Not too much has been going on here, I’ll just update with the interesting things that have happened recently (interesting to me, at least!).
The letter bombings here seem to have tapered off (at least for now). The political situation in Africa and the Middle East (Tunisia, Egypt, and Jordan) probably won’t have too much of an effect on us. There may be some demonstrations of some sort, but demonstrations of one sort or another happen about as often here as road construction back in the states. As long as we stay aware of what’s going on and where the demonstrations are occurring, it doesn’t seem to be a big deal to avoid those areas.
I got pulled over a couple of days ago. We live on a one way street, and for the last couple of weeks there have been Municipal Police parked on the side of the road flagging random people down and checking documentation. I got flagged down. I was a little freaked out about it, and had a bit of a blond moment; there are a few things that (as a foreigner) we’re required to carry with us: our U.S. driver’s license, an Italian translation of our U.S. driver’s license, an insurance card, and our MFA card (the MFA card is an official Italian document identifying us as officially being affiliated with the U.S. and negating the need to carry our passports wherever we go). I handed him the Italian translation of my driver’s license, then remembered that I’m supposed to give him the MFA card first… so I gave him my MFA card, then pulled out my U.S. driver’s license and handed it to him, then reached over and grabbed the insurance card (which we happened to have received in the mail that day). By the time I handed him the insurance card, he wouldn’t even take it from me; while I was digging the insurance card out, he had decided either (a) that I had provided all the necessary information and identification, (b) that it wasn’t worth any more effort to deal with someone who leads the conversation with “Mi dispiache, solo inglese” (I’m sorry, only English) and hands over an MFA card, or (c) that he felt sorry for me and decided to let me go out of the kindness of his heart (since I hadn’t done anything wrong to start out with!). I don’t really care which of those reasons turned out to be the real reason, but one way or the other, I didn’t get a ticket.
Cori was under the weather last week; I looked at some of the orientation materials we were given when we checked in here and saw a product that I thought would help her feel better. So I drove up to the pharmacy and took a number. While I was waiting for my number to be called, I pulled out my phone and translated “upset stomach” to Italian. Google Translator translated it (“mal di stomaco”) and gave me a phrase that it thought would be helpful:”Posso avere qualcosa per il mal di stomaco e vomito?” (Can I have something for an upset stomach and vomiting?). When it was my turn, I dutifully read the translated phrase, and added “sette anno bambina” (“seven year old girl”). The pharmacist said “Allora”, “Si” (“Ok”, “yes”) and disappeared in the back. He came back out a minute or so later, and in perfect Queen’s English said “This will help your daughter’s stomach. Dissolve one pouch in about this much water” (indicating about an inch of water). Well, just color me stupid. I’ve found that (as this experience demonstrates) as long as you’re willing to make an effort at the language, the people here are willing to work quite a bit to communicate with you; if I had walked up to the counter and only been willing to speak English, I probably would have been brushed off with random Italian phrases (“No, the temperature around here has been quite dim lately, but my father’s cow has a broken steering wheel” or something like that).
I entered the chili cook-off at Becca’s office. I only entered because they just had 8 entries, and I wanted to make sure there were enough entries. All told, there ended up being 13 entries, with two of them spicy enough to remove paint - but all were quite tasty. My chili ended up winning first place. I was quite surprised, to say the least. Now I have to enter a chili next year to defend my honor.
We’re planning on spending a few days around Naples later this month when my mother in law comes to town; we’re planning on going out to Sorrento to revisit the scene of my accident. I think I’ve come to grips with it now… it’s on the right side, so I don’t have to see the scrape every time I get in and out of the car!
That’s all that’s been going on here… sorry for the delay on the post!
Friday, February 4, 2011
Monday, January 3, 2011
History lesson + mini-vac:
We decided to take a long weekend in Naples this weekend, doing all of the touristy stuff. We arranged to meet some friends (from Rome) down here, and hung out with them some yesterday.
A quick history lesson: for 2 days in 79 a.d., Mount Vesuvius erupted in a big way, causing a bit of consternation in the lower boot area. Clouds of ash spewed almost 100,000 feet into the air, delaying flights worldwide for quite a while.
We first visited Herculaneum, a city on the northern flank of Vesuvius. This city was spared by the majority of the ash, and is remarkably well preserved. We saw frescoes on the walls, mosaic tile floors; most of the walls of the buildings are intact.
We met our friends for lunch afterwards; the kids enjoyed playing together, and Cori kissed alangosteen shrimp crawfish baby lobster. Becca and I couldn't decide what we wanted to order, so we decided to each get something different, and split both entrees. The gnochi came out first, and happened to get placed closer to me. The second entree (fetuccini with scampi) came out a few minutes later, and was placed in front of Becca. It was a plate of noodles with two 8 inch (not including antenna) baby lobster looking bugs perched on top of it. I quickly decided that the gnochi was for my meal, and I graciously allowed my wife to take on the bugs. Everyone at the table (including, to a much lessser extent, Becca) got a big kick out of these things... the kids were daring each other to touch them. Cori ended up kissing one of them. I wasn't at the table at the time, so I don't know what her motivation was for that.
After lunch was Pompeii, but due to time constraints, we didn't get to spend very much time there, only about an hour and fifteen minutes. Pompeii is pretty well known, so I won't spend a lot of electrons telling you about it. We have pictures that will be posted within a few days, and you can see the differences between Herculaneum and Pompeii for yourself.
Last night, we went to Sorrento for dinner. Well actually, for a car accident, dinner, a concert attended by everyone in the southern half of Italy, and the resulting traffic jam afterwards.
We knew about the festival in Sorrento, and caravan'd out there with our friends. It's about 20 miles away, but the roads are twisty and hilly, and there was quite a bit of traffic out last night. While searching for a place to have dinner, we got into a bit of a scrape with a cement bridge piling, and *presto* our car's now "Romanized". Big scrape down the right side. At this point in the night, we'd been stuck in traffic for over an hour, and after all this, I'm sure I was an absolute delight to ride with. We finally found a place to park and walked through town to find a good place to eat, passing through a picturesque city square with an enormous stage set up on one side. Had decent pizza for dinner, started wandering back towards the cars. Four adults, four kids. That picturesque city square was now a thronging mass of people. It took almost an hour to shove our way across. Finally got through, got to the cars, then took almost 3 hours to drive 20 miles, due to the traffic jam of everyone leaving early to beat the rush. We left Sorrento at 10:00, and got back to the hotel at about 12:40. All told, should've gone to the Chinese place across the street for dinner instead, but that's just my opinion. I was not a happy camper last night. It's over now.
This morning, we decided to skip the Mount Vesuvius tour and trek back down toward Sorrento for more punishment - but on the other side of the peninsula, to the Amalfi Coast. Absolutely gorgeous drive, straight up and down mountains, 5 mile per hour hairpin curves, we'll post pics of this too. Had lunch in Amalfi, did the tourist thing. It's my favorite town now - too bad it's so far from Rome. Not a day trip, anyway. Fun drive, perfect little town on the coast.
The natives are restless, and are bugging me about going to dinner, so that's all for now; sorry for the abrupt conclusion. Keep an eye out for pics, either on FB or here - I'll try to make sure I update all of the places you folks could check.
A quick history lesson: for 2 days in 79 a.d., Mount Vesuvius erupted in a big way, causing a bit of consternation in the lower boot area. Clouds of ash spewed almost 100,000 feet into the air, delaying flights worldwide for quite a while.
We first visited Herculaneum, a city on the northern flank of Vesuvius. This city was spared by the majority of the ash, and is remarkably well preserved. We saw frescoes on the walls, mosaic tile floors; most of the walls of the buildings are intact.
We met our friends for lunch afterwards; the kids enjoyed playing together, and Cori kissed a
After lunch was Pompeii, but due to time constraints, we didn't get to spend very much time there, only about an hour and fifteen minutes. Pompeii is pretty well known, so I won't spend a lot of electrons telling you about it. We have pictures that will be posted within a few days, and you can see the differences between Herculaneum and Pompeii for yourself.
Last night, we went to Sorrento for dinner. Well actually, for a car accident, dinner, a concert attended by everyone in the southern half of Italy, and the resulting traffic jam afterwards.
We knew about the festival in Sorrento, and caravan'd out there with our friends. It's about 20 miles away, but the roads are twisty and hilly, and there was quite a bit of traffic out last night. While searching for a place to have dinner, we got into a bit of a scrape with a cement bridge piling, and *presto* our car's now "Romanized". Big scrape down the right side. At this point in the night, we'd been stuck in traffic for over an hour, and after all this, I'm sure I was an absolute delight to ride with. We finally found a place to park and walked through town to find a good place to eat, passing through a picturesque city square with an enormous stage set up on one side. Had decent pizza for dinner, started wandering back towards the cars. Four adults, four kids. That picturesque city square was now a thronging mass of people. It took almost an hour to shove our way across. Finally got through, got to the cars, then took almost 3 hours to drive 20 miles, due to the traffic jam of everyone leaving early to beat the rush. We left Sorrento at 10:00, and got back to the hotel at about 12:40. All told, should've gone to the Chinese place across the street for dinner instead, but that's just my opinion. I was not a happy camper last night. It's over now.
This morning, we decided to skip the Mount Vesuvius tour and trek back down toward Sorrento for more punishment - but on the other side of the peninsula, to the Amalfi Coast. Absolutely gorgeous drive, straight up and down mountains, 5 mile per hour hairpin curves, we'll post pics of this too. Had lunch in Amalfi, did the tourist thing. It's my favorite town now - too bad it's so far from Rome. Not a day trip, anyway. Fun drive, perfect little town on the coast.
The natives are restless, and are bugging me about going to dinner, so that's all for now; sorry for the abrupt conclusion. Keep an eye out for pics, either on FB or here - I'll try to make sure I update all of the places you folks could check.
Saturday, December 18, 2010
Big update...
What’s happened recently? Well in no particular order…
We took a day trip up to Bracciano with another family to see the renowned Christmas Village that they’ve got there. We didn’t see much of a “Christmas Village”, but there was a market area set up with about 20-30 vendors for random stuff: pottery, wine, antiques, crafts, and that sort of stuff. We saw what appeared to be a renaissance festival, outside the walls of a real castle (which happens to be the place that Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes were married, if anyone is interested). We had lunch at a local restaurant. Well, we were going to have lunch but ordered antipasti, expecting to get a small appetizer. They covered the table with food; everything from bruschetta to some sort of octopus dish to a plate of different cheeses, a tray of mussels, different kinds of pancetta, prosciutto….. you name it, they brought it out. Incredible food, both in quantity and quality. The town is on the banks of a volcanic lake, so the fish is freshly caught – we took a walk on the shore of the lake and started an informal “Rock Relocation Program” for all of the lava rocks covering the shore. That job’s unfinished, and that’s one task we’re looking forward to going back to and working on some more. Any help you folks want to provide would be welcome.
On the way up to Bracciano, we saw signs for a Texas BBQ place, but I haven’t been able to find it on the internet. We’re going to drive back up there specifically to look for the signs, and if that place exists, I’ll post a review and comparison against real Texas barbecue. I don’t have very high expectations, but I’m looking forward to trying it.
Over Thanksgiving, we went truffle hunting. This was organized by the community liaison folks at Becca’s work; there was a tour of a winery, then we went out for a demonstration of truffle hunting. Basically, we followed a guy while his dog sniffed around the bases of trees. Wimpy (the dog) found a couple of black truffles… if you want to know what a black truffle looks like, think of a black rock about half the size of a tennis ball, give it a light mushroomy smell, and cover it in dog slobber. Buon appetito! The hunt was followed up by a meal (featuring truffles in every course) in the restaurant up the hill. The food wasn’t bad, but knowing that dog slobber is a featured ingredient in every bite of food changed the meal a bit for me, and maybe my sense of taste has been dulled by all the junk food I’ve eaten over the years, but… well, while the food was good, would truffles be worth $60 each? Not in my estimation. I’m certain that there are people for whom that would be a worthwhile expense; I’m just not one of them.
It snowed yesterday. It’s only supposed to snow once every twenty years, and this is the second time in two years. There was about a ½ inch accumulation, and it was gone by bedtime. It was apparently just barely enough to make people forget how to drive. I normally go down to meet the kids’ bus at 3:35, and end up waiting for about 5 minutes for it to get here. Yesterday, the bus didn’t get here until 4:20, and the kids said that they left school early. Becca’s commute home was a lot of fun, to hear her tell it. All I know is that it took her almost 2 hours to drive 8 miles. Last winter, it snowed in February or March, so I don’t know if that means that we’ll get a bunch of snow this year, or if we won’t see any more snow the whole time we’re here. One odd thing about the snow: it was a thunderstorm. I’ve never seen that before, but Becca heard the thunder at her office too, so I don’t think I’m hallucinating.
We didn’t bring a lot of Christmas decorations and stuff with us, since we packed out in June and July – at the time, it didn’t seem that important. All of it’s in storage. Well, not all of it, we brought one tub of ornaments, and one tub of wrapping supplies. Becca ended up buying a tree while at the base in Naples earlier this week, so we’ve at least got a tree, and all of the presents will be well wrapped.
That’s it for now. Hope everyone’s holiday season is filled with peace, joy, and lots of goodies. Ciao!
We took a day trip up to Bracciano with another family to see the renowned Christmas Village that they’ve got there. We didn’t see much of a “Christmas Village”, but there was a market area set up with about 20-30 vendors for random stuff: pottery, wine, antiques, crafts, and that sort of stuff. We saw what appeared to be a renaissance festival, outside the walls of a real castle (which happens to be the place that Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes were married, if anyone is interested). We had lunch at a local restaurant. Well, we were going to have lunch but ordered antipasti, expecting to get a small appetizer. They covered the table with food; everything from bruschetta to some sort of octopus dish to a plate of different cheeses, a tray of mussels, different kinds of pancetta, prosciutto….. you name it, they brought it out. Incredible food, both in quantity and quality. The town is on the banks of a volcanic lake, so the fish is freshly caught – we took a walk on the shore of the lake and started an informal “Rock Relocation Program” for all of the lava rocks covering the shore. That job’s unfinished, and that’s one task we’re looking forward to going back to and working on some more. Any help you folks want to provide would be welcome.
On the way up to Bracciano, we saw signs for a Texas BBQ place, but I haven’t been able to find it on the internet. We’re going to drive back up there specifically to look for the signs, and if that place exists, I’ll post a review and comparison against real Texas barbecue. I don’t have very high expectations, but I’m looking forward to trying it.
Over Thanksgiving, we went truffle hunting. This was organized by the community liaison folks at Becca’s work; there was a tour of a winery, then we went out for a demonstration of truffle hunting. Basically, we followed a guy while his dog sniffed around the bases of trees. Wimpy (the dog) found a couple of black truffles… if you want to know what a black truffle looks like, think of a black rock about half the size of a tennis ball, give it a light mushroomy smell, and cover it in dog slobber. Buon appetito! The hunt was followed up by a meal (featuring truffles in every course) in the restaurant up the hill. The food wasn’t bad, but knowing that dog slobber is a featured ingredient in every bite of food changed the meal a bit for me, and maybe my sense of taste has been dulled by all the junk food I’ve eaten over the years, but… well, while the food was good, would truffles be worth $60 each? Not in my estimation. I’m certain that there are people for whom that would be a worthwhile expense; I’m just not one of them.
It snowed yesterday. It’s only supposed to snow once every twenty years, and this is the second time in two years. There was about a ½ inch accumulation, and it was gone by bedtime. It was apparently just barely enough to make people forget how to drive. I normally go down to meet the kids’ bus at 3:35, and end up waiting for about 5 minutes for it to get here. Yesterday, the bus didn’t get here until 4:20, and the kids said that they left school early. Becca’s commute home was a lot of fun, to hear her tell it. All I know is that it took her almost 2 hours to drive 8 miles. Last winter, it snowed in February or March, so I don’t know if that means that we’ll get a bunch of snow this year, or if we won’t see any more snow the whole time we’re here. One odd thing about the snow: it was a thunderstorm. I’ve never seen that before, but Becca heard the thunder at her office too, so I don’t think I’m hallucinating.
We didn’t bring a lot of Christmas decorations and stuff with us, since we packed out in June and July – at the time, it didn’t seem that important. All of it’s in storage. Well, not all of it, we brought one tub of ornaments, and one tub of wrapping supplies. Becca ended up buying a tree while at the base in Naples earlier this week, so we’ve at least got a tree, and all of the presents will be well wrapped.
That’s it for now. Hope everyone’s holiday season is filled with peace, joy, and lots of goodies. Ciao!
Saturday, October 30, 2010
Tuesday, October 26, 2010
And now for your normally scheduled Rick....
Well, we finally got out of Rome (for REAL, this time!) and had a blast of a little mini-vacation. We left on Wednesday and drove to Assisi, where we saw the Duomo that bears St. Francis' name. Very impressive, seeming to hang on the edge of a cliff. We ate in that town, then moved on.
Next stop, Perugia. Our mission (and boy did we accept it!) was to eat chocolate. The Euro Chocolate Fest was going on, and there was more chocolate than I've ever seen before. I'd like to remind you... I've lived through 39 Halloweens, Easters And Valentine's Days, and I've never seen anywhere close to this amount of chocolate. There must have been 250 vendors selling different types of chocolate. Still.... we had to keep moving. We spent a little time on the ground there, then hit the road for...
Verona. 2 little hotel rooms. Halfway decent dinner. American-ish breakfast buffet include in the price of the room. Got on the road immediately post-nosh. Nuff said about Verona. Maybe we'll go back there, but that's it for now.
Next night was going to be in Garmisch, Germany, so we had to keep moving. It was a fairly long day... the drive took about 4-5 hours, up into the Alps, through Austria (we've heard they're picky on speed limits there, so I had to slow down!)... we stopped in Innsbruck. Pretty town, had a sandwich sorta thing at a restaurant in a mall. Nothing spectacular. Scenery all around the town? Exquisite. Town itself? 45 minutes of looking for lunch, 30 minutes eating, 30 minutes back to the car. I think it's got a lot more to offer, but we weren't in the market at that moment. Next stop: Garmisch.
Garmisch. Found the hotel with minimal problems. Room? Fine. Buffet downstairs? Fine (if a bit expensive). Scenery? Awesome. We could see an Alp from our balcony. (As an aside, is it called an Alp if there's only one of them? There were more to the left and right, but STRAIGHT off our balcony was a single perfect, mid-sized mountain. Mid sized, as in 1500+ meters.)
The next day we went to Neuschwanstein Castle. You'll remember that this is the castle that Walt Disney based Sleeping Beauty's castle in Disneyland on. Absolutely magnificent. You'll all see some pictures at some point, even though the pictures won't even come close to doing it justice. The way the whole experience works:
Step 1: Pay for parking at the bottom of the hill.
Step 2: Walk halfway up to the town to purchase tickets for the tour in your choice of languages. Wonder how you're going to get up the rest of the mountain (to the castle itself) since buses aren't running today, due to weather. Start walking up.
Step 3: Walk the remaining quarter of the way up to the town. Follow the smell of freshly squeezed horses to find the horse-drawn carriage pick up point... if you need an additional clue, look for the hordes of people lined up on the side of the road as the smell of used grass gets stronger.
Step 4: Patiently wait your turn to ride an "Authentic Horse Drawn Carriage" up the remaining (probably) 2000 feet of the mountain. Get off the carriage when it stops, still 500 vertical feet down the mountain from the castle.
Step 5: Climb the rest of the mountain... past 3 or 4 souvenir stands.
Step 6: Enjoy the castle. It's a phenomenal tour... our guide was a native German speaker, who was pretty close to fluent in English. He had a very ummmm...... European sense of humor, and his sense of timing on most of his (rather odd) jokes was quite a bit longer than we (as a group) were used to. Entertaining? Absolutely. Informative? Absolutely. A little creepy? Absolutely. If I needed a babysitter? Absolutely NOT!
King Ludwig II was (a) a little bit loony, and (b) a LOTTA bit obsessed with Richard Wagner (one of Germany's best known playwrights and composers from the 1800's). Scenes from all of Wagner's epic stories decorate all of the interior walls of the castle. One of the original rooms in the castle is a cave. A man-made cave, to duplicate the set of one of Wagner's operas. Did I mention that Ludwig II wasn't wrapped too tightly?
Unfortunately, we only had one *really* good day of weather while we were there.... we putzed around a lot, but didn't really *do* anything. We walked around Garmisch, swam in the pool one day... just putzed. Our next trip up there, we want to go to Zugspitze, the highest mountain in Germany. You can take a cable car up to the top... it was in the original plans, but got scrapped due to weather.
I think I've almost got Becca broken down to let me get a Bavarian Cuckoo clock one of these times we go up there. Wish me luck, everyone.
Nice relaxing vacation. Will post pics in the next couple of days.
Next stop, Perugia. Our mission (and boy did we accept it!) was to eat chocolate. The Euro Chocolate Fest was going on, and there was more chocolate than I've ever seen before. I'd like to remind you... I've lived through 39 Halloweens, Easters And Valentine's Days, and I've never seen anywhere close to this amount of chocolate. There must have been 250 vendors selling different types of chocolate. Still.... we had to keep moving. We spent a little time on the ground there, then hit the road for...
Verona. 2 little hotel rooms. Halfway decent dinner. American-ish breakfast buffet include in the price of the room. Got on the road immediately post-nosh. Nuff said about Verona. Maybe we'll go back there, but that's it for now.
Next night was going to be in Garmisch, Germany, so we had to keep moving. It was a fairly long day... the drive took about 4-5 hours, up into the Alps, through Austria (we've heard they're picky on speed limits there, so I had to slow down!)... we stopped in Innsbruck. Pretty town, had a sandwich sorta thing at a restaurant in a mall. Nothing spectacular. Scenery all around the town? Exquisite. Town itself? 45 minutes of looking for lunch, 30 minutes eating, 30 minutes back to the car. I think it's got a lot more to offer, but we weren't in the market at that moment. Next stop: Garmisch.
Garmisch. Found the hotel with minimal problems. Room? Fine. Buffet downstairs? Fine (if a bit expensive). Scenery? Awesome. We could see an Alp from our balcony. (As an aside, is it called an Alp if there's only one of them? There were more to the left and right, but STRAIGHT off our balcony was a single perfect, mid-sized mountain. Mid sized, as in 1500+ meters.)
The next day we went to Neuschwanstein Castle. You'll remember that this is the castle that Walt Disney based Sleeping Beauty's castle in Disneyland on. Absolutely magnificent. You'll all see some pictures at some point, even though the pictures won't even come close to doing it justice. The way the whole experience works:
Step 1: Pay for parking at the bottom of the hill.
Step 2: Walk halfway up to the town to purchase tickets for the tour in your choice of languages. Wonder how you're going to get up the rest of the mountain (to the castle itself) since buses aren't running today, due to weather. Start walking up.
Step 3: Walk the remaining quarter of the way up to the town. Follow the smell of freshly squeezed horses to find the horse-drawn carriage pick up point... if you need an additional clue, look for the hordes of people lined up on the side of the road as the smell of used grass gets stronger.
Step 4: Patiently wait your turn to ride an "Authentic Horse Drawn Carriage" up the remaining (probably) 2000 feet of the mountain. Get off the carriage when it stops, still 500 vertical feet down the mountain from the castle.
Step 5: Climb the rest of the mountain... past 3 or 4 souvenir stands.
Step 6: Enjoy the castle. It's a phenomenal tour... our guide was a native German speaker, who was pretty close to fluent in English. He had a very ummmm...... European sense of humor, and his sense of timing on most of his (rather odd) jokes was quite a bit longer than we (as a group) were used to. Entertaining? Absolutely. Informative? Absolutely. A little creepy? Absolutely. If I needed a babysitter? Absolutely NOT!
King Ludwig II was (a) a little bit loony, and (b) a LOTTA bit obsessed with Richard Wagner (one of Germany's best known playwrights and composers from the 1800's). Scenes from all of Wagner's epic stories decorate all of the interior walls of the castle. One of the original rooms in the castle is a cave. A man-made cave, to duplicate the set of one of Wagner's operas. Did I mention that Ludwig II wasn't wrapped too tightly?
Unfortunately, we only had one *really* good day of weather while we were there.... we putzed around a lot, but didn't really *do* anything. We walked around Garmisch, swam in the pool one day... just putzed. Our next trip up there, we want to go to Zugspitze, the highest mountain in Germany. You can take a cable car up to the top... it was in the original plans, but got scrapped due to weather.
I think I've almost got Becca broken down to let me get a Bavarian Cuckoo clock one of these times we go up there. Wish me luck, everyone.
Nice relaxing vacation. Will post pics in the next couple of days.
Monday, October 11, 2010
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
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
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Wierd experience of the day:
At this point, we're down to the minutia of daily life, and I won't inflict the majority of that on your poor folks, so I'll just hit the high (low?) points.
Today, I started with visiting one of the holiest sites in Christendom, and finished out my day driving down "Prostitute Alley." Perhaps I'd better explain:
Becca and I took a tour this morning of the Scavi, the necropolis under St. Peter's Basilica. Pretty interesting from an archeological perspective, and from an artistic perspective as well... We got to see the earliest known surviving Christian ornamentation, in the form of mosaic tiles in a 2nd century crypt (which clearly demonstrated the connections to the Bible and Christianity while being thinly veiled as Pagan to satisfy the local customs - Christians were still being persecuted at this time).
After all of the majesty of St. Peter's, I don't know what I was expecting from the necropolis. There was a fairly well defined route that we followed to see all the allowed rooms, through a partially uncovered brick (almost) maze, and at one point toward the end of the tour, we entered the Clementine Chapel. As you can see from some of the pictures at that link, this chapel is incredibly ornate, and reminds you of the Basilica upstairs. While we were in this chapel, another tour group came out of a recessed door on one side of the chapel. We waited until the whole group had come out, then we were led in (by our guide) and found ourselves in a room with the remains of Saint Peter. I'd already used up my (already schetchy) supply of "I see dead people" references, and I decided that this would be an opportune time to hold my tongue. It was quite sobering to see the Holy Relics which anchor the entire Catholic empire.
Cori had a birthday party this afternoon at a friend's house. Said friend happens to live (on weekends, anyway) in (what used to be) a monastery about 1/2 hour north of town. Both my GPS and the directions provided by the party organizer led me down a specific road, about 15 miles long. Every 1/4 mile or so, the road was lined with prostitutes, singly, or in groups of two or three. Mind you, this was not a big busy street - this was a road that stretches through farmland north of town. I'm still not certain why that particular road was selected (or how the PRU marketing department increases traffic on that road)... you'll notice that I didn't give you the name of the road. I'm not expecting a check in the mail for my marketing efforts, and don't want to wake up next to a horse head in the morning just because I squealed on the internet.
That's it for now. Lemme know if you have any questions!
Today, I started with visiting one of the holiest sites in Christendom, and finished out my day driving down "Prostitute Alley." Perhaps I'd better explain:
Becca and I took a tour this morning of the Scavi, the necropolis under St. Peter's Basilica. Pretty interesting from an archeological perspective, and from an artistic perspective as well... We got to see the earliest known surviving Christian ornamentation, in the form of mosaic tiles in a 2nd century crypt (which clearly demonstrated the connections to the Bible and Christianity while being thinly veiled as Pagan to satisfy the local customs - Christians were still being persecuted at this time).
After all of the majesty of St. Peter's, I don't know what I was expecting from the necropolis. There was a fairly well defined route that we followed to see all the allowed rooms, through a partially uncovered brick (almost) maze, and at one point toward the end of the tour, we entered the Clementine Chapel. As you can see from some of the pictures at that link, this chapel is incredibly ornate, and reminds you of the Basilica upstairs. While we were in this chapel, another tour group came out of a recessed door on one side of the chapel. We waited until the whole group had come out, then we were led in (by our guide) and found ourselves in a room with the remains of Saint Peter. I'd already used up my (already schetchy) supply of "I see dead people" references, and I decided that this would be an opportune time to hold my tongue. It was quite sobering to see the Holy Relics which anchor the entire Catholic empire.
Cori had a birthday party this afternoon at a friend's house. Said friend happens to live (on weekends, anyway) in (what used to be) a monastery about 1/2 hour north of town. Both my GPS and the directions provided by the party organizer led me down a specific road, about 15 miles long. Every 1/4 mile or so, the road was lined with prostitutes, singly, or in groups of two or three. Mind you, this was not a big busy street - this was a road that stretches through farmland north of town. I'm still not certain why that particular road was selected (or how the PRU marketing department increases traffic on that road)... you'll notice that I didn't give you the name of the road. I'm not expecting a check in the mail for my marketing efforts, and don't want to wake up next to a horse head in the morning just because I squealed on the internet.
That's it for now. Lemme know if you have any questions!
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