Return from a long hiatus, or The world in a nutshell

We like pubs in Bath!

Hi from the blogosphere!

What has happened...let's see. In February, Lee had to leave the country for a month to have his visa processed (it doesn't take a month, but much like everything Israeli, they had no "real" estimate for how long the visa process would actually take; we had to have Lee near the Israeli consulate in London for an extended period of time), so we took advantage of that time. From February 15 through March 15, we did a significant amount of travel. From Israel, to California, to England (London, Bristol, Bath, London), then a week in Rome (and Ostia Antica and Florence), then a few more days in England, and I scuttered back to the US to spend a few days with my family before returning to Israel.

As the interesting bits of THOSE trips were Bath and Rome, I'll throw that stuff in here now - then the next post will get to Eilat, Egypt, Eilat, Petra, Dolphin Reef, and one more trip down to Eilat when my friend Meg was here.

In the interest of not overwhelming anyone with too much _stuff_, I'm going to do the Cliffs Notes version of the first part of this update.

To Bath!

Bath is a little kickass city (I had originally said 'town' and was tut-tutted by Lee, who informed me that the 'town' has a cathedral, which makes it a 'city') in England, where Jane Austen lived for a period of time, where Brits can come from all over the country to soak in Roman baths, and engage in holiday making shopping along the (very posh and upscale) high street - AND where I had my first West Cornwall Pastie. Mmmm pastie.

We looked at the Abbey (gorgeous) did the Austen Center tour (a bit disappointing for 7 pounds!), and checked out the sights before heading back to Bristol for the duration of our stay in England.

(Abbey in Bath; Relics in the Jane Austen Center)

To Rome!

As we did have a month away, we spent some time debating taking a real vacation together - skiing in France/Belgium/Switzerland/Italy was too expensive, so we decided to go budget and spend a week in Rome instead. I'd never been, and neither had Lee, so it was an opportune time to get some culture (and not enough rest). We'd spent a bit of time pre-booking tours (ruins, Vatican, Borgese museum)so our week was jam-packed and well planned. Here come the cliffs notes:

(Overall Notes: The fountains of Rome are sweeeeeet! Free-flowing, clean, crisp, delicious water. We carried one water bottle the whole trip and just refilled at one of the hundreds of taps coming out of the ground!
We had a favorite restaurant near our hotel- the man who worked there - I dubbed him Roberto Tito - saw us on the street daily, and we were warmly welcomed and lavished with treats every time we ate there!)

Day One: TRAVEL. Car to Reading, canceled and rescheduled train to London, flight to Rome, train to city center, metro to bus stop, bus to hotel. All in all, 13 hours door to door (then another door, as we switched rooms in order to have a bathtub!). Collapse.

Day two: We'd booked a group tour of all the old ruins (forum, colosseum, tivoli fountain, pantheon.....), which ended up being just the two of us with our amazing tour guide Elisabetta. She was super knowledgeable, and we got to see so much of the city in a short three hours. Starting at the Colosseum (not actually called the Colosseum back in the day, but the Flavian amphitheater - big flashy name. Colosseum came from the colossus statue of Nero that was stationed outside- the nickname stuck!), we worked our way through the Forum (saw Julius Caesar's tomb!!), then on to Tivoli fountain (depending on how many coins you throw in over your left shoulder, you will (1) return to Rome, (2) fall in love in Rome or (3) fall in love with a Roman and get married in Rome.). From there we hit the Pantheon - as it became a church very early on, it's amazing well preserved, and still the largest free-standing, unsupported dome in the world. It has a hole in the ceiling, when it rains, it rains inside on parishioners. Something about the Roman ruins- anything that was taken over by the church was taken very good care of, the rest was allowed to fall into disrepair. Or pillaged for building supplies. We ended our tour in Piazza Navarro, where we spent the remainder of gloomy afternoon drinking lovely wine and watching passersby.

(Men dressed as centurions at Colosseum; Tivoli Fountain at night)

Day three: Mostly free day! We wandered around the city, checked out the Metro, danced around the Piazza del Popolo, went to the Museo Borghese (the largest private collection of Italian art...and they are eager to remind you of that frequently during the audio tour). It was a gorgeous day, and we toddled around Rome, eating gelato, and drinking coffee and thoroughly enjoying ourselves. We wound up that night going back to Tivoli fountain, then heading across the river to the 'place to be' for evening entertainment and dining. We had a bottle of wine at dinner THEN went to a brewery we found. Delicious beers. All 5 of them. Then we found ourselves LOST IN ROME!! Egads! We were not located near a metro line, nor convenient to any taxi stands....hours later we made it back to our hotel, giggling and still very drunk.

Day four: A free day! Following Elisabetta's advice, we took the train down to Ostia Antica. And BOY are we glad we did! Ostia Antica was Rome's port town- all goods coming from the sea came through this place. The Ostia Antica road was a major thoroughfare from the ocean directly to Rome. It's well forgotten about, so the ruins are as well preserved as Pompeii, minus the volcano bit, and we spent the whole day wandering around a mostly intact Roman city! It was very easy to imagine people wandering around doing their daily business on the roads and in the buildings - incredible! Even more incredible was that compared to the bustle and tourist crazy sites in Rome, this place was _empty_. Lee and I saw maybe 20 other people the entire day. Luxury to be able to walk around at our leisure...if you get to Italy, go here. So very very worth it.


(Crazy faces at Ostia Antica)

Day five: Sadly, we had a very early morning. Our tour of the Vatican was set for 9:30, and we arrived in time to discover that I'm an idiot and booked the wrong tour. We also discovered that things are not always set in stone in Italy. When attempting to switch our booking from the Garden tour to the Museum tour, the first man we spoke with told us absolutely NOT, unpossible! Grumbling away, we returned shortly to speak to another employee who gladly switched our tour to the 10am museum tour. It's all about who you ask! The museum tour was feh. All the popes tried to out-do one another in the opulence of their quarters, so they pilfered more art, and commissioned more fancy artists...it was all guilded and glitz and enormous. You are forced to walk through in a certain order, which finishes with the Sistine Chapel. The disappointing bit about that is that you see a shitload of amazing Raphael paintings before getting to the chapel- so while Michelangelo was incredible, it's on the heels of two hours of incredible, so I think it loses some of its OOMPH. But, dude. That's where they elect popes!
We moved on from there to St. Peter's Basilica. There aren't words. Its...uh...it is...big. Too big. Too much marble and gold and shiny shiny shiny...scary big and shiny imposing crazy church. We had a free tour of the Basilica by some pre-priests (young priests-to-be in seminary, doing their time at the Vatican). It was great, until the preachy bit near the end. The price you pay for a free very knowledgeable tour!


(Hall of Maps- Vatican Museum; St. Peter's Basilica)

Day six: Florence. Ah, yes. It was cold, and we messed up our trains. But we saw the statue of David (it's really big, and in a crappy tiny museum!), and climbed up into the tops of very tall buildings. I was most impressed with the frescoes on the ceilings of the churches showing hellfire and damnation. Those Italians were GRAPHIC with their depictions of what being a bad person brings you in the afterlife. It took us LOTS of hours to get home after we messed up our train - we were kicked off one train and forced on to another, and it just took forever. We did, however, get our own cabin with fold out sleeper seats, so all was not lost.

(Fresco on the ceiling at a big church in Florence)

Day seven: Our flights to London were pretty late in the day, so we spent this last day touring the remaining sites - like the Castle de San Angelo. The massive fortress built by a Roman emperor as his tomb, and re-imagined into a nearly impenetrable fortress which housed the popes when it wasn't safe in the Vatican. We then headed back to our Piazza Navaro for a farewell to Rome drink (and not very good bruschetta...which had been amazing everywhere else) before heading to the airport.

(Castel del San Angelo)

Tired, beat up, road weary, cranky, sleepy. Back to London.

Next up....uh...some other story from a bit more recently. Like maybe Egypt?