honeymoon « Kenny Smith | A remarkable thing happens …

honeymoon

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23
May 10

A day in the park (museum and elsewhere)

We visited the Villa Borghese Museum today. Originally a suburban party villa, the collection that now resides there was started by by Cardinal Scipion Borghese, the nephew of Pope Paul V. From those 17th Century beginnings, coming to Napoleon’s brother-in-law and finally transforming into a public museum in the 1700s.

The museum boasts the world’s greatest Caravaggio collection and one of the best Bernini collections you can find. There is no photography in the 20-room museum, but here are our favorite sculptures for the day, first a Bernini, his famous Apollo and Daphne. It must be seen in the round, and up close. Then, even someone with little understanding of sculpture, like me, is awed. Another incredible piece is Antonio Canova’s Pauline Bonaparte, which was quite scandalous. She’s reclining on a mattress, which looks for all the world like a different stone, or perhaps like an actual mattress.

The detail in both are incredible.

All of the Caravaggios are in one room. Bernini, meanwhile, absolutely steals the show. He always does. His talent was so great that he could convert even the unartistic viewers. The man had a gift. And makes you redefine your concept of having a gift.

There is a park on the property. We rented a two-person, pedal yourself rickshaw and drove it around, enjoying the beautiful afternoon weather. I took a lot of pictures.

We had a War Eagle moment at the museum, Ren’s first international one. We were waiting to go inside — you visit by appointment — and a lady walked by and noticed my shirt. Guess I’ll have to make a WEM section for the site after all.

We went across the Tiber River into Trastevere, which has gone from medieval village, to working class neighborhood to Left Bank to high priced neighborhood to rustic and touristy. The graffiti is plentiful, though. To get there we caught a bus, which took us to a tram. We missed our stop on the tram, so we got off about six stops later to catch a tram headed the original direction. We took the correct stop (which was the intial stop for the first tram, incidentall) and wandered deep into the neighborhood.

The sky was growing dark and we are stumbling through alleys. Occassionally we wander across a little piazza that Americans have overtaken. Mostly we feel like we are in alleys. A policeman finally helps us find our way to Trattoria da Lucia. Rick Steves says “lets you enjoy simple, traditional food at a good price in a great scene. It’s the quintessential rustic, 100 percent Roman Trastevere dining experience, and has been family-run since World War II. You’ll meet four generations of the family, including Giuliano and Renato, their uncle Ennio and Ennio’s mom — pictured on the menu in the 1950s. The family specialty is spaghetti alla Gricia with pancetta bacon.”

We sit in the alley under the stars, in Italy. We are serenaded by an old man on an accordion who says “U.S.A.!” and then launches into a passionate “Somewhere Over the Rainbow.” It was perfect.

Steves has given us three great restaurants in a row, so I say pick up his books before your next European visit. I had the spaghetti alla Gricia, which was profoundly delicious. We’re ripping off that dish. And we also found the most simple, delicious summer dessert. When we get settled at home after the trip you’ll have to stop by and have some.

A table of four American ladies, a mother and her three adult daughters, were seated next to us. We exchanged names and hometowns and notes and tips on traveling in Rome. Turns out they are from not far from where my family lives. Turns out one of the ladies’ daughters is going to a basketball camp at Auburn. She gives us her card. She is a financial adviser.

We need one of those.

We got turned around in the alleys of Trastevere trying to leave, somehow emerging blocks away from where we needed to be. At first it was The Yankee’s fault (and she’s usually great at this) and then I took over, pointing us in at least the right direction. Time was of the essence. Meals aren’t to be rushed through here. Late starts and two hour dinners are the norm, and the waiters aren’t necessarily in a hurry to produce the check.

Our hotel is on the exact opposite side of Rome from Trattoria da Lucia and the buses stop running at midnight. We finally make it back to the tram stop, catching what might have been the last ride of the night back across the Tiber. We caught the absolute last bus, waiting out what seems to be the driver’s mandatory break at St. Peter’s, still miles from our place.

Finally we made it back to our neighborhood. But we missed the stop. We needed the fourth stop. The Yankee (who really is good at this sort of thing, normally) insisted we’d just made the third stop. Turns out the fifth stop is at the bus station, so we walked back from there. I’ll give her grief over that for days.

In addition to the slideshow above, there is a brief photo gallery on the day.

Tomorrow our cruise begins!

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22
May 10

Vatican video

A bit shaky, a bit rushed, very Flip, but nonetheless: St. Peter’s Basilica, as seen from the ring around the dome. The mass choir sings. Everything here is more impressive and beautiful in person.

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22
May 10

Saturday at the Vatican

Sistine Chapel ceiling

At the Vatican we saw what must be the world’s most comprehensive statuary collection. There’s ancient Egyptian works, Greek works, Roman impressions of Greek works (those are the newcomers) and more. You can see 5,000-year-old writing in this museum.

Finally you work your way into the Sistine Chapel. No words you have read, no pictures or video you see can prepare you for the pinnacle of Rennaissance art, so I won’t try to start.

It is a fresco, painted while wet over several years, depicting all of Biblical history of the world, from creation to Judgment Day, which is found on the front wall. The sides are painted as curtains. Overwhelming is a word you use a lot in Rome, no more deservedly than here.

The floor, incidentally, was terrible.

We had lunch at La’Isola della Pizza, of which Rick Steves says “wood-fired pizzas, sidewalk seating and home-cooking at its truest. Adele, Vito or their son Renzo serve up generous plates of their mixed antipasti and Vito himself hunts the wild boar for the cinghiale pasta.”

They offer a four-way pizza, un quattro stagioni. We chose the quattro formagi (four cheese), Gorgonzola e salsiccia (mozzarella, sausages, Gorgonzola), Capricciosa (tomato, mozarella, ham and egg (it worked, well)) and bascaiola funghi e salsiccia (mozarella, mushrooms, sausages). We were serenaded by a violinist.

We hiked the 320 steps (we paid two Euros to avoid another 180 steps) to the cupola above St. Peter’s Square. This is another tremendous view. You can see all the way to the Tiber and beyond. On the way up to the top you can see a bird’s eye view of the basilica.

We took in a mass. St. Peter is buried there, in this most ornate, overdone place on earth. Seated next to us were the Sisters of the Arrive Late, Leave Early Convent. Watching a nun check her watch during mass is great. Watching another answer her cell phone is even better.

We decided on gelato for dinner. It is our honeymoon, why not? We found some in a mid-block mall near our hotel. You walk in from the street, but it feels like an underground. Everything was closed, except the restaurant. We’re doing lots of things like that, dancing our way through Rome, hardly believing we are here. And we are only getting started.

Site stuff: Because it will otherwise get overwhelming I’m breaking up the photo galleries. I’ve posted almost 140 photos for the first two full days. Here’s yesterday’s. Click here for today’s. You’ll soon have video to stare at as well.

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21
May 10

Rome, Day One

The Roman Colosseum

Incredibly full and busy day. We say the Colosseum — understated in size in person, but only a third of it remains for modern eyes. We walked up to Palatine Hill, the central hill of Rome, and the forum. We visited a little museum, stopped by the Piazza del Campidoglio and the Victor Emmanuel monument.

We took in an incredible view from the rooftop. I made a hasty panorama. (Magnify and scroll left.)

We took in the Pantheon, which is the oldest imposing structure around (and still boasts the world’s largest unsupported concrete dome). It was built in the 1st Century and became a Catholic church in the 13th. The first two kings of Italy. Renaissance artist Raphael and others are buried here. It is the most alive place we’ve been today.

We had dinner at Trattoria der Pallaro, which Rick Steves says is “a well-worn eatery that has no menu, has a slogan: ‘Here you’ll eat what we want to feed you.’ Paolo Fazi — with a towel wrapped around her head turban-style — and her family serve up a five-course meal of typically Roman food, including wine, coffee and a tasty mandarin juice finale. As many locals return day after day, each evening features a different menu.”

They brought us olives, cured beef, the best salami ever, lentils, an unidentified vegetable, rigatoni and roasted pork loin.

Steves knows his business. This place was delicious.

More pictures (almost 70 of them) can be found in the new, and rapidly growing, honeymoon gallery. There could be a brief video forthcoming too.

Tomorrow: The Vatican.

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20
May 10

I see London, I see Rome (more of Rome)

Our time in London

We had a layover and plane change in London. We stayed for about an hour. All I know of England I learned at Heathrow.

I grabbed a London visitors guide, because it was there, and stared at the currency exchange station and the HSBC ads which are posters displayed in the old Burmashave style. They are displayed in a series of four. The first three posters have an image and one word, like “responsibility.” One picture is a soccer player over a ball, maybe another is of a child holding something delicate and the last one is a goldfish fish in a bowl. Each of the three posters has the word “responsibility.” The fourth poster says something like “words mean different things to different people. If you let us datamine you to death we can know what they mean to you. And by to death we mean every word. And by you we mean everyone. And by know we mean we can help you more. And by help we mean this is a little sketchy isn’t it? And by sketchy we mean we’re the world’s local bank.”

It is a brilliant campaign, but like my doctors, I prefer a bit of anonymity with my banker. Tell you what, you get the decimal plays in the right spot (or, failing that, err to the right) and I’ll make sure I don’t write bad checks. We can stop there and call that a relationship, mmmkay?

So Heathrow is nice. Two hours later we landed in Rome and walked onto the jetway, the thin, fraying, waterstained jetway thinking “This is some first impression.”

It got better.

We had to wait a faith-shakingly long time for our checked luggage. It could be in Norway by now and who would know?

The first American ad we saw was at the passport control station: Iron Man 2.

The passport guy ably demonstrated the disaffected air you’ve come to expect from government employees. Good to see that some things are universal. He sort of throws your passport back at you after stamping it on which ever page his finger opened. It’d be nice if these things were in sequence, but they stamp probably a thousand of these an hour and are as generally disdainful of the idea of long passport lines as you are, so that doesn’t happen.

We caught the train into the center of Rome, passing both attractive countryside and depressing and old apartment complexes. In the States I’d think they were some post-Nixon/Carter tenement or maybe a housing project, but it is unwise to make such leaps here. Most of these people have forgotten about that Nixon guy anyway.

On the train a woman across the aisle was listening to a blaring Kid Rock tune in her headphones. My second American pop-culture reference of the trip had to be that guy warbling on about Sweet Home Alabama.

My third was a McDonald’s, found just outside the train station where the earnestly helpful and entirely exploitive cabbies were happy to try and help us. Because we have luggage and are wearing the look of out-of-place, confused Americans he offered to take us to our hotel for only 30 Euros.

“Special price.”

Our hotel was in walking distance, even toting our plane-safety-threatening heft of luggage. We declined.

So we made our way to the Hotel Margaret which boasts, on both signage and website that they are a two star hotel. That’s oddly humorous as truth in advertising goes, but you’re in Rome, man, you’re here to see the sites, not be in the room and watching television. Or so I’m told.

Our room is small, but it holds the luggage, is clean and has a bed and corner bathroom. It will do the job.

Later we’d realize just how firm the mattress was. And then we realized the double is really two twins pushed together. After last night, though, that didn’t matter much.

Dinner was conveniently located across the street. The Yankee picked up a Rick Steves book, from which many of our trip plans have been created. She found a reference to the Ristorante da Giovanni. This is a where-the-locals eat place, which is the only way to travel in our opinion.

Ristorante di Giovanni

Steves writes, “Ristorante da Giovanni is a well-worn old-time eatery that makes no concessions to tourism or the modern world — just hard-working cooks and waiters serving standard dishes at great prices to a committed local clientele. It’s simply fun to eat in the middle of this high-energy, old-school diner.”

Giovanni has been there since 1948. The walls are homey and wood-paneled. Our waiter, a delightful, helpful and friendly old man who takes pictures with his guests, smelled of wood sealer.

The Yankee had tortellini, soup and eggplant. I had a three course meal of minestrone (in which I was a bit disappointed, oddly enough), rigatoni and roasted chicken, which was delicious. (Dinners here are served in courses, perhaps even in that McDonald’s near the train station.)

After dinner, which was late, but absolutely in keeping with the rhythm of the local culture, we stumbled sleepily across the street. We buzzed our way into the hotel, took the skinny little elevator up to the fourth floor and wrapped up the night.

Our three-day, whirlwind tour of Rome starts tomorrow!