Walking, shopping and eating, sometimes all at once

Yesterday Sarah bought a cute pair of shoes from Altariva making Paul the only one to have not bought any from there, although he has hit the Geox shop a few times.  We all met up at Campo Marzo and got a few things there.

Sarah and Paul went off to Antico Enoteca in Via Della Croce for lunch. We have all had a few meals there - it is a relaxing environment, good food and they make a good Spritz Aperol :)

Rob bravely went to Poste Italiane and got some large boxes and bolletini to post stuff home.  It was relatively painless -hope that it is the same when we actually post the boxes today.

Rob, Jules and I went to Roscioli in Campo de' Fiori for a pizza top up -always so good there.  We then walked down to the river and along towards Isola Tiberina.  

I like this light in Via Della Maddalena

Rob and Jules wandering around near the Pantheon

This guy is a brilliant performance artist who can stay still for an amazingly long time while looking like he is speeding off to somewhere

The Tevere was in flood after all of the heavy rain and the pedestrian paths alongside the river where Jules was photographing a few days ago were under water as were the bottom steps of the stairs leading down to the river.  

 The low lying parts of Isola Tiberina were also under water.  The river was flowing really quickly and there were muddy whirlpools everywhere, we watched planks and other debris rapidly passing by. 

After never having seen Nutria before we saw several yesterday.  Some were being dragged along by the current and were unable to swim their way to shore. A large one had managed to make it to a stairway and was cleaning himself when we saw him.

Next we went to see the Bocca della Verita and the Basilica di Santa Maria in Cosemedin 

The mosaics are spectacular

Relics of one of the several Saint Valentines -this one isn't the one of Valentine's day fame, he was a martyr who ended up with his skull in a gold and glass box.

Wall constructed on Roman foundations with debris from the Teatro di Marcello site

Teatro Marcellus

Shopping, Palazzo Valentini, Aqua alta in Venezia

I'm the only one who is well at the moment, the others all have colds and are in various stages of recovery.  Today we all stayed pretty close to the centro.

Jules went to the Domus Romane di Palazzo Valentini in the afternoon and enjoyed it.  From what he said the exhibition has been expanded since we visited last year and now includes an underground area near Trajan's Column.   Palazzo Valentini is a multimedia museum - with images projected onto existing excavations.  The excavations are still a work in progress. 

When I first heard about Palazzo Valentini on Revealed Rome I thought that it could be either really good or naff.  It was brilliant and I guess that is why you need to book to get in. The entry fee is now 11.50 euros if you book online and the Revealed Rome review is of what we saw, not with the addition of Trajan's Column.

Sarah wasn't well enough to go to the Vatican, neither was Paul :)  Hopefully her flu will be a bit better tomorrow and she'll be able to go out. she needs to do some serious shoe shopping :)

We did some shoe shopping -at our favourite shoe shop in Rome, Altariva in Via Del Tritone, 31.  They have good shoes which are good prices -you don't have to pay 1000s of euros for a pair of shoes.  I love their boots and bought a few pairs last time -and a few more yesterday :) 

The staff at Altariva are always extremely friendly and helpful and are very patient with our  Italian.  They are very good sales people but are also genuinely friendly.  Last year while we were buying some shoes one customer tried on about 10 pairs of long boots - the shop assistant was very helpful and understood about getting just the right pair and was still extremely helpful and friendly.  I can imagine the same scenario in Perth but it would be with a hassled customer and totally impatient, eye rolling, pacing salesperson.


The apartment that we are staying in is in a great location, around the corner from Piazza di Spagna, but is extremely noisy -no double glazing like the apartment in Venice, nowhere near as comfortable either.  It isn't the best place to be staying when you're not well as it is hard to sleep. Home is going to seem so quiet after this.

It looks as though we left Venice at the right time, the aqua alta has been really high, about 1.5metres, that's 10cm higher than the highest when we were there.  Many people were caught unawares as the prediction was for much lower water. At 1.5m, the barriers infront of shops etc would have kept out very little and it would be difficult to get around as wellies would be useless.
Photos from newspapers:
Venezia Today

Affaritaliani.it

Andkronos

It is so sad to see Venezia under water -each time the water subsides you can see where a bit more paint, mortar etc has washed away.  Venice is slowly being returned to the sea.

Striscia la Notizia

While we were taking photos near the Pantheon on Friday we noticed a sound guy walking with a crew.  When we checked the photo we realised that it was a Striscia la Notizia crew with Dario Ballantini in costume.  His theatrical make up was really well done.

 Striscia la Notizia  is a popular Italian TV program which is on most nights and has satirical segments.      Politicians are a common target and the Angelino Alfano character regularly appears on Striscia.  Politicians are doorstopped on a daily basis in Piazza Montecitorio  -Palazzo Montecitorio is where the lower house of Italy's Parliament is located.

Government/ parliamentary buildings

I have no idea who the politician is, but he must have been worth waiting for :)

Brilliant makeup

Dario Ballantini

We missed Striscia on Friday night as we went out for dinner.

Temporale, calcio and not much else

Today there were big storms in Rome: wind, thunder, lightening and heaps of rain. We tried to do some shopping but our umbrellas weren't up to it -I'm so sick of 5 euro umbrellas.

At the first sign of rain, umbrella sellers magically appeared from everywhere trying to entice you to buy yet another crap umbrella.  I'm going to buy a decent umbrella tomorrow -I'm building up quite a collection at home :)

The guys went to the calcio this afternoon: Roma v Lazio.  They have seats in the stands so will be dry for the game but will get soaked on the way home.

Sarah and I stayed close to the apartment and went to Babington's Tearooms. I don't think that there was anyone there who wasn't a tourist. However the tea was good and at 10 euros for a pot it should have been :)

More photos at dawn, eating, shopping and a flash mob in Piazza del Popolo

Jules and I started out early yesterday to take photos from the Pincio of the rooftops of Rome and in particular, Piazza del Popolo. I took these photos but Jules will have way better ones as he has a great camera.

St Peters Basilica and the Vatican in the background, Piazza del Popolo in the foreground

The Pincio was deserted except for a few runners and other photographers

It's hard to get a clear view as there are so many trees near the edge of the Pincio

Unfortunately it was overcast this morning and we didn't really get the sun breaking cleanly through.  It is supposed to be warm later in the week so we should have better luck then.

Piazza di Spagna was also deserted but the streets were full of delivery trucks -the only time that there is any room on the road.

Via della Croce

It was a good opportunity to have a good look at Piazza del Poppolo without people everywhere.

In the afternoon a 'Gangnam style flashmob' turned up in the piazza.

 We just happened to be there and were trying to work out why there were so many people milling around -there were thousands, the piazza was packed.  Rob & I left after a while but Jules hung around photographing the crowd (which grew to fill Piazza del Popolo) and eventually filmed the dancing. I've read in a few places that there were 30,000 people but others say that there were 15,000. Whatever the number, there were heaps.

Flash mob gangnam style

A perfect day in Rome

Clear blue skies and 18C, a perfect day to be walking around Rome.

In the morning we had a coffee at a nearby bar then walked to Campo de Fiori and sampled some delicious focaccia  at Forno Campo de' Fiori for breakfast. After spending some time at the markets we went to Largo  Argentina to see if there had been any new excavations or rebuilds and also checked out the cats.

We passed by the Pantheon -not so many tour groups around earlier in the morning

It is such an impressive structure from any angle

The Area Sacra di Largo Argentina site seemed a little more organised than last year.  We also looked for cats -a bit like "Where's Wally", as usual they were initially well hidden

Chris, Sarah and Paul looking for the cats

Rob, Jules & I went for a walk along the Tiber in the afternoon on the way we stopped in to Roscioli near Campo de' Fiori for a focaccia snack

There are so many surprises along the streets of Rome -this fountain sculpture was not far from Campo de' Fiori

A perfect October day

Rob & Jules took the photos

While we were walking along we saw a group of tourists looking down to the river so we joined in.
One guy told me that what we were looking at was a large river rat.  It was huge but didn't look much like a rat to me.  There were plenty of rats running in and out of burrows near it and they looked quite different.

When we got home Rob checked online and found that it was a large  Nutria or Myocastor coypus
They are an introduced South American species and are commonly called  Nutria or Coypu
 They are supposed to have large orange teeth -none of us are going to get close enough to check them out.

You can get an idea of how big the animal was by the size of the backpack in the foreground

This guy was feeding the nutria and the many rats!

Jules went down to take photos- I stayed as far away as I could.  In the middle of the right of this photo you can see the nutria swimming away.  It was slow moving on land but really quick in the water

The nutria was much larger than the large rats that were running around.

Castel Sant'Angelo

The river was quite still

The sellers are back, fake bags everywhere. This time last year the bridge was clear. The police have a blitz for a while, the sellers go away for a while, then they come back.

On the way back to the apartment we passed by this beautifully decorated old building near the Teatro dei Satiri

We had drinks at La Buvette in Via Vittoria, 44/47. Enjoyed their chiccetti or snacks (can't remember what the locals call them. Well made drinks and very tasty snacks.