Today was definitely a quieter kind of day. Terni, where we stayed last night and was the birthplace of St. Valentine, is in a big valley between some very large hills. We know the mountains aren’t too far away because we can see snow in the distance. The area around here is quite beautiful and it feels very pastoral.

2 million year old tree

We began the day with a short visit to Dunarobba Fossil Forest. This is one of the most unique paleontological fossil forests in the world because the trees, which are about 2 million years old, have not petrified and many are stilll in their original upright position. The forest was discovered in the 1980s as the adjacent mining company was digging in a clay quarry. Since the regular tour is in Italian, the lady at the ticket booth took us on a personal tour explaining everything in English.

Then we headed to Assisi, the birthplace of St. Francis. It is quite a complex (called a commune) visible from miles away high in the hills. The outer wall is still intact and I suspect a lot of money has been put into renovations and upgrades. the roads within the walls are quite narrow with lots of twists and turns…and of course lots of hilly terrain. The main focus is the Basilliica of San Francesco built in the 1200s. The walls are lined with beautiful frescoes which are still in relatively good shape. The museum was also an interesting spot with more reliquaries than anywhere else I’ve been. I’m not sure why the Catholic Church places so much importance on these kinds of things.

The afternoon drive was very relaxing as we took the slow route through the Chianti wine region. Now when people talk about spending time in the Tuscan hills, we’ll be able to visuaize it. The south side of the hills are lined with vineyards while the wineries are all on the north side. Mile after mile of place to stop for tastings. Certainly the scale is nothing like what we saw in California or even perhaps in Niagara although it’s hard to tell from such a short 50km trip. The scenery was quite beautiful and between our navigator Siri and my chauffeur George, I felt somewhat pampered…able to just look out the window and enjoy the view.

Tonight we’re in a little hotel in the suburbs of Florence – called Firenze in Italian. It’s quite quaint and each room is named after a different rose. Dinner was at a pizzeria next door. It took about 30 minutes to order and eat and another 30 minutes to get the bill. They are very slow here in bringing you the bill as we have experienced elsewhere in Europe.

When  we were planning our trip, one of the things on George’s list was to see the Vatican Museum. It turned out that it was not open while we were in town because of the Easter celebrations. We were intending to move on this morning to Villa d’Este, but as it turned out it was open on the Monday National holiday and so was closed today (Tuesday). Change in plans – we decided to stay in town for the morning and do a guided tour of the Vatican Museum, Sistine Chapel and St Peter’s Basilica.

The domee of St. Peters

What a busy area around the Vatican – with 30 – 40,000 visitors each day. We found our tour guide and after heading through another security checkpoint (they are at every venue), we headed inside chock-a-block with all the other group tours. The tours use headsets so that you can hear your guide even though you may not be right up close. We started in the Vatican Museum and were introduced to room after room of sculptures, paintings and tapestries owned by the Vatican City and collected by successive Popes down through the ages.

Map frescoe of Milan region

I found the Gallery of Maps most interesting. Dating back to the 1580s, there are 40 large frescoe panels each depicting the topography of a region in Italy including a depiction of the major city in each region. Our guide described it as the renaissance version of google maps. The ceiling in this 120m long gallery was particularly beautiful. We spent some time out in the courtyard before entering the Sistine Chapel so that she could explain what we were going to be seeing. They require silence in the chapel and no photos are allowed because of copyright issues. She told us quite a bit about Michelangelo and some of the special things about his ceiling paintings. We heard the story behind the nude characters in the original painting and then a period where the pope of the day charged a different painter with putting clothes on the characters (called the underwear painter) and another pope approved removing the clothes in a subsequent restoration. It really is an awesome sight and one could spend hours looking up at the paintings.

Easter roses at the high altar

Before we started the tour, they warned us that the Vatican had indicated, just this morning, that the Basilica would be closed until 1pm because the Pope was leading a special mass. As it turned out, just as we were about to exit the Sistine Chapel, our guide indicated that she had just received word that the church was open. We spent about 45 minutes wandering around the church and then went downstairs to see the crypt where a number of previous Popes are buried.

We picked up our luggage from the hotel and headed out of Rome. Despite everything we were told and had read, driving in Rome really wasn’t that bad. With our GPS we were quite able to find our way around. Many of the roads don’t have street signs so you just have to guess as to where to turn sometimes. Siri always reroutes you when you make a wrong turn.

One of the many baths

We decided to stop at Hadrian’s Villa on our way to Tirni. Hadrian was the emperor from 117 to 138 and had the villa built as an alternative to the emperor’s palace on the Pallatine Hill in Rome. It was used by successive emperors and then fell into disuse. Like most other abandoned sites around Rome, the valuable marble and statuary were removed and used in other buildings – maybe even St Peters. There were some 30 buildings on the property many of which are still in some state of preservation. It was quite interesting although in some ways it wasn’t too different from the sites and stories associated with the forum.

In my post yesterday I indicated that it had been a day of walking. While we were eating dinner tonight George looked up his step counter app on his iphone. Yesterday was 28,000 steps (21.1 km) and today was about 22,000 steps. No wonder my calf muscles are sore!

We’re both feeling the effect of some 24,000+ steps tonight – many of them of the vertical variety. It was a day of walking!

View of the city from first level

We began at the Casel Sant’Angelo and managed to beat the lines since it was just around the corner from our hotel. Originally commissioned by Hadrian about 120AD, it was built as a mausoleum for his family. It was converted to a military fortress around 400AD and was modified and used by successsive popes as a place of safety, including a hidden passageway from the papal apartments. Once the tallest building in Rome, the only way to see it is via a number of successive staircases. I counted on the way down…there were 200 steps. Some of the rooms have been refurbished as a museum, which was quite interesting. I enjoyed the treasury, a room full of built-in cupboards, moveable chests and other paraphernalia used to house the papal treasures.

Marcus Aurelius

From the Casel, we walked over the Tiber bridge to the local bus stop. A short ride dropped us at the Musei Capitolini. The museum dates back to 1471 and most of the artifacts come from the city of Rome. Housed in three different buildings, some two and one three stories tall, there seemed to be an awful lot of stairs. I got lost at one point and had to retrace my steps to figure out where I was. One of the highlights of the museum is a new display area that houses the original equestrian statue of Emperor Marcus Aurelius, thought to date back to 176AD. When they were cleaning it, they realized that at one time it had been covered in gold – some of the gold leaf still visible. In another area was an interesting collection of plaques that have been uncovered as archeological digs have unearthed them. We ate our lunch at the museum before heading off to the Colloseum.

The lasagna church – level 1 a Roman temple; level 2 a medieval church (notice door behind pillar); level 3 current Christian church

Temple of Romulus dating back to 400AD. The most amazing thing is the green doors – they’re the original ones and they still work!

This was our favourite part of the day since it was a guided tour with a great guide, Sarafina. We learned a lot about life in Roman times and how they are discovering new things as excavations continue. The forum was the general business area of the day-to-day life of the residents – market, temples, government buildings, and schools. The Palladine Hill area was where the emperor and his family lived. Most of the landscape looks like ruins, but the guide helped us to visualize the opulence that would have once been there. Italians are experts are recycing – we saw a church that has three distinct levels, nicknamed the lasagna church, as successive inhabitants used the previous buildings for the foundations of their building.

The colloseum is an amazing building and our upgraded ticket allowed us access to both the floor, to get a performer’s perspective, and the underground, to see where the gladiators and slaves would have prepared for their events…dark, smelly and noisy are just a few adjectives that come to mind. It was built around 79AD and sat 80,000 people. They say they could get them in and out within 30 minutes! The lower level would be for government officials, the second level for the upper class, and levels three and four would have been for the rest of the population. Tickets were free and seats were assigned. Women sat at the very highest back rows (up by the top windows in the picture).

It was almost 6pm when the tour was over and we were both pretty wiped…especially our feet and legs. We stopped for dinner on the way home and I found out that a meat dish doesn’t necessarily come with anything. Fortunately, I’d ordered vegetable soup and since the both arrived at the same time, I just pretended that the vegetables weren’t in a soup broth.

Our last experience for the day was taking the metro back to a stop close to our hotel. Their subway system is quite easy to use, appeared to be very clean, but was quite crowded. Sarafina had told us earlier that they are building a new subway line but they have to keep stopping because they unearth some new ruins. Until they can be excavated by archaeologists, subway construction has to stop. It’s now going on seven years! Maybe the TTC should use this as an excuse for their delays and budget defaults. At least it’s understandable!

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.

Jimmie’s grave

the Cenotaph

Memorial monument

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.

Using GPS to wend our way through the back streets to the Pantheon – tourist maps have gone the way of the dodo

The Pantheon and altar

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.

One of DaVinci’s flying machines

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!

I can tell that this trip is going to be an exciting adventure! Day two was no more mundane than day one.

Amphitheatre

Store front – likely a cafe/restaurant

Pompeii is a very interesting place – amazing really given the age of some of the buildings  dating back to 500BC. An earthquake hit in 62AD doing a fair bit of damage and then the volcano erupted in 79AD, burying the city under 4 to 6 meters of ash and causing complete evacuation of the city. Excavation and restoration has been ongoing since the 1700s and is still ongoing. Details of everyday life have been well preserved since the layers of ash ensured preservation from water and weather. When Vesuvius erupted many people sought safety in their homes. The next day, when tons of ash decended on the city, many were just buried in place.

Getting out of Pompeii and on the road to Sorrento was quite an experience – only possible because we have GPS. The entrance ramp to the highway was closed so we wound our way through street after street, turn after turn (including many mis-turns) until we found ourselves down by the coastline through the industrial end of town. It was quite exciting but between George’s good sense of direction and Siri…we made it.

Double-decker road through town

Houses built into the side of the hill

The Amalfi coast drive did not disappoint despite the fact that it was a cloudy afternoon with intermittent rain. The trip is about 40 km of the narrowest winding road either of have ever been on. George excelled as the chauffeur in a standard-gear car, no less! The car survived without a scratch, although we did have a little scare when we rubbed against the stone wall. We decided it must have been the tire that took the brunt of that escapade. There aren’t many places to stop for pictures as the road is right against the cliffs with a 500′ drop to the ocean. Busses travel both ways, honkng their horns to warn oncoming traffic. Everything works well until two of them get to the same tight curve at the same time! Time didn’t permit us to stop and explore the small towns along the way – each seemingly have a special character of their own. We did stop in Minori so that George could rest his clutch foot and enjoyed hot chocolate made the european way with real melted chocolate. Right down at the ocean it was very cold and windy as we walked around town for 10 minutes.

Our stop for the night was Cassino, north of Naples. We arrived about 7pm, dropped our things in the room and left to find dinner. Would you believe the only place we could find was the Golden Arches! I guess people don’t eat out here. The only restaurant we found was called Al Capone, but it was booked for a private party. There were lots of cafes and pizzerias but they’re all take aways or have a few tables out on the street. It was a bit cold tonight to dine al fresco. So MacD’s won out and I broke my golden rule of never eating dinner there.

It was a fun day – full of exciting adventures – and between Pompeii, Minori and Cassino we walked over 17,000 steps! Definitely taking the pain pill tonight.

I’m off again – this time to vacation with my wonderful son, his Chistmas gift to me in 2013. He said we could go anywhere in the world that I hadn’t been before. We decided on Italy because I have an uncle buried at Cassino War Cemetery that no one in my mom’s family has viisted. I really wanted to visit and take pictures before his siblings all pass away.

It was a bit of a delayed start as our plane was late leaving Frankfurt and hence we were two hours late leaving Toronto. Needless to say we didn’t make our connecting flight, to Naples, in Frankfurt. Despite trying to sort things out with the airline prior to leaving Toronto, we had to wait until arriving in Frankfurt to find out what plans they had for us. In the plane, they announced that all those on the Naples flight had been rerouted through Munich. It would seem like a rather simple solution to just go to the gate and pick up our new boarding passes, but no, we had to stand in line for 75 minutes at the Service Centre to hear that we were rebooked and get our new passes. In fact, we were only 3 hours later arriving in Naples but it meant that we won’t see anything of the city.

International travel is not for the faint-of-heart. Delays such as we experienced today provide wonderful opportunities to wait in new and different airports and to sample new and different airline food. While we were happy to finally arrive all in one piece, we are both quite tired and decided to eat at the hotel bistro instead of searching out a local restaurant. We both suspect that our dinner was thawed and reheated…but didn’t much care!

Now it’s off to bed for tomorrow is Pompeii and the Amalfi coast.