Our journey home - days 15 and 16, Rome

OK time to try to remember all that happened over a week ago in Rome!  As Richard reminded me this morning, I get to the end of our holidays and run out of blogging steam - well that and I have been reading all the posts on an online art course I am doing for the next 8 weeks or so with Jane Davenport from Byron Bay called 'Supplies Me'!  Can't wait to get home to Australia in a few days to start the actual art work!

Anyway back to Rome!  We arrived in Rome on the Saturday afternoon after driving down from Spoleto.  The drive was a little less crazy than some of our other journeys - well at least it was until we hit Rome!  We headed straight to our hotel and dropped our bags off and then went straight into the centre -yes the centre - of Rome to drop the car off!  We had to stop and buy some fuel on the way.  Boy, how we both wished we could speak Italian as the attendant was the rudest person ever!  After many times around the block with Portia we finally found the place we needed to drop the car off - well we thought we did until the guy behind the counter tried to direct us back the wrong way up a one way street to the car park!  I just kept playing dumb and eventually he said 'it's ok we will take it!'  Yay, success as I think Richard had well and truly had enough of driving in Italy!

We went for a bit of a walk and bought a public transport pass for our stay.  Good move as these cover trains, trams and buses.  We had some lunch and headed back to our hotel for a bit of a siesta.  Our hotel was fabulous!  Only two train stops from the Colosseum and full of art works!  Have a look at some of them:

These were in the carport at the entry to the hotel!

and these in the bar. 

There were more dotted all over the hotel, but I took no other photos unfortunately!  There was also some great graffiti art in the garage, but again no photos (the day I went to I had forgotten to put the memory card back in my camera!)

Anyway on Saturday night we just went out for a quick bite to eat and then went for a walk to get our bearings in Rome again.  We did find a fabulous gelati place - but more of that later!

On Sunday we decided to do a general walking tour of Rome.  Here's some of what we saw:

This building is not loved by the Romans.  They think it is too white and have named it either the 'typewriter', or if they are being really picky about it 'the false teeth'.  It has two eternal flames at the front as a memorial for service people.

Some of the details.  To give you an idea of scale the moustache on the man in these first photos is apparently three metres across and you could drive a double decker bus under the horse's belly!

This was the balcony Mussolini  made all his speeches to the Italian people during WWII.  It overlooks the square in front of the false teeth.

We walked past the Pantheon:

We walked from the Pantheon to Piazza Navona where we sat and shared a half a bottle of wine and watched the world go by:

There are some massive fountains in this square but we took no photos this time, we have them from our last trip to Rome and the light was not ideal.  We still however, checked out the work of the artists in the middle of the square and wandered from there towards the Tiber River.

In August there are markets every evening along the banks of the river, so we decided it might be worth checking out.  The markets looked very pretty from a distance:

.....but there was nothing there that made me say 'ooh I need to take you home!'


We did however manage to find a restaurant under one of the bridges and had some pasta and half a litre of red!  Very romantic!!

....and on the way home I found some graffiti quoting probably my favourite song of all time!

Got to love John Lennon.....so come dream with me!

There are still a couple of days of Rome and then we will be off to Bangkok where I am actually sitting while I write this! Ciao for now!

Our journey home - days 11 to 14, Spoleto and Spello

Wow, those days since I last updated have gone quickly!  Just two weeks today and we will be home in Australia; but we have a few things to do before then.

Our last few days in Spoleto were very lazy ones.  We lounged about and relaxed a lot!  Richard's shoulder was really giving him strife and the bed in Spoleto didn't help it, nor I must say did the driving a manual on very twisty windy roads when the gear changes had to be done with the right hand.  He had to drive because my English license says I have only been driving for one year and the insurance for me to drive was ridiculous!

I will see how many days I can cover with this blog.  The uploading is very slow so it may take a few goes for me to catch up!

On Tuesday we went for a drive up into the mountains (Monti Sibillini) around Umbria and the border of Le Marche.  In the winter this area is a snowfield and there were chairlifts and ski lifts on various hillsides.  It was incredibly beautiful but we did not take many photos because it was too hard to stop!  Here is a typical view though:

On Wednesday we stayed in Spoleto and went for a walk to find the Roman Theatre.  There is not much to see there other than a small stretch of the wall on the outside and the occasional glimpse inside through  the broken boarding that is on all the windows.

We also visited our favourite gelateria - the pear with grappa and the chocolate orange were divine!!

One night, out the front of this shop, we were treated to the sight of a guy dressed up as a Roman Warrior with a boom box karaoke machine singing along to Robbie Williams 'Real Love'.  It was hilarious!  He then handed out little credit card size fliers to groups of young men.  I think it was for a gay club because one of the young men very happily gave his to me when he heard me saying I wanted one for my journal!

On Wednesday night we visited the most fabulous little restaurant and I am so sorry that I didn't take my camera out to dinner that night!  It was gorgeous and the food was fabulous too!  We had a pasta that was done with bacon and green beans....ohhh!!!

On Thursday we visited a little town called Spello.  It is an ancient village and the home of many artists.  They had a gallery there devoted to Norberto.  It has some of the coolest paintings of flying monks!  Just loved it.  The photo of the statue of St Francis on the horse in Assisi on my previous blog is one of his works too!  Spello was lovely, but it was hard work making our way up the hill in the heat, so again first stop was a gelati! It was well worth the trip.

There was an embroidery display in this hall and the chariot and the mangonel that follow were the displays in the front foyer.

A sundial.  It was a work done by a local artist as a memorial piece. 

Porta dell'Arce (a gate from the Roman ages)

San Severino a 7th century church!  When we went inside there was a nun and another young woman playing the guitar and singing.  It was absolutely beautiful.  Think Enya meeting with angels! 

The wall and tower connected to the church.

Some of the fabulous roadways in Spello.

The main gate into the village.

Friday morning I started the day with coffee and a chocolate croissant in the artists' cafe near our apartment.

Again we had a lazy day, went for a walk and had a very late lunch in another restaurant just near our front door.

We were the only ones eating at this time, but we had walked past many times and seen it very busy.  We had a pizza that was not the best we have had on this trip, but still better than many you would get in Australia!

On Friday night the lady who was our host invited us to join her, out at her family property for 'cake after dinner'!  We drove out there (about 20 minutes out of Spoleto in a village called Poreta).  She had guests from her two other apartments there as well as us.  The other two couples were lovely people.  One couple were from Milton Keynes (just out of London), but were both born in Halifax, 7 miles down the road from where Richard was born.  The other couple were from Bavaria and were both special needs teachers!  You can imagine that we all found a lot to chat about!  The cake was delicious - zuppa inglese and an apple cake followed by watermelon! It was a great night.

I will leave this here and follow up with Rome soon!  Bye for now (Richard says I have to add 'too busy admiring my new shoes!').

Our journey home - days 8 to 10, Spoleto and Assisi

On Saturday we drove from the Amalfi Coast to Spoleto in Umbria.  Once we were off the coast, the roads widened and straightened out considerably and we were able to make good time.  We arrived about four, but had arranged to meet the owner of the apartment at five so we did a little bit of grocery shopping, had a cold drink and then waited for her. The apartment is right in the middle of Spoleto and so that means we have to park the car on the outskirts of town and then walk in!  It’s OK until you consider we are moving half a house with us!  So we did two trips to get most of it into the apartment! 

Our three front doors!

Door 1

Door 2 

..and Door 3 behind Door 2! 

The first night by the time we had settled in we just went for a short walk in the immediate area and then had dinner at a restaurant that is almost at our front door! 

On Sunday we stayed in town.  Richard’s shoulder was hurting from all the driving around bends on Friday and we were both tired.  We did boring things like some washing and just lazed around and read and snoozed!  In the afternoon we went down to the piazza at our front door and had gelati.  The best we have had so far on this trip!  There was a lemon one that was just superb!

Later in the evening we went for quite a long walk and took some fabulous photos of the area:

Nearly every village we have been in has had a stage set up.  This is the first performance we have seen though!

The clock on Piazza Mercato 

One of the many lane ways! 

The aquaduct 

As you can see it is breathtakingly beautiful.  After our walk we went out for dinner and both had rabbit casserole.  Again it was fabulous and for desert I had pineapple and basil sorbet!  We are getting an ice-cream maker when we get home so that I can experiment!

Today, Monday we went to Assisi.  We started off at the Chiesa di San Maria sopra Minerva Tempio di Minerva.  The paintings in there were breath taking.  There were no photographing signs everywhere.  We find it really strange that as atheists we respect that but a lot of the obviously catholic people were madly clicking away! There are signs also asking for silence, yet so many do not respect that either!  Here is a photo of the outside:

Next we went down to the Chiesa Nuova.  It was built in 1615 on the remains of the building believed to be the house of St Francis’ family.  We were able to take a few photos in here and some just at the door.

St Clare and St Francis

The dome in the Chiesa Nuova 

The Oratorio di San Francesco Piccolino is a tiny chapel where it is believed St Francis was born.  Here is the doorway to the chapel, but again it was not appropriate to take photos inside.

Our next stop was the Basilica di Santa Chiara.  It is an example of Italian gothic architecture built between 1257 and 1265.  It has paintings from the 12^th-14^th Centuries and the body of St Clare is preserved in the crypt.  Again no photos, but again people taking them!  A bit macabre if you ask me!  To top it off they make the sign of the cross as they leave.  Do they need to then go to confession after that? 

We had lunch and then trekked down to the Basilica di San Francesco.  This was fabulous.  I actually found it very moving and more so because in here people seemed to have more respect.  Is that because there were quite a few nuns and priests around?  I don’t know.  The interiors of both the upper and lower churches were fabulous.  The most glorious paintings and it all just felt so, so peaceful.  

We went down to the tomb of St Francis and I have to say that I found it very moving.  It was incredible seeing the reverence of the visitors compared with other places we had visited.  They filed past the tomb and touched it.  I saw two old ladies touch the tomb, and then turn to each other and hug with tears in their eyes.  It brought the tears to my eyes.  Visiting the tomb obviously meant a great deal to them and here the respectful silence was palpable.  Walking away from the tomb I spotted a young couple with a baby with obvious disabilities sitting in the chapel saying their prayers.  The mum had tears in her eyes, again I welled up.  Although I don’t believe, I did have a thought for some of my dear friends who do and sent my wishes of well for them.  I wonder if they count?

I have found a cafe very near where we are staying with wifi!  It has a great atmoshpere and I have eaten breakfast and am sitting drinking and iced tea as I do this.  Richard is or was still at home in bed.  The music playing is fabulous.  I will say bye for now and post this.