Ciao from Rome!

I have been invited to write a guest column for the Shores Family in Rome

This is Rick Shores also, but I'm the older one :)

My trip began last Monday with a flight over the big pond. It really was a long and not so easy flight. We were 2 hours late taking off from New York, most of it sitting on the tarmac.
I found it hard to sleep on the plane, so by the time we landed I was already feeling pretty weary and it was 9am or so local time. I had a very long strange day ahead. The very strong suggestion I was given was to stay awake that day to help with the jet lag and catch up to local time. After a while it felt like my body and brain had turned to mush. It took another day or two to really start feeling normal again.

Since then it has been very interesting to see the city where modern civilization began. It's chaotic, crowded, rather dirty, and amazing at the same time. Oh and pretty intimidating if you don't read or speak Italian.

I have begun to get comfortable riding the Metro, and had success one afternoon in figuring out how to get myself by bus from St Peter's Square back to home base in the northern suburbs with one bus change.
Everything involves a lot of walking, so if anyone reading this has had thoughts of coming over, I would suggest you start your training now :)

We all took a short drive on Saturday to the ancient Etruscan town of Orvieto. The Romans conquered them when they started getting powerful and renamed the town. It's name means something like "ancient town".
So it was really old when the Romans came along two thousand or so years ago. It was very beautiful. An impressive "Duomo", picturesque tiny streets and an incredible view from the volcanic hilltop it sits on.
I've posted a few pictures of it on my website. If you want to look, they're at http://www.rksimages.com

One of the many highlights had to have been my second taste of gelato. It was an awesome chocolate with an orange flavored candy mixed in. Heavenly!!

Tomorrow morning, my personal adventure continues with a train ride north about 4 hours to Riomaggiore, the southernmost village of the "Cinque Terra"
I'm staying there for 5 nights to hike and take pictures and further immerse myself in Italian culture.
I'm very excited!

When I come back to Rome next week I'll post more pictures before we all climb into the car for a road trip to southern Germany for a stay in the Bavarian Alps

Thanks for reading
Rick