Tuesday, September 21, 2010

A VERY full day!






Wednesday, 21 September 2010

Ciao, Tutte! (Which I am hoping means: Hi, y’all!)

Let’s see…where to begin! First of all, Tom and Anna Marie made it safely back to Monrovia yesterday, and are enjoying the wonders of jet lag! How fun to see friends on the other side of the world! In fact, last night, we went to a restaurant they recommended, which is only a couple of blocks from the flat, called Preistorique; lots of fun paintings of cave dwellers and mastodons on the walls! Mom had a bresaola salad, but with fresh buffalo mozzarella; R had a plate of penne cooked in oil with crushed red pepper and parsley, just like he makes at home – he said it was great! I had a pizza with eggplant and spicy salami – very good too! Got home around 9, and to bed very early, as we wanted to be at St. Peter’s this morning at 7 a.m.

So…up EARLY, much to everyone’s unhappiness, and on to the #62 bus. That got us across town and to St. Peter’s Square (which is really a circle…) just a few minutes before 7. No problem just walking through security; no queue at all, and it is such a huge church, it felt like we had big parts of it to ourselves! R took some wonderful pictures, including a couple of daylight dawning from the porch in front of the cathedral. It is such a beautiful and impressive place – definitely a “must see” for anyone’s trip to Rome! Had a good look around, then decided to head back to the flat to change back into shorts (knees and shoulders must be covered).

Also, as we’d gotten up so early, decided to take our morning nap then!
Up again around 10, and out – back to the #62 bus, which goes by or close to lots of wonderful Roman sites! This time we got off near Piazza Navona for the Barracco Museum. This is a wonderful collection of ancient sculpture and assorted items, collected by a very rich Italian at the turn of the century, when Egyptian antiquities were very hot property. (Probably literally!) A bachelor, he eventually left his entire collection to the state, who has now assembled them here in an old palazzo. The English translations of things were excellent, everything was neatly labeled, and we very much enjoyed the collection!

After that we crossed the Via Vittorio Emanuale II and went into the Piazza Navona, where we had been several evenings ago with Tom and Anna Marie. Visited the church of St. Agnes in Agony, and then decided to have lunch at Tre Scalini on the piazza. Very, very good food and service; we would recommend it highly! It is also very competitively priced compared to some of the other places in the area. Mom had their Minestrone, I had a great bresaola and parmesan cheese salad, and R had a plate of grilled vegetables which were terrific. Again, Frascati wine, but this time only half a bottle, as we were heading back to St. Peter’s for our tour of the necropolis and wished to remain steady on our feet! Ended the meal with gelato – Mom had fruits del bosco (berries of the woods) and I had stracciatella and chocolate, my favorite combination. The chocolate was almost black, it was so dense! LOVED it!

We still had time to kill before our 3 p.m. Necropolis tour, so we headed from Piazza Navona up a block or so to the Palazzo Altemps, which now holds part of the national sculpture collection. There were some really striking pieces spread around this former cardinal’s palazzo, but the labeling was very poor, as was signage in general – a bit disappointing after Museo Barracco!

When we had finished there, it was time to make our way back over to St. Peter’s and our tour. Caught the good old #62 where we had gotten off on Via Emanuale II and rode it to St. Peter’s. Boy, what a difference a few hours and few more thousand people make! The place wasn’t packed, like we have occasionally seen it, but it certainly wasn’t deserted like it was this morning! This time, though, we had to get through the Swiss Guards and to the Scavi Office. The tour group was 15 people plus the guide, a third year American student studying theology in Rome. We had done the tour several years ago, and to be honest, David our guide today wasn’t nearly as “up” on things as our guide last time, but he was pleasant and the tour was fine. It was, however, unfortunately, VERY humid in the necropolis, and we were all VERY sticky by the time we finished! It is an amazing place to visit; we highly recommend it, and now they have a book about the place in English, which they didn’t have before. R is reading it now, and says it is very well written. The place where St. Peter’s bones are said to be buried has been identified, the remains sealed in an unbreakable clear container, and you can see the graffiti wall where early Christians wrote many things over the years.

Finished up the tour about 4, and straight back to the bus stop. Fortunately we were able to get seats, as this became one very crowded bus as it wound its way back to Piazza Bologna! The trip took almost an hour at that time of day! Whew! Back for a lie down before we foray out to dinner tonight! May find someplace around here.

We have now seen just about everything that was on our “to do” list, and still have three days left! We’re looking for something to do in the morning, figuring that we’ll have a nice leisurely lunch at a glassed-in restaurant on the Via Veneto tomorrow, then a BIG nap before the soccer game which begins at 8:45 p.m. What a nice day!!

Lots of love,
m
x

1 comment:

Brenda said...

Love the pictures! Of course it reminded me of Angels and Demons. So cool!