England

 

Well, this is my last full day in England. My few days here have gone so quickly. I have mixed feelings. In many ways I am looking forward to getting back home to Oregon. After being on the road for almost three weeks, I am missing my own bed and my dog. However, I have felt very comfortable being back in England. It almost feels as though I have never been away and that the years that I have lived in Oregon are part of another parallel life. This feeling was especially strong while we were visiting good friends up in Yorkshire. They hadn’t changed much, the house and countryside looked the same (all beautiful), and the only difference was that they are now empty nesters, their kids at university or out in the world. We spent last weekend with them and it was like stepping back in time. We had a lovely weekend. On the Saturday we visited York, a beautiful old city. I couldn’t persuade my kids to go into the huge cathedral there – they had enough of those in Italy. After seeing the sights, we went to Betty’s, a traditional English teashop for afternoon tea. In the evening we had that traditional English food, the Indian curry, and very nice it was too. On Sunday, after a lazy start to the day and a very English breakfast of eggs, bacon and sausage followed by toast and marmalade, we went to the Peak district, an area of outstanding beauty, for a bracing walk on the moors. It is very different from hiking in Oregon – no trees and there were plenty of sheep around. A quick visit to a 13^th century pub for a pint on the way home rounded out the day – lovely.

The last few days have been spent catching up with friends in and around Cambridge. It’s been lovely to see everyone. The village we lived in, Foxton, hasn’t changed at all. Andy and Claire managed to connect with some friends. I think that was the one thing that kept reminding me that time has passed since we were last here – the kids are all grown up. Some of them have changed so much that I would probably pass them in the street without a second glance. A friend in Foxton organized a gathering in the local pub so I had a chance to catch up with quite a few friends. Thanks Glenda.

On Tuesday we caught the train to London and visited the Imperial Museum. We all wanted to see the Holocaust exhibition. I know, it was a gruesome way to end our sightseeing but the kids were too young when we went to the museum while we lived here. The exhibition is so extensive that we had little time to see anything else other than a model of a First World War trench. You can enter the trench and walk along the duckboards as the sounds of war reverberate around you. Oh, and they have recreated the odors of the trench so you can smell the stench that the soldiers had to live amongst. Nice (not).

Even the weather has done its best to remind me of life in England. It has been blustery and wet. I notice it is hot and sunny in Oregon – looking forward to some of that.

Last Day in Florence

 
Because Florence is the birthplace of the Renaissance, it seems fitting that we should spend our last day in Italy visiting one of the famous art galleries. Having only one full day in Florence, we decided that we didn’t have the time needed to really appreciate the artwork in the Uffizi and so that museum would have to wait for a second trip. Instead, we chose The Galleria del’Accademia, a smaller but popular museum housing the original Michelangelo’s sculpture of David.

This vacation in Italy has transformed my feelings about sculpture. I have never been that interested in it before but I think that is because I have never really given statues the attention they deserve. While we were in Rome we visited the Borghese Gallery where, among others, the statues of David, Apollo and Daphne and Pluto and Proserpina by Bernini are displayed. How Bernini managed to convey such emotion and how he managed to make the cold, hard marble look like warm, supple flesh is beyond me. I could have spent the entire visit to the Borghese Gallery just looking at these works. What was interesting in the Galleria del’Accademia, in Florence, was that you get a chance to see how Michelangelo actually created his sculptures from the block of marble. Four sculptures, called the prisoners, are still partially enclosed in their marble blocks.

We also found time to visit a new small museum dedicated to the inventions of Leonardo Di Vinci. The museum has created models of all his inventions from wood. It was really impressive especially when you remember he was also a great artist. All I can say is that he must have had great time management skills to fit everything in.

It doesn’t really feel as though we have done justice to Florence.  We are here for too short a time and the city is heaving with tourists. It feels busier than Rome, although that may be because the most popular tourist sites are compacted into a smaller area. We will have to return…

And now for England.

And so to Florence….

 After a week in the Tuscan countryside where we alternated lazy days playing cards and sitting by the pool with trips to Siena, San Gimignano and Pisa, we plunged back into the mayhem that seems to be the hallmark of Italian cities. In Rome we did not have a car, but we drove into Florence. Things went well to start with. We quickly (or as quick as you can, given the hairpin bends and narrowness of the country roads in Tuscany) found our way into south Florence but the fun and games started as we got into the old part of the city. The streets rapidly narrowed and out sat-nav system seemed to get itself into knots, sending us this way and that, often down streets that are so narrow that you wonder how you are ever going to get down them. Down one of the streets two ladies were helping an elderly women walk down the road. As we approached they all shuffled over to one side but I don’t think the old woman was physically able to step up off the road onto the sidewalk. I held my breath as we crawled past, missing them by a matter of inches. Somehow we found our hotel, more by luck than anything else.

Our hotel is great. It right in the center of Florence, about five minutes walk from the Cathedral. We have a suite, which consists of two big rooms. It feels a little like being in our own personal art gallery as the ceilings are painted with beautiful frescoes. The weather has cooled down a bit, so although the sun is strong, it is not as hot as it was in Rome, thank goodness. After a walk to the Piazza della Signoria and the Ponte Vecchio we found a lovely restaurant near the hotel where we had a leisurely dinner complete with complimentary sparkling wine.

Going to the Vatican

You know, I had never really been particularly interested in visiting art museums or galleries. I think my parents dragged me around too many when I was a kid. However, when I was planning this trip to Rome, it just didn’t feel as though it would be complete without a visit to the Vatican. I opted for a semi-private tour. This meant there would be a maximum of ten people in our tour and an English-speaking guide. It seemed horrendously expensive at the time of booking but I can honestly say it was worth every penny. Francesca, our diminutive Italian guide, was a bundle of energy. An archeologist by profession, she was also passionate about art history.

Having a guide put meaning to the art that we were looking at, important for me because I have to admit to being rather ignorant about the Renaissance period. The Sistine chapel and St Paul’s Basilica were predictably fantastic but so also were some of the other rooms we passed through on our way to the chapel. One, that I can only call the Map Room because I can’t remember its real name, was a real highlight. On the walls were intricately drawn maps of every region of Italy while the ceiling was covered in the most amazing artwork. We couldn’t take very good pictures in here because you weren’t allowed to use flash photography (the flash makes the color in the art fade). Our guide got quite irate at other tourists who were not in our group and were using flash.

Before we went into the Sistine Chapel, Francesca warned us that she wouldn’t be able to talk us through the art because you are supposed to be silent in the chapel. However, I was amused by the way she completely ignored the strident calls for silence by the stern guards in the packed room. Even as a guard was pointing and walking towards her shouting, “Silence!” she just ducked behind another tourist and continued. I thought she was going to get chucked out of there because the guards do strong arm people out of the chapel from time to time. We saw a man get expelled for taking photographs, strictly forbidden due to copyright.

In Rome - Our First full Day

As in any capital city, Romans always seem to be in a hurry to get somewhere. If you fancy a roller coaster ride, there is no need to seek out the Italian version of Disneyland, just take a taxi. Central Rome is laced with narrow roads paved with a kind of cobble that makes a rhythmic rumble as the cab dives up and down the tiny streets. Its weird because one minutes you are in one of these streets and then the cab will pop out into a piazza lined with cafes or one of the main, wider roads before diving round a corner into another alley, usually narrowly missing some poor unsuspecting tourist in the process. Ian was profoundly grateful to discover that our car rental pick up location was outside of the centro area meaning that he didn’t have to negotiate the narrow streets.

In a bid to and escape the relentless sun rest our tired legs after a visit to the Coliseum (I recommend getting the audio guide, it made the visit much more meaningful), we took a bus tour on one of those open top buses. We actually sat downstairs for some of it but while stopped in the shade at the central bus station, I moved upstairs where it was cooler. The bus was stopped for about twenty minutes and I was very entertained by watching the Rome police direct traffic. The shrill blast of whistles split the air as at least five gesticulating, arm-waving policemen ordered buses and cars in an out of the intersection. If a car dared to hesitate too long, the whistle shrills took on an angry, urgent peal and the arm waving became even more intense until the offending car cleared the road. The bus tour itself was rather disappointing. We zoomed past the notable buildings too quickly to appreciate them. This is probably because everyone in Rome drives as fast as they can or dare. It feels as though there is a giant auto race which every driver in the city is competing against everyone else. Fortunately te tour was a freebie from the hotel we stayed in so we didn’t complain too much and at least our tired feet got a rest.

Day One - En Route to Italy

Wow! I’d forgotten what a brutal flight it is from the Pacific Northwest to Europe. It feels like we were on a plane for hours and hours, which of course we were.

We got to PDX courtesy of Linda C in plenty of time for our early morning flight. As it turned out, we were earlier than we had planned. Our flight was delayed for 90 minutes sending shivers of anxiety through me as I worried about whether we would make our connection for Rome. The delay seemed to take the excitement out of our trip as we contemplated the long journey ahead. Happily that was the only downside in our day as Ian was upgraded to first class (leaving the rest of us to slum it in economy) and we were all able to piggyback on his premier status and board the plane early.

Landing at Rome airport, it was already 80° and it was only 9.00am. I had organized a driver to transfer us to our hotel and he met us with what can only be described as an extremely well used Mercedes. I suggested that Andy should sit behind the driver rather behind Ian so that he would have more legroom but he observed, “No its okay, the seats have ready-made knee slots for extra room.” Countless knees had pushed and stretched the leather so that that there were two concave pockets on the back of each front seat exactly where your knees would sit.

Immediate impressions of Rome: everyone drives extremely fast without regard for lane control and there is graffiti everywhere. I guess I have become accustomed to the lack of graffiti in Portland over the last seven years. Overwhelmingly, though, is the feeling of stepping back in time. Our hotel is in central Rome very close to the Ponte Sisto, a bridge dating back to 221 AD. The hotel is surrounded by old building, some obviously having been recently renovated others looking as though they haven’t been touched for hundreds of years.