This morning Barbie hopped on a train to the Amalfi coast to meet friends and clients. I walked her to a taxi and saw her off, and then returned to the apartment. And slept. I kept sleeping. I would wake up, look at the time, and then fall back to sleep. And Josh in the other bedroom made not a peep. It went on like this until noon. Clearly after the non-stop activity of the fam, I needed some rest.
Beginning the day at noon in Rome is no problem. There are so many incredible sites close together, you can do
a lot in a little amount of time. First on the agenda, Roma Passes and lunch. I knew we needed to get Roma Passes from our 2006 visit here. WIth a Roma Pass, you not only get into several museums and archeological sites for free, but you also get unlimited rides on the subway and busses. A Roma Pass lasts three days, and at 25 Euro is s steal because, among other things, at the Colosseum it allows you to enter without waiting in line.
We considered having lunch at Pizza Roma again, but it makes sense to check out other restaurants in the neighborhood.
Ristorante Carlos Menta places this classic car here, likely to make sure that you know you are in Roma.
Josh has donned his Colossal Waste shirt for the day. The best picture that I get of it will go on the special page devoted to wearers of the Waste Wear.
I love the outdoor restaurants of Europe, and it always frustrates me that a place as sunny and nice as Los Angeles does not have a similar tradition.
Not a bad view for lunch. I am loving the Roman sky and clouds, after three weeks of the humidity of Southeast Asia making the sky look gray.
I mixed things up and got the spaghetti carbonara. In the end, I longed for bolognese, but at least I tried something different.
Josh had a salad, and you know I do not take pictures of the food of others, and then we split this mushroom pizza. It was good, but yesterday's lunch was clearly better.
The plan is to walk to the Colosseum and the sites around it, as you can easily spend a whole day in that area.
Crossing the Tevere.
The ruins on Palatine Hill above Circo Massimo.
Circo Massimo today, where the charriot races, public games, and religious festivals once occurred, is an empty dustbin.
In the days of ancient Rome, Circo Massimo (Circus Maximus) was the first and largest circus, and could accommodate 150,000 spectators.
Circo Massimo today. To the right there is some construction. It appears as if the city is looking to improve this site. In the future, we will know.
Along the Circo Massimo, we saw a local demonstrate how to correctly use the public fountains. Plugged to drink and unplugged to fill water bottles. People often refill their water bottles a these fountains. Here, Josh demonstrates how to plug the spout and turn it into a drinking fountain.
We came to the Palatine Hill, where the affluent of ancient Rome had their residences, including many emperors.
This was a forum on Palatine Hill. Palatine Hill is a good visit, as it is rich in history. In a museum, you can see artifacts and evidence of structures dating back to the pre-Roman era. In fact, they have dated Rome's history to this hill, where they have found evidence of people living here as far back as 1,000 BC.
Josh and his Waste Wear shirt pose with the ruins of Palatine Hill. As Palatine Hill was home of the well-to-do of ancient Rome, the words Palazzo-Palace-Palais have their root from the word Palatine.
You can see the Vatican's dome of St. Peter's THERE.
From Palatine Hill you can see much of the city, include the back of the Vittorio Emmanuel II Memorial, known deridingly as the Wedding Cake.
Look down on the Foro Romano from Palatine Hill. For centuries this Forum was the center of public life in Rome, and was the location for many government buildings and processions.
The Arch of Titus, built in 82 AD by his younger brother Emperor Domitian to commemorate Titus' victories, including in the Siege of Jerusalem in 70 AD.
Then, of course, walking out of the Forum and towards the Colosseum brings us to the Arch of Constantine, the newest of Rome's triumphant arches as it was completed in 315 AD. The design of this arch has been copied throughout Europe, particularly the Arch de Triomphe in Paris.
We are finally here. All day I had longed to see the Colosseum again. It has been five years since I have gone inside. (Guest photographer Josh Meisel.)
That is the line that we walked by with the Roma Pass. My guess is that we skipped a line of around 300-400 people because we had pre-paid. I suppose I should be glad that most people do not know about the Roma Pass.
I rented a blimp to get this shot. (Okay, they had an aerial view on the wall.)
I have discussed the Colosseum, originally known as the Flavian Amphitheater, at length in previous Waste visits. I covered how it was built, when it was built, how it replaced Nero's ridiculous royal palace, and how Christians were never actually martyred here. Today, we just look at it.
To see the complex chambers hidden beneath the floor in this amazing entertainment complex, you realize how incredibly advanced Rome was in 80 AD. They built this in eight years, from 72 AD to 80 AD.
There is not a stadium on planet Earth that does not owe a debt to the Colosseum's engineering.
From the Colosseum's middle level, we get a great view of the Arch of Constantine.
The hidden chambers. Besides being able to fill this place with gladiators or wild beasts, they could fill it with an artificial race and act out sea battles and boat races.
This amused me. At the exit there stood a row of tourists unwilling to wait in line to get inside, holding their cameras high to get a picture inside without the wait. If only they knew about Roma Pass.
Walking away from the Colosseum I held my iPhone to a lamp post and tried several times to get a Slow Shutter shot of the still Colosseum surrounded my moving tourists and traffic.
My favorite picture of the day, and at the moment my favorite picture ever. It has bumped Siena from my iPhone lock screen, so that I see it every time I reach for that phone.
The Vittorio Emmanuel II Memorial. I have covered this in past years, and do not want to take too much time here. Vittorio Emmanuel II unified the Italian peninsula to become the first King of a united Italy, as until that time Italy had been warring city states and the property of neighboring kingdoms. Unfortunately, his monument destroyed a Medieval neighborhood of Capitoline Hill, and was built so very huge that the Romans refer to it disparagingly as The Wedding Cake. After World War I they placed the tomb of the unknown soldier here, which helped make the Wedding Cake, in the words of commentary that I heard,
less useless.
Sometimes it is good to be a soldier.
The man who unified Italy. WIthout him, Venice could be part of Austria, and other parts of Italy could belong to France and Spain. Amazing to think that the USA is an older country, technically, than today's nation of Italy.
A view of the Roman Forum and Colosseum from the Vittorio Emmanuel II Monument.
A view from the street of the Palazzo Senatorio (Rome City Hall) atop Capitoline Hill, next to the Vittorio Emmanuel II monument.
After this, we headed back to Trastevere.
I know you people love dogs, and what is sweeter than a dog cooling himself in a public fountain.
Such a ham. This dog seems to be posing for me.
What do I love more than phonetic spellings? Phonetic spellings in other languages.
Okay, it is time to share with you the way to our apartamente Trastevere.
Viale de Trastevere, our nearby boulevard.
The walk up Via Emilio Morosini, our street.
The door to our building.
The key to that door.
The building's courtyard.
The building's elevator. Good thing, as we are up five flights of stairs.
Our door!
After some time to recuperate, Josh persuaded me to have dinner. We decided to take no risks and go to Pizza Roma, where we had eaten lunch with Barbie the day before.
Josh felt like wine, and the waiter described the house red as, "More like water than wine." Could have been an upsell, but this wine was good and not too expensive.
Again with the lovely outdoor dining area. The only drawback, people like to smoke.
We ordered the branzino. I have had branzino, Mediterranean sea bass, at numerous Italian restaurants in the USA, but I expect this to be the best and freshest ever.
How is that for presentation? Nothing fancy, just a fish in a pan with some olive oil.
Filleted before our eyes by the Bangladeshi waiter from yesterday's lunch. He said he was not a professional, but he did quite well, placing half the fish on Josh's plate and the other half on mine.
If you were I, this plate of branzino and potatoes would look incredibly delicious. And, of course, I felt like I was being particularly healthy. (Especially because I left most of the potato.) I try to avoid hyperbole, but I have never had a better piece of fish than that pictured here.
After dinner we walked around Trastevere, looking at all the young couples on dates and young people hanging out. Seriously. I feel old, and not just because I cannot be bothered to drink and party like all the young people are doing youthfully.
Sadly, the smoke started to get to me and we headed back home.
Until tomorrow...
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