hchhewitt: nothing says 'i love you' like 1kg muesli

Last week Mama and Papa Hew came out to visit, bringing with them the sunshine, thai green curry paste and most importantly 1kg muesli. Nothing says 'i love you' like muesli! I decided to play tour guide and jam-packed their 'relaxing city break' with culture, history, shopping and cuisine. A particular emphasis on the last two as Pops was treating!

The Botanical Garden of Padova (est. 1545) was the very first botanical garden in the world. It was created to help students of the university in their studies in botany, medicine, chemistry, ecology and pharmacy. Now i don't have green fingers (i couldn't even keep my basil plant alive) but this garden is definitely worth a visit, especially if you drag yourself out of bed to enjoy it in the early morning sunshine. Turning a blind eye to their late night flight, i unceremoniously woke Mama and Papa Hew to show them this...

Aquatic plants

Goethe's Palm, the oldest plant in the garden (planted in 1585). He's mighty tall.

Not taking the early morning start as an excuse, i managed to pack in four churches, four piazza's, three markets, two restaurants and numerous cafe and spritz stops into the rest of the day.

No rest for the wicked, the next day we had a family outing to Venice.

Apparently they have the identical sculpture in Chatsworth House's gardens. Bringing a little bit of Derbyshire to Italy.

This shot is becoming a firm favourite.

This photo doesn't quite do justice to this leaning tower of Venezia. Looking around much of Italy's old infrastructure you get the feeling that their rulers were askew back then.

Another favourite shot

Caffè Florian tops the '5 things not to do in Venice' list. It's one of the oldest coffee shops in the world and has been more or less left untouched since 1720 when it first opened. This is reflected in its €14/hot chocolate prices. Usually i walk past and sneer at the gullible tourists inside, but this time (on Mama and Papa Hew's insistence) i was going to be one of them.