Via Appia

View from the Palatine

Okay - we here. The hotel is lovely - mere steps from St Peter's and it's Sunday. What a wonderful place to be. Okay last night's meal made up for the lack of the cruise. The restaurant in the hotel stayed open to serve us and we sat under lovely trees in a courtyard at the Hotel Columbus - former home of Pope Julian II. Every protestant bone in my body is cheering - despite the fact that our rooms are on the fourth floor where the servants would have slept. Who cares - it's a papl palace. And the meal - I ate beef tartar for an appetizer ( a treat my mother introduced me too in Berlin when I was eleven.), and pidgeon for my main course, and finished with a lovely creme brulee ( again for my mother.) My son is eating as many different types of pizza in order to tell his friends about it - but I seem to be eating for my parents. And I know my father would have approved of this place. It had all those elements he loved in a restaurant. Great food, good wine, excellent service. I went to bed exhausted and happy.

The next morning it was very hard to get up to do anything, We dragged ourselves downstairs to eat breakfast and my husband and daughter went for an exploratory walk afterwards. Arthur and I| figured out the internet, and he blogged while I had another nap.

Via Sacra

Then in the afternoon we went for a tour. A three hour tour of Ancient Rome - the Colosseum, the Palatine and the Roman Forum. It was great but like many tours there would be things you weren't interested in. However for the most part I was thrilled to walk on the Via Appia and the Via Sacria on the same stones Marcus Aureluis and Ceasar walked. Thanks to Colleen Mccullough's books about Rome I could picture the ancient senators sacking the Temple of Saturn to get the money to buy wheat. It was wonderful. Mirian was delighted to meet her special animal totem. As she squatted posing as her favorite alter ego Geicho Girl on a discarded ruin in the vicinty of several temples ( the Vestial Virgins being one) a real little geicho ran out and up the wall behind her. far more real for her then some statues and a story about Romulus and Remus. But I was delighted to see she found the detailed architectual ruins worth photographing.

We left by taxi and came back to Vatican City where our hotel is. Garland and \miriam knew where to find a wonderful gelato shop and we were all looking forward to having some. We finished by enjoying pizza but had to rush as the restaurant must close by 8pm - Pope's orders. We strolled outside the arches and picked a trattoria for desserts and then strolled home enjoying the view. Right outside our hotel is set up a depiction of the stations of the cross. I took photos of each one.
Now the children have been put to bed, and my internet time will soon run out. So I'll post this. If you're interested in the children;s blogs - visit Dragon-Journal.blogspot.com and Dr-Epic.blogspot.com on this same blogger.