Holiday Slideshow: Gaeta, Italy

Do you get a bit sad on the final night of your holiday?  I always get a bit sad.  Because I know I'm heading back to reality, to bills and emails and groceries and laundry.  Because I know I'm saying goodbye to the possibility, the anything could happen, of travel (at least for a little while).  Even writing this post, about the final stop on our holiday is making me feel a little bit sad!

After getting off the big boat we headed towards Rome and stayed in a little seaside resort called Gaeta.  The old town is rather pretty and lovely to walk around, and we had the best meals here (seafood pastas, simple grilled fish, yummo!).  Gaeta is packed with hotels and restaurants and places to camp.  It feels a bit like the kind of place where families from Rome would go every summer holidays, year in year out.  A bit like Sorrento or Torquay in Victoria (what would be the equivalent in your neck of the woods?  Maybe the Gold Coast for Queenslanders?  Or the Sunshine Coast for New South Welshians?)

We stayed in a stunning hotel a bit out of town, Grand Hotel Le Rocce.  It had a beautiful little beach (though it was quite a trek getting down to it and back, probably for the best after all that pasta...) and gorgeous terraced gardens with the most amazing collection of succulents. If you have a few days to kill and you're flying out of Rome I'd highly recommend a couple of days swimming and eating in Gaeta.

Our holiday ended the way all our European holidays end - with my husband completely underestimating the amount of time it will take us to drive to Rome airport, which leads to a very nervous hour or so watching the clock in the car and me telling him to 'drive like the wind!'.  And then we get to the airport with barely a moment to spare, so the husband throws the step-sons and I out of a moving vehicle whilst yelling 'grab the bags! run to the check in desk!' while he speeds off, throws the car keys at the poor hire car guy and sprints back to meet us.  Ahhh, the fun of family traditions huh?

ps. thanks for indulging me and my holiday slideshow posts!  I hope you enjoyed them - if so, there are lots more photos on my Flickr.  And if not, normal programing will resume shortly!