Trieste
In November we traveled to Trieste. Trieste is in Italy on a little strip of land about 20 km wide and 100 km long that lies south of Slovenia between Slovenia and the Adriatic sea. This is a picture of the "beach". It's not a beach at all, but it is the
swimming area. You can see the water is really clear. It's a rather large city that sits on the the edge of the mountains and slopes down to the sea. It's only about an hour and a half away. Behind me, you can see a really tall pedestal standing rising above the city. I think there's a bronze woman on top. We didn't see it up close, but you can tell how huge it is. We went with a visit to the aquarium in mind. The Acquario Marino, which we read about in our Eyewitness Italy book, was supposed to be an excellent place to see Adriatic sea life. So that sounds exciting right? Well, all we had was an address. We didn't have a map of the city or anything, so we decided that an aquarium should be near the water. We wound our way down the mountain, through the city, toward the sea. Driving along the water we saw a building that says Acqua Marina. That sounds right so, we parked and went in. The first thing we saw was a glass enclosure where there's an indoor pool and old men in speedos. We quickly deduce that this is not the aquarium. We went to the desk and tried to ask the lady where the aquarium with the fish in it is. She understood us, but she didn't speak enough to give us directions so she took us to a window and pointed across the bay. There are a lot of buildings in the direction that she points, but we said "grazie" and left. Back at the car, I tried to call the aquarium. The man said that it was located 1 km away. We had a good parking place and 1 km is less than a mile, so we decided to walk. We walked around the bay for what seemed like more than a km and still couldn't find it. On our way back to the car we saw the front of a building that we had walked past. It said Acquario Marino. When we walked by it the first time, we had dismissed it as an abandoned building. It was the aquarium. We didn't go through it because it was 4 euros a piece and we had neglected to get euros before we left. We walked around trying to find an ATM, but we had just about walked back to the car and still hadn't seen one. In addition, this acclaimed aquarium that we had read about it our Eyewitness book seemed to be nothing more that a couple of rooms big. We decided to see the aquarium another day.
It was close to lunch time, and I had seen a Bennigan's. We went there to eat lunch. It was about 11:30 or noon and since Italians don't eat lunch until 2 or 3, we were the only ones in the place. Although it was decorated kind of like Bennigan's it clearly wasn't like the ones back home. We're learning that even though there are a few McDonald's and apparently a Bennigan's here and there, you still don't get the kind of food you're used to. Mike had fish and chips, which he said was good. I had a cheese burger, but it wasn't even close to a real cheeseburger. The cheese is a different kind of cheese and it's fried. I don't know how to describe it, but it was not "a tasty burger" ( a line from what movie?).
After we ate, we drove around for about an hour. This was the real adventure. People were triple and quadruple parked. What should have been a 2 lane road with parking on each side was turned into a one way road. Plus it's on a freaking mountainside. 
We almost died several times. 
But Mike did an excellent job. We are after all, still alive.
Then we got out of the city a little following signs for Castello Di Miramare. The picture on the left is taken as we were walking up to the castle. 
On the right is the side of the castle that faces away from the sea-the front I guess. 
This is how you would approach the castle 
if you were arriving by boat. We got to tour the castle and the grounds. There were extensive gardens and even a bird habitat (that you had to pay to go in to, so we didn't). These are pictures of us in the gardens. Of course I'm sure it would be much prettier during the summer. Although the castle wasn't at all old by European standards (built in about 1869), it was pretty and interesting because the guy that built it later became the emperor of Mexico. Too, during WWII it was the headquarters for the US Army and helped to put Trieste back in the hands of the Italians. There is a concentration camp in Trieste. I didn't know exactly where it was, but we drove by what I think must have been it. When we go back to see the "aquarium", we'll have to check that out more closely as well. 
We left at sunset. As we were driving home, we saw another castle. We 
parked and tried to find the entrance, but were unsuccessful. Plus it was almost dark. Oh well, a castle for another day. Trieste is kind of fun, but not to drive in. Or maybe that's the part that made it fun...
