TRIP TO ITALY - HOTEL, St. Lawrence Cathedral, Pirate Ship, local street vendors
We had a really nice stay in the NH Marina Hotel.  This is a chain of nice hotels in Europe.  We have seen them in a few cities.  The meals were great, the service great, people very friendly and helpful and could speak English.  Steve and I had the best room in the hotel in our opinion, because we loved the view of the harbor and boats.  Christina was so thankful that her room had a bathtub.  Christina was missing a bath as our "bathtub" in the apartment is pretty small and can hold about 4" of water at the most.

Dining at the hotel.

Dinner at the hotel.

Views from our room.

Across the street from the hotel we waited for the traffic light to change and saw this truck loaded with garlic.  The smell of garlic was really strong.  The local restaurants come here to pick up their garlic.

This Pirate Ship was parked right next to the hotel.  It is a tourist attraction and sort of impressive to look at but we learned after we went on board it was made for a movie, not a old ship really.  But it was fun go visit and look at anyway.

Cannon deck

Every pirate ship has to have it's skeletons

Christina peeking into the captains room.

St. Lawrence Cathedral

Different from many because of the stripped dark and light stone and marble it is made with.

Street Vendors

The street vendors selling cheap reproduction purses, sunglasses and the junk, hang outside of the hotel property waiting to pounce on tourists.  They are really obnoxious and follow you and keep hounding you until you get angry, such a shame.  They are just trying to make a living but it is a really uncomfortable thing to have to walk through and try to avoid each time you leave to go someplace.  Once we saw them all urgently fold up their goods in the canvas tarp and start to walk away, then we noticed the Cabineries coming through.  Funny to watch because as soon as the Cabineries turn around, the tarps go right back down as if this is the normal thing that happens everyday.

Cabineries on the left of the photo, the Vendors fold up and walk away as the police approach then put the goods back down as soon as the police turn around.