Europe – Day 2
This morning we awoke feeling like we’d been run over by a 747 jet! My legs felt like dead tree stumps. Dale woke me up at 9:30 a.m. – Italy time, but my body-clock time was 1:00 a.m. My body’s saying, “No, no – time to stay in bed.” Of course, we fight that because Rome awaits!
First Rome experience – The Shower.
It looks like a pretty normal shower/type arrangement. The tub is a little smaller and narrower than we’re used to American style, but other than that, pretty normal – that is until you get in. The tub has such a sharp slope to it that you literally have to stand with one foot in front of the other. Quite a balancing act, I can tell you. Pretty funny. I honestly don’t think you could take a traditional bath because it would be so uncomfortable to sit in it. What were they thinking?? I haven’t a clue.
We finally get showered and dressed and go outside. My body is still saying, “It’s 1:00 in the morning. What are you doing out here?? Go back to bed NOW!” We walk around, ignoring the body clock, looking for something to eat. I start feeling a little woozy, even faint. World traveler – I am not. We head back to the hotel and go to the restaurant there, a very fancy-looking thing with linens on the table and goblets and such. We’re thinking, “Well, it’s expensive looking, but we’re about to pass out here and coffee might be a good thing, even if it is expensive.” We walk in and the waiter looks at us reprovingly and says in broken English, “10:30,” shaking his head. It’s now 11:00. He then says, “Okay, I find you something.” We sit down and he brings us a nice continental-breakfast-type thing and coffee that is so strong even Eric would shudder. Of course, he also brings some heated milk which we quickly learn is how you make your coffee. Heated milk with a little added coffee and of course some sugar, and in my case – LOTS of sugar, since I’m not much of a coffee drinker. We have a nice little breakfast. Come to find out, the breakfast is included in the hotel fare. Would have been nice to know that. Tomorrow we’ll know for sure, and it will be before 10:30.
We needed some sun block (stupid thing to forget), so we head out to find the “market place.” We finally find it and buy it and believe it or not, by that time I am so exhausted I can’t stand it anymore. Head back to hotel. Dale is not as tired, so he heads out to visit a museum that is just a couple blocks from our hotel. I crash. Dale goes to the museum and takes over 200 pictures!!! Oh my goodness. You know, he’s such a history buff – loves all kinds of history, any history, knows all about the most obscure facts of history that you could ever imagine, but ROMAN history – now THAT’S his real love. So he’s in heaven here. He says that his battery and the camera battery ran out at almost the exact same moment. He heads back to the hotel, comes in the room and crashes, and I didn’t even hear him at all.
We awaken feeling refreshed and head out again. This time we head to another museum. Oh boy, the museum-thing has begun. I quickly run out of interest at looking at every statue and piece of Roman pottery shard imaginable. Dale is totally fascinated with it all. I discover that I have to see a museum three or four times because I get way ahead of him and he calls me back to point out some “fascinating” piece of archeological discovery. I nod and agree and then I have to go past the things I just looked at again. Again, he calls me back to view the next “fascinating” piece of archeological discovery. This is going nowhere fast. What to do?? I find that one of the prizes for me in a museum is finding a comfortable place to sit. Of course, they occasionally provide an uncomfortable bench, but the big prize was finding a padded chair with a back on it that was probably left by some employee accidentally, but I quickly avail myself of it. Awe!! There!
For lunch and dinner today we just roamed Rome and ate at the spots where the locals eat. That’s my favorite thing to do. We had pizza – of course. Dinner – same. Roamed Rome and had lasagna – of course.
Our last highlight for the day was the lovely fountain that you’ve all seen in pictures. It’s so beautiful at night. Got a few pictures, but they didn’t turn out too well until I discovered how to turn the “backlight” on on the camera. That last shot is better.
Tomorrow we are going to take a bus tour. This one goes to all kinds of spots and you can get off at each spot for as long as you like. Our body clocks should be adjusting soon, and we’ll be able to rest and ride and then get off and see up close. If I can just keep Dale out of the museums, we’ll do just fine :)
Love to you all!
This morning we awoke feeling like we’d been run over by a 747 jet! My legs felt like dead tree stumps. Dale woke me up at 9:30 a.m. – Italy time, but my body-clock time was 1:00 a.m. My body’s saying, “No, no – time to stay in bed.” Of course, we fight that because Rome awaits!
First Rome experience – The Shower.
It looks like a pretty normal shower/type arrangement. The tub is a little smaller and narrower than we’re used to American style, but other than that, pretty normal – that is until you get in. The tub has such a sharp slope to it that you literally have to stand with one foot in front of the other. Quite a balancing act, I can tell you. Pretty funny. I honestly don’t think you could take a traditional bath because it would be so uncomfortable to sit in it. What were they thinking?? I haven’t a clue.
We finally get showered and dressed and go outside. My body is still saying, “It’s 1:00 in the morning. What are you doing out here?? Go back to bed NOW!” We walk around, ignoring the body clock, looking for something to eat. I start feeling a little woozy, even faint. World traveler – I am not. We head back to the hotel and go to the restaurant there, a very fancy-looking thing with linens on the table and goblets and such. We’re thinking, “Well, it’s expensive looking, but we’re about to pass out here and coffee might be a good thing, even if it is expensive.” We walk in and the waiter looks at us reprovingly and says in broken English, “10:30,” shaking his head. It’s now 11:00. He then says, “Okay, I find you something.” We sit down and he brings us a nice continental-breakfast-type thing and coffee that is so strong even Eric would shudder. Of course, he also brings some heated milk which we quickly learn is how you make your coffee. Heated milk with a little added coffee and of course some sugar, and in my case – LOTS of sugar, since I’m not much of a coffee drinker. We have a nice little breakfast. Come to find out, the breakfast is included in the hotel fare. Would have been nice to know that. Tomorrow we’ll know for sure, and it will be before 10:30.
We needed some sun block (stupid thing to forget), so we head out to find the “market place.” We finally find it and buy it and believe it or not, by that time I am so exhausted I can’t stand it anymore. Head back to hotel. Dale is not as tired, so he heads out to visit a museum that is just a couple blocks from our hotel. I crash. Dale goes to the museum and takes over 200 pictures!!! Oh my goodness. You know, he’s such a history buff – loves all kinds of history, any history, knows all about the most obscure facts of history that you could ever imagine, but ROMAN history – now THAT’S his real love. So he’s in heaven here. He says that his battery and the camera battery ran out at almost the exact same moment. He heads back to the hotel, comes in the room and crashes, and I didn’t even hear him at all.
We awaken feeling refreshed and head out again. This time we head to another museum. Oh boy, the museum-thing has begun. I quickly run out of interest at looking at every statue and piece of Roman pottery shard imaginable. Dale is totally fascinated with it all. I discover that I have to see a museum three or four times because I get way ahead of him and he calls me back to point out some “fascinating” piece of archeological discovery. I nod and agree and then I have to go past the things I just looked at again. Again, he calls me back to view the next “fascinating” piece of archeological discovery. This is going nowhere fast. What to do?? I find that one of the prizes for me in a museum is finding a comfortable place to sit. Of course, they occasionally provide an uncomfortable bench, but the big prize was finding a padded chair with a back on it that was probably left by some employee accidentally, but I quickly avail myself of it. Awe!! There!
For lunch and dinner today we just roamed Rome and ate at the spots where the locals eat. That’s my favorite thing to do. We had pizza – of course. Dinner – same. Roamed Rome and had lasagna – of course.
Our last highlight for the day was the lovely fountain that you’ve all seen in pictures. It’s so beautiful at night. Got a few pictures, but they didn’t turn out too well until I discovered how to turn the “backlight” on on the camera. That last shot is better.
Tomorrow we are going to take a bus tour. This one goes to all kinds of spots and you can get off at each spot for as long as you like. Our body clocks should be adjusting soon, and we’ll be able to rest and ride and then get off and see up close. If I can just keep Dale out of the museums, we’ll do just fine :)
Love to you all!
1 comment:
Got lots of laughs out of this one. You're an awesome writer, Mama!
Post a Comment