SALONE INTERNAZIONALE DEL MOBILE 2012 -INTERNATIONAL FURNITURE TRADE FAIR is on in Milano April 17-22 2012. This is one of the largest international furniture fairs in the world and very popular as Milan is such a big design city. Milan also has a wonderful design museum - the Triennale Design Museum if you love creativity with furniture.

Many Hotels are booked the year before.  I suggest if you were planning to go to Milan in this period and you do not need to attend the fair then it is best to stay somewhere outside the city if you need to watch your budget. All the hotels raise their prices because of the extreme demand. 

Passion for Italy Travel can help you with avoid the problem areas in Italy - become one of our clients and fill out the Booking Enquiry form and we will phone you.

Opera lovers of Puccini will be delighted to attend their favourite Puccini operas in the birthplace of Puccini.

Gran Teatro all'Aperto G. Puccini, Torre del Lago Puccini, Tuscany Italy

20 July -25 August 2012

Passion for Italy Travel Agency books concert tickets for no extra charge for clients who book accommodation through us.  We are not a booking agency for the general public. Contact us for Lucca hotels.

To become a client fill out our BOOKING ENQUIRY form

Passion for Italy Travel would like to wish a Merry Christmas to you and yours right around our whole world. We wish for Peace in our global village. Peace begins in our own hearts and at Christmas time with our own families. The holiday period is a good time to try to practice peace with our loved or (not so loved ones) and to heal rifts that can often occur over the years. 

The internet has connected us all and allows us to intertwine our cultures and languages. It is a wonderful experience to work with clients from all over the world all wishing to travel to Italy. We have had nearly every country in the world viewing www.passionforitaly.com this year except for maybe Antartica..!!! I guess the internet cables would freeze over down there!!

Wherever you are, whatever you will be eating or drinking or sharing on Christmas day have a peaceful joyful day!!

Passion for Italy Travel will be closed for Christmas from 23 Dec - 9 Jan 2012 to enable all our staff to spend time with our own families and we look forward to organising your holiday in Italy in 2012.

Merry Christmas!
Passion for Italy Travel   www.passionforitaly.com

Most little villages have beautiful Christmas markets where all the local artisans can sell their hand made products.One of the nicest I saw when in Italy for Christmas, was in Perugia where they were displayed in an ancient underground building that had been newly renovated and full of nooks and crannies. It was used as a shelter during the war and to escape from the Nazis but now is being put to a joyful use. Perugia is the capital of Umbria and is a beautiful hilltop town with amazing views.

We waited in the cold, wind and rain for midnight mass outside the Catholic church in Grosseto Tuscany. It was a high mass sung in Latin which dutifully put my children and their father to sleep with those wonderful gregorian chants. The presipe or nativity scenes in the churches are very impressive in Italy. They are usually very large with life size statues. Grosetto's was unveiled in a solemn ceremony and blessed at the end of the mass and was enormous.

Most Italians build a new nativity scene in their homes every year and no scene is the same. Lined with moss and lights they are a work of art.  The best presepe are found down south in Napoli where there is a whole street devoted to selling all the nativity statues in all varying sizes as well as the stables with  accompanying lights. People travel all over the world to see this street and it is very impressive. 

One of the churches in the village of Pozzuoli near Napoli had made a presepe that was so huge that it took up three rooms under the church. Four men took four months to construct the village made out of pottery with all the people in the village represented. A delightful way to spend one's creative time but a lot of work. These guys need more recognition. They are artists in their own right.

TOURISTS TO STAY AWAY FROM CINQUE TERRE 

The villages of Vernazza and Monterosso, Cinque Terre in Liguria have been inundated by terrible flooding and mudslides with six people dead and now the villages are filled with mud and much damage. If you have planned a holiday in Cinque Terre in these coming weeks Passion for Italy Travel advises strongly to cancel and perhaps go to the Amalfi coast instead. 

If you wish to donate money to help with the clean up please see the bank accounts to donate to on this blog site: www.littleparadiso.com

I just have to show you these three videos of my favourite Italian comedian, actor and performer - Gigi Proietti! He is very very talented in all areas and very popular in Italy and has been for 30 years. Un grand Uomo!

Click on the links below: this first one they are asking as you can see 'What is the time?" then "How can you tell the time by lifting the cow's udder?"

It says it all about Italian humour - I think it is hilarious and it is this humour that I love about the Italian people. They always make me laugh. I think I laugh more in Italy than any place in the world.

Gigi Proietti - Le Barzellete Proietti

Gigi Proietti singing Nun me Rompe Ca'

Speaking Napoletano 

Do you have a whale of a problem organising your trip to Italy?

Researching a trip to a foreign country is very time consuming. If you are time poor and your time would be better off making money in your work then that is why Passion for Italy Travel is here to do this for you.

On January 5th, the Piazza Navona opens up to a fair of toys, sweets, and other presents among the beautiful Bernini fountains.  Nearly two weeks after Christmas, celebrations are still in full swing as the Piazza becomes a huge open air market for stocking fillers for La Befana (the Italian equivalent of 'Santa Claus') when she visits on the night of the 5th January.

"To live content with small means; to seek elegance rather than luxury, and refinement rather than fashion, to be worthy, not respectable, and wealthy, not rich; to study hard, think quietly, talk gently, act frankly, to listen to stars and birds, to babes and sages, with open heart, to bear all cheerfully, to all bravely await occasions, hurry never. In a word, to let the spiritual unbidden and unconscious grow up through the common. This is to be my symphony." 

William Henry Channing (1810-1884)

Naples, Italy, has agreed in principle to host two stops on the America’s Cup World Series; the first will be in April 2012, the second in May 2013. Designed to expose millions more people to the sport of high-performance racing, the new professional circuit was created to bring the America’s Cup experience to top international venues.