We started our day with pastry and coffee, as usual in Europe. Our B&B delivers breakfast via a coupon for a hot drink and a croissant at a nearby bakery/cafe, a nice morning routine that gets you up and moving. We tend to find a “regular” bakery with coffee whenever we are staying somewhere for more than 2 days so this fit perfectly for us. Perfetto.
We knew Thursday would be tiring, even grueling, as we had booked a 3 hour tour of the Coliseum, Palatine Hill, and the Forum. In retrospect we should have conserved our energy before the 2pm start; instead we walked the mile uphill and back to the main train station in order to, we hoped, get tickets to Orvieto. We have been there before, and really loved it, and a day trip seemed perfect for our free day (free meaning no tours booked) Saturday. David and I had each spent an hour or two online trying to buy tickets but nothing seemed to work. In theory Orvieto is an hour and fifteen minutes away, touted as the best day trip from Rome. However, every train was at least two hours and we couldn’t find a feasible return booking at all. Well, surely the humans at Roma Termini would be able to help us. Alas, it was not to be…she found us an outbound that was two hours long, but the only, the ONLY return was to leave an hour after we arrived and would take two changes and 9 hours. What? “Construction,” she explained.
We walked next door to the Mercado Centrale, a pretty cool, modern food hall where I was happy to find I could get a “trapizzino,” a new fast food that is genius—foccacia cut into triangle, slit, into which you can have various traditional Italian foods such as eggplant parmigiano, chicken, and, what I chose, lingua in salsa verde. Delicious and, for once, not too much food. Our experiences with panini were disappointing. Way too big, and really not that good. Get a trapizzino if you can find it— 6 euro and perfetto.
Here are some more pictures of food we ate this week.
Yes, it was yummy.Fried artichoke—deliciousPolpetto with pasta (spaghetti with meatballs)Italian breakfast—coffee and pastryPanini that WAS good at AV in centro historico—“vegeteriana 1” but SO big I could eat about 1/2.
We finished lunch and walked down, down to the Coliseum. There were mobs of people on an April Friday. We cannot imagine what it is like in high season when it is hot. The tour started at the Coliseum where we spent the first 90 minutes. Our guide, Italian, was at times hard to understand but I appreciated her approach. Basically what went on here was a horror, accepted entertainment of murder, animal cruelty, and mayhem. “Little children attended, sitting on mother’s lap watching people kill each other—in battle, or in response to the emperor’s decision or sometimes the decision of the crowd. Kill him slowly! Kill him quickly!” Horrific and probably contributed to the continuation of a bloodthirsty culture that persisted for hundreds of years.
Next we walked up to the top of Palatine hill. It’s not a long walk but boy were we tired so it felt a slog. But well worth it…a beautiful space with stunning views.
The forum, en route to our tourThe sound of road construction is “chink chink” as they tap pavers into placeColiseum exteriorWe had been to the large coliseum in Nimes…dwarfed by RomePalatine HillView from Palatine HillPalatine HillA section of the forum—ancient Rome’s shopping center
We were saturated with sights and sounds and exhausted by all the walking (totaled 5 miles this day) and almost missed our tram stop at our B&B.
Saturday is yet unplanned—but we will have time to do laundry and chill out a bit before we head to Naples.
Several years ago I read a piece about why Americans who live in less populated areas are so afraid of foreigners and so convinced Democratic mayors are inept—these Americans have never spent time in a big city. If you have not experienced the messiness of New York, London, Paris, San Francisco, even little old Oakland, it is scary and crazy from a distance. All big cities are messy, noisy, heterogeneous, confusing.
Wow, Rome covers all of those bases. It is big; it is messy; it is noisy; it is complicated. Also fascinating, exuding history—ancient history—at almost every turn. Yup, we’re having a good time even in our first jet-lagged days.
Random ruins we passed on a walk to the Pantheon.
We chose to stay in Trastevere, a neighborhood known for excellent restaurants and a bit removed from Roma Centro, the historical district. It was a good choice. We are staying at Dulcis in Fundo, a B&B right on the tram line. Our host met us at the tram stop from the train station from the airport (easy to navigate even as tired as we were after 24 hours of travel) and walked us into the building, up the steps, up the ancient (our host called it vintage) elevator, and into our room. Room is large, host Alberto is as friendly and helpful as you could ask for, and the plumbing works.
I had asked Alberto for his walkable restaurant suggestions and we were only a few blocks from all of them. Pizza first night, pasta second night, all delicious.
Peppo al Cosimato in Via Natale Del Grande. As good as they look.
Our second night we went to the famous Tonnarello for pasta. Not only were we seated immediately (they often have a 30 minute wait but we were on the early side) but we were surrounded by happy families, gracious and friendly service and delicious pasta. There are comments on the web re Tonnarello—is it still good? Worth the wait? If you are in Trastevere do not hesitate to go.
Villa Borghese
Our first booked tour was of this private family art museum from the 1600’s. If you have read any of my trip reports you know we love museums and this was spectacular. Much smaller than Musee d’Orsay or the Louvre or the Uffizi, it is overwhelming nonetheless with rooms decorated with frescoes, paintings, finely detailed mosaics (I thought they were paintings until I looked closely) and stunning marble sculpture. We were not so familiar with Bernini and we were wowed over and over. The Rape of Persephone, terrifying…but not as terrifying as Apollo and Daphne, showing her transformation into a laurel tree at the moment Apollo touches her. Those Greek myths are not kind when it comes to forcing young women to submit to the gods who want them. Bernini’s skill at depicting movement turns cold white marble into hot violence.
Our guide was an expert, so articulate in English and so charming to our ears with the beautiful rolling “allora” with which she began each explanation. Every language should have “allora!”
David’s intensity as he prepares to sling the rock to kill Goliath. The face is the sculpter’s.The pressure of the hand on Persephone’s thigh…wow.Persephone has no chance of escape.Truth, the blond woman, is revealed by Time, the bearded man on the right. The eagle head that Time forms in the white sheet is a symbol of the Borghese family.
We would have called ourselves experienced travelers but there are always things to learn.
Even if you have used an airport dozens of times for international travel, be sure to confirm which terminal your flight departs from. We started in the International Terminal at SFO, not knowing that there are now two—at opposite sides of the airport. The only way to get from one to the other is a 30-40 minute walk. Thank goodness we had allowed plenty of time.
Even when your agent and the airline sell you an itinerary with a connection in a foreign airport, double check that it is doable. For example, a 90 minute connection at Heathrow via British Airways sounded reasonable; now we know we would have had only the tiniest chance of making it. “Luckily”our initial flight from SFO was on the ground an extra two hours due to a customer incident so our initial 90 minute connection was not to be and British Airways automatically rebooked us to a later flight to Rome with a 3 hour connection. It took more than 2 hours to get from arrival gate, passport control, security (agonizingly slow even with light traffic), and to find which side of the very large and crowded concourse our gate was…and…
Do not assume the departure gate information is correct. When we arrived at SFO International Terminal our departure gate was posted on the boards as G2. We left from A11. (When we asked about this the answer was “oh, you cannot trust the board.”) And at enormous Heathrow gates are not even posted until 30 minutes before boarding time, probably why we saw so many people literally running down halls looking panicked.
Do not expect new processes to work well. Europe is instituting a new biometric system to track visitors which entails photos and fingerprints. How hard can this be? The Rome Airport is riddled with brand new kiosks and signs instructing foreigners to stop at a kiosk to preregister. Kiosks which were all blocked off until right before passport control. Why quickly became obvious—the kiosks are incredibly slow, so slow that they are difficult to use. Attendants wandered the crowd helping travelers follow the instructions. In the end it was pretty simple, but the learning curve was steep.
Just because there are elevators doesn’t mean they work. Especially when you are hauling baggage.
We kept ending up in the neighborhood Le Marais…and glad we did. It is lovely, accessible, full of cool shops, food, museums, and people-watching. But first, a stop at the Lazare Boulangerie for coffee and croissant for me, coffee and pain chocolate for David. We loved this place–so bustling, friendly, always a table free. It was a two block walk down the hill from our hotel, and surrounded by metro and bus stops.
The walk from hotel to metroOur regular breakfast place.
We had the Carnavalet museum on our list for a while. If you are REALLY into history, it’s a delight–the history of Paris from ancient times through the twentieth century. It is free, there are no timed entries, you just walk in and start looking around.
We about wore ourselves out at the museum, to be honest, and we had a 4pm entry at Sainte Chapelle followed by the Conciergerie. Sainte Chapelle? Overwhelming. It seems impossible it was built in four years…and the Conciergerie is just down the street. It is interesting, different, and ultimately depressing as it includes the prison where women were kept before being executed during the French Revolution. Having read and seen lots about that era at the Carnavalet, it was entirely too vivid for me. This is where Marie Antoinette was held. Scary and sad.
It was fun to be on Ile de Cite, which in contrast to neighborhood Paris where we had spent the previous days, it is majestic Paris–the Seine, enormous buildings, lots and lots of tourists (from seemingly everywhere in the world).
A restaurant that was on my list was the famous, and very old Le Procope, which opened in 1686. It was a doable walk from the Conciergerie, so we ventured into the Left Bank (madness) and within a few blocks we were there–an hour before our reservation, but they took us. Of course we had to have historic dishes–mine was the vol au vent, a rich concoction of sweetbreads and mushrooms in a pastry shell. Oh my it was delicious and I couldn’t finish it. Polished off our requisite bottle of wine and dragged ourselves to the metro to get back before we collapsed.
Oeufs mayonnaise—we must have had this dish 5 times. Everywhere a little different and delicious. Vol au vent. Yikes.
Thanks to David’s excellent planning and ticket management we were outfitted for our Eurostar train mid-morning Sunday and without a hitch were boarded and on our way. Surprisingly there was no electrical or USB support but we were charged up and had our trusty little backup battery. Never travel without one!
Gare du Nord, our introduction to Paris
David had also researched the bus-metro pass options and combined with my French we bought just what we needed at the train station in Paris—a one week pass good for every mode. The trick is knowing it runs from Monday through Sunday, so David knew we needed a bus pass for just the one trip from Gare du Nord to our hotel. Seemed like a few moments and we were checking into the Joyce Hotel in Montmartre. Great location, pleasant hotel with warm and helpful staff, comfy room and bed. The first night, though, the room was waayyy too warm and we got little sleep. The next morning I sorted it out with the front desk and since then we have had a cool room and good sleep. Fortunately bcause we have been kicking it every day!
Here are the highlights for days one and two.
Sunday
We were tired, we were hungry, we were disoriented. After unpacking, such a joy since we are staying in one place for 10 nights, we found a close-by bistro and went to dinner. I laugh as I write ’close by’ because I don’t think you can throw a stone in this city without hitting a bistro, a brasserie (bigger, bigger menus), or a boulangerie (bakeries that usually have savory things too like quiches and sandwiches). We landed at Poni, a very friendly place that takes walk-ins and has a wonderful vibe. When we went back a few nights later the guy behind the bar remembered us and where we sat and as we left said “see you tomorrow.” I had ‘salade cobb’ as I was hungry for veggies after Amsterdam, David had his first of so-far 3 boeuf tartare. The salade was enormous, the wine just fine, the tartare very good.
Poni’s salade cobbBrioche Perdue came with 3 scoops of whipped creamGreat vibe, so friendly
We dragged ourselves back up the hill and fell into that first too-hot night and thus crummy sleep.
Monday
At 11am we met in Le Marais for a food tour through Viator. First stop, a classic boulangerie, everyone got either pain chocolate or a croissant. You know David had the pain chocolate as he has had every morning since. Following a little talk on boulangeries, historic preservation, and a some Le Marais background we walked to a fromagerie, Laurent Dubois. The owner also ages cheese for other cheese makers (I have read about this—you must have very specific attributes to age cheese…temperature, ambiance, skill). The owner has won the annual award for excellence several times, and has cases of his special creations out front. Our guide bought two cheeses, a comte aged 25 months (not exactly the same as what we get at Costco!) and a creamy, mild blue with two ribbons of hazelnuts, probably 5” high. You cut it like a pie. The guide had bought two baguettes at the boulangerie so we expected cheese and bread at some point. He walked us to a wine shop/restaurant, Vins Des Pyrenees, another award winner. A table was set for our group of ten, each place with two wine glasses. Uh oh. It was about ten minutes to noon! As soon as we were settled every two people had an enormous croque monsieur delivered, fortunately cut in two to share. I personally could eat about half. THEN we had two wines, something red I don’t remember (very good) and a delicious viogner. We were presented with the two cheeses and sliced baguettes! So much food. The blue with the viogner was recommended and yup, so good.
Historic boulangerieNot ready for what was comingThat is a half croque monsieur; couldn’t finish itOh, that comte…and the blue!ALMOST finishing up…still had meringues to goWhat was called a townhouse, later taken over by workers during the revolutionOpposite the house, a building for growing tropical plants and trees
Next we were guided through hidden gardens and picturesque streets, with a bit more history, and paused in the small Jewish area where our guide sadly told us the falafel place he wanted us to sample was closed for Sukkot. We groaned—so much food! But he had a consolation prize, a nearby chocolate shop where we each got to pick 3 chocolates and/or macarons. I am not a macaron fan but these were ethereal, and it was easily the best chocolate I have ever had. We walked some more, learned more about the neighborhood, and then a last stop at a meringue shop. I passed, David popped one down, and we hurried off to a 2pm entry at the Musee Jacquemart-Andre.
Le Marais streets
It was a bit of a trek, with a long walk and a bus ride, then more walking, and we hopped into the “avec billets” line. This is an enormous mansion, donated to the city, and as such has the large, old rooms filled with objets d’art, the original furniture (it was built at the end of the 19th century), lots of paintings, and an exhibition space which, when we visited, had a pretty breathtaking collection of the paintings by Georges De La Tour, 1593-1652. He was a successor to Caravaggio, then all but forgotten after his death until he was rediscovered in the 20th century. His work is beautiful in many respects but especially for his use of dark and light. Many paintings are illuminated by a single candle. Worth a look.
Munich is a lot. Three stand out as the most thrilling experiences–we were able to go from room to room in a state of delight. Peak art museum.
We had so much fun simply staring at paintings and sculpture we had never seen in books, in a special exhibition, never anywhere. And wows as a percentage I would put at 30%, off my personal experience charts. I cannot stop thinking about the wows. Thank you, Janina, for your guidance. The city has so much and you helped us prioritize.
Love of art and fascination with the artistic mind are mysterious preoccupations for me, a not-artist. I am not a skillful enough writer to use words that would convey even a bit of the awe I felt.
Our top three, and what we loved about them:
Stadtische Galeries im Lenbachhaus
I had heard of the Blue Rider school but knew nothing about it. I assumed I’ have’d seen examples simply because of all the art museums we have visited. Wrong again.
The museum itself is in a lovely space. The early Kandinsky’s, as well as Gabrielle Munter and August Macke, blew my mind. Icing on the cake–so to speak–is the excellent museum cafe that we returned to for a second lunch a few days later.
The link below is to an online selection of the Blue Rider collection.
This very early Kandinsky wowed me. I am not that fond of his late abstract work, but this experiment using a palette knife is lovely.
Pinakothek der Moderne
Turns out there are three Pinakothek museums, and we went to two of them…and “der Moderne” was a revelation. Big, tall galleries, each with a theme that is explained on a poster as you enter; mixed media, paintings, video, posters, sculpture, mixed into the theme in eye-popping ways. The building itself is tall, wide, with an enormous lobby full of fun kinetic seating that was well-exercised by the many kids of all ages. Note: Seems in Europe there is much more expectation and tolerance of small children in art spaces, which was great in our opinion. Get your kids to a museum!
This museum is best known for its industrial design collection, but frankly we were so overwhelmed with the other galleries we decided to skip that floor and head over to Alte Pinakothek across the street which was great but missed being in our top three. The competition was tough.
Always fun to see a Magritte1938 self portrait, Florence HenriGiant fantasy room
Glyptothek
We are Roman and Greek history and mythology nerds, so when we mentioned our interest in this museum to Janina and she told us how much she loved it we put on the must-visit list.
First, the building itself is impressive, with tall, domed, coffered ceilings, giant windows, and plenty of room between items to wander and circle them. We noticed everywhere in Europe the art is rarely behind glass or in cases–you can get right up close and really see the work. For these ancient sculptures this made our viewing experience feel personal–you can walk around a piece, no barriers, and it frankly was hard not to reach out and touch them (we did NOT).
The phone app they offer added so much to our understanding of what we were looking at, as did the posters in each room explaining why certain pieces were displayed together and what they represented. There was too much to absorb in one visit. And every now and then, a gasp–as in the room where a bigger than life size Apollo looks down on us mortals and even in his purely arts-patron guise is freaking powerful and impressive.
I told David I felt as if I’d just completed a masters in classical sculpture by osmosis.
We arrived in Shin-Osaka train station after the whirlwind Shinkansen from Tokyo a bit tired but ready for a brand new city. The central train station is sparkling. We followed the many, many signs, which fortunately made it hard to go astray, because it is a trek to the subway line from the Shinkansen platform. We have since taken the city metro multiple times and it is without a doubt the most beautiful and cleanest subway we have ever been on, and we have been on a lot of subways. Every train spotless, but also every train painted differently. Comfy seats, natch.
Great people watching—the fashions sense of women, young and old, is lovely and varied. The rare young woman in jeans and a knit shirt (never have seen a plain old t-shirt on a female) is wearing beautifully cut wide leg pressed jeans and some adorable top, often cropped. The most common look, though, is layers and layers—net skirts over ankle length skirts over boots, long breezy shirts over other roomy shirts. Or mini skirts and boots. Or completely color coordinated layers of, say, a crop top and a sparkly long sweater and several long-strapped, hip-length purses. I guess they are purses. I have tried to take photos, either at a distance or by asking if it is okay. And I have been refused, with smiles, then giggles. I would happily stand for half an hour watching girls and young women go by, taking pictures. But of course that would be rude. There are also many coordinated couples, by color or style, sometimes in traditional dress, always gorgeous.
The places we have wandered give the impression of a very prosperous city. Our cousin Maya mentioned that the little kids are so well dressed, and yup. No jeans and grubby t-shirts. We watched some boys playing ball, about 7 or 8 years old, in three-quarter length cool pants, stylish knit shirts, good looking sneakers. They rough-housed like boys but it looked like a fashion spread in the cutest way.
I will try to put together a gallery of fashion. If I can get permissions!
Boy oh boy has this city ever changed in the 17 years since I took a day trip from my immersion school in Cuernavaca. It seems very prosperous, much larger, with a lot more going on everywhere we turn.
We are staying in Meson Sacristia de la Soledad, a lovely small inn with maybe 4 guest rooms (counting the tables set in the dining room that seems right). The owners live here as well, and are delightful, helpful, warm, welcoming. When helping us with the lost iPad I kept apologizing for the trouble, they kept telling me it was their job to help and make sure we were comfortable and happy.
I cannot recommend Meson Sacristia de la Soledad highly enough. The location is great, the room is comfortable…the owners have several other properties, one of which has a full restaurant which we dined at one evening (delicious) but we are happy we are here instead—smaller, quieter, just lovely in every way. I cannot wait to post reviews every place I can find.
The Meson is built around this lovely garden; our room (picture on the right) is behind the yellow door on the second floor.
Abraham is always there to help at Meson; the lovely breakfast room where we feasted every morning.
The historical district was a Dia de Los Muertos celebration—happy friendly crowds everywhere—which continued into Sunday unabated.
Centro Historico was so lovely at night.
Around the zocalo; the famous street of antique shops (the blue people were still celebrating Dia de Los Muertos)
Below are scenes from around the zocalo. Nice town.
Templo de Santo Domingo/Capilla del Rosario
When we were at the International Museum of the Baroque (see below) a couple urged us to visit this church, so we did. The main church is stunning, with an enormous wall of saints (?) and other people important to Christianity (we couldn’t identify a one), but when you reach the front and look to the left, the Chapel of the Rosary shines out at you and then draws you in. I have never seen such compelling faces in the decorations around the walls of this small, extremely tall, chapel. It’s a wow.
Fantastical creatures and gorgeous faces in the Capilla.
Museums Galore
We are museum lovers and Puebla has given us a slew to visit. I don’t think I can rank them so will just give you a snapshot in the order we saw them, more or less.
Museo Amparo
This is listed as a private museum, which is surprising because they had free days and also free nights at the museum. In any case the tickets are inexpensive. The audio guide is solely for the pre-Hispanic exhibits, and wow, they are great. Why great? They are arranged by aspect of life—music and musical instruments, artistic expression (first place I have encountered a discussion of the contrast between European art, which strove for realism, and pre-Hispanic art which is dominated by a more abstract representation of people and things), spiritual understanding of how the world works (rivers, for example, are the way the life forces communicate with each other)…so rather than a chronological march, everything is tied together to help you understand how they saw the world.
The special exhibits were no less impressive. An exhibit open right now features an American Jewish-African Ecuadorian woman, Karina Skvirsky, which blew us away. She works with photo collages, which were disturbing and interesting, but her short film that represents/recreates her great grandmother’s journey at age 14 from the Ecuadorian countryside to the city where she worked as a domestic was spellbinding.
The first view of the terrace through the glass walls seemed unreal.
Finally, the third floor, which we might have skipped because it’s the cafe and we weren’t hungry, opens onto a terrace that is exactly at the height of the many surrounding church domes and towers—which are so close, given the narrow streets, and of many colors, under a cloudy sky the day we were there that looked unreal. We gasped.
Museo Internacional de Barocco
This extremely modern, almost distractingly high tech museum about 20 minutes’ drive from the Centro Historico was a surprise in all ways. Puebla, founded in the 1500’s, is a baroque city with many obvious examples of the style in its churches and other buildings. The museum, though, explores everything about the baroque period—architecture, science, music, painting, etc.—around the world, using poblano examples wherever appropriate but is truly a complete picture of how the baroque period changed everything in western culture.
Bilbao-like on a huge site complete with rock lined pools.
The architecture of the museum is very modern designed by a Japanese architect, and stunning. On the inside the exhibits are arranged by subject (painting, architecture, scientific exploration, music…) and each room is filled with examples, explanations, multimedia presentations, narrations. It was wonderful and a bit exhausting. Well, well worth the Uber ride and typically low ticket fee.
In this room a narration and shifting pictures on two huge screens (you can see one here) discussed baroque buildings in Puebla, which is laid out in a scale model, lighting the building discussed in turn. Very elaborate!
Biblioteca Palafoxiana
Not strictly a museum, this is the first public library in the Americas. Bishop Juan de Palafox left his personal collection of 5,000 books to the Seminary of San Juan in 1646, with the stipulation that access not be limited to church personages but open to the public. It is small and gorgeous and the exhibit laid out in cases in the center is currently on the recording of indigenous languages by the clergy during the first several hundred years of the church’s presence in Mexico.
The entrance to the library; the interior is a large room with multi-tiered stacks.
This beautiful poem brought tears to my eyes. The panel to the right had the Nahuatl translation. The title is When a Language Dies. Use your google translate if you do not read Spanish. Vale la pena.
Museo Casa Alfenique
This was a surprise—we expected a restored residence (it is named for a confection made of egg whites and sugar and is embellished within an inch of its life) but it is a lovely history of Puebla and its role in Mexican history (you all know that 5 de Mayo celebrates the victory over the French invaders in Puebla, right?) as well as a lovely explanation of China Poblana, the creole/criollo indigenous/Spanish culture of Puebla revered in Mexico. Well worth the visit.
Casa De Los Hermanos Serdan
This place was a little gruesome—the bullet holes from one of the revolutionary struggles in 1911 remain on the exterior and inside, including a large decorative mirror with obvious bullet damage. The exhibit is about the Mexican Revolution in general, about which we realize we are insufficiently educated, and the slaughter in and outside what was the private home of the Serdan family. I cannot begin to explain what all this was about—read some history if you are interested. But do visit the museum when you come to Puebla. These events still resonate.
Bullet holes remain outside the Serdan home. On the right is the kitchen at Alfenique—beautiful.
The worst part of traveling is the night before an early flight. We slept poorly as usual. With a 6am departure we had scheduled a Lyft for 4:25am, having checked and double checked that we were set for such an early ride. I looked at my phone at 4:15…”Your ride will arrive in 45 minutes.” WHAT? Checked Uber–no cars available. Called Flywheel Taxi, “Open 24 hours” to get no answer. Called the Lyft driver to confirm he was going to be that late, saying “I have a flight to catch”…his initial response was “Hey, why the attitude?” He went on, very impatiently, “They just put this on my list and I still have to drop this guy off at SFO.”
Went back to Uber, still no cars available. Then a most welcome text appears, “Your ride will arrive in 15 minutes.” They had found a new driver, who did appear in 15 minutes. We were so grateful, and it turned out so was she. She had been out in Walnut Creek where she was getting calls for rides further and further out, and “I wanted to get back to Oakland, and I took this (our) request because I had already turned down 2 and they don’t like that.” Arrived at OAK in plenty of time, boarded, relaxed, and off we went.
The airport in Mexico City is big and pretty well organized. When David turned down a hallway to the men’s room a young man walking out said it was closed, and to follow him. We did, a long and complicated route, to an open men’s room. That left us a very short hallway from the bus counter where we bought tickets for a bus leaving in 30 minutes–David prodded me to ask for a senior discount. I did, happy to remember the word for “discount” but the the ticket agent was unsure there was one, that is until he asked if we would contribute to their fund for “ninos en Puebla,” which I gladly did and then voila, the senior discount was discovered and applied and after a short wait we were on the bus to Puebla. Took a taxi to the hotel, Meson Sacristia de la Soledad, through a mass of people which the driver complained about steadily. Then a police barricade was at our block so we walked the last bit. Dia de Los Muertos, with a major parade two blocks further which we ran to watch after checking in to this lovely, warm, hospitable little inn (meson=inn).
Our room is huge, colorful, comfy. We dumped our things and headed to the parade, and then to Las Ranas for supper. The zocalo (central square) was jammed with families, many in costume, many elaborately painted faces, vendors, a stage with a band playing, balloons of course, just happy madness everywhere. Supper was great–a half kilo of a meat/pepper/onion/cheese mass, hot off the grill, and a huge supply of tortillas. We ate until we could eat no more. With David’s beer and my jamaica the bill was $8. We wandered back through the crowds intending to fall into bed, but…
David: I can’t find my iPad!
Me: Relax, I’ll find it.
Ha. No iPad. David was of course very upset as he concluded he had left it on the bus, and I, realizing that calling the bus company myself would be futile as the conversation would be way too complicated, went downstairs to ask Paco for help. He roused the owner who, in his pajamas, called the bus company and after a very long and, yes, complicated, conversation, reported the missing item. We had our ticket stub so we knew what seat, which bus, etc. He gave them his cell number to call if they located the iPad. They gave him an incident number which we would need to retrieve the item if they found it. David had calmed down, we had setup “erase” on the iPad as soon as it connected to the internet, and got ready for bed.
Knock, knock, knock at our door maybe 45 minutes later. It was Paco, to report they found the iPad and the owner would drive us to the terminal the next morning after breakfast. I think I said about five times “Es verdad?” The next morning I assured the kind owner (Lulu) we could go whenever it was convenient for her, but she graciously said “David will not be able to relax until he has it in his hands” which was true, and within a little while we had retrieved the iPad and everything was wonderful again.
Saturday morning Gideon and Yoojin, and Birdie, their whippet, picked us up bright and early (6:45) and we headed south to Busan. Birdie is gorgeous and regal, and while at first she seemed spooked by the situation and us, Gideon and I sat in the back seat with her and before long she was sleeping/meditating with her head in my lap. Doggie fix!
This is a mountainous country, and we drove right down the middle from Seoul in the northwest to the second largest city, Busan, on the coast in the southeast. Blue-green mountains on all sides, and the most modern and well-kept freeway the entire route. David read that Hyundai built the freeway in under 3 years. Amazing. We arrived in Busan after about 5 ½ hours, hitting rather horrid traffic as we approached the city and then went in fits and starts through downtown and over to the southeastern edge where our airbnb was. This time we were in a modern highrise, though not so high by Busan standards (18 floors or so) and we were on the 15th. Lovely apartment with two bedrooms, very roomy, overlooking a small lake surrounded by a park.
We parked our luggage and headed out for some walking for us and for Birdie and a little sightseeing. The weather was warm to hot, but a seaside beachy heat, so we went to a nearby beach and walked looking for a place to eat. Finally we settled on a place with outdoor tables since we had Birdie with us and ate truly delicious fish and chips, then headed back to chill, watched a little Korean TV and went to bed.
Sunday we woke to a little bit of a cloudy morning. Luckily the airbnb owner had stocked the kitchen with breakfast food—two loaves of Japanese style bread (white, thick, fluffy), apples and oranges, juice and milk and cornflakes. We devoured breakfast and headed out. Our first stop was the Haedong Yonggungsa temple which is right on the coast, in a dramatic setting of rocks and hills. Due to the holiday weekend it was jammed with a cheerful crowd and much pointing and fussing over Birdie (typical Korean response to dogs, especially unusual breeds since most dogs we see are toys and often are being carried in arms and tote bags). We were perhaps among 8 total westerners in the crowd.
Next was Beomeosa, in central Busan but way, way up a mountainside, and finally downtown to the fish market where we had supper around 4:30.
The Busan fish market is well known, quite large and nothing like we’d ever seen. Stall after stall, many with tanks of live shellfish of all kinds including hundreds of abalone, a little shocking to a Californian. Clams of all sizes, and lots of things I could not identify. The deal is you select fish and shellfish from a stall, and that stall proprietor calls upstairs to the associated restaurant. A short discussion about how things will be prepared is conducted (sashimi for the larger fish, smaller fish grilled, and the giant clams steamed in our case), you pay (came to about 80,000 wan) and a young woman comes down to take the fish up in a bucket and lead you to a table. Banchan appears, then the various dishes and accouterments (e.g., soy sauce and wasabi for the sashimi), drinks are ordered, and we start to eat. And eat. And eat…and then the soup comes which is made from the fish bones and veggies and is boiled on a little gas burner that is placed on the table. We ate most of that, too.
We were stuffed. As we left it started to rain, and I didn’t think I personally could look at food again, but ha, we went across the street to a bustling, nay jammed couple of blocks filled with street vendors and people, umbrellas and commotion, and proceeded to eat some sweet little buns shaped like peanuts and fried dumplings filled with nuts and something or other that was also sweet, Delicious! It was really raining by then so we hustled back to the car and headed back to our apartment. With traffic this turned into a 90 minute drive…we staggered upstairs and fell into our respective beds.
Around 2:30 David and I both woke up and went to pee. The moment we finished an alarm started screaming, bells ringing, and the repeated instructions in Korean telling us, apparently, to get out. Of course our first thought was “what in the world did we just break? By peeing?” Yoojin ran into the living room as we all were totally confused and freaking out. She said “A FIRE??” and we all started getting dressed, still in a daze. It was freaky but not that frightening, as 1) this is a concrete apartment building and 2) it was POURING rain, and had been for at least 5 hours. How could the building possibly be on fire? Gideon went into the hall and a man was fiddling with some box on the wall and mumbling there was a problem with the alarm, as if this was not unusual. Nonetheless the alarm continued, so Gideon and I decided to go down the stairwell and see if we could find someone to explain there was no need to worry. We walked all the way down (15 flights) and did not see a soul. As we walked down it was increasingly obvious we were the only residents with any concerns since we never found anyone else up and about. We got in the elevator and went back up. Into bed, everyone. This was actually the second time on this trip we have been awakened in the middle of the night—a few nights after we arrived David got a phone call at around 3am, a wrong number from Berkeley. Okay, let’s have this be two of two.
Monday morning we were all back in the car at 7am, as Yoojin and Gideon dropped us at the Central Bus Terminal. We took the bus to Jeonju and they drove on back to Seoul.
Inescapably Rational 