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Italy - Day 7 - Club 103

From Venice we went north to tour Italy's spectacular Dolomites mountain range.  A guy from our hotel told us that if it was raining in Venice it will be snowing in The Dolomites and he was right.  We were in a small group with a family from Singapore who had never seen snow.

Cortina has now hosted the Winter Olympics twice.  We stopped to see the ski jump used in the 1956 Olympics.  It looked to be in rough shape and now had a soccer field at its base.  Our guide said that today's ski jumpers fly in the air too far to use it.

After warming up with some coffee at a bakery we walked around downtown Cortina.  I'm glad I packed a warm coat and hat.

Lake Antorno

A cassette sticker from Club 103 which plays Contemporary Hit music and is based in Valle di Cadore, Italy. Programming is heard across the Dolomites and the Veneto region.  They went on the air in 1976.
 

Italy - Day 6 - Radio Venezia

From Florence we took a two hour train ride to Venice ("Venezia").  It was raining when we got there but it was OK because we had already booked a mask making class at a place called Ca'Macana.  Venice is easily the most beautiful city I've ever visited.  Every corner you turn is another picture postcard--just gorgeous.

A view from Rialto Bridge.  Our super fancy hotel was just up on the right side of this picture.

Rialto Bridge from down below.

Venice's mask tradition dates back to the middle ages. I'm holding the plaster mold used to make the "plague mask" design I chose.  They use "cartalana" a special, highly absorbent paper that doesn't shrink when it gets wet. After drying, we painted and decorated them and added tie strings.  It was really fun!

I think the masks turned out great!  We paid to have them shipped home otherwise they'd probably get crushed in our luggage.

No trip to Venice is complete without a gondola ride.

Radio Venezia was a terrestrial station from 1974 until 2023.  They can now be heard online and on DAB.  Listening live while making this post I heard Talking Heads, John Paul Young, DJ Maze, Double, Suzanne Vega and Alicia Keys
 

Italy - Day 5 - Radio Planet Firenze

Today we took the train for a day trip to Pisa for a citywide bicycle tour.  Our guide met us at the train station and set us up with our rides at the nearby bike shop.  We rode to the Leaning Tower of Pisa and got a very in-depth history of the tower and surrounding buildings.  It was very interesting!

The Pisa Baptistery, Pisa Cathedral and Leaning Tower.

Square of the Knights

Radio Planet was on the air from 1996 to 2002.
 

Italy - Day 4 - Punto Radio

Today began with a walking tour of Florence ("Firenze" in Italian)  Highlights included the Cattedrale di Santa Maria, the Basilica di Santa Croce and the Galleria dell'Accademia.  That evening we took a pasta making class and drank a lot of wine.  So fun!

Basilica of Santa Croce--burial place of Galileo, Michaelangelo and Machiavelli.

Fontana del Porcellino--rubbing the pig's nose for good luck.

Making pasta!

Michaelangelo's David at the Accademia.  This 17 foot masterpiece sculpted in marble was incredible to see in person.

Punto Radio broadcast to Florence from 1977 to 2007.
 

Italy - Day 3 - RAI

Day three began with an extended tour through the Vatican including the Sistine Chapel and St. Peter's Basilica.  We stopped at the post office to mail my dad a postcard with a pope stamp and cancellation from the Vatican.  We then started walking back to our hotel with stops at the Pantheon, Trevi Fountain and Spanish Steps.  We ate lunch outdoors at a little bistro and stopped somewhere for gelato.  It was a great day!  That evening we took a train to our next stop--Florence.

St. Peter's Square

Trevi Fountain

Spanish Steps

RAI is the Rome-based national public broadcasting company of Italy.  Programming is seen and heard in about a dozen countries in the European Union.  They began broadcasting in 1924 with a speech by Benito Mussolini.  More RAI stickers can be seen here.
 

Italy - Day 2 - Radio Studio Napoli 2000

On our second day we took a bus tour south to the ruins of Pompei near Naples.

I was surprised at the size of the city that was buried under 15 to 20 feet of ash after the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 AD.  It's huge, really.  About 170 acres and over 2000 buildings and they are still uncovering new areas.  Pompei even had its own red light district.  A penis carved into a cobblestone on the street pointed the way to it.  I am not making this up.

 

This cast was formed by pouring liquid plaster into the empty cavity left by a human body in hardened volcanic ash.

The crater of Mount Vesuvius which last erupted in 1944.

I picked this sticker because Naples (Napoli) is located near Pompei.  But it appears that Radio Studio Napoli 2000 was actually a station over 400 miles away in Milan.  Is that Mount Vesuvius on the sticker spewing music instead of ash?  I'd like to think so but I don't know.  This website says that Radio Studio Napoli broadcast Neapolitan music in Milan circa the early 1980s.
 

Italy - Day 1 - Radio Roma

This year’s vacation was in Italy so I’ll be featuring some Italian stickers for the next few days. 

My wife and I flew from Dayton, Ohio to Washington DC to Rome for a 12 day stay. We were exhausted after not getting much sleep on the overnight flight so we just chilled in the hotel lobby until our room was ready.  Later on we took an incredibly interesting tour of the Colosseum and Roman Forum.

Radio Roma was the first private radio station in Rome.  They went on the air in June 1975.  
 

KPRR

"Power 102.1" KPRR has been a Rhythmic Contemporary station in El Paso, Texas since 1986.
 

KFLB

KFLB is a Religious station in Midland/Odessa, Texas.  They were located at 90.5 FM until moving to their current frequency of 88.1 FM in 2009.  They are one of about three dozen stations in the Family Life Radio network.
 

WXAM

1400 AM WXAM was a Top-40 station in Charlottesville, Virginia from 1980 to 1984.
 

WRFX

WRFX "99.7 The Fox" is a Classic Rock station in Charlotte, North Carolina.  The 100,000-watt station is also the flagship station of the nationally syndicated John Boy & Billy Big Show.  WRFX is licensed to Kannapolis, NC.