Our day began with yet another trip to McDonalds! Breakfast of luke warm strong coffee and a dry croissant just didn’t cut it. I knew it was going to be a long day.

 

Our first stop was at the Commonwealth War Cemetery in Cassino. The resting place of some 4200 Commonwealth soldiers, including 855 Canadian men, it is where my uncle, James H. W. Johnson, is buried having been killed on the last day of this part of the Italian offensive. None of my mom’s family has made it this far and I am eternally disappointed that I didn’t research this before George and I came to Italy in 1979. I’m sure my mom would have appreciated seeing where Jimmie was buried. It’s a lovely spot overlooking gentle rolling hills and is well maintained.

All roads lead to Rome – so the saying goes – and the A1 is a modern highway with a speed limit of 130km/hr when it’s not raining. Since we had intermittent showers, our speed fluctuated between 110 and 130. Many of the roads in Italy are toll roads and we’ve probably already spent about 15 euros on tolls. I guess they’d rather the people who drive pay for the roads rather than tax everyone. What a novel idea!

Actually getting in to our hotel was much easier than either of us had expected since it’s a major holiday and there are many visitors. The biggest problem was finding a place to park the car, but the hotel clerk went with George and they were able to find a free spot on the road for tonight. We may need to move it tomorrow since it won’t be free on Tuesday. Our hotel is within sight of the Vatican, which is not a bad place to be.

We hadn’t really planned what we were going to do this afternoon since we arrived earlier than planned. First we had to swim upstream as all the people from the service in St Peter’s Square were just leaving as we headed out. Our intent was to take the Hop On Hop Off tour to get our bearings and then visit the Pantheon, but things were so disorganized and crowded that after a 20 minute wait, we decided to walk to the Pantheon. It’s an amazing structure, built in 126AD, and houses the tombs of the first two kings of Italy. Its concrete dome continues to be the largest unreinforced concrete dome in the world and the oculus, an opening at the very top, is 142′ above one’s head.

 

 

 

 

We checked out a couple of museums and decided to stop at the DaVinci museum. DaVinci, an artist, scientist, mathemetician, inventor and engineer must have had quite a mind. A number of his sketches have been used to build some of the many machines he thought up well before his time – flying machines, parachutes, war machines, musical instruments, and submarines to name a few. We were both in need of a sit down and warm drink after that so spent about a half hour at a cafe in one of the many piazzas close by. On our way back towards our hotel we thought we might stop in at the Castel Sant’Angelo but the line must have been about 90 minutes long. It was raining quite cold by this time so we dcided to try the bus trip again. It wasn’t the best of tours and I think I’ll write to the company to express my disappointment.

Despite the fact that the golden arches are right next to our hotel, we were able to find a cute little restaurant for dinner and enjoyed the warmth of the room and the food. George thinks our step total today is more than yesterday, so go me!