Many years ago when we lived in Melbourne (1958/68 ) my parents were emigrants. They couldn’t afford to take their family on holidays as tourists. The only occasions that I can remember is that during the Christmas holidays in summer, dad sometimes took his three daughters to St. Kilda beach, which was very near to where we lived. Mum didn’t come with us, she preferred staying home doing housework while we were all out. I can’t forget the day I got sun burnt, so much that I had blisters on my shoulders. It was dreadful. Mum had to medicate me with cream and it took so much time to heel.
When we came back to Italy (1968), only once, in August, my parents took us to the beach in Versilia. They thought of renting a house from friends, for several days. Our dwelling wasn’t near the beach, so we had to walk through a couple of lanes to get on the shore. Mum prepared our lunch at home and Dad was loaded with the sun umbrella and all the towels. My parents looked nice wearing their bathing suit. My sisters, Maria and Loretta, played with their buckets and shovels on the sand and built sandcastles. We had a great time… that was the only year that my family went on holidays together.
When I was engaged with my husband, during those years, it was unusual to go on holidays with a boyfriend. But in August 1973 we decided to have a holiday together. Mum told me to take my sisters with us. It was for her like giving to me a guard, in that way she felt less guilty for leaving me alone with a boy.
My husband and I took our children on holidays at the camping area on the beach. We liked going to Donoratico, San Vincenzo, Cecina, Castiglioncello and Populonia. We had a big tent and all the necessary camping gear. We usually went with my cousin and her family. Our holidays were joyful, even though we stayed out for only 10 days, in August. During one of our vacations in Donoratico we met a family who a roulotte. They were very nice people, they were Sicilians. They came to live in Pistoia many years before. With them we tied up a deep friendship which is still alive today. Counting more than 30 years.
The years passed by and when our children had grown up it became more difficult to take them out with us. From that moment my husband and I started going by ourselves…but nothing was the same.
In 2003, after 35 years that I had come back to Italy, I decided to have a trip back to Australia to celebrate my 50th birthday. For my husband it was the first time. We had a wonderful month of holidays with our relatives. We traveled by airplane from Pisa to Rome, then to Singapore, arriving in Melbourne after 24 hours of flight. We visited Sydney and Bunderburg and met relatives that we had never seen before. We had a month of happy holidays with them. It was fantastic staying all together.
This year when the school year ended, (June 2021) I took my three grandkids on holidays for a week at the beach, to Lido di Camaiore. Only them and me. After that, in July we booked a week holiday in Trentino, with my daughter and my son-in-law too. This was the very first time that we had a holiday together. We saw interesting places and very beautiful landscapes. We had long walks on the mountain chain of the Dolomiti discovering big and smaller lakes.
During the year I often take part in organized trips, even though if only for a one-day voyage. I enjoy travelling on the bus because it gives me a chance to meet a lot of new people that become very friendly. Sometimes I’ve also met persons who I haven’t seen for a long time. Once, I also met a colleague that was about 10 years that we hadn’t seen each other again after our retirement. That day we had fun together. The tourist agency organizes everything very well.
Happy return home to everybody……