Le Grand Tour d'Europe!

We're back! It was amazing!

I won't bore you with all the details, but list the cities and then get to the imporant part - YARN!
We flew into Zurich, took the train to Milan, Lake Como, Florence, and Venice. Rented a car and toured Tuscany: Siena, Volterra, San Gmignano, Montelcino, Monsumanno Terme, Montecatini Terme. Returned the car and took a train from Pistoia to Pisa, Genoa, then Nice, France. We flew from Nice to Dusseldorf, Germany back to Zurich. 17 days - a fast-paced, independent trip!

Orange is VERY popular in Europe, this is a cell phone network (throughout Europe) sign in Zurich :



We arrived in Europe right at the Easter Sunday weekend. There were bunnies in all the advertising. This is a display at a store in Bellagio.




Spirals are very popular in Europe!

An antique lightbulb in Milan store window:


Iron work in Milan:




Stone work:


Mosaic tile on a Montecatini Terme sidewalk:



Color is very different in Europe.

The Mediterranean Sea, Nice, France:


Pebble walkway at the Sant' Ambrogio Basilica in Milan:


Buildings in Milan:


Produce at a Milan Saturday morning market:


Building, water, and boat in Venice:


This is where the color Siena comes from.


These two buildings at El Campo in Siena.


This is a handmade finely crocheted scarf that I saw in Bellagio. It's little squares, different yarn, all connected together:


This is a sweater that was for sale at a Florence flea market, I liked the detailing:



We went to a HUGE flea market in Lucca, where I found these three prints from the 1930s. I will frame them and make an ensemble:




My favourite one, hands and sheep!


I went to the yarn store in Milan, and it was very small, with not very good yarn. I forgot to take a picture of it because we were in a hurry to get to the train station.

This store has been in Florence for 40 years! It's in a great part south of Florence, called Oltrano.


I bought this yarn there, enough for a scarf! It's 100%, shrink resistant Merino wool, about $10 for both.


The woman who owns the store said that she could tell that I worked in a yarn store because I looked at all the labels. I wanted to find yarn that is not readily available here in the US.

We met a couple traveling from Highland Park, CA, on the train from Milan to Florence. They stumbled upon a yarn store in Florence that I had not heard of called Mirko Filati. I forgot to take a picture of the store, it was a basement store underneath the street!

This is a cotton/linen mix, I bought 10 skeins for about $20.



This is Grignasco Extrafine Merino yarn with colors that you would not believe. It has 1635 yards, about $8. I hope to have enough to make the Knitty Clapotis or the Sheer Poncho.


It was very hard to find the yarn store in Siena. It was supposed to be in an area that used to be in the section where stores used to sell chicken. We finally found the address. Two months ago it became a cafe. :-(

This was a really lousy acryllic yarn and all-purpose sewing store that we stumbled upon in Nice.


We were walking to buy bread in Nice, when Dave said, "Don't look up!"
The Anny Blatt store.


I bought 12 skeins of this 100% wool yarn (960 yds total), made in France! It was on sale and cost about $50, and had the same name as Dave's mom, I HAD to get it!


While I was gone, I took one project with me, the ultra-long knitted Swedish pattern that becomes a spiral top. Pictures tomorrow of the new length! I knit on all of our train rides. People would walk by and stare - they were mesmerized!

I'm happy to be back and get started knitting my ISE4 pal's scarf!