Vatican and Colosseum

There’s some advantage in being on a group tour - mainly, that you enter major attractions by the group tours entrance. Some of the line-ups we saw were over one hour long. Temperature was 32C.

St. Peter’s square, Basilica, Vatican Museum and Sistine Chapel all contain amazing art. Each of us wore a little radio receiver around our neck with an earpiece plugged in and listened to our guide, a local specialist, explain the details. Knowing something of the history of the church and what is preached compared to what is practiced by those who preach, and seeing the incomprehensible level of opulent luxury lived by the top administration of the outfit, I found myself as perplexed as ever with the state of human nature.

Giant pine cone - symbol of Roman hospitality

Square (piazza) inside the Vatican Museum

 Sculpture gallery contains art 'acquired' from all over the world

 Fig leaves were added during certain regimes.

One of several ornate ceilings in the Vatican Museum

The gold standard of Pietas.  Michaelangelo's consumate masterpiece.

Different marbles from near and far.

Entering St. Peter's Basilica

"Spare no expense!"

Dome of St. Peter's Basilica

Letters on band of pure gold leaf are 7 feet high.  Click to see people above.

There were thousands of paintings too, but photos not allowed except for mosaics.

Holy water font at one entrance

Vatican Guard is still a career option for a young Swiss.

Impossible for us to capture the size of St. Peter's square.

This giant poster commemorating the beatification of my favourite Pole, is about 5 stories high.

In the late afternoon, Susan, Louise and I took the subway (Metro) downtown, then a cab, back to the violin shop only to find that the two instruments made by Claude Lebet had gone home with some one who wanted to buy them. As a consolation prize, the good maestro offered Susan an Italian 1765 violin and me a viola made in 1863 in the north of Italy. They don’t normally rent antique instruments so we were very happy with the arrangement. Susan actually liked the Lebet violin which she had tried yesterday more, but for me, this older viola, being a bit smaller in body size, was a better fit. As he listed them at 30,000 Euros each on the contract for insurance purposes, we very gingerly walked out on to the cobbled streets and decided to taxi home rather than jostle with gypsies on the Metro.

But first, we took a nice walk along the Tiber river. It has wide (20 feet) walkways on both sides and a few people were walking or biking along while restaurants and vendors of all sorts were completing their set-up for the evening’s business. We had a nice drink and light dinner at a table by the water. Very exclusive, four staff and we were the only customers because it was so early - 7:30 p.m. Most Romans work 9:00 or 10:00 until 1 or 2, then shutdown for 1 to 3 hours and return to work until about 7:00 p.m. Then they go and get ready to go out for the evening. Doesn’t seem to leave much time for bike riding or birding. Due to lack of green space and bike lanes, my guess is that Rome is one of the least likely cities in Europe to encounter a biker or birder.



Tomorrow, off to Pisa and Florence.

Driving to Rome via Spoleto

From Cortina, the roads are very good. We enjoyed an hour or two of mountain scenery before we hit the foothills, and then began to cross the valleys of the large Po River Delta . With many miles to cover, we used the Autostrada a fair bit. It’s a system of fast two and three lane toll roads, and by the time we reached Rome I guess we had spent around 25 Euros ($40). The speed limit is 130 km/hr . We stuck to the right or middle lane and pottered along at about 110. Every now and then the speed crept up to 125 and even then the odd Alpha Romeo or Mercedes would streak by as if we were standing still. Italian roads don’t hug the contours of the land like ours do. If there’s a mountain, they tunnel through it. If there’s a valley, they bridge over it. And all towns are bypassed. Rest areas are every 50k or so, and always include ‘toilette’, gas stations, fast food and a self service resurant of some kind. In these, you go to the cashier and pay your bill, then you go to the counter and hand them the rceipt and the server fills your order.

Scenery is wonderful, including vast fields of sunflowers, all facing the sun, and in Tuscany and Umbria every hillside town is topped with a guard tower and usually a small walled castle.

The drive took most of the day. We made a detour which added an hour or two to our day but we wanted to see Spoleto where Merrie had spent a couple of summers playing in the orchestras of the
“Festival of Two Worlds”, initiated by composer Gian Carlo Menotti. The festivals run annually in both the old (Spoleto, Umbria) and new (Charleston, South Carolina) worlds. We looked around the beautiful town for a half hour and enjoyed a nice dinner in a little restaurant where the owner/hostess made up a few plates of what she had on hand. Delicious.

The Castle (Menotti's home) and church bell tower from the streets of Spoleto



Giant poster for the Spoleto  Festival

By the time we reached the Periferico, the 80 km ring road that surrounds the greater Rome area, it was getting dark. Luckily the road on which our hotel lay was a major one and showed up on the exit signs. Also, the traffic at that time of day was light.

These 'Umbrella' pines are everywhere in Rome - an important source of shade.

The next morning we set off to find the studio of Claude Lebet, a well known (in Italy) violin maker. The plan was to rent instruments for the next two weeks. A very different traffic scene - scooter and motorcycles continually zooming by on both sides of us between the lanes of moving traffic. If you left a car length of space ahead, there would instantly appear three scooters abreast in front of your bumper. I quickly learned that there seemed to be a rhythm to the apparent chaos: if you just keep a steady speed and don’t swerve or react to the swirling killer bees, you become a constant to them and they take care of all the swerving and reacting among themselves. Still, it’s amazing that the sides of streets aren’t littered with road kill (drivers) and yard sales (motorcycle parts). Important rule: Don’t hesitate.

Then the parking. The saying is that Romans don’t park their cars, they abandon them.   Along some blocks, there were more double parked than single parked vehicles. Suddenly (actually after half an hour) we came upon an empty space. OK, three quarters of our car was covering the sidewalk, but that’s how everybody else was parked so we (I) figured we’d be all right for a half hour.

Thanks to the kindness of Dave in Denmark and Dr. Allan deCaen in Edmonton (a former student and an excellent violist!) we became aware of a fine violin shop near the Roman center, "Atelier (studio) Claude Lebet". What a pleasure it was to enter the workshop of a modern day master luthier. Rather than student instruments, which we were expecting, Rudolfo (number two man) offered us a violin and viola made by maestro Lebet himself. We then learned that they could not be picked up until the next day. And so, disappointed, we headed off to find our car not towed or ticketed and returned it to the rental agency which had an outlet two blocks from our hotel. (more horseshoes) In Europe, it’s fairly common to rent a car in one location and drop it off in another with no drop-off charge. It may have helped that we drove from Trieste (lower demand) to Rome (higher demand).

Our friends from the Port Angeles symphony were due to arrive that afternoon, so Susan went to the hair salon and I cooled off in the room. That evening, we all joined up for the first official group activity, a welcome dinner in a restaurant with a very nice view and bottomless wine bottles included.

 Italian beauty fresh from the Salon

 Don't let the computer in this pic fool you; internet service in this country is abominable. 

The band at our group dinner

Our tour leader, Gay.  All the women received a rose at the end of the dinner.

When I asked the waiter what do the men get, he said, "For thee men, Coffee!"

I Dolomiti Ultimo (IV)

A thunder and lightning storm developed in the evening, but by morning it had cleared off to make room for another perfect day. Off to our third via ferrata - the most challenging and highest trail yet (still, only rated 2B). It’s not very long but is almost all at altitude above 10,000 feet. Following ridges near the top of Monte Cristalo, the route is named Via Ivan Dibona, after a famous mountain guide. First we had to take two lifts (funivie) up Cristalo Mountain. The first was a quad chairlift which was sleek and modern; the second was a relic from the 1956 Olympics… looked like little dangly Chilean miner rescue pods that take only 2 standing people. We stopped for coffee at mid station to acclimatize to the altitude and recall how it’s been a pretty good life . . .

At the top, much higher than the Olympdownhill ski runs and WAY above treeline, we geared up and took a little ‘via ferrata’ scramble up a ridge, through some more tunnels, up some iron ladders and over the longest suspension bridge in the Dolomites trail system. What a view. Incredible. We took lots of photos, but it really is impossible to capture the feeling. And who lives up there, besides the barrista/bartender and innkeeper of the rifugio? These amazing birds called Alpine Choughs (chuffs). Look a bit like crows or ravens, but with yellow bills and orange feet. They nest in the rocks, eat who knows what, and have the most musical crow caw you ever heard.

As the tin can that I was riding in (Susan and Louise clutched each other courageously in the following pod) swayed and wibbled its way onto the landing deck, I noticed a yellow dog barking and racing around each pod as it arrived, following it desperately around the platform until the pod with descending passengers sailed off over the edge for the return journey. “Don’t go!, Don’t go!” (translation from “Bark! Bark-bark! Bark!”)

These photos look better enlarged.  Click once to enlarge a bit; twice for more detail.

Our Italian lifty explained as I stepped in, that this was the last year of service for these pods.  I thought I heard him mutter as he secured the door, "better you than me".

Fastest 3.000 feet I ever 'climbed'.

Alpine Choughs

Refugio at 10,000 feet.

No, we were not swinging.  It just hangs a bit funny but feels very solid.

Above the bridge

Susan went back to join Louise and I carried on for about 15 minutes along a fantastic ridge.  Hope to return to do the whole thing one day.

True to form, we squeezed every moment out of our time on this fantastic mountain, ….had a cold one at the midway point rifugio, and rode the second-last chair down before they closed the lift for the day.

Tomorrow, we drive 8 hours to Roma, where we meet the our Port Angeles Orchestra Tour the following day, to begin the musical leg of this tour.

 Cafe next to our hotel

Farewell to Cortina

I Dolomiti III

Next day, our second via ferrata was at the Falzarego Pass, a crucial strategic area during WW I when the Italians were fighting Austrians for control of high ground. The Lagazuoi (La-ga-ZOO-oy) Tunnels, involved hiking up a ton of switchbacks and then climbing the rest of the way inside the mountain through a system of tunnels which were built during the first world war to protect the forces that were guarding the pass. Many side tunnels and rooms still contained equipment and left over materials from those days. Absolutely incredible. Incredible also, was that we old farts were still able to do a five hour climb between 6,700 and 9,000 feet altitude! With rented helmets and our own headlights and harnesses, we climbed an elevation gain of over 2000 feet . Susan and Louise were inspired to stay the course because of the best part ahead: the cable-car ride back down! …. The Italian wine and smoked salmon with giant do-it-yourself bocconcini/tomato/greens Insalata Caprese also went down very well as dinner in our rooms. We had now discovered the supermarket and were no longer slaves to over-priced, veggie-challenged dinners.

My favourite mountain flower, Alpine Forget-me-not

 Many switchbacks

Switchbacks done, now for the tunnels

 The tunnels were long.  They took about an hour.

A few "windows "along the way gave us a bit of variety

 The moles emerge

Out on to the ridge

 This tiny flower, less than an inch high, reminded me of Moss Campion

Grandma  on the mountain

Orange lichen about the size of a loonie takes about 100 years to grow this much. 

Long way down 

But here comes our ride, La Funivia