We're big fans of Italy. We love the language, the food, the cities, and especially their slow pace of life. We're also big fans of other people experiencing places that we love - so our hope is that as soon as you are done scrolling through these images, the next thing you do is book a ticket to lo Stivale (the boot)

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Blevio

Our first stop was Blevio, a small town on the Southwest finger of Lake Como in Northern Italy. We chose to make this our first stop so we could spend a few days relaxing away from the tourist hotspots on the lake, and the view from our Airbnb definitely helped. Also our hosts gave us some free Red Orange juice, which is an automatic 5 star rating for the Johnsons.

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Lake Como

We took a ferry around Lake Como, and it was definitely worth the 25 Euros. You get to relax on a boat as it cruises around a beautiful lake surrounded by mountains, so there's not much to complain about unless you are prone to seasickness.

Anytime the ferry stops to pick up more people, you can get off and explore the town then hop back on the next available ferry.

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Bellagio

Bellagio is one of those tourist hotspots that I mentioned earlier, but everyone says that it's a must see if you're on Lake Como, so we hopped off the ferry and spent about 2 hours walking around "The Pearl of the Lake".

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Como

Our last stop in the Lake Como area was the city of Como. We stayed in a hostel called Ostello Bello, and everything was painted yellow so it gets a 5 star rating from Courtney Susan.

We took a day trip up to Brunate, where the Faro Voltiano Lighthouse gives a great view of the Lake.

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San Miniato

Next we went down south to San Miniato, in the Tuscany region. This small town was significant in ancient times, sitting right along the Via Francigena - a path connecting Rome and Northern Europe.

Today it's most known for its well preserved city walls and buildings, along with the White Truffle festival that is held there every year.

We lucked out and got to go to their monthly Farmer's Market, which helped the city lock down a solid 5 stars from us.

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Cinque Terre

Cinque Terre has become overrun by tourists in recent years, but it still is definitely worth a see if you get the chance. It's well-known colorful houses are cool, but it's the feeling of being stuck in time that seems to be most attractive to visitors. Cars aren't allowed in most of the villages, so time moves extra slow.

After about 48 hours of insane travel across the pond, our friends finally made it up to Monterosso al Mare at 1 in the morning, and we started the 15 minute trek up the hillside to our lemon grove Airbnb.

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Florence

Next up was Florence, the capital of Tuscany. There's way too many historic buildings, churches, and landmarks within this city to sum up in a few sentences, so you're going to have to Wikipedia it when you're done here.

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Chianti Region

One of the last adventures that we got to go on was a wine tour around the Chianti Region. It taught us one very important thing - our Balsamic Vinegar is super fake.

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