As ever I had plans, though part of them were in black and white.  I set off for the station and the main museum.  It was due to close at 19:30 so I had a few hours spare.  On arriving I wandered round the gardens outside and decided to leave it till tomorrow or Saturday as I was not sure I’d have enough time.  I thus wandered.  I reached Piazza Espagn, better known as The Spanish Steps.  The bottom level and the piazza were full of gawkers, hawkers and beggers (reminding me some what of Park Guel in Barcelona).  From there I went on to a back street restaurant recommended by an ex-colleague of mine, L’Enoteca Antica in Via della Croce.  While in a touristy area it was maily full of locals, always a good sign.  The food there was good and not ‘stock Italian’ (except for the dolce). Continue reading →

Round the corner is the magnificent Basilica Di Santa Maria Maggiore, a large domed church/cathedral with a cavernous, gilt filled interior.  It shouts grandeur, highlighting it’s importance before the Vatican came in to being.  The entrance is actually on the other side from Via Cavour, with the piazza on each side being separately named.  It is large and impressive, but the outside is nothing compared to in.  The main part is a single pillerless hall with chapels and confession booths off to each side.  The ceiling is high with plenty of gilt, but it’s not quite as bling or in your face as my description may sound.  You will need to check out the pictures once posted. Continue reading →

I should quickly point out that the late start was not due to getting up late, in fact I could have grabbed an extra half hour or so in bed if I’d thought about it (wish I had).  Internet here at the hotel is patchy and slow,so on deciding to upload the RAW pictures from my camera to a cloud site (MS Skydrive) it should have taken just a few hours maximum (it’s only about 0.5 GB), however I still have 3 files uploading and 1 to start out of 40 !! – it’s actually sped up this morning.  Once done I can delete the files from the camera (they are already on the laptop but I just want cover).

Waking up this morning the leg felt fine, but as soon as I wandered down to breakfast I could feel a slightly worrying stifness.  Thus my plans today will be a cautious wander.  Basilica Di Santa Maria Maggiore is just round the corner and is meant to be rather spectacular.  From there I have options in 3 directions depending on the comfort factor of the leg.  I fancy wandering back to and along the station to get to Porta Maggiore, though there’s not that much else around that area. From there I could hit Termini and get the metro up to Piazza Barbrini (Trevi Fountain) or Spagna (Spanish steps).  I’ll play it by ear.  Still need those uploads to finish ….

I know I said I’d probably finish the wedding photos before doing any of the others, but now in Rome I’ve part changed my mind and have uploaded the photos I took this morning.  I had already processed 57 wedding photos, and that count now stands at 70, with about 160 left to go,

Photos are at my Webshots account

Update 2019

Webshots closed down their hosting (and then tried restarting it in an odd format).  I moved my photos to Photobucket, which was slow but worked well, even paid for an upgrade until they dropped the lower end ones.  Recently they also reduced the free account capacity to 250 photos (was already down to 2,.5 GB) so I’ve been forced to move again.  Now the photos for this holiday can now be found at my Onedrive Holiday folders

So I set off this morning towards the Colosseum, but cut east of it, up some steep interesting steps, through an arch to St Pietro in Vincoli, past the university building, past Parco Traiano and on in to Domus Aurea and Cole Oppio.  This is meant to be a pay to enter area, but unless I missed some thing (google spy-sat maps to be hit) then it was mainly an open park used by many for lying in the shade, while most the ruins looked to be shut off for archaelogical or repair work.  Still is was a pleasant treck,  I then wandered down to the Colosseum by which there is a fenced off area of ruins that do not appear on maps.  I took some photos of here, turned around and …, pain, sudden sharp at the back of my right knee. Continue reading →