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Italy Travel Update Issue #13, September 27, 2003

Another month has seemingly flown by here in Rome. I don't have much to show for it except for lots of pictures of monuments, architecture, paintings, streets, bridges, sculpture, gardens, ancient ruins of forum buildings, basilicas, baths, and so on.

By the first week in September the weather finally cooled down to tolerable levels. In fact, except for the rare thunderstorm or rain shower from a front passing through, the weather has been singularly fabulous for the past three weeks. It is usually sunny, with occasional midday clouds flying through the sky on their way to who knows where. The temperature gets up into the upper 70s or low 80s during the daylight hours, and some nights it cools off more than others, anywhere from low 60s to upper 60s or low 70s. So it's sleeveless tops all day long, skirts or jeans, sandals if you want, and then lightweight long-sleeves at night, or a sweater to throw over the sleeveless top. Excellent sleeping weather and excellent sightseeing weather.

I've been doing a lot of the latter, exploring the various neighborhoods with the Michelin Green Guide in hand, wandering the narrow medieval streets around Piazza Navona, Campo dei Fiori, Trastevere, Torre Argentina. I'm usually out in the early afternoon to late afternoon, and thus many of the churches I pass by are closed, but I've had the occasional surprise. One such surprise enabled me to see three Caravaggio paintings in San Luigi dei Francesco (see photo, left).

There has also been a number of special events in Rome, such as the night they opened up Palazzo Braschi (which houses a museum) for free guided tours till midnight. I had to wait about an hour to get in, and then another half hour for the next guided tour, but I didn't mind.

Then there was the Saturday in which five banks housed in various 17th and 18th century palazzi opened up their doors for free, giving visitors guided tours (or allowing self-guided tours) of gorgeous salons normally only seen by the employees or, I suppose, important clients with lots of money to invest in the bank. One place housed a small baroque chapel, another had an enclosed loggia with beautiful ceiling frescoes. Once again, I had to wait in line for entry to some of the palazzi, but the place with the longest wait (an hour and a half!) had the best guided tour and the most grand rooms to see: Palazzo Altieri. Unfortunately, you couldn't take pictures in this Palazzo, though it was possible in some of the others.

Tonight is another special event: La Notte Bianca (The White Night). It is an entire night in which many venues in Rome will be open all night (literally, from 8pm to 8am), or part of the night, with music, exhibitions, guided tours of monuments, churches, ruins, in all parts of the city. Again, many of the monuments will be open for free visits and/or guided tours, some palazzi not normally open to the public will be open, many restaurants and shops will stay open late or all night. If you want to see just how big this event is, go to the web site at www.lanottebianca.it (there is an English version). The downloadable list of events is 93 pages in Word.

I got a printed copy of the booklet and have planned my evening as best as possible. I was too late to get in on some of the guided tours of various monuments (like the Coliseum), as those required reservations and they were all full up when I called this morning (with only small groups of 25 to 35 people every half hour or so, it's not too surprising, though I'm amazed that even the 4 am and 5 am hours are filled!). But there are some venues open for guided tours that don't require reservations... yes, I imagine there will be lines, and I'm prepared to wait. We'll see how long I last in the evening, I usually don't stay up much past 1 or 2 am these days. It should be fun.

I also made a trip to Lucca in a rental car to collect the rest of my clothes and books, and my bike. I have successfully gone on several bike rides, though it is challenging trying to ride out of Rome. I found a map noting the few dedicated bike paths of Rome, and as luck would have it, I live just a few corners away from the beginning of one of them.

This path goes south along the banks of the Tiber River, sometimes literally right at the water level, other times above its banks or nearby. It starts off as a typical urban bike path, with street crossings and intersections for roadside businesses (much like the paths around Lake Tahoe, for those who have been there), then it eventually crosses into the countryside with no cross-traffic concerns at all. It's not a long path, in a fitness cyclist's eyes, perhaps about 10 miles out before it ends. It's mostly flat, except for underpasses and bridge crossings, so it's easy riding, and it seems to be fairly new, as it is in excellent shape.

Unfortunately, it is pretty much the only bike path that I can get to easily, as I discovered in my ride yesterday to the northern version of this path, which begins north of the Vatican. I had to traverse a whole section of the city to reach it, and it wasn't in as good shape as the southern path, and had more intersections, with truly annoying barriers at each intersection. I know those barriers are meant to keep out cars and motorbikes, but the opening in them is so narrow that I had to stop and inch through them.

Riding the city streets in Rome is not like anywhere in the US, as the typical road surface on many streets in Rome (whether small or large) consists of small square cobblestones set closely together. Sometimes the cracks between them are filled in well and the surface is fairly smooth, other times (especially on the smaller, less-trafficky streets) the stones are not set flat, but jut up at odd angles, with no "filler" in the spaces. Makes for very bumpy and potentially dangerous riding for a skinny-tire road bike like mine. And there's no such thing as a shoulder to any road. So after my several explorations, I think I will limit future rides to the nearby southern bike path.

No new work has come my way, though I have been looking and attempting to network with other Vassar alumnae/i living in Rome, or other ex-pat organizations. Now that there is just a month left to my stay here, it makes it even more difficult to find work -- not too many people will want to hire someone for just a month. But I'm going to keep trying to network, meet people, etc., in the hopes that someone may know someone who needs a web designer. And in the rest of my free time, I'll continue to sightsee, and go to as many free events and tours as I can find in this city!

Some of my Rome photos are in a mini-album in the photos section for your enjoyment, and I've sprinkled a few others here on this page. I hope to add another album of Rome photos in the next couple of weeks. I certainly have lots of pictures from which to choose!

I hope you are all having some lovely fall weather and fun events of your own. Continue to keep in touch, I enjoy hearing from all of you as much as you have told me you enjoy hearing about my travel adventures.

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