Arrivederci, Roma

Sunday, with somewhat heavy hearts, we left Roma for the next leg of our trip. We both really enjoyed Rome, and really enjoyed the people we met while visiting the Eternal City. But, the real reason we undertook this whole adventure is this month we are spending in Tuscany, so undertake it, we must.

After a bombolone and espresso, we hit the road about 10:30, and made it to our new landlord’s house about 1:30. We both had pictured Giovanni as a middle-aged man with his stomach sticking over his pants, but to our surprise, he was probably 30-something and very cheerful. He got in his car and led us on a chase through the back roads to our new home in Certaldo.

We didn’t mention to him that we had done reconnaissance work and instead, let him think we were seeing our home for the first time. And, in many ways, we were. And we were pleased to see the inside of the little apartment where we will be spending the next month.

It is absolutely darling, and the area in which it is located is astoundingly beautiful. It sits right in the middle of vineyards and olive groves, with a vista of hill towns. We have a balcony off of our bedroom where we look out at the vast beauty of the area. Our house actually sits in a little teeny-tiny community called San Benedetto, just outside of Certaldo. There is an old Church of San Benedetto, but it is no longer used. The little house in which we will live for the next month was the priest’s house.

It appears that the church is about ready to topple over, which doesn’t give me a whole lot of comfort. In fact, Giovanni told us (I’m not making this up, and he said it dead seriously) that if we sit outside on the patio, we probably should sit on the side opposite of the church in case the inevitable happens and the tower topples. I’m just going to trust in God’s grace and enjoy the whole patio until I hear a crunch. Bill and I have already scoped out where we’re going to run in the event of an earthquake. Here’s a photo of the crack in the church.

Early in the evening, we drove to the hill town of San Gimignano, a 10-minute drive from our house. They were reported to be having some sort of a dance, but, though we stayed until after 7, no dance transpired. We enjoyed some wine, and had a big gelato for our dinner. When we came home, we drank our limoncello on the balcony and Bill enjoyed a cigar.

We will have some trouble getting used to the heat. We had air conditioning in Rome, but no such luck here. We had hoped that it would cool down at night, but it is nearly 10, and doesn’t seem to be any cooler. I’m thankful that we at least have screens on the windows so that we can leave them open. I suspect however, that they will need to be closed during the heat of the day, as will the shutters. We notice that’s how the Italians do it. They shut up their houses entirely when the sun’s high in the sky. We will have to get used to this heat.

By the way, I need to add a number 11 to our top 10 list:

The Italian roads are narrow, as I have said. Even the lanes on the motorways are narrower than we’re used to in the United States. The divider in the median is usually concrete or metal about four feet high and is about a foot off the passing lane, leaving you no room for error. Shortly after leaving Rome, and while we were motoring along in the right lane, Bill looked in his rear view mirror and saw a car coming up fast in the passing lane. Suddenly it hit the divider. He seemed to lose control, swerving and then slowing way down. Bill and I assumed he had pulled over to check out his damage. Within a few minutes, Bill saw him roaring up the passing land again. It seems the accident had only slowed him down momentarily. He roared past us and was gone. A few minutes later, we notice that he had slowed down again and was now in the right lane. As we pass him, we notice that, while he was driving, he had rolled down his window and was trying to straighten out his mirror which had been smashed into his now damaged door in the accident. Now, while I say he slowed down, he was still going 120 kilometers an hour, or almost 75 mph. He finally gave up his futile attempt to repair his car on the fly, and hit the gas again and was gone in a few seconds.

Top 10 List

Bill and I have had two weeks to observe the people and activities in Rome. Here is our top 10 list of strange, amusing, and/or interesting things that we have seen in Rome:

10. Nuns run in packs, priests travel in pairs. There are more priests and nuns in Rome than I have seen in any other city in the world. Nuns generally travel together in a group. For the most part, priests seem to travel with one fellow priest.

9. The bus drivers in Rome make it a point to try and knock people around. Did you ever see the Bob Newhart skit where he is the teacher at a bus driving school, and he is telling his students how you should start out really fast so that people go flying and then stop really fast so that they run into each other? Well, Rome bus drivers attend that school. It HAS to be on purpose. Plus, there is the bus driver we observed who was driving the bus with both hands behind his head….

8. Women drive scooters wearing high heels. When we were here seven years ago, there weren’t many women driving scooters. Now, a large number of the scooters you see zipping around town are ridden by women. And they very often are wearing fancy shoes with very high heels. They also walk around on the cobbled streets wearing these same kinds of shoes.

7. People with fewer groceries than you cut in front of you in the grocery line. Romans are great line cutters. They stand in lines waiting patiently and lull you into thinking that when the bus comes, or the doors open, or the time has arrived for whatever you’re waiting for, there will be an orderly procession in. But without fail, that does not happen. Instead, there is inevitably chaos. And at the grocery store, they apparently believe that if they only have a few things, it is their right to go in front of you. Meanwhile, as you let them do so (as if you could stop them), you hear the people behind you muttering to each other and sighing loudly.

6. Scooters don’t think traffic lights apply to them at all. In fact, scooters don’t think any traffic rules apply to them at all. Many Romans drive cars with this same misguided thought, but it’s more apparent with the scooter drivers. Here’s an example: There is a pedestrian light right by our apartment that you press to get across the street. When that light turns red for the cars and green for the pedestrians, the scooters (and some cars) just keep going through it until they see the whites of your eyes. They won’t hit you. They’ll stop only when they must. At least you hope they’ll stop.

5. There is no bus or metro car too crowded for a Roman to enter. I mean this quite literally. I have seen seven or eight people waiting for our bus out front. When it pulls up and is packed to the gills (I’m talking people smashed against each other as they stand in the aisle), Bill and I will choose to wait for the next bus. Not the Romans. They absolutely push their way onto the bus. I have seen instances where the doors have trouble closing because people’s backsides are hanging out. But they just push harder against their neighbor. I have never seen anyone besides us wait for the next bus or train.

4. The fashions are very different here in Rome than we have seen anywhere else in Italy. The young women are very scantily clad. That might be because of the heat, but they have plunging necklines, short tops, strapless shirts, and so forth. Also, the women’s fashion expression that Bill has noticed the most, and that probably drives him the craziest, is that no matter what type of blouse or dress they are wearing, they wear the same type of bra. So the bra straps show, which isn’t that unlike the United States. However, they wear regular bras that cross their back when the shirt they might be wearing is backless. In fact, I think they use their bras as part of their fashion statement, because they are often the same color as their blouse, or perhaps a contrasting color that might go with the skirt. As for the men, they almost always have at least two buttons open on their shirts, and very often more than that.

3. The older women here all dress the same. The women above the age of 60 must all shop at the same store or outdoor market. They all wear the same type of housedress, usually with flowers. Then when they get to 80, they change to black dresses. My question is, how, and at what point, do the fashionably dressed young women with fancy underwear and high heels morph into the women wearing shapeless housedresses?

2. Scooters love ambulances. Scooter drivers are extraordinarily happy when they hear the sound of the ambulance. Instead of pulling over and respectfully letting the ambulance pass and continue down the street, they fall into place right behind it, and as the ambulance blows through the stoplight, the scooters follow right behind it. Many cars do the same thing.

And number one on our list of strange, amusing, and/or interesting things that we have seen in Rome,

1. A young woman running to catch the bus, holding her three-year-old’s hand, with her infant attached to her exposed breast, nursing. Bill said the infant was having a great deal of difficulty hanging on. No doubt that baby is tired of breakfast on the run.

Ostia Antica

Having seen just about everything we have wanted to see in Rome, Bill and I decided today to have a bit of an adventure. We took a local train from one of the metro stations to an area called Ostia Antica, about a 20-minute train ride from the metro station. Ostia Antica was ancient Rome’s port city. The ruins that remain rival Pompeii as far as being able to actually offer the opportunity to see how the ancient Romans lived. The city was Rome’s port city until the Tiber River changed its course and left the city dry, and eventually vacant.

The area of ruins is huge, and it took a couple of hours for us to see what we saw, which wasn’t nearly the entire ancient city. Still, it was fascinating and we enjoyed it very much. Though we were really tired and dirty, we decided to ride the train a bit further where we could have the opportunity to see the Mediterranean. We got off the train and walked down to where we had a chance to look, but not touch. The area we chose to stop consisted entirely of private beaches, so we couldn’t even dangle our toes. Still, it was pretty. There didn’t seem to be a lot of people enjoying the sea because it is still so dang hot. It is way too hot to sit out in the sun, even if you can jump in the water on occasion.

We had dinner at our little restaurant for the last time, since we will spend Saturday night in the city. For the first time, Bill decided to try a Caffe Coretto. That is an expresso with grappa. Well. Let me just say that grappa is really nasty stuff. Wow. I’m talking seriously nasty. He describes it as expresso with kerosene. Caffe Lattes from here on out.

Our Neighborhood

I feel really grateful to have had two full weeks in Rome. There are an amazing number of things to see in this beautiful city. We have seen many of them before, but always in a bit of a rush so that we could get on to see the next thing. This time we had the luxury of taking our time and really looking at all of the beautiful art and artifacts, of noticing and looking at all of the old ruins and ancient walls that are spread all around the town. As you walk around town, it isn’t uncommon to see a small bit of ancient wall just sitting all by itself, or to be inside a building and see a piece of ancient wall or ancient floor exposed but covered up by glass. ‘Random ruins’ is what we have taken to calling them.

One of the things that surprised me here in Rome is the fact that they only have two metro lines – the red line and the blue line. The red line, which is the line we took almost all of the time, travels to many of the sights. But surprisingly, there are a number of sights that are very far from any metro lines, such as Piazza Navone. The reason for the rather abbreviated metro system is simple: every time they have begun digging for anything, including underground metro lines, they run into old Roman ruins. There are apparently still so many ruins and walls underground that they just don’t even want to start digging. Otherwise it becomes too much of a headache to go through all of the necessary channels to continue.

Thursday we decided that we simply didn’t have anything we wanted to see bad enough to put up with the heat. I had written a list of everything we wanted to see and do while here, and we checked off the last thing several days ago. That is, the last thing except one. I still want to see the Trevi Fountain at night, but I think we will do that Saturday night, our last night here. So we stayed inside and read all day long, except for a break to go to the grocery store.

So, let me tell you a little bit about our apartment and where we have been living for the past two weeks.

Our apartment, which the owners call Aurelia Den, is located on one of the main streets coming into Rome from the north. As such, we were concerned that it would be very noisy as the street on which it sits is extremely busy and noisy. Instead, since our apartment is in a building way off the road, we have found it to be quite quiet, at least as far as traffic noise. We do hear the sounds of children playing all around us, especially in the evening.

I think I mentioned before that there are no single family homes in Rome. Everyone lives in an apartment, which they may own or rent. So these communities are like neighborhoods back home. Some of the units, especially on the ground or top floors, might have extremely large patios, such as the one pictured here. This particular apartment is directly across from ours.

Our apartment development is gated, and each unit on the ground floor has a gated patio. So the complex is very safe and private. The night that Italy played Spain in soccer, I sat on our little balcony and watched the children play while their parents watched the game. Apparently many of the grandparents, or some sort of close relative, live right in this same development. The children were running around back and forth from apartment to apartment. It had the feel of My Big Fat Greek Wedding. While it seems particularly noisy to us, I pointed out to Bill that the kids really aren’t being any noisier than our grandkids are when they play outside in their own back yard. The difference is that the noise is bouncing off brick walls and cement.

Our apartment is right next to a Catholic Church (there are few other kinds of churches in Rome). So every morning at 7:50, the church bells ring, calling people to come to church. They ring again at 8 o’clock telling us that Mass has begun. The same thing happens again at 6:50 p.m. and 7 o’clock. I’ve grown used to hearing the bells wake me up in the morning.

It doesn’t take long for the Italians to accept you as a part of their community. There is an old man who walks throughout the development every day who now smiles and tells us buon giorno every morning. Yesterday he began a conversation with us, but unfortunately we were not able to understand since he spoke Italian. The maintenance man who takes such wonderful care of the facility has also taken to greeting us cheerily every time he sees us. We see him over at the restaurant across the street, and he is happy to see us every time.

And, of course I have already mentioned how we have become regulars at the restaurant. Our friendly baker talks to us every morning in Italian, despite the fact that he knows by now that we speak no Italian. That fact never seems to faze him. He smiles and chats away. We smile and nod.

There are plusses and minuses living where we are staying in Rome. If we had chosen to stay in an apartment or hotel in the center of Rome, it would certainly have been a lot more convenient. When we wanted to go into the city from here, it was a 30- or 45-minute endeavor. Still, our main goal for this entire adventure has been to get to know the people of Italy and to get a flavor for the country. Since we were going to be here for two full weeks, we wanted to be living with the locals instead of in a hotel. We wanted to shop with the locals and eat with the locals.

Our apartment is the one with the table and two white chairs.

I hope that we find our place in Certaldo to be as happy a place for our last month in Italy. I’m confident we will.

Another Lazy Day in Roma

We had no television in our lovely little apartment until our landlord brought a new cable (the old one having been broken). Being without television wasn’t a great loss since we don’t speak much Italian and there are no shows in English. However, as we sat at a little bar at lunchtime, we learned from the television that Italy is in the middle of an extraordinary heat wave.

Ah ha. That’s why I’ve been so hot. I had been told that Rome’s temperature is generally around 30 degrees C (90 degrees F) in the summer. So I had been figuring that the temperature has been somewhere around 85 or 90, with exceptionally high humidity. In fact, the temperature has apparently been 100 or more, with that same high humidity. No wonder we seem to need to take two or three showers a day.

We had a very quiet day, just going into town for a short while in the morning to shop and to revisit the church of San Croce in Gerusalemme, which contains relics of the Passion which Constantine’s mother brought back from Jerusalem. All afternoon we read and took it easy.

We did take time to make our arrangements to come home. We will be returning home early in August, via Chicago where we will spend a few days with Bill’s mom. Knowing a date certain for coming home gives this reluctant traveler a bit more peace of mind.

We had a quiet two-hour dinner at the restaurant across the street from our apartment, where we now seem to be treated as regulars, having eaten there a number of times (pictured here). With our television fixed, we watched the Germany/Turkey soccer game until bedtime.

Fishing for Underwear

Using a handmade contraption of a metal pipe we found on our balcony, our telephone cord, our surgical tubing clothesline, and a clothes hanger, Bill was able to retrieve the underwear from the terrace below.

You recall from yesterday’s blog that we made the nearly fatal error of accidentally dropping underwear that we were trying to hang out to dry into the courtyard below us. The courtyard is locked, and though we have tried on a number of occasions to reach the person who lives there, we have decided the apartment is vacant. Thus, we had to use more serious measures in order to retrieve the necessary garments. I’m happy to say that Bill’s gerryrigged contraption worked, and even more important, apparently no one reported us to the police. McGuyver, eat your heart out.

Today we hiked to the very tippytop of the dome of St. Peter’s. We had done that once before, walking that time every step of the way. This time, being 10 years older, we took the elevator as far as it would go, and then walked the remainder of the way – some 300 steps on an extremely narrow one-way staircase. As you near the top of the dome, you are literally leaning over to avoid hitting your head on the curved wall. The stairs at the top are no more than 18 inches wide, if that. Once you get on the top, you have an amazing view of Rome. But between Bill’s dislike of heights and my claustrophobia, we have concluded that we probably have visited the dome for the last time.

We stopped one more time into the basilica itself. St. Peter’s is truly one of the most amazing things I will every see. The sheer enormity of the church is astounding. You don’t really realize just how big the art is until you walk right up to it. This photo of Bill with the cherubim that make up the holy water font illustrate the size. Apparently all the statuary are proportional so that everything appears to be the same size. If that is so, the statues at the top must be unbelievably large.

We also visited Santa Maria del Popolo, which has a painting of the Crucifixion of St. Peter done by Carvaggio that is just amazing. I was absolutely mesmerized by the look on Peter’s face as they were lifting his cross up. I love Carvaggio’s use of light and dark to show the emotion of the people and to let us know who really is the “star” of the painting.

We had dinner tonight with David Troy. We may or may not see him tomorrow night depending on his schedule. He leaves Thursday for a couple of months in the states. We have enjoyed spending time with him.

Soccer Sadness

The Italians were in a very bad mood today. Their beloved football team lost its quarterfinal match in the European Cup to Spain last night. The game didn’t end until nearly 1 a.m., and the televisions were blaring and the Italians were shouting at their televisions until the very end.

When we went across the street this morning to get our bombolone and espresso, we asked our new friend, the baker, about the game. He expressed his dismay in Italian, using hand gestures in the way that only Italians can. According to his sign language, Spain’s team was a bunch of cheaters, the refs were bribed, and they can all go…., well, you know the rest.

The drivers were more aggressive (if that’s possible), there was more honking, and you could hear men arguing in their cars as they drove to work. All in all, they were not a happy country today. Ah well. Thank goodness for espresso, vino rosso, and Mama’s cooking. They’ll be fine by tonight.

Bill and I knocked a couple of more things off our want-to-see list today. We visited the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls. The basilica is the one of the largest in Rome, second in size only to St. Peter’s. One of the most significant differences between St. Paul's and St. Peter's is the fact that St. Peter's has so much art and so many side chapels. St. Paul's doesn't have as much, so it just looks massive. The original church was built over St. Paul’s tomb by the Emperor Constantine I. The original church was destroyed by fire and rebuilt in the 1800s, but we saw the original tomb and also the chains that held St. Paul while he was imprisoned in Rome.

The church is particularly interesting because it has a mosaic of each of the popes lining the ceiling all around the massive structure, from St. Peter to Benedict XVI. The dome of the church was very beautiful, also mosaics. The mosaics are very beautiful.

After visiting the church, we took a bus out the old Appian Way to visit the catacombs. We took a tour of the Catacombes of San Calisto. The catacombes, we learned, are ancient Christian underground burial sites from the second through the fifth century. In the 500s, the Goths, Visigoths, and other bad folks who plundered Rome also sacked these Christian burial grounds. There apparently wasn’t much of value for them to plunder, but they desecrated the tombs anyway. In the 1800s archeologists rediscovered the catacombes and began studying the whole area, and after World War II the catacombes were opened for tours. We enjoyed the tour very much, and particularly relished the cool air underground.

We came home and did some hand wash, and subsequently developed a new problem. Some of our wash (undergarments, naturally) fell into the patio area directly below us. We now have to figure out how to explain to people we have never seen and who likely speak no English that we have dropped undies in their back yard. We never have a dull moment.

We went to dinner again at our favorite little place across the street (we are becoming regulars) and had a wonderful meal once again. But I just have to tell you one Italian story: about the time we were getting ready to leave (around 9:30), an empty tour bus pulled up, stopped, the driver put on the flashers, got out, came into the restaurant and ordered dinner. Now, mind you, we are on a busy four-lane city street and the bus was blocking one full lane. As David Troy would say, Italian logic.

Heating It Up in Rome

It gets almost unbearably hot in Rome, despite the fact that the temperature is probably only in the 80s. The level of humidity is what really gets to Bill and me. As we walk around the city, we carry our bottles of water and refill them frequently at the many water fountains available around Rome. These fountains, often beautiful pieces of art in and of themselves, spit out ice cold water that tastes surprisingly good and is very refreshing. It’s the only way to survive.

The other necessity is to walk on the shady side of the street whenever possible. Of course, everyone else has also figured this out, so often that side of the street is usually packed with fellow city explorers.

Despite all of our best efforts, by time we get home from our sightseeing, we are invariably drenched and extremely dehydrated. We walk into the apartment, immediately turn on the air conditioning (which we are extremely grateful, and lucky, to have), drink large glasses of water, and take another shower.

This morning we left the apartment at about 7:30 and walked to the bus stop that would take us to the underground. The sign indicated the bus would arrive in 11 minutes. Because we are becoming more and more Italian, we knew that would be plenty of time to grab a cup of espresso at the bar across the street. We crossed the street, ordered two caffe, drank the espresso in one or two gulps standing up at the bar with the rest of the Romans, paid our 1,60 and walked back to the bus stop, with three minutes to spare. Italians will do that several times a day.

The subway took us to Santa Susanna Church, where we enjoyed a Mass said in English. The inside of the Church, like all of the churches in Rome, is ornate and beautiful. Following Mass, we stopped at a bar around the corner from church and had a cappuccino, then telephoned Father David and arranged to meet across town in Trestevere for lunch.

Since we had some time before lunch, we stopped at St. Peter’s and visited the crypts that are beneath St. Peter’s. While there were an enormous number of people, there were far fewer people than we had seen on previous days. We visited the tomb of Pope John Paul II, which is, probably not surprisingly, a very simple tomb. We also saw the tomb of St. Peter, and several other popes, as our time allowed. As we were leaving, we snapped a photo of the Swiss Guards that are the security at St. Peter’s. It is reputed that Michalangelo designed their uniforms.

Soon we caught the bus that took us to Trestevere where we met David and found another in our series of yummy restaurants. This particular one was blessedly air-conditioned.

Following lunch, we walked to the bus stop, where we had to wait quite a while for our bus. That’s why I began today’s blog the way I did. By time we got home, we both needed to throw our clothes in a sink of sudsy water and wash them out. I think when we get home, we will have a ceremonial burning of all of the clothes that we wore on this trip. You’re all invited.

Eating Bombolone

Following the series of very busy days that we have spent learning about all the art and various treasures in Rome, we decided to give ourselves – and most particularly our feet – a bit of a rest.

We have found a pastecerria/restaurante that is across the street from our apartment that serves the best bombolone that I have tasted in Italy (and I have given a number of them a try). Bombolone are Italian doughnuts. These particular bombolone are always fresh and warm and absolutely covered with sugar. In fact, they sit on a tray filled with sugar. So, since I have discovered them, I have become addicted to them. Every morning we go over and order due (2) bombolone and due caffe. We lick our sticky fingers (well, at least I do; Bill goes and washes his hands after) and drink our caffe and love life. So that’s how we started our day.

We then took the underground to the Termini station where we caught a bus that took us to Campo di Fiore, where the best market in Rome is held every morning except Sunday. It really is a good market. I bought some dried fruits, a couple of artichokes, and some souvenirs for my family. Because we were so tired, we came home after, and spent the remainder of the afternoon napping, reading, and reading emails.

Our plan was to cook dinner here at home, but about the time we were going to begin cooking, we got a text message from our landlord asking if he could come clean the apartment tonight instead of tomorrow as he had originally planned. Being flexible, we told him sure, no problem.

We decided since the restaurant across the street makes such good bombolone, perhaps the rest of their food is good as well. Well, we were certainly right on that point. We started out with crostini and pomodori (tomatoes), then we each had our own pasta dish. I had spaghetti aglio e olio and Bill had fettucine ragu. Both were exceptionally prepared. In fact, it might have been the best pasta I have had yet, though I keep saying that. We split a second course of chicken romana. They tossed in a sambuca and a lemincello, and we were happy campers.

We will hit the hay early tonight, and go to early Mass at St. Susanna’s, which is the American Catholic Church in Rome.

Anniversary Day

There’s a line in the movie Roman Holiday (a movie I’ve mentioned on a couple of occasions but you can’t help think about it when you’re in Rome – rent it!) at the end when a member of the press corps asks the beautiful princess (Audrey Hepburn) what her favorite town in Europe was. She begins to give the politically correct answer that all of the towns were beautiful, and then she catches Gregory Pec's eyes in the crowd and gazes into them (who wouldn’t?) and says, “Rome. My favorite city is Rome.”

Having the ability and great pleasure of spending my 16^th wedding anniversary in this beautiful and extraordinarily romantic city was something I’ll never forget.

We didn’t get as early a start to the day as we had hoped, so by the time we got to St. Peter’s Square, the line to get into the great church was extremely long and it was extremely hot. So we elected to bag that idea, and instead walked (keeping on the shaded side as much as possible) to the Piazza Navone. I shopped a bit, and then we met Father David for lunch. As Bill and I sat waiting in the Piazza Navone, we listened to a man sing opera. Sitting there, looking at one of the beautiful fountains in the piazza, and listening to the man sing beautiful arias caused Bill to note that it felt a lot different than Denver.

We walked around a bit looking for a restaurant that satisfied all of us both by menu and by price. Having lived here for several years, David knows exactly what to look for to make that decision. He didn’t fail us this time either. We found a restaurant several blocks off the Piazza Navone that served wonderful pizza, which Bill enjoyed, as well is interesting and yummy pasta dishes. I had something I had wanted to try for some time – fettucine tonno (fettucine with tuna). It is an extremely simple dish to make, consisting only of tomatoes, olive oil, garlic, and a can of tuna packed in olive oil. It was unbelievably delicious. I now have a meal to add to my repertoire on Fridays when we can’t eat meat. It’s not just tuna casserole anymore!

The restaurant was one that catered to locals, which is something good to look for anywhere in Italy. It means cheaper and better tasting food. The table next to us was made up of about six men, all wearing the same uniform that indicated to me that they might be telephone or cable installers or something like that. It was fun to watch them because they enjoyed their meal so much, eating a variety of pastas and drinking wine and finishing up with lemincello and grappa. Remember that in Italy (and much of Europe), their business would be closed until 3:30 or 4, so it isn’t uncommon to have a very relaxed lunch like that.

By time we finished eating and shopping, it was 3:30 and the churches were beginning to reopen. We visited Gesu Church, which is the Jesuit church in Rome. The church was built in the classic Baroque style, and is sumptuous and colorful. It houses the body of the Jesuit’s founder St. Ignatius Loyola.

Then we popped over to the Church of St. Louis, King of France to see work by the painter Caravaggio. Caravaggio’s style revolutionized painting in the late 1400s and early 1500s because it was so different from what the people had been used to. I loved this painting. On the right, you can just barely see Jesus pointing to Matthew, the tax collector. On the left, you see Matthew pointing at himself, as if saying, “What, me?” As you will recall, after that, Matthew stood up and walked away from his money and prestige to join Jesus.

We finished our day of touring at a church, Santa Croce in Gerusalemme, which houses a number of passion relics. The relics include one of the beams from the cross of the good thief who died next to Jesus, and to whom Jesus said, “Even this day, you will be with me in Paradise.” Also in the church is the finger of St. Thomas, the apostle who doubted the others when they told him they had seen Jesus after the resurrection, and who needed to place his finger into Jesus’ wounds to believe. The collection also includes thorns from the original crown of thorns. Most amazing is the piece from the true cross of Jesus that was on top and had the inscription Jesus, King of the Jews.

In another room they had an exact replica of the Shroud of Turin, which is the shroud that it is believed was placed over Jesus in the tomb and bears His image. The thing that most impacted me emotionally was a crucifix that someone made using the image on the Shroud of Turin, thereby exactly duplicating the way that He was crucified. The body on the cross was twisted, with the arms clearly broken, and the body was covered in blood. The crucifix was very moving and startling and brought me to tears.

We came home and relaxed a bit, and then we caught the underground back into town.

The first time we were in Rome, back in 1997 or 1998, we ate dinner at a restaurant called Hostaria Romana. I have never forgotten that restaurant, first because the food is good, and second because we had such a good time. So that is where I wanted to have my anniversary dinner if it was still in existence.

Bill did some research and found a restaurant with the same name in the area where he recalled the restaurant being located. We weren’t sure it was the same, but when we came up upon it, sure enough, it was the same restaurant, and even had the same waiters! The restaurant was packed, but they kindly fit us in by seating us at a table with two Americans who were just finishing up. They were a mother and daughter from North Carolina traveling together in honor of the daughter just graduating from high school. We enjoyed talking with them, and particularly enjoyed how the waiters reacted to the daughter, who was very pretty. Italian waiters, what can you say? They reacted the same way to my niece when we were there a few years ago with her. We had them take a picture of the four of us. Dedie and Erin are the ones who aren’t us.

I had mentioned that it was our wedding anniversary, so at the end they brought us tiramisu with a candle in it and two glasses of prosecco. What a nice way to end our anniversary day.

Another Day in Rome

Sixteen years ago today Bill and I were married. What a wonderful 16 years!

Well, I certainly got in trouble yesterday morning. Bill and I went to the grocery store to pick up a few things such as bottled water, cereal, wine, and so forth. I always carry a little fold-up cloth bag with me, but we knew it wasn’t enough. We were going to need a second bag to carry our groceries home.

Now, most of you think, no problem, right? At our neighborhood grocery stores, the grocery sackers cheerily ask “paper or plastic” and proceed to put one or two items in each sack so that you end up with 10 bags. Well, grocery bags are one of those things that Europeans in general, and Italians in particular, are very funny about. (Sort of like ice.) If you want a bag, you pay for it. Italians bring their own bags. Most of the women have these elaborate grocery carrying things that are on wheels so that they can just walk to the market. Personally, I think all of that is just wonderful. Yesterday, it just so happened that my one bag wasn’t enough.

This is where the trouble began. I was entirely aware that if you get a plastic sack, you pay for it. So, while we stood in line to pay for our groceries, I noticed there were a large number of plastic bags at the next checkout stand, which was empty. I simply went over to that booth and picked up a bag, thinking I would put it with our groceries so that they could charge us when we paid for our groceries. I no sooner had the bag in my hand when the checker in the next grocery stand (the one in which Bill was standing) began yelling (and I swear to you I am not exaggerating when I use that word) something in Italian. I couldn’t understand anything she was saying, and initially was unaware that her screams were directed at me. But as I walked back to Bill carrying my bag, I became aware that the checkout area had become silent (except for the woman yelling), and every single elderly Italian woman standing in every line in the store was staring at me in horror as though I had disrobed. Once I became aware that I had done something seriously wrong (though even now I don’t know what it was), I gave a pathetic shrug of my shoulders and guiltily placed the bag back on its pile.

When we got up to the checker, Bill said to her, “Una borsa.” (a bag). She handed him one of the exact same bags, added five cents to our total, and everything was fine.

Once we got the groceries back home and had lunch, we met up with David Troy. He took us on a whole afternoon of sightseeing that included visits to a number of churches, including San Pietro in Vincole (St. Peter in Chains), which houses the magnificent statue of Moses sculpted by Michelangelo, as well as the actual chains that held St. Peter when he was in prison in Rome.

Acts 12, 6-7

And when Herod would have brought him forth, the same night, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains: and the keepers before the door kept the prison. And behold an angel of the Lord stood by him and a light shined in the room. And he, striking Peter on the side, raised him up, saying: Arise quickly. And the chains fell off from his hands.

Speaking of Acts, one of the most moving things we visited was the prison that held both St. Peter and St. Paul, also detailed in Acts. In the prison we saw the spring that appeared so that each man could baptize the guards who converted to Christianity.

The relics we see in some of the churches in Rome are amazing. For example, at a very obscure church we saw the partial skeleton of St. Valentine, and another church featured the actual heart of a St. Charles.

One really touristy stop we made was to the Boca della Verita (Mouth of Truth). You remember the Mouth of Truth was featured in the movie Roman Holiday, so everyone has to have their picture taken with their hand in the mouth. We were no exception.

We concluded our very full day at a restaurant in Trestevere, a very fun neighborhood, where Bill and I shared a delicious rigatoni with cream and sausage and saltimboca (veal scaloppini with prosciutto and sage.) David, as usual, had pizza. We finished the evening with a delightful stroll along the Tiber River.

Tonight Bill and I will celebrate our anniversary by dining alone at some romantic Roman trattoria.

Visiting the Pope

I had a theory. My theory was that on Wednesdays, hundreds and hundreds of people stand in line to get into the weekly audience with Pope Benedict. If hundreds of people are standing in line to see the pope, that meant hundreds of people AREN’T standing in the line for the Vatican Museum – a museum with notoriously long queues.

Yay! My theory proved right. At almost 10 o’clock, we were able to walk right into the building and get our tickets. Granted, the museum itself was pretty busy, but everything is immense and so you don’t feel that crowded.

Last time we visited the Vatican Museum, we walked straight to the Sistine Chapel without looking at all of the other beautiful exhibits and paintings. This time we took our time and saw all of the beautiful Etruscan pottery, Greek and Roman sculpture, tapestries, and, most breathtaking of all, a room of frescoes by Raphael. The frescoes were painted on the walls of the room that was part of the apartment of Julius II, the pope famous for the construction of St. Peters and, of course, hiring Michelangelo to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel (which turned out to be a fine decision on his part). One of the Raphael frescoes was entitled The School of Athens. Raphael placed his chief competitor Michelangelo into the painting as a sullen loner. He can be seen in the front with his head in his hands.

Bill spotted a particular statue that he liked. I don’t know what the actual name of the sculpture is, but Bill dubbed it The Three Sisters in honor of his wife and two sisters-in-law.

The museum tour ends with a visit to the Sistine Chapel. No matter how many times I will see that lovely chapel, it will never fail to take my breath away. How a human being can create such a beautiful and spiritual work of art is beyond me. God’s hand, it is very clear. No photos were allowed.

Following our museum visit, we had thought we would go into St. Peter’s. Though we were there the other day, I still want to visit the tomb of John Paul II. Unfortunately, we got out of there about the same time that the audience had ended, and all of those hundreds of people who had listened to the words of Pope Benedict VI were now trying to get into St. Peter’s as well. We elected to go on another day.

We grabbed a bus to take us back to our metro stop. We have been blessed with meeting the most interesting people. We boarded the bus, and a priest already seated on the bus moved over so that we could sit. He asked us, “Americano?” (We must just SCREAM American, because everyone knows we are.) We said yes. He was visiting Rome from Massachusetts, and had just left the audience with the Pope. He was enthralled when he heard how long we had been traveling and our future plans. We talked for some time until he had to leave the bus.

After a quiet afternoon at home, we went back into the city around 4:30. I had wanted to visit St. John Lateran Basilica, which is the Pope’s cathedral (remember that in addition to being pope, he is also the bishop of Rome). The church is gorgeous, with beautiful statutes of all of the apostles sculpted by students of Bernini and a magnificent ceiling of gold.

Just outside of the church are the Scala Sancta. This staircase is believed to be the stairs that were part of Pontius Pilot’s palace, and as such, climbed up and down repeatedly by Christ on the day he died. It’s believed that the emperor Constantine’s mother brought the steps back to Rome. The only way you are allowed to climb the steps is on your knees. Bill was seriously considering doing it, but waited too long and a group of high school students packed the steps. The sight is awe-inspiring, that’s for sure.

After that, we met David Troy and his friend, Father Placido, who comes from India, for dinner. We ate at an Indian restaurant in a very ethnic neighborhood near the train station. It is clearly a place for locals, and the food was delicious. It was nice to eat something other than pasta or pizza for a change (though I love both).

The weather was clear and very warm.

When in Rome

After our long day on Monday, we were determined to take it a bit easier on Tuesday.
We slept kind of late, and then had coffee and cereal in our apartment. It’s kind of fun to see and hear our neighbors awaken and ready themselves for the day. Our apartment is located in one building in a development of about five or six. Virtually all Romans live in some sort of apartment because there are no single-family homes here amidst the congestion. In the morning and in the evening, when either their windows are open or they are out on their patios or in the courtyard (their substitute for being out in a yard) you can see and hear everyone eating, laughing, talking with their friends, playing with the kids, or as last night, cheering on Italy’s soccer team (who was leading France 2-0 when I went to bed). The strong sense of community feels a lot different than neighborhoods back home.

We met David Troy at about noon at the Spanish Steps. He took us on a day of sightseeing. We visited the Pantheon, the Castel D’Angelo (the former mausoleum of the Emperor Hadrian and a former fortress for Popes hiding from some sort of trouble, now a museum), and ate a leisurely two-hour lunch at a wonderful pizzaria near the Piazza Navona that baked their pizzas in a wood-burning oven.

We did a lot of wandering around neighborhoods. David knows Rome extremely well, having lived here for quite a while. Since he has visited all of the tourist sights on numerous occasions, he now explores the back areas when he goes on Roman walks. It was fun to see some of the areas with which he is familiar. For example, we walked down one street where all of the stores sold priest and bishop vestments, chalices, enormously expensive monstranses of gold and silver, and all sorts of items for churches. We paused to look in the window of the business that has been designing the pope’s vestments practically forever, and Bill took this picture of David and me so that when David becomes pope, I can say I knew him when he was a mere priest studying canon law.

One thing that surprises me about Rome (and really Italy in general) is that you find magnificent works of art in these churches. For example, we stopped in the Church of Santa Maria Sopra Minerva, near the Pantheon. It is well-known only because there is a very famous statue carved by Bernini (an elephant) in the piazza in front of the church. Very little mention is made in guidebooks about the church itself. And yet, standing near the altar is a beautiful statue of Jesus holding the cross that was carved by Michelangelo. You would think that would be worth a mention.

We also visited one church that will certainly maintain its title in my mind as the most bizarre of our entire trip. I particularly thought of my stepmother, who, like me, is a fan of all things unusual. The crypt of the church is entirely decorated with the bones of the monks of the Church’s order. Apparently, the idea came from one particularly odd monk, who thought it would be a good way to remind people that we will some day die and go to our afterlife beyond. According to David, a number of years later, the church wanted to remove the display thinking it was too macabre, but the City of Rome refused to allow it because the display had by that time become a tourist attraction. The display was incredibly intricate, using bones from hundreds of monks – jawbones, hipbones, vertebrae, entire skeletons, all creating the church’s decorations. Unfortunately, we were not allowed to take pictures.

After leaving that church, Bill and I were tired and came home. We had a quiet night in our apartment reading, playing cards, and listening to our neighbors watch their beloved Italian soccer team beat the French.

Roman Holiday

We’ve been in Rome since Sunday. The pace is decidedly different here than it was in Roccatederighi. I think I will always love Rome.

We had a bit of a fright when we first got here. We began calling the owner of our Rome apartment about an hour out of town, per previous instructions from Vincenzo (the owner) via email to Bill. Alas, Bill kept getting a message that, though we don’t understand much Italian, seemed to be telling us that the telephone was not in service. Since that was the only number we had for him, we were quite nervous. Did they even own the apartment? Had they taken our 100 euro deposit while we had taken it in the chops?

We found the apartment quite easily, and even found a place to park our car (not right at the apartment, but off street nearby). Bill kept calling the number and I kept praying. Same message.

We walked to the apartment. The security doors were just being opened by a tenant, so we got inside the gates. We searched around a bit and were even able to find the actual apartment building. The name on the box outside was not that of Vincenzo. Hmmm. Bill kept calling and I kept praying.
Again, because of someone leaving the door slightly ajar, we were able to get inside the apartment building and upstairs to see the door of the apartment itself. Much to our relief, the name on the apartment door was the last name of our elusive friend Vincenzo. At least such a person actually existed and apparently actually owned the apartment.

We had decided that the only thing we could do was to telephone Bill’s nephew and have him send an email to the address to which Bill had been sending emails and tell him our plight. We were very concerned because up to that point, it had taken Vincenzo several days to respond to any email, but we didn’t know what else to do.

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned that we have a travel angel who has been taking care of us on this trip. I’m serious. I don’t know if it’s my mom, Bill’s dad, or just someone up in heaven who is taking pity on us poor, silly travelers. But we have very often had a problem mysteriously fixed, or gone back to check something to see that we had left a door unlocked, or been inclined to look under the bed only to find one of our credit cards that had somehow fallen on the floor.

Well, Bill was about to call his nephew David Troy, but decided to give Vincenzo one last try. Lo, and behold, he answered the phone! “Were you coming today? I thought it was tomorrow,” he said.

David Troy calls it Italian Logic.

By the time we got settled into our very nice little studio apartment, David Troy had walked over. It turns out that he lives about a 20-minute walk from our place. He had asked Bill when he telephoned a bit earlier if we had any interest in hearing Mass in English. Since we had not heard an English Mass since early in May, we jumped at the chance. So we walked back to the house where he lives. He is a priest with the Order of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and lives in the order’s house. He is studying Canon Law in Rome.

After our wonderful little Mass, which he celebrated with a friendly young priest from Brazil who is trying very hard to learn to speak English, David took us over to St. Peter’s and showed us some of the magnificent art there. It was very interesting because he knows a TON of the history, and we learned so much from his tour despite the fact that we had visited St. Peter’s twice before.

About 7:30, we met up with the nice Brazilian priest (whom we had invited to join us for dinner) and had a very nice meal at a trattoria where all of the staff knew Father David. We enjoyed our pizza and pasta and conversation very much.

One funny note: At the end of our meal, suddenly the waiter brought over two desserts. David Troy saw them coming and knew that they were being wrongly delivered to our table and should actually go to the table next to us that was filled with high-school-age children. He pointed out the error to th waiter. The man at the table across from us, who was traveling with the kids, came over and introduced himself. David asked him where he was from. Denver, Colorado! He was a teacher at a Denver Catholic high school and he and his wife were accompanying these kids to Europe. It’s a very small world.

Yesterday Bill and I got up early and found the laundry, which is also an Internet spot. We did a load of wash and caught up on our email. After that, we took the subway into Rome and walked around a bit. We had lunch and a gelato, and came home because it was getting hot. We rested a bit, then found a grocery store and bought a few supplies.

We had dinner in our apartment. We had eaten a large lunch, so we just had some fruit and cheese and wine. After dinner, about 7:30, Bill suggested we go back into the city and do a bit more exploring. It cools down considerably in the evening, so I thought that sounded like a good idea.

We took a bus to the subway station, then took the subway to the train station. We walked a bit, looking for the hotel where we had stayed in the past (which we didn’t find) and St. Susanna’s (the American Catholic Church, which we did find). We then walked over to the Barbarina area and had a lemincello. It was about 10:45, and we walked over to the nearby subway station, only to find it closed. Nonsense, I thought. This is a major world metropolitan city. The subway wouldn’t close at 10:45. We took a bus back to the train station, certain that the metro station there would be open. Nope. Line A was shut up tight as a drum.

Thankfully, we found a taxi and were able to take a very expensive cab ride home. Live and learn. By the way, we walked a total of 28,557 steps yesterday.

Where the Heck Have We Been?

For the past few days, we have been in the area of Italy called Maramma. Maramma is technically part of Tuscany, sort of between the Chianti wine country and the Mediterranean Sea. Maramma is Italy’s Wild Wild West.

Marimma is hilly, but sort of brushy and wild-looking. There are a lot of grapevines growing, but there are also a lot of hay and olive trees. Maramma is where the beef cattle graze and cowboys herd them on horseback. I wanted to visit here because it’s one of the areas of Italy we had never visited and was reported to be one of the most beautiful. I did find it to be one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. Hauntingly beautiful, in fact.

Bill found our hotel on the Internet. The price was reasonable and it was near the town of Massa Maritimma, which is considered sort of the capital of this area. We knew it was going to be an agriturismo in a remote area. We didn’t know just how remote.

We stayed in a town called Roccatederighi. You probably won’t find it on your map. It is a small town in which probably 500 people live. It is high, high, high upon a hill. If you’ve driven in Italy, or even have taken trains, you’ve seen towns such as Roccatederighi. They are dark gray with tile roofs and all the buildings are made out of stone. They look very medieval, and for good reason. They generally were built during the medieval period to be a fortress or safe area for an important person living in the area. We saw the town as we were driving up the hill. We saw many towns. We had no idea we were going to actually be living in one of them for four days.
When we drove up the Residence Mariletta, no one was around. This wasn’t surprising, as it was about 1:30 – siesta time. So we parked our car and walked around the town. It doesn’t take long because the town generally consists of one road – it comes into town, goes around the back of the town and leaves the town. None of the stores were opened. Most indicated they would reopen at around 4:30 or 5.

We found a little bar that was open. There was a man about Bill’s age tending the bar, and his wife was wiping down the tables. What appeared to be their grandson was keeping himself busy in the background. He would occasionally go outside and look into the hills using his binoculars. Bill ordered a birre and a vino rosso (when I said ‘small’ the man politely corrected me and said ‘pico’. These are not people who speak a great deal of English. My guess is none.

By time we returned to the Residence Mariletta, our innkeeper, Luella, had returned. She too spoke very little English, but through sign language and rudimentary English on her part and rudimentary Italian on our part, we were able to check in, pay the bill, and get our things moved in.

It is a very pretty inn. The view from our window was magnificent. It is set at the foot of the town, but remember that the town is up on a hill. As such, our hotel was also up on a hill. The road we took to get here, thanks again to our GPS’ desire to take us on the most scenic if most frightening roads imaginable, was terrifying. One narrow, winding lane that theoretically accommodates two cars. I think the road is so rarely driven, however, that when we drove past the postman coming the opposite way it was the first time I have seen such a look of astonishment on any Italian driver’s face. “What in Sam Blazes (or the Italian equivalent) are you doing here?” he was undoubtedly saying.

As usual, when we looked later at the map, we determined there is a larger, safer, but longer way into and out of town. That’s the road we took to get out of town and into Rome, where we are now.
Because our apartment had a kitchen, we later walked back into town and made the rounds to buy some things for dinner. I bought pasta, tomatoes, garlic, capers, anchovies, and olive oil, and was able to throw together a pretty nice meal. None of the women in any of the stores spoke a lick of English, but we got by pretty well. I had my dictionary, and I’m getting to know some of the words. Olio di oliva; basilico; sale; filetti alici; just enough to get by. And they are all so pleasant, so happy to help me.

Our time spent there was very interesting. Roccatederighi is not a town that is on anyone’s tourist map. I think the Resident Mariletta was the only hotel in the town, though we noticed a lot of agriturismos on the larger road down to Grosseto. So when the townpeople saw us, they knew we were not from around there. But though they looked at us with curiosity, they got used to seeing us visit the market each day to pick up supplies for dinner.

Saturday night we decided to attend the vigil Mass so that we could get an early start on Sunday. There are two churches in town – one on the very tip-top of the hill that we couldn’t get inside to see and one sort of in the middle of the hill that we got in to see. It was very small, but as I say, there are very few residents. We were trying to make sense of the Mass schedule when an older woman came up to us, recognizing that we were trying to figure out what time Mass would be held. From her gestures and what little Italian we could understand, we learned there was to be a procession from the bottom church to the top church starting at 5:30 p.m., and then Mass would be held at the top church at 6 p.m. She kept touching her forehead, so we decided that there was going to be some sort of ceremony involving the Blessed Mother that would involve a crown. As temporary Roccatederighians, if there is a procession, we are so THERE.

At 5:30, we show up at the bottom church. There are a number of people milling around, and everyone knows everyone else. There is a lot of cheek kissing, etc. Five-thirty comes and goes, and the clock is nearing six. We begin notice that a number of people are carrying cameras, and we can tell they are clearly waiting for something. At 6 o’clock sharp, out comes the priest, and with him is a bishop. The old women begin kneeling and kissing his ring. No statue of the Blessed Virgin to be found. Oh oh.

The procession begins. You have the priest and the bishop leading the way, followed by 20 or 30 Roccatederighians, many older women dressed in black, and Bill and me. We all walk up the extremely steep hill to the upper church, at which the choir is in place and flowers are all over. Bill and I find a place, and they begin handing out programs. I take out my dictionary, and quickly figure out that we are, in fact, attending the confirmation ceremony. So we watched Maria and Giacamo and Antonio and I don’t know who else become confirmed members of the Catholic faith, while the proud parents, grandparents, godparents and friends looked on – and of course those strange two people who have been wandering around their town for the last few days.

I learned something about myself the four days we spent in Roccatederighi. I always thought I would love to spend time somewhere remote and eerily beautiful with no television, etc. In fact, I nearly lost my mind. Granted, the weather didn’t cooperate. While we could look down onto the beautiful swimming pool, we were unable to enjoy it because it was chilly and overcast and rainy most of the time we were there. Oh, except when we woke up Sunday morning to pack our car, it was beautiful.

But I’m glad to have had this experience. I will never again have to wonder who actually lives in those towns up on top of the hill. I know they have an active, friendly, close-knit community who accepted the presence of two strangers with graciousness.

The Smallest Little Town We Have Ever Seen

Bill and I are alive and doing fine. We are staying in a very remote village until Sunday when we move to Rome. We do not have Internet so I am not able to post my blog or be in contact with anyone.

To get to this town, we drove on an extremely narrow, winding road, to get to the top of the hill to our town. As usual, though it should have been only a one way road, it was a two way road. On some spots there would be a traffic sign with one arrow pointing up and the other arrow pointing down. One arrow was red and the other was black. This sign was at a point in the road which was too narrow for two-way traffic and apparently, the car going in the direction of the black arrow had the right-of-way. Fortunately, we did not meet any cars at these points to test this theory.

We are in a hill town called Roccotederigghi. It is beautiful if quite remote. Yesterday it was foggy and rainy all day and we had to stay in our little apartment. We nearly lost our mind. Today is sunny and warmer so we drove into a nearby town called Grosetto where we found this internet cafe. We have some beautiful photos of this town but are unable to post photos until we have our regular Internet service, hopefully on Sunday. We will post the photos then.

Sunday morning we leave for Rome. We hope to continue the blog at that point.

Lazy Day

If you looked up the word lazy in the dictionary, you could possibly see a picture of Bill and me. This was definitely a lazy day.

We slept in and after breakfast, we drove into Sestri. We parked the car, watched those same seven men and one woman play bocce ball for a bit, and then rented beach chairs. For about three hours, we sat in those chairs on the beach of the Mediterranean, read our books, and watched the mothers with their kids, and the grandmothers with their grandkids, play in the sand and in the water. We did get up and get into the water for a bit, but nothing as strenuous as swimming. Heaven forbid. The water was very warm.

We walked over to the Coop to buy a few things for a picnic on the patio tonight. One thing I still haven’t gotten used to in Italy is the fact that all stores – all stores – close from 1 to 3:30 every afternoon. Even the Coop. Can you imagine King Soopers or the Jewel or Giant or Fryes just locking up from 1 to 3:30? Crazy. So we sat at a little bar and drank a glass of wine while we waited for it to reopen.

Tomorrow we leave for our four days in Maramma.

High Over the Med

After breakfast, Bill and I drove into Sestri Levante, parked the car, and set off to explore the little town in which we had landed for a few days. We made our way to the beach. Monday is apparently the day for passagiata, elderly style. Passagiata is what the Italians call a stroll, and it generally takes place in the evening before dinner. But clearly Monday morning is the day the seniors of Sestri Levante get together and share stories about the weekend.

We saw them gathered at the beach, walking along with their grandkids, having espresso at the cafes along the street. We came across a group of seven men and one woman, all probably in their 70s, playing bocce ball. We stopped and watched them for a while.

After a bit, we caught a train to Monterosso, which is the first Cinque Terre town on this side. Our goal was to walk from Monterosso to Vernazza along the hiking path. My sister and niece and Bill and I had done this when we were in Italy in 2001. I’m not sure why, but my recollection of the hike is that it was pretty, and not difficult at all.

Well, folks, I’m not sure if I just managed to block out the difficulty of the trail or if seven years has made a huge difference (or a little of both). However, I found the trail to be enormously difficult – and well worth the trouble.

It is about 3K from Monterosso to Vernazza, and three-quarters of it is uphill. What I had forgotten is that there are something like 10 trillion steps to climb, and the path is narrow and hangs precariously over the Mediterranean Sea. It is unbelievably beautiful, but I found that I couldn’t take my eyes off my feet because I was terrified of falling down and spraining or worse, breaking, my ankle.

It was very hot. We found ourselves literally drenched in sweat. We had brought water, but not enough. Nevertheless, we made it! As we were coming downhill into the town of Vernazza, seeing the pretty yellow and pink town from up high made it all worthwhile. We met a young man, kind of heavy-set, probably in his mid-20s, as we were coming down. He asked us if he had very far to go. We told him, yes, unfortunately he had a long way to go. He groaned. I told him if I could make it, he could do it too. He thanked me for my motivation and walked on. I wonder if he made it.

Last time we walked the trail in 2001, about halfway through the walk, on the highest part of the trail, we came across a man selling homemade sweet white wine that he had in a barrel of ice. I remember that we bought some wine, and then walked on. A short time later we came across a picnic table where we stopped, opened the wine, and poured it into the plastic wine glasses we always keep with us. It tasted like heaven. This time, there was a man selling wine. I don’t know if it was that the wine wasn’t iced down, or if we are just older and saw the danger in drinking wine and then walking on a precariously high hill where, if you slipped you would plummet into the Mediterranean Sea. Whichever it was, we elected not to buy the wine. (Sorry Miss Maggie.) Nevertheless, we did stop at the picnic table and asked a passerby to take this picture.

When we got into Vernazza, we were hot, tired, sore, and hungry. We stopped at a restaurant and finished a liter of fizzy water and a liter of delicious cold white wine in short order. We also each ate some delicious pasta. After our daily gelato, we caught a train to the second-to-the-last of the Cinque Terre towns. Believe it or not, we got off the train, and walked the last leg of the Cinque Terre hike from Manarola to Riomaggiore. It is an easy hike of only about 1K, and they call it Via Amore – the lovers’ road. It was a lovely end to our day in Cinque Terre.

We took the train back to Sestri, and stopped at the Coop to pick up a melon and some prosciutto. I can’t explain to you how delicious the melons in Tuscany are. You can just close your eyes and pick one, and you know it is going to be sweet and juicy. We took it down to the patio, cut it up and ate it with the salty ham and some cold white wine while we watched the sun go down again. Wow.

The Best Yet?

This is the prettiest place yet.

I know I keep saying it, but I think it keeps getting better. At any rate, each part of Italy that we have seen has been beautiful, and each in a different way. This leg of our trip, we are sitting on a hill overlooking the Mediterranean.

I couldn’t be any more serious than that. Our hotel is located in a town called Sestri Levante that is just north of the Cinque Terre. The hotel sits high on a hill overlooking the town and the beautiful sea. In fact, it sits on such a high hill that we were thinking perhaps our GPS had led us astray. But no, it really does sit on the top of this hill overlooking the town. We just watched the sun set over the Mediterranean sitting on the patio of the hotel. Bill smoked a cigar and we drank some wine that we still had from France. Really, how does it get any better than that?

We left Perugia about 10 this morning and arrived here around 2 or so. We caught our breath after seeing how beautiful this all was, got settled in, and then set out on our first-day adventure. We drove into the town of Sestri Levante, parked, and bought train tickets for Venazza, one of the Cinque Terre towns. About the same time, it started to pour rain. We went back and forth: should we go, or should we use the tickets tomorrow? The rain seemed to be coming down a little slower, so we decided to risk it and go into Vernazza.

Vernazza is probably the prettiest of the Cinque Terre towns. Cinque Terre stands for “five towns” that literally sit on cliffs overlooking the sea. You can’t reach them by road; you can only get to them by boat or train. There is a hiking trail that connects all of the towns. When we were here in 2001, my sister and niece and Bill and I hiked part of the trail. I would like to try it again. Maybe tomorrow.

The area is known for lemons and basil, and I can attest that there are plenty of both. The gardens around the town are stupendous. They already have gorgeous tomato plants, and the basil grows wild. Because basil is so prominent, so is pesto. So what the heck? Bill and I both ordered spaghetti with pesto for dinner. Oh my gosh. Was it ever good.

Tomorrow we may go visit the beach that is near our little place. Or, I may just sit out on the patio and read and look at the ocean.

We’re Not Fooling Anybody

We try to have one day each week that is relaxing, meaning that Bill doesn’t have to drive the car. Since we leave Perugia tomorrow for our place by the Mediterranean, we decided to have today be our day of rest.

We visited the Perugia old city again, but this time we took a bus. For a euro apiece, we can leave the driving to them. Because we are such creatures of habit, we tracked down the same pizzaria where we had such delicious food a few days ago to eat lunch. This time we both got pizza. Bill was tempted to have pasta, but I told him I can and will cook pasta but I can’t make a pizza like they make. So we each ordered a different kind and shared. Bill had arugula and prosciutto; I had salami, tomato, and green olives. Both were wonderful.

We laugh, however, because while we are really trying to learn and use our Italian, they all know before any words come out of our mouth that not only are we not Italian, but we are American. Before we can say, “buon giorno”, they say, “hello.” Could it be my travel purse or could it be Bill’s travel pants? Or perhaps the pack hanging on my back. Hmmm. At any rate, when we walked into the restaurant, Bill began saying “Tavalo per due” and the man just interrupted him by asking, “Do you want a table for two?” By time August rolls around, we’ll have them totally fooled.

After visiting so many massive churches, tonight we went to Mass at the little church in the neighborhood in which our hotel is located. It was a pretty church, but so tiny. There were seven rows of seats on each side, and if people would squeeze, they could fit four in a pew. But the church itself was so lovely.

Next stop – Sestri Levante, a little town just north of the Cinque Terre.

Maxwell Smart

Today your two favorite travelers, aka Maxwell Smart and Agent 99, (if you’re under age 50 you will probably have to look that one up) underwent a reconnaissance adventure.

As most of my readers know, the real point of this European adventure that we have undertaken is a month-long stay in an Italian town. When we first began planning this trip, we had thought we would live someplace for anywhere between four and six months. It became apparent that was probably not practical for a variety of reasons. Once we decided to have our long-term stay be a month, we thought we would stay in Lucca, which is roughly between Siena and Pisa. Upon doing some research, however, we elected instead to become residents of a community called Certaldo for that month. Certaldo is about halfway between Florence and Siena, and about 10 minutes from San Gimignano, the town noted for its many medieval towers.

While we are certainly enjoying our travels to date, we are both eager to begin our Certaldo adventure. It’s frankly been driving me crazy that Perugia is so close to Certaldo and I have wanted to see it so that I could know what to expect for the month of July. Bill agreed today to drive there and see what we could expect in a few weeks. How big was the town? How close is the nearest big town? How far out of Certaldo is our little house? Is it walking distance? How big is the market in Certaldo? All these were questions I was eager to have answered.

Let me start by saying that, as I mentioned yesterday, our GPS has a bit of a mind of her own. We asked her to take us on the fastest route, and so we took the toll road for 7/8ths of the way, and a terrifyingly narrow, winding road through a couple of really small towns for the final 8th. While I clutched my door handle as we went around curves on a road that should be one-way but instead is two-way with no way to see what’s around the corner, I kept thinking, how are my sister and her husband going to drive this road?

My sister and brother-in-law will be joining us in Certaldo for two of our four weeks in July. My fear was that they will not have had any chance to acclimate themselves to Italian drivers (and again, I can’t emphasize enough how crazy Italian drivers are) before they drive to Certaldo. Yikes!

I am so pleased to say that we are both thrilled with our choice. Certaldo is larger than either one of us expected, but it is still a small community. The city is divided into two sections, the new part (which is closest to our house) and what they call Certaldo Alto (the old section, which is up on a hill).

The first thing we did was drive out to our little house. I can’t even begin to tell you how beautiful it is. Our view is amazing. I promise I will spend every minute of my day sitting on my patio looking out into the hills, with the towers of San Gimignano in the distance. Well, until I go in to cook dinner, that is. Those of you who don’t like to cook can’t understand how much I miss cooking.

After we checked out our digs, we drove back into town to have lunch. (The house, by the way, is definitely walking distance into town. My fear, however, is that again it is a very winding road and there is not much room to walk on the side. I’ll have to see how much traffic there is.) We stopped at a restaurant that is just inside the town, very close to our house. We had a wonderful lunch of pasta and wine. The waiter couldn’t have been nicer, and when I told him I was trying to learn Italian, he helped me with pronunciation and choice of words.

At the end of the meal, he brought over a plate of homemade biscotti that were absolutely delicious. I still am trying to think what the flavor in the cookies was. Perhaps amaretto. Anyway, we enjoyed the cookies, and when we were finished, the woman who I think was either the owner or manager brought over a bottle of wine and said it’s their gift to us. I was astounded at their graciousness. Whereas in France, when you don’t know the language, they sniff, in Italy, they bring you a bottle of wine! Go figure. I told her as we were leaving that we would be living just a couple of miles from there for the month of July, and assured her she would see more of us.

We then took a funicular up to the top of the hill where the old city is located (after climbing hills yesterday, we were amused to see that they had a funicular. Weenies.) The old town is very pretty, and you could see the entire area from there, including San Gimignano off in the distance. What I really like about it is that there are really very few tourists, as no one really knows about Certaldo yet. Don’t tell anyone.

Back to the drive. Our GPS, for some reason, took us home an entirely different way, and it was a much easier drive. So, now that I’ve got my sister nervous about driving to Certaldo, I will assure her that provided they take the proper roads, they will be just fine.