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Via Appia Antica

5 Nov

For the past few decades, there have been efforts by the State to preserve and protect the historic area, limiting construction, acquiring private property.

We’ve been wanting to take this trek for over a year. Missed it last December, and summer was too hot, so now that fall is here we took advantage of the Italian holiday (All Saints’ Day) on November 1 and ventured out.  I gave my “new” legs about an 8km (5 mile) test, the longest walk I had since prior to surgery. It felt great! It is difficult to believe this is so close to Rome: just a quick Metro + bus ride away.

Not much of a narrative this time, just some pictures to share.

Ruins of a famous villa and “circus” or chariot race track.

Very peaceful stretch of the Via Appia Antica. That’s Ric meandering in the distance.

A peek through the gates at a private estate.

We encountered many cyclists during our walk. We think the ancient stones would be a tough ride, but there are some dirt paths alongside the road.

Piece of a sarcophagus

Along the road one sees many artifacts such as this statue.

Tombs once lined the ancient road. There are some intact crypts to visit, and many crumbling structures such as this one.

Our place in Rome

3 Oct

Our household goods and furniture arrived in July, 7 weeks after we did, but it took a little time to get all the pictures hung and acquire some new storage pieces to replace built-in shelves, cupboards, and closets that we have in our Portland condo.  So here, at last, is a peek at our furnished digs in Roma. The “before” pictures are with embassy-provided temporary IKEA furniture. I have to say, although the temporary furniture was spartan, it was great to move right into our apartment, and not have to spend 7 weeks in a hotel room.

Living Room “before.” IKEA temporary furniture: no TV, rugs, nor accoutrement. Bed pillows and a throw added for color. 🙂

Pictures hung, the new TV that is seldom used: it feels like “home.”

Another living room view, looking toward the hallway and kitchen, with the lovely Libby passing through.

Dining Room “before.” This was our multi-purpose eating space and office.

Dining Room “after.” Still partly used as a home office. My desk is in the corner to the right. Ric’s desk is in his train room, but he hangs out with his laptop at the table so we are together.

Kitchen “before.” This is really a nice space but we needed more storage. Note the long empty wall on the right which we filled with…

… a nice wood-topped cabinet. From IKEA, of course!

Our IKEA cabinet. IKEA wanted €200 to assemble, so we scheduled a do-it-ourselves day. It was a very satisfying project. No one was injured.

Forgot to take a “before” picture of the bedroom. It was quite spartan, to say the least. Libby makes another rare appearance and models one of her favorite locations.

We still have some things to do. Perhaps acquire some local artwork for the bedroom, and I plan to hang some draperies before cold weather sets in. But we are “at home” here in every way. So are the cats, who have traded our small garden in Portland for a window sill 4 stories above the street in Rome.

Dare-devil Janie on the (very wide) window sill. The metal braces are part of the shutter assembly. Libby watches from the cat tower. Window screens are a rarity.

A castle and a palazzo

6 Aug

We had a busy and fun weekend. While some would cower in air-conditioned comfort, we headed out to experience more of Rome. The key is to go early, come home by noon-ish, then back out at night. There’s too much to do in Rome in the summer! You can’t curl up under the covers like LibbyJean!

Saturday we always go to Campo dei Fiori, a busy busy market almost any day of the week. We love the bustle and hustle, and access to the best salumi in all of Rome: Antica Norcineria Viola. Unfortunately now closed for ferie, so we have to make do with our stockpile until he returns in September.

Beautiful vegetables and the best salumi in Rome.

We also had our usual cappucino and pastry, this time con mele e crema, near Santa Maria della Pace.

Saturday night, after dinner at our favorite little trattoria, we ventured to Castel Sant’Angelo for Notti d’Estate (Summer Nights), and a special tour including the Passetto di Borgo (secret passage allowing the Pope to escape if the Vatican was sacked — and it was), prisons, and the bathroom of Clement VII.

Castel Sant’Angelo aglow, beckoning.

The English tour, for which we had reservations, was at 22:45. We were there by 22:00, looked around a bit, and then waited for our tour to be called. At 22:50 I asked “When will the English tour start?” Madam it has already left! We never heard or saw anyone claiming to be an English tour guide…. So we joined an Italian tour and vowed to return later this summer and pick up an English version so as to get all the details. Lucky for us, tours continue into September. And with the lovely nights we have in Rome, it will be a good excuse to stay out late once again.

We were able to climb to the ramparts and look down on the Tiber River, the crowd in front of the castle, and the gorgeous moon over Rome.

Playing with water: fun for kids of all ages. There are “nasone” and other little drinking fountains like this all over Rome. Ric demonstrates his technique. Block the flow with your finger creating a stream to drink from.

It really was a gorgeous night. The river was still and Rome glowed like it was lit by torches. That’s St. Peter’s Basilica on the right in the picture.

Bridge reflected in the Tiber; Basilica San Petro on the right.

Sunday we ventured out early to see a photo exhibit at the Museo di Roma in Palazzo Braschi. While the photos were great (Italian movie stars of the 40s, 50s and 60s), the star real was Palazzo Braschi

The art is interesting, but Palazzo Braschi is the star.

Featuring many scenes of Rome as painted during the Renaissance, it is fun to see how things looked to the artists of the time. Palazzo Braschi was the perfect stage for its collection.

The massive staircase was like an Escher painting.

This captivating capital crowns one of the many red granite pillars and is typical of the amazing detail in Palazzo Braschi.

Fabulous detail throughout, this captivating capital is typical.

Residents of Rome get a reduced price, and those residents over 65 with a Carta d’Identia get in free. (There are reductions  for residents at many attractions.) We had the place almost to ourselves. Once you have seen the Vatican Museums, the Capitoline, and the Borghese, it’s nice to avoid the huge crowds and escape to one of Rome’s many lesser-known sites.

You never know who you’ll see in a museum. We thought this papal bust looked like Vincent Price.

Palazzo Braschi exits right onto Piazza Navona.

Sunday afternoon we spent at home, and after sunset, a gelato outing capped the weekend. Perfect!

Have a great week everyone!

What do I miss and Independence Day, Italian-style

4 Jul

A friend recently asked “Is there anything you really miss here?” (“Here” being the U.S., Portland, or my former office depending on context.) He got me to pondering…. After almost 7 weeks in Rome what do I “miss?” The adventure is still new: so much to explore, to learn, to see. But I do miss

  1. People, of course. I used to see my son every day, now niente, although we did “Skype” recently. Dinners with Voyageur Femmes. The great people at my place-of-work in Portland: devoted, smart, fun, challenging (in a good way). V & B, our best pals, dining out together, exploring Portland, big holidays. “Dates” with Jonnie seeing oddball plays and artsy movies. While our family is spread about the country, certainly picking up the phone to chat is not as likely to happen, if only because the 6 to 9 hour time difference makes it tougher.
  2. Cool Portland June. Sometimes called “June-uary,” this Roman heat makes me long for the days I had to use the fireplace in June in Portland. (July is promising more of the same.)
  3. Familiarity. We get lost in Rome. I never got lost in Portland (at least not after the first year or two). Sometimes we head out and never get to our intended destination. All part of the adventure, but tiring when it is 90 degrees.
  4. A large cup of American coffee once-in-awhile so I can sit with my husband for half-an-hour and chit-chat to start the day. But we’ve replaced that with aperitivi. Not a bad substitute.
  5. My furniture. Should come any day now….
  6. The Oregon Zoo, a big part of our lives or so many years. We will miss ZooLaLa this month for the first time in 10 years!

That’s about it. I love my job, love the people I work with, and the location is amazing. Food to die for, markets to dream about, and don’t get me started on the pork salumi! Good thing we walk several miles a day. I do not miss Starbucks as much as some would conjecture. The coffee here is damn fine, and we have our amazing Nespresso machine at home.

As to Independence Day, we were fêted at the Ambassador’s last night, along with 3000 or so others, including Premier Mario Monti.

The crowd gathers in the garden at Villa Taverna

It was definitely a unique 4th-of-July party in an Italy-meets-America sort of way.

La Porchetta, artfully done and oh-so-delizioso!

The menu ranged from hotdogs and hamburgers to porchetta and parmigiano reggiano.I especially enjoyed the Virginia baked ham, which many Italians eyed with suspicion as if thinking “why would you do that to a prosciutto?” There was watermelon, ice cream, and corn-on-the-cob, but also pizza, pasta, and the most impressive cheese table I have ever eaten my way through laid eyes on. Italian wine flowed along with Miller beer. (If you can lay your hands on a bottle of Brachetto d’Acqui, do it. A fine summer red for aperitivi!)  The National Anthem was sung by one of our Marines, and the musical entertainment was 100% American jazz/swing/pop. The party is a hot ticket for Italians: Efforts to secure an invitation endured until the last moment. Italian guests out-numbered Americans by a huge majority. In fact, Ambassador Thorne gave his speech entirely in Italian. Lest you think the U.S. Government spent taxpayer dollars on this largesse, be assured corporate America and L’Italia delle imprese (Italian business) made the evening possible through sponsorships. Crowning the evening, an impressive fireworks display. Happy #236 America!

Fireworks above the carefully trimmed trees of Villa Taverna.  Bravissimo!

Quite a show in the middle of Rome.

Rome at night

30 Jun

It has been brutally hot in Rome for 15 days; there is no end in sight (well maybe it will be in only the upper 80’s by Tuesday). AccuWeather.com varies the forecast with catchy phrases like “plenty of sunshine” and “blazing sunshine.” The low here tonight is higher than Portland’s forecast high for the day.

Il Colosseo at night, glows as if lit by torches.

But night time is magical and soft. Last Saturday (we are repeating the pattern today) we did our morning shopping, then holed up in air conditioned comfort from Noon until 7:30PM, when we hit the streets. For those who know us, this is aberrant behavior. We were usually on our way home from dinner by 7:30PM in Portland.

Rome comes alive about 8:00PM. We headed to a riverside “event” called Lungo il Tevere. This is a street market that runs along the Tiber (Tevere) River for about a mile. It’s a seasonal, semi-permanent installation that occurs every single night until September 2. Some nights the focus is on jazz, on others comedy or the creative arts. So one can return over and over and find something a little different in terms of entertainment.

The Tiber is >30 feet below the city, thanks to flood-control walls built in the 1870s. The broad riverside walkway is perfect for the tents, booths and cafes that line it for the summer season.

Lungo il Tevere (along the Tiber) summer market, cafe, entertainment venue.

Lamplight makes the river walk more romantic.

Young and old, singles and families, strolled from booth to booth, café to café, enjoying the night and freedom from being cooped up in apartments. We declined to eat at Lungo il Tevere this time, preferring the Largo di Torre Argentina area and a little place we found last December. But on our way out, we paused on the bridge to savor a lovely sunset and the dome of St. Peter’s.

Sunset and the Basilica San Pietro

A summer night out in Rome would not be complete without a stop at the neighborhood gelateria. This is the scene a couple of blocks from our apartment at 23:15. And it is like this every night of the week (at least in summer). There seem to be two peak times: around 18:00 for pre-dinner aperitivo and about 23:00. Bar Gelateria Duse has a melon gelato that is to die for! So intense is the fruit that it is practically healthy.

This is our go-to place for gelato. Open late!

Another night, we ventured out as dusk descended with guests to see the monuments along Via dei Fori Imperiali, which leads from the Coliseum past the Roman Forum. There we so few people compared to daytime, you’d have thought you were in downtown Omaha except more scenic. (No offense to Nebraskans, but you know what it’s like.)

Monuments at night: serene, peaceful, lovely.

Even our neighborhood is bathed in gold at night!

Goodnight Moon! Parioli – view from our window.

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