient Romans who were sick would spend the night there. When healed, they would leave small statues of their healed body parts in gratitude. We see this tradition of ex-votos up close in Sorrento.

The Tiber River

Pleasure Activist Tip: Saunter and take the time to see. We’re meandering down a rather hidden alley. A restaurant kitchen has its window open. I glance in. The cook is stirring a pot of sauce. I look closer. Yep. That’s a toothbrush in her mouth. Mark and I chuckle. An intimate moment captured.

Church of St. Cecilia

Intimate Trastevere

Rick Steves' Italy 2000

Rome’s Birthday Celebration

You never know what you might find right around a Roman corner! To our surprise there's a full military band. The crowd's in heightened anticipation. Then she appears: the mayor of Rome. Media swarm. People cheer. The band begins playing and Romans break out in song. I’m not sure what the song is but I can feel and see the emotion on the faces all around me. The Romans are celebrating their city’s 2771st birthday!

Pleasure Activist Tip: Participate in any festivals or holidays you come upon or at least enjoy watching the locals celebrate. Four celebrations we experience on this trip: Rome’s City Birthday Celebration, St. George’s Day, Liberation Day and May Day.