First, everyone from the tour guides to the taxi driver loathe Trump.
Second, last night as we paid for our last pizza the tv above the cashier suddenly started playing Jesus Christ Superstar. We looked up at a montage of Trump…as Jesus, with Meloni, shaking hands with the Door Dash Grandma, etc. The woman at the register quickly said “Anti, anti!” to make sure I wouldn’t misunderstand the message.
That’s all for the moment. We await our flight to Paris. Much more to come re Napoli.
We arrived in Naples via il treno from Rome Sunday afternoon. Thank goodness we had booked a taxi to get to Roma Termini, because there was a marathon underway and all the buses were delayed, rerouted, etc. The driver told us there is a marathon about once a month. That would have been nerve-wracking!
The train was a low-cost local, the ride was two hours, and it was extremely comfortable. We bought sandwiches in the terminal and the table between our seats was ample. And because we had booked ahead, the fare was about $10/each. All good!!
I do not recommend arriving in Naples on a Sunday without a clear understanding of the transportation system, as, unusually, google maps gave us terrible directions. The first and seemingly simplest was to take the bus. We wandered a bit, had to ask a few people, but found the bus stop. In Rome you pay for buses and trams with a credit card and just ping the device on board. Faulty assumption that Naples would be the same. I asked a woman how to pay for the bus, and after a spirited discussion among the group waiting, the answer was to buy a ticket first—not available on board. Where? Any tabacchi, small stands that are everywhere selling cigarettes and sundries. Open on Sunday in the surroundings of the Garibaldi station? Nope. Second option in google maps—the metro (subway). Directions were to go to MET, walk 8 minutes to Line 2, ride to another stop, transfer to Line 1, get off at Toledo. I asked 3 or 4 people in the station what/where is MET. No one knew. We looked around for a ticket machine, found one, it refused to take any of our cards, and a nice young man (from Brazil, spoke a little English and Spanish, thank goodness) helped us get our tickets. We were hot and tired and relieved that we were on our way at last. We walked around a corner where a transit guard was checking people going through—helping as necessary. I showed him the directions on google. Yes, yes, he said, Line 2, go one stop to Museo, change to Toledo. Great, sounds easy. Alas this wasn’t true—there are only two metro lines in Naples and we were already on Line 1…and we had to ride only a few stops before we saw “Toledo” coming up. Get off here? I asked the two tattooed twenty sometimes sitting next to us. They advised yes, get off. So we did. After two very long escalators (think Dupont Circle in D.C.) and two staircases, we trudged out onto the street and found the Toledo stop is literally in front of the alley where the door to our B&B is. So much running around and fuss for such a simple trip.
Note: the metro is so very deep because of all the buried Greek and Roman streets, requiring public works to keep digging past all of that ancient stuff.
Our B&B is fine…pretty modern, slightly off kilter as Italian places seem to be (loose screws on towel bars, that sort of thing), and I had the instructions to get in. A code at the front door, an elevator that operates only with a €20 coin and is so tiny the two of us with luggage were squeezed into a comical contortion, go to floor 4…elevator labors up and stops on 3. We were rather desperate to get out so did, and yup, we were on floor 4. (We should have known this…ground floors in Europe are floor 0.). A 7 digit code to open the door and everything we needed was on the desk inside. Big room! Good air conditioning! Comfy bed!
We are staying in the recommended Spanish Quarter, the old part of the city, on Via Toledo, a major commercial street that is a pretty constant roar of traffic and motorcycles, honking and beeping as pedestrians weave through intersections while motorcycles and cars weave around them. It is semi-organized bedlam. The sidewalks are especially uneven as are the streets, so walking you must look down and around you at the same time. It’s rather exciting once you get the hang of it. We saw no crashes, no fallen pedestrians, so it all seems to work. Courage required, however.
We had no dinner plan so just wandered the streets behind our B&B, getting hungrier and a little confused. We let ourselves be hawked into one of the gazillion restaurants (it had pretty good reviews) and collapsed at a table on the street and ordered wine and alici fritti and calamari fritti. Delicious. Then, too tired to go looking further for a proper dinner, and a bit, uh, relaxed, we ordered pasta. It was all so good…and we toddled back to our rooms to collapse.
When Orvieto was not possible we had a free day Saturday and it turned out a lovely, and, compared to our normal pace when traveling, a relaxing day.
We dawdled over breakfast at Geselda’s, wandered back to the room, and decided to have a long indulgent lunch. Our host had suggested Dal Cordaro if we wanted an osteria, and when I checked for a dinner reservation they only took them 15 days ahead. We decided to try our luck walking in when they opened for lunch. We were the second customers and were seated right away. The atmosphere was somewhat cold and brusque and we were a bit uncomfortable until we were about halfway through ordering when the waiter suggested they had a special salad not on the menu…he was struggling to find the right word when one of the owners came by and said “cabbage.” Yes, he said, with olive oil and anchovies. We were game. We have learned dishes with just a few ingredients in Italy are very often delicious. It was. But everything was fabulous…with the antipasti’s cannellini beans, polpetto, and artichoke were beyond expectations. It was a meal to remember. As we left the man at the cashier asked if we enjoyed the food and I stopped to talk a bit. We are from California, we are so sorry about our insane president, the very typical conversation these days with Europeans. “We do not understand how he was elected again” he said to me. Yeah, we don’t either. He reached over and shook my hand. “Good luck to you!” And to all of us.
One reason we wanted to try Dal Cordaro is it is steps from a bridge over the Tiber, very picturesque, and we took the long walk along the river back toward the Coliseum, and finishing with a wander through the Ghetto. Really lovely on a Saturday afternoon, not crowded at all. Suddenly we were back in familiar territory and hopped on the #8 tram back to our room.
We had one last meal in Rome and we couldn’t decide what to do. I wanted to try Eggs, a super modern slightly strange “all about eggs” place where you can get a course in which every dish is served in a half eggshell, yes, in a cardboard carton, but David thought it would be too weird. So instead we decided to walk through the restaurant district of Trastevere and discovered why you might hate this neighborhood. We had wandered into this area and it is where we ate several times. It was a little crowded but fun and eclectic. Saturday night is an entirely different experience.
It was not yet dark, 6:30 or so, and it was absolutely jammed with tourists and partying teenagers, little kids running around the piazzas, motorcycles…insane. We had not selected a destination so kept pushing through, hoping something would appeal. There was one sort of odd suggestion from our host that we were iffy about, a tiny place Maritozzi. This is the name of a slightly sweet bun typically served in the morning filled with whipped cream. Reviews were mostly raves with scattered hates, intriguing. The place is so small that reservations are a must but we wanted to see if we could walk in since it was still early, and the location was deep in this insane neighborhood so it gave us a destination. When we arrived there were only a few people there—it filled up quickly—and we were offered a perch (this place is really small) if we would be ready to leave in an hour since it was reserved at 8. Sure!
The menu thankfully had guidelines—order two small maritozzi and one main. The maritozzi are filled with savory things so we chose beef tartare and smoked salmon, and gnocchi for David and cacio e pepe for me. The quality of everything is very high, the tiny open kitchen a whirlwind of activity, and they have even been given “best carbonara in Rome” award from somewhere or other. They make their own pasta and offer pasta workshops which I wish I had known about. For me, though, the slightly sweet bread filled with savory food was not my favorite (yup, too sweet) and the pasta was for me too heavily sauced. But the experience was a lot of fun, all the diners seemed in celebratory mode. I guessed the place was all foodies, chefs, etc. Glad we went, wouldn’t return. Best if all it was down a narrow alley out of the fray.
The walk back through the crowds was okay, we never felt in any danger, but again not our scene. Arrivederci to the Rome food world!
Overall we would recommend staying in Trastevere over more central neighborhoods as it was, during the week, pleasant and extremely convenient. The tram stop was literally in front of where we stayed and it ran right to Piazza Venezia, from which we walked to the Borghese and the Coliseum. So convenient and when we returned “home” it was almost an escape from the Rome of crowds.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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!”
Tomorrow the Coliseum and Palatine Hill.
We would have called ourselves experienced travelers but there are always things to learn.
Enough said. We made it.
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.
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.
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!
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.
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.
We dragged ourselves back up the hill and fell into that first too-hot night and thus crummy sleep.
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.
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.
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:
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.
https://www.lenbachhaus.de/en/digital/collection-online/collection/the-blue-rider
My favorites, not at the link:
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.
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.
Continue readingWe 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!
Inescapably Rational 