Italy with Mama Mia

Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Walking in Venice with Mama Mia...

Bells in a Venice Piazza

I've decided to add some video and sounds from our trip. Here are bells in a Venice Piazza. I recorded this our first night in Venice.

Sunday, October 27, 2013

Dear Readers,
What follows is the list of the dates and things that Mama Mia and I did on our Italian Vacation. I do not recommend these itineraries unless you are dedicated to walking and are of sound mind and body. Truly, someone needs to give us an award for everything we saw. What a wonderful trip. I will never forget it. Thanks for being with me on my first Italian trip, Mama Mia!

If you'd like to read about our entire trip, I recommend starting with the first post and working your way up to this post. That will keep it all in order.

Love,
Suzanne

October 5th

Travel to Italy

October 6th

Arrived in Venice
Vaparetto Rides
Dinner (they had an extremely low toilet with no seat...many toilets in Italy had no seats!)

October 7th

San Marco's Square
Doge's Palace with the Bridge of Sighs and the Prisons
Beautiful lunch in traditional trattoria
Basilica di San Marco
Museo di San Marco (rooftop!)
Elevator to top of Campanile (the guy who ran the elevator reminded us of Igor)
Dinner/Shopping near Piazza di San Nichola

October 8th

Vap to San Michele
Shopping on the Rialto
Church of San Rocco (including his bones!)
Outside of Frari Basilica
Train to Firenze
Dinner in Firenze (at place that had pictures of the Florence Flood on the walls)
Walked along the Orno
Walked up to the Piazzale Michaelangelo

October 9th

Duomo with Crypts
Climbed the Campanile
Baptistry
Accademia to see David et al
Carousel ride
Orsanmichele Church
Priori (Palazzo Vecchio) Outside only
Uffizi
Dinner right outside the Uffizi

October 10th (my birthday!)

Bargello Museum
Galileo Museum
Paper Shop
Sante Croce from outside only
Birthday Coffee Break
Ponte Vecchio
Medici Pitti Palazzo
Public Library Branch
Brancacci Chapel
Piazza Santa Spirito
Train to Roma
Bought Roma passes
Birthday Dinner

October 11th

Mass at St. Peter's Basilica in chapel next to the Pieta
St. Peter's Basilica and St. Peter's Square
Vatican Museums
Sistine Chapel
Late Lunch
Spanish Steps
Naps
Trevi Fountain at night

October 12th

Met. Fr. Augustine and Fr. Martin at the Basilica (cut all those people in line)
Scavi/Necropolis Tour
St. Peter in Chains (Michaelangelo's Moses)
Colosseum Tour
Palatine Hill Tour
Roman Forum
Capitalini Museum Lunch and Museum (maze museum)
Capitaline Ramp
Vittorio Emanual Monument
Night Gelato in our neighborhood

October 13th

Mass at North American College
Brunch at North American College
Castel Sant'Angelo
Piazza Novona
Pantheon
Luigi Church (Matthew Caravaggios)
Column of Marcus Aurelius
Barbarini Museum
Caputian Monks
Dinner near Barbarini

October 14th

Bus to Circus Maximus
San Callisto Catacombs
Saint John Lateran
San Clemente
Scala
Maria Vittorio - St. Teresa
Mary Major
Last Dinner in our Neighborhood

October 15th

Flights home

Tuesday, October 15, 2013

Boarding!

We are boarding for Indy!

We Are Stateside!

We are stateside! I found this flight to be much more comfortable than going to Italy... We are currently in Charlotte waiting to board our last flight. Mom's flight, on the other hand, was, of course, more exciting than mine. She sat next to a woman who watched three comedies in a row and laughed through them all. Loudly. With much guffawing.

I was happy to see two pigeons in the Rome Airport... They reminded me of the ones we saw at Termini... Sounds like a picture book! Hoping to send our final list of everything we did soon. Thanks to all my faithful readers. Mary and Joe get the awards for the most interactive readers. Cin cin!

Monday, October 14, 2013

Debbie's Birthday Party

Here is our last breakfast. For those of you in the know, the pastries here are like Debbie's Birthday on crack.

Last Dinner in Italy

St. Mary Major

The Church of Maria Vittoria

The Scala

San Clemente

St. John Lateran

Catacombs

Circus Maximus, Pyramid and the Roman Baths

Santa Claus List

Mom and I both had a list of things a mile long that we wanted to do in Rome. Today was spent polishing off the Santa Claus list of things we wanted.

You will be astounded at what we saw today and if you aren't. Meh. You have imagination issues.

First of all, we had a bit of a leisurely breakfast for the first time since Florence. Today was the only day on our Rome portion of the trip that we didn't head to the Vatican neighborhood for something so that was a nice change. We began our journey by hopping on the B line of the Metro toward the Circus Maximus. This is where the chariot races once were held. Think Ben Hur and all that. We got off our stop and the Circus Maximus was right there. This is one of the lesser restored sites of Rome and is basically a green field with a suggestion of the track and some big bits of structure on one end. Some workers were working on those structures today and one of them was smiley and jolly and waved at me. I waved back and took his picture. (Mom's Santa Claus List)

After a bit gazing at the giant Circus (it was nice to see a green place...we'd been mostly in buildings for the majority of our trip) we boarded a bus to head to the San Callisto Catacombs. On the bus we got to see a few things that were cool namely Il Lato Storico Della Piramide (which is a big old pyramid...it was under scaffolding, but still, it was cool), the Roman Baths (just a glimpse), and a castle called the Museo Della Via Ostiense Porta San Paola...I don't know the story on that, but it was cool to see another castle. I mean there are old things all around, but I don't get tired of seeing them.

On our first bus, we met a big tourist group of German kids and they were very helpful in identifying the right stop. The bus went one stop and then stopped for a long while...at least 10 minutes...we were impatient (can you imagine?) for it to start. But it finally did and we had a rushed moment of "San Callisto? San Callisto? before we jumped off, sure we were at the right place. We were. We approached the Catacombs and were happy to be in what looked like a big park with lots of beautiful Roman conifers and green green grass. The tours were just getting ready to start and they announced each tour in its own language. We, of course, went down with the English group. We had to walk down a narrow staircase. Our tour guide Niccola explained how the best and most important catacombs (underground dome) had what looked like chimneys to let in light and air. We got to see a catacomb with an underground chapel in it and the crypt of a pope and (my favorite) the crypt of St. Cecilia. She is no longer there, but we saw a copy of a lovely statue of here laying dramatically face down and in a bit of a fetal position on top of her crypt. There was one little bit where we had to walk through a very narrow passage with no light and emerge right in front of a little metal railing that could easily poke your eye out were it not for the guild saying "attention...attention..." The Catacombs were definitely on mom's Christmas List so we were happy to have them (PS...mom wants me to tell you all that we got one Roma pass for our trip and used it three days then we just paid for a 6 euro metro pass for public transit for the day and spent all the rest of our last day on Catacombs and churches...none of which would take a Roma anyway...this might be good for those of you on a 4 day Rome plan like us).

Our next leg of our journey required us to pick up a bus. Drunk from our earlier bus success, we started off in what we thought was the right direction. We were excited to walk along the road because it was a part of the Appian Way...a very early road leading to Rome. After a while, we realized we weren't on the Appian Way and we were also not near a bus stop. We walked for a while longer and finally saw a bus stop. It looked good. Our stop was listed. We watched three of the wrong bus go by before a lovely Italian lady showed up to wait for her bus. We asked in very broken Italian about our bus (number 117) and, despite not speaking English, she gave us a definitive NO. We think that particular bus runs on Market Days only. We came to the conclusion that we had gone the wrong way out of the Catacombs. We took a 15 minute walk back to the exit to the catacombs and found another bus stop. We stood at it for about 5 minutes before a group of more German kids showed up. In desperation (because we had lost about 45 minutes of our day in all this brew-ha-ha, we asked them if they spoke English and if we were at the right place. The Savior Boy (that's what we will call him from now on) said we were close. Our stop was across the street. We thanked him profusely (I did ask him if he was SURE...he said he was...he'd been there twice already on this trip) and proceeded to wait at the correct stop.

Finally, the right bus came and we got on it and headed to St. John Lateran.

St. John Lateran is big and beautiful. It is the Pope's cathedral in Rome and also, I think it claims to have the head of John the Baptist, but, as with all these crazy relics, I'm skeptical. I did like the fact that it had electrical candles you could "light" in honor of an intention. Love those things. They are so corny.

We realized that we were close to the Scala, the church that houses the steps that Jesus walked (or crawled) up at Pontius Pilot's place. They were closed until 3 so we headed to San Clemente (been on our list for days) to see there underground church. Their building started as a grand-ish house and was then built up with another church and finally, the church we see today. We stopped for pizza and diet cokes (first one I've had in months) and then headed to San Clemente. The church was big and we had to go down a long stair case to get to the underground areas...some of which went back to at least the 4th century and maybe even the 1st or the 2nd. Their was a soft path that you followed through the catacombs. There was a map but it was easy to get lost. We got to see two levels of the catacombs and even saw the fresh water streams that are accessible right there in the catacombs.

After the awesome catacombs, we headed back to the Scala. We did not climb the 28 steps on our knees like some folks were but we did see the chapel at the back that used to hold lots of relics of saints. We finished up there and headed over to the big one for my Santa Claus list...Maria Vittorio...home of the Ecstasy of St. Teresa...Bernini's masterpiece. I've been excited to see her ever since we decided to go to Rome so I'd been anxious all day to get there. We had plenty of time by taking the Metro from Lateran to Teresa and imagine my surprise when it was discovered that she lives in a church on the corner of Via Venti Settemente and (drum roll) Largo di San Susanna! Can you believe it? She was amazing to see and the church is one of the most ornate and opulent that we've seen (which is crazy considering how many churches we've seen on this trip). I was so content to be in the presence of such a great work of art.

But we still had mom's Santa Claus list and only 1.5 hours to complete it. Luckily it was just one church, Mary Major, which was beautiful and huge and houses what is contended to be the manger. Yes. That manger. It was amazing.

During our jaunts today Mom bought a leather purse, we had our last Gelato, and we were sufficiently tired at the end, but happy to have seen everything on our Santa Claus list. The evening wrapped up with a lovely dinner and, of course, the finishing up of our walking of 20,000 steps. We packed for the rest of the evening and now it's time for bed. So tired.

Guys! Our Rome vacation is coming to an end. Look for a few more pictures and one last post with a list of everything we did in our 4 days. It was certainly not for the weak.

Ciao ciao!

Little Stories

Since it's our last day I feel I should mention a few funny stories before launching into our Santa Claus list that we accomplished today:

1. There are many places that offer audio tours of the attractions. We never got one. There are also many places where complete strangers ask you to take their pictures and you ask complete strangers if they will take your picture. Also, there are times when you see complete strangers having a hard time taking a picture of themselves and so you offer to take their picture for them. They are usually very happy for the help. Yesterday we were at the Castile San Angelo right by Hadrian's tomb and this couple was (I thought) taking a picture of themselves kissing by Hadrian's tomb. I don't know why anyone would do that, but I thought I'd help them. I went up and was like "photo? I help you with photo?" They gave me a very dirty look and said "no photo!" Then they went on listening to what I thought was a camera but was actually an audio guide. I was quite embarrassed.

2. Crossing the street here is a bit of an adventure (unless you are in Venice...then it's a canal and it's romantic). You just walk in front of moving cars and hope that they stop. However, sometimes there are lights and the cars have the right of way. I walked in front of a car once and she didn't stop and I yelled at her! I was supposed to have the right of way. She yelled right back at me. There was a light and she had the right of way after all. Mom and I laughed at the yelling. No one got hurt and I got to feel a bit Italian and a bit sheepish at the same time.

3. Everyday mom has tracked our steps. Our goal was 10,000 a day until we realized that we average about 20,000. Today at dinner we were up to 17,000. That's why after dinner we had to walk about an exceptionally boring piazza (they do exist) until we got to exactly 20,000 which happened right outside our hotel door. We've been dedicated walkers, as we should be.

4. There is a strict rule at some places about no pictures. Many places it doesn't matter but some places they are very strict. At this one museum (Barbarini) a man had taken a picture and the docent asked him (in Italian) to delete it. They got into a big argument (in Italian) about it. She kept saying something like "I told you no pictures." And he kept saying something like "Oh, it doesn't matter." And she kept after him and after him until we had to walk away because they were never going to stop arguing about that picture. For all we know they are still arguing about that today.

5. Buying stamps for postcards happens in official Tobaccaria shops (Tobacco) indicated by a T sign. You also post your cards there. In Venice you can only post in the small black boxes NOT THE RED ONES (that was told to us more than once). It took us a while to realize that in Florence and Rome you CAN post in the red boxes, but only the split ones that have Rome / Everywhere Else. Some of you got postcards and that was tough, so if you didn't get one, don't be sad. Who had time to write postcards with our schedule? Only Button Cat and Button Cat doesn't have anything remotely resembling hands, let alone imposable thumbs.

6. The trashcans here are cute.

7. We filled our water bottles up at the many potable water fountains found all over the city.

8. We were walking (getting our 20,000 steps in) and we walked by a ristorante and the waiter said to us "Table for two? Me and you?" and he pointed at me. We thought that was pretty funny. Of course that earned a "No grazie!" and some giggles.

9. I'm a little nuts about money when I'm on trips like this. Mom will tell you how crabby I got when I didn't have a chance to count my euros before going to bed. Tonight we have reconciled everything with the conclusion that I owe mom five (American) dollars.

10. We miss you all but we miss the babies the most. Ciao ciao!

Tuesday, October 29, 2013

Sunday, October 27, 2013

Tuesday, October 15, 2013

Monday, October 14, 2013

Sunday, October 13, 2013