A Villa in Italy

July 15, 2022 by Nicole Harrison in Italy

In 2014, Jason and I visited Italy on our first international trip together, and when we took a day trip out into Tuscany, he said he wanted to come back someday and stay there for a week with friends. Eight years later, with friends we hadn't yet met, we fulfilled that dream.

On a whim last fall, during a boozy brunch with new friends, we booked a surprisingly cheap villa outside of Lucca for a week in June. To everyone's surprise, eight months later we actually went.

Everyone got to Lucca in various ways - some spent a couple of days in New York and then London, some just went to London first, and a few of us went to Rome for a day before taking the train north. We stayed by the Trevi Fountain, which had been wrapped up and under construction the last time Jason and I were in the city, so we finally got to see it. We also enjoyed a visit to the Roman Forum and our favorite spot in the city, the Orange Garden.

A photo of the Trevi Fountain from the side, with a view of the crowd — The crowd at the Trevi Fountain (photo/Jason Rafal)

Black and white photo of the inside of the Pantheon's roof — The roof of the Pantheon (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of two buildings in Rome, one yellow and one red — Some of the buildings near our hotel in Rome (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of a narrow street in Rome with outdoor restaurant tables — Narrow streets in Rome (photo/Jason Rafal)

A close up photo of one side of the Colosseum — The Colosseum against a cloudy sky (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of the view along the wall of the Orange Garden, with the Rome skyline in the distance — Along the wall at the Orange Garden (photo/Jason Rafal)

Close-up photo of a face whose mouth is a fountain — One of the amazing fountains in Rome (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo looking up an apartment wall covered in thick ivy — A green wall (photo/Jason Rafal)

The Roman Forum, somewhat under construction (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of a narrow street in Lucca, with a tall arch connecting two buildings — The view down a Roman street (photo/Jason Rafal)

We weren't quite sure what to expect when we got to the villa, since it had looked amazing in pictures but we were still skeptical of the price, but it was amazing. Five bedrooms, most of them with their own bathrooms and sitting areas, and a large kitchen and dining room greeted us. There was a second kitchen outside, as well as a grill and pizza oven, a greenhouse dining room, and a pool.

Photo of a building with mostly glass walls in front of a tall blue house at sunset — The view of our villa from the backyard (photo/Nicole Harrison)

One of our first excursions was to the Villa Reale di Marlia, which was a large, stately house surrounded by incredible grounds and gardens. If you’re ever in Marlia (for some reason?) I think all of us would highly recommend it.

Photo of a very old building with open windows and a rock tiled floor — One of the beautiful views on the grounds of the Villa Reale di Marlia (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of the villa group between two high hedges with a clock tower in the background — The villa group at Villa Reale di Marlia (photo/some random guy)

The group also did a cooking class that focused on pasta. Everything was delicious, and the surrounding winery was beautiful as well.

Photo of a hand kneading pasta dough — Making pasta dough (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of a person putting greenish white ravioli filling onto a strip of pasta — Filling the ravioli (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of a person running a strip of pasta through a pasta machine — Making the pasta (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of three piles of fresh pasta — Finished pasta (photo/Jason Rafal)

On one of the days, we made an excursion to the town of Lucca, about 20 minutes from where we were staying. It’s a very cute town that features completely intact city walls from the Renaissance era. The top of the wall around the town has been made into a park with lots of trees for shade and a path around the parameter for walking, running, and biking.

The view down one of Lucca’s old, narrow streets (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of a fountain with two humanoid statues in the foreground, and more statues behind the fountain — In the beautiful gardens of the Palazzo Pfanner in Lucca (photo/Jason Rafal)

Later in the week, we headed for Cinque Terre. In a day that featured a variety of transportation options, we drove to La Spezia, then took a train to Riomaggiore, then took a ferry to Manarola. The towns are absolutely beautiful - brightly painted houses against a coastline of clear blue Mediterranean water.

Photo of pink flowers with the buildings of Riomaggiore in the background — Looking back at the coast in Riomaggiore (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo looking away from the ocean over the buildings of Riomaggiore — Looking out across Riomaggiore (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of a cat laying on the ground with an old wall in the background — A cat lounging in the town (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of the colorful buildings of Riomaggiore along the coastline — The buildings of Riomaggiore (photo/Jason Rafal)

In Manarola, we went swimming and cliff jumping (with various levels of difficulty - the part I was jumping off of was more like a large rock than a cliff, but some of the bravest in our party jumped off the top part of the rocks in the photo below). It was the first time in the Mediterranean, and after I got over the initial shock of the amount of salt (the sea is about 10% saltier than the Pacific), I loved the perfect temperature and the ease of treading water.

Photo of a cove with swimmers and people jumping off of cliffs into the water — The cliff jumping area at Manarola (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of Manarola with the swimming cove in the foreground — Manarola (photo/Jason Rafal)

On our last day in Italy, some of us left and the rest spent some time wandering around Florence. We saw the Duomo, which is always amazing, spent some time shopping at Ponte Vecchio, and walked through some of the Uffizi (we were too overwhelmed to do the whole thing). Jason and I loved Florence the first time we visited, and even though it was a bit too full of tourists this time for our liking, it was wonderful to get to spend time there again.

Photo of buildings at the Duomo — Some of the beautiful tile work at the Duomo (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of an old wall cutting through Florence with dense green trees on either side — The view along the wall from the Piazzale Michelangelo (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of the Ponte Vecchio bridge with the Florence skyline in the background — Ponte Vecchio from the Uffizi (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of a full-wall painting of Tuscany specifically showing the sea monsters detailed in the sea — The sea monsters detailed in a full-wall painting of the area in the Uffizi (photo/Jason Rafal)

Photo of a close up of part of a statue that features a goose holding up some cloth, with two crossed legs in the background — And excellent goose in the Uffizi (photo/Jason Rafal)

Italy was our first trip out of the U.S. in two and a half years, and it set the bar high for future group vacations. It was wonderful to just hang out somewhere new, eat cheap and delicious produce, struggle with language barriers, and spend time with friends escaping the heat in the pool. Until next time, Italy.

Photo of nine people on one side of a long table recreating the Last Supper — One last group photo (photo/Jason Rafal)

Days 8, 9, and 10: Hello Venice, Goodbye Venice

November 16, 2014 by Nicole Harrison in Italy

Venice is wonderful, gorgeous, and utterly confusing. There are canals. There are streets. There are alleys that dead end at residences. There are streets that look like alleys. There are alleys that look like streets. There are streets that dead end into canals. It’s a glorious mess.

Another reason that Venice is challenging to navigate (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Our hotel, perhaps in an attempt to seem even more Venetian, made no sense either. After being told that our room was on the first floor, we went up three flights of stairs and around five corners to find it. The room itself had padded green fabric walls, and brown hinged shutters on the windows. Very cute and very old looking.

Venice has no cars—your options within the city center are walking or boating. Since we didn’t feel inclined to pay for boating, we did a lot of walking. We spent both sunrise and sunset of our full day in Venice at Piazza San Marco, a huge open space at the edge of the city. We also spent a bit of time looking through the surrounding shops. Venice is known for glasswork, and there was beautiful glass art everywhere. There were also a surprising number of candy shops (Lindt was apparently a local favorite).

(Photo/Jason Rafal)

In Piazza San Marco we also visited the Florian, which is the oldest continuously-run coffee shop in Italy (it opened in 1720). The place was frequented by the likes of Lord Byron and Charles Dickens, and Jason was very excited to visit. We had very expensive coffee, hot chocolate, and cookies, which were all delicious and beautifully presented.

Our tray at the Florian (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Espresso doppio from the Florian (Photo/Jason Rafal)

We also wandered through the daily vegetable and fish markets, which were crowded with locals making purchases for their homes and restaurants. While not huge, the fish market had an impressive variety of fresh seafood, from swordfish to various types of shrimp. Everything that needs to be either put onto or taken off of the island arrives in boats, and then is taken to its destination by handcarts. Walking around in the early morning, we were able to get a sense of how many handcarts are required to transport trash, recycling, food, and restaurant products. For lunch, we headed to the Jewish ghetto, where we learned over matzoh ball soup and latkes that Venice’s ghetto is actually older than Rome’s.

The vegetable market (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Delicious latkes and apple sauce (Photo/Jason Rafal)

For our last night in Italy, we had a wonderful dinner and went to a Vivaldi concert. Venice is very proud of him. While my favorite part of the concert was Pachelbel’s Cannon, it was all very enjoyable. The women were all dressed in period costumes and ornately done-up blonde wigs.

To begin our 19-hour journey home, we left our hotel at 4:45 a.m. and headed to the dock to meet our water taxi, which took us on the 20-minute boat ride to the airport through the quiet darkness. After a stop in Frankfurt, during which I told a very confused German woman who had been selling me a nut roll grazie, even though we had been conversing in English, we headed back to Denver.

Our early morning boat ride (Photo/Jason Rafal)

We had a great trip, and thank you for reading along!

Italy, Day 7: Tuscany

November 13, 2014 by Nicole Harrison in Italy

Today we decided to take a touristy trip into the Tuscan countryside. In general, I hate being one of the sheeple in a tour group, but I always forget how much I like a good tour guide. Ours was Agatha, a Polish postdoctoral student who studied Renaissance art in England in the winter and lived in Florence in the summer. She spoke English well, and was also rather funny.

Overall, I liked our tour, but I’m going to try to refrain from making this sound like an ad, so I won’t mention the company. If you’re going to Florence and want to look them up, let us know.

We started our day in Siena, where we learned about a crazy horse race that happens twice a year in the village square in the name of the Virgin Mary. Siena has 17 districts (in a town of 55,000, they are not huge districts) and each district is randomly assigned a horse. They party for three days and then the jockeys get on bareback and do three laps around a hilly semicircle with sharp corners. The jockeys often fall off, but the horse who crosses the finish line first wins regardless of its rider’s status, which seems fair to me. Then, there is more celebration. Otherwise, it is a very cute town with very narrow streets. It was founded about 1000 years ago by bankers, who built a lot of religious stuff to redeem themselves for being bankers, and then town construction essentially halted 300 years later. Today, it’s all protected as a UNESCO world heritage site, so no touching.

Siena (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Inside the dome of the Siena Cathedral (Photo/Jason Rafal)

After Siena, we drove out to an organic farm in the Chianti region for lunch. Let me say this about the Tuscan wine country: if Florence is absurdly beautiful, Tuscany is basically inconceivable. I have no words. It’s somewhere between the original definitions of sublime and beautiful; it has the awe-inspiring quality of the sublime, but none of the terror, and much of the softness of the beautiful. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, you can look up Edmund Burke. I don’t recommend reading the entire book, but the ideas are interesting.

Tuscany, with San Gimignano on the hill in the background (Photo/Jason Rafal)

(Photo/Jason Rafal)

With lunch, we had four types of wine: a white, a young Chianti, a merlot, and a dessert wine. I wouldn’t say that I can pair food and wine now, but I’m starting to get it. Also wine is delicious.

After lunch, we went up the hill to San Gimignano. As Agatha put it, this is a perfectly preserved medieval town because nothing of interest has happened here in 600 years. In San Gimignano, we had the best gelato in the world (according to a panel of experts) and took more pictures of Tuscany being gorgeous. And then we all got back on the bus and took a nice wine-induced nap.

The best gelato (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Lastly, we went to the leaning tower of Pisa, where we refused to take pictures of ourselves holding the tower up. I did make us take a selfie, which hurt Jason’s artistic pride a great deal. The tower has been stabilized, so some people climbed it. We wandered around instead.

The leaning tower of Pisa (Photo/Jason Rafal)

If you come to Florence and have more than a day to explore, get out into the countryside. And then call me so that we can discuss Burke.

Italy, Days 5 and 6: Firenze

November 13, 2014 by Nicole Harrison in Italy

We departed Rome and took the train to Florence. It was a high-speed train, which was pretty great, and it only took us about an hour and a half to get there. The Italian countryside between them was, of course, lovely. As we went north, the clouds came down and the rain started again. The train internet was the fastest I’ve seen in Italy, so I took the opportunity to post a few blogs.

A rainy train ride (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Let me just effuse about Florence for a minute. I’m already in love with Florence. It’s almost absurdly beautiful, with its little streets of shops and picturesque river. Just wandering around, I came across several beautiful old buildings and piazzas. It’s also a bit less hectic than Rome, which is a nice change. Really, just lovely. Come to Florence.

We spent much of our first day in Florence trying to decide what we wanted to do in Florence. We figured that out, had two incredible meals, and did some shopping. Overall, a very pleasant day.

Ponte Vecchio (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Palazzo Vecchio (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Tuesday promised to be less rainy, so after sleeping in a bit, we wandered. We walked down across the river again and headed toward the Giardino di Boboli. We bought tickets and walked through the garden, which was massive, hilly, and had dozens of paths that seemingly arbitrarily happened across statues and other works of art that were scattered throughout. There was also a fountain gate guarded by statues of the wind and goats, which I appreciated. It was lovely and green and damp-smelling, and all in the middle of a city.

The Florence Cathedral (Photo/Jason Rafal)

A statue in the Giardino di Boboli (Photo/Jason Rafal)

For lunch, we stopped by the Piazza San Spirito and had far too much food and a bottle of wine. I wanted to try the vegetable soup, so I ordered a small soup as well as a regular-sized pasta dish. The soup was huge (I have no idea how big a large would be) and there was a lot of pasta as well, so we spent a long time just eating, drinking, and waiting for the want and ability to eat more. It was very Italian of us, especially since we didn’t start lunch until around 2.

Far too much delicious food (Photo/Nicole Harrison)

Post-lunch espresso (Photo/Jason Rafal)

After lunch we decided to go to the Piazalle Michelangelo, which apparently had the best view of the city of Florence. Of course, this meant that it was uphill, which meant that we dragged our overly-full selves up a steep hill and then a lot of stairs. The view was beautiful, though. Definitely worth the climb.

At the Piazalle Michelangelo (Photo/Jason Rafal)

After some more exploring and a nap, we went off in search of dinner (again, we were on Italian time—around 8:30. Only took us six days to figure it out…). We found the Trattoria San Lorenzo, which had good reviews on Yelp, and sat down. If you’re ever in Florence, this place is great. There is currency from all over the world taped to the bar, which is interesting to look at, and the food is amazing. They also have awesome middle-aged male waiters—when Rock Your Body started playing in the restaurant toward the end of our meal, one of them started humming along.

Just a small note about gelato—it’s for before dinner. Don’t go expecting the good gelato places to still have any gelato out at 9:30.

Italy, Day 4: In Which We are Serenaded for Someone Else’s Birthday

November 10, 2014 by Nicole Harrison in Italy

Today was almost completely unplanned. We had considered doing a couple of museums, but it would take a lot of time and effort, and we’re not very patient people. I wanted to go to the App ian Way, which was the old road to Rome, so we walked in that direction after breakfast. When we got near the , there was actual nature, which was lovely. There was finally no threat of rain, so the walkers and bikers were out in force. After wandering around the paths near the Catacombs of St.Callixtus for a bit, we decided to move on to my next desired destination, the Giardino degli Aranai.

A building along the Appian Way (Photo/Jason Rafal)

The giardino was a bit of a hike from where we were, and Jason was getting hungry and tired, so we decided to try to find food first. We quickly realized that it was Sunday, which meant that most of the good restaurants were closed. We decided that our best bet would be to head back toward the Colosseum, which would have food areas pandering to tourists.

After being ambushed by a bike race and finding a way through the giant wall (the most difficult part about trying to navigate Rome by foot), we got back to the Circo Massimo. We found a restaurant that was both open and crowded (with both tourists and Italians) and were ushered to a seat. I have noticed that Rome has very proactive and primarily male restaurant hosts. They stand in the sidewalk and usher you to a table if you seem at all interested (or try to start up a conversation if you’re just passing by, which was difficult for me as a shy tourist).

An alarming sign on a railway bridge (Photo/Jason Rafal)

A bike race in Rome (Photo/Jason Rafal)

The wall (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Some Romans marching around (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Lunch was accompanied by Chianti, which was dangerously smooth. We also shared some delicious tiramisu. Jason thinks that tiramisu is the first step toward making me like coffee, which seems unlikely, but I’m happy to eat tasty creamy desserts.

Dog parking (Photo/Jason Rafal)

After lunch, we headed to the giardino, which was up the hill from the Roman Forum. It was a beautiful area—lots of cobblestones and trees, both of which I like. We finally arrived at the giardino, which is actually a tiny, lovely park. It has benches, a small grove of orange trees, rose bushes, and a gorgeous view of the city. We had joined the group who was sitting on the rock banister and looking out at the city when the people started singing.

A fountain at the giardino (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Nicole and the view (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Over the next few minutes, we pieced together that someone had hired two opera singers, a brother and sister pair, to serenade a middle-aged woman for her birthday. Using an iPad and a speaker to play the music, the brother sang My Way in an extremely heavy Italian accent, slowly gaining the attention of the entire giardino. His sister, who was wearing a floor-length burgundy dress, then sang a song from an Italian opera (we both recognized it, but couldn’t tell which one it was). After more rounds of applause, the pair sang happy birthday to the woman together. With the performance over, we headed out.

The brother sings My Way (Photo/Jason Rafal)

The sister sings an Italian opera (Photo/Jason Rafal)

We were kind of at a loss for what else to do, so we headed for the Jewish ghetto, which was close, on the assumption that it would have more open stores than the rest of the city on a Sunday. Indeed, unlike when we had walked through on a Friday, the place was hopping. The restaurants were full at 2:30 p.m., and there were groups of children playing in the streets. We stopped at a gelato shop so that I could try a frulatti (seems to be a fruit smoothie) and took a look at the section of original wall, which is near the Teatro Marello. The Roman ghetto is apparently the oldest ghetto in the world. The informational sign made it seem like the Jews just chose to live next to the wall, which was an amusing/sad way of putting it.

Fontana delle Tartarughe (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Late afternoon sun over the Roman Forum (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Walking back to the Colosseum metro stop, the street was a zoo of people. We couldn’t figure out why, but a large area of the street was blocked off, and crowds of people were just walking in both directions. Between that and the men trying to sell “selfie sticks” (little extender arms that hold your cell phone and allow you to take pictures from a couple feet away with a remote), it was fairly overwhelming. It’s definitely a bustling city. It’s been great, but I think I’m ready to move on.

Italy, Day 3: In Which We Get Drunk and Go to the Pantheon

November 10, 2014 by Nicole Harrison in Italy

We had breakfast at the hotel again. Weirdly, when we got to the breakfast area and I told the attendant our room number in Italian (I’d been practicing!), she had no idea what I was saying and we had to repeat the number in English. We decided that since this hotel was more for international travelers than Italians, she must have gotten the job based on knowing some English.

We decided to go over to Vatican city and explore that part of Rome. Jason’s feet were basically made of blisters because we had walked so much the day before, so we went to the nearest metro stop and bought tickets, then took the metro to the Vatican area. Upon our arrival, we realized two things: 1) getting into the Vatican would cost us either 400 euro or several hours and 2) I would not be allowed in at all because I was wearing a skirt without tights. This was particularly puzzling because there was no shortage of women in leggings in line. But, apparently, knee skin is much more scandalous than skintight fabric. I realize that this is probably a dumb American thing to think, but it seems silly all the same.

Because neither of us wanted to put in the effort to remedy these two things, we decided to wander off toward the Pantheon instead. On the way, we found the impressive and medieval-looking Castel Sant’Angelo, which was built over the mausoleum of Emperor Hadrian. It says something about the quality of this preserved castle/museum that we were able to get lost several times while guiding ourselves around. The views were beautiful, and several ceilings featured intricate frescos.

The view from the Castel Sant'Angelo (Photo/Jason Rafal)

After finding our way outside, we started looking for lunch. We have a habit of finding good-looking places using Yelp or Jason’s Rome app, and then instead stopping somewhere else on the way. Today, that means that we headed through a couple of beautiful Roman allies and found a pasta shop across the alley from a homemade pastry store on our way to somewhere else. We sat down and ordered pasta and a bottle of the house white wine, with Jason arguing that it was more economical than purchasing two glasses. We may have been behind on wine tasting, but we were definitely starting to catch up. We spent a lovely leisurely lunch hour eating ravioli (Jason) and pesto linguini (me) while we slowly drank the bottle. I amused the waiter by acting alarmed when he tried to take my plate when it still had a couple of noodles on it. It’s nice to eat slowly. I’m not sure why I usually eat so fast.

(Photo/Jason Rafal)

After lunch we teetered into the pastry shop and bought some dessert before heading out again. We found the Piazza Navona, and soon after we stumbled into the back of the Pantheon. We went in (apparently my knees were not as offensive here) and I pretty much just stared at the ceiling. If you’ve never seen the Pantheon ceiling, it’s a dome that looks like layered rock leading up to an open circle, through which we could see the blue sky. Not being religious, the ceiling was definitely the thing I most appreciated.

The Pantheon (Photo/Jason Rafal)

After managing to get out of the Pantheon without embarrassing ourselves (I hope), we went to the Trevi Fountain, and were both extremely disappointed to see it under construction. The fountain, and the building behind it, was coated in scaffolding, and a temporary walkway had been created so that tourists could go close enough to the fountain to throw in coins. We did not partake.

As we wandered around, we came across a parade, or a protest, that somehow involved the labor movement. There was lots of flag waving and shouting. The area was surrounded by police, but they seemed pretty relaxed.

(Photo/Jason Rafal)

We went home to regroup before taking the metro back out for dinner. I had wanted to go back to the area where we had lunch, but I couldn’t figure out where it was, so we wandered until we found a few restaurants in a small piazza and sat down. The couple who sat next to us at dinner were from Morocco—they had just come up to Rome for the weekend. It turned out that the man, who had excellent English, had gone to college. He did a year at UT before deciding to move to Virginia, where he went to JMU. He said that he moved to Los Angeles for a bit after school, and enthused about California.

Italy, Day 2: Gatto di Foro Romano

November 10, 2014 by Nicole Harrison in Italy

On Friday, Rome was rainy. We had breakfast at our hotel and started to walk toward the Roman Forum in the drizzle. On our way out, we saw that a tree a few blocks from our hotel had been hit by lightning in the thunderstorm the night before. The blackened stump was being demolished by several chainsaws, and the scene was surrounded by excited locals and police people.

The crowd around the tree (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Streets flooded by rain (Photo/Jason Rafal)

We wandered toward the Colosseum with a map for guidance. Although the map showed the general area in green, it did not show the massive, ancient wall between our hotel and the Roman Forum. We walked along the wall until we found a narrow road that showed occasional patches of cobblestones under the pavement. There was no sidewalk, so we ducked out of the way of cars whenever necessary. After walking by several tall and intimidating gates in the wall, we found that one belonged to the Canadian Embassy. After a few more minutes of walking, we gave up and used Jason’s phone to figure out how to get out of the car-dominated embassy maze.

The Canadian Embassy (Photo/Jason Rafal)

We found our way to the Circo Massimo, and we were suddenly surrounded by huge ruins. After walking through the Capitoline Museo, we joined the line of tourists waiting to buy tickets for the Colosseum (it was Friday, and rainy, but there were still a lot of groups). I’m sure I can’t say anything original about the Colosseum, but I’ll say this. It was massive; it was intricately built; it was crumbling. Jason found facts about the structure on his Rome app. It turns out that it was partially funded by the raiding and pillaging of Jerusalem (Jason was irritated to still have to pay 12 euro to get in) and that before the maze of tunnels was built under the floor, it could be flooded for water-based entertainment. Unfortunately, the potential for gladiator fights with sea monsters was put to an end by Titus, who decided that the space was needed for animal cages and equipment. I should note that some Googling revealed that this whole flooding the Colosseum thing is still under debate, but we decided to go with it.

Nicole reaches out toward Jupiter (we think) at the Capitoline Mueso (Photo/Jason Rafal)

The Colosseum (Photo/Jason Rafal)

For lunch, we looked for a place recommended by the same app, but ended up going to a restaurant next door instead. We were serenaded by a saxophone player, who played Stevie Wonder and posed for pictures with us before demanding five euro. After our bruschetta and pasta (delicious), we struck up a conversation with the Russian sitting at the table next to us as Jason drank his post-meal cappuccino. In broken but understandable English, he explained that he traveled to Rome for work frequently, and he gushed about how much he loved the woman who owned the restaurant. He told us that this particular trip to Italy was because they always went somewhere for his boss’s birthday. Our friend had wanted to go to Havana, but he settled for Venice at the boss’s request.

Jason and the saxaphone player (Photo/Nicole Harrison, who was somehow unable to make Jason’s camera, which was on autofocus, focus)

Roman street (Photo/Jason Rafal)

After lunch, we visited the Roman Forum. The forum feels like an assortment of crumbling bits of buildings that were dumped into a pit in the middle of the city. There are a lot of pillars and bits of pillars, half-walls, and inscribed stones. I found it extremely difficult to actually feel the age of the Roman Forum; it’s simply too old for me to relate to. It’s definitely awesome, and it’s wonderful that it’s preserved in the city center, but I can’t picture it actually being used. Maybe I need to watch some more reenactment movies.

A tourist stands in the rain and looks over the Roman Forum (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Nicole in the Roman Forum (Photo/Jason Rafal)

The Roman Forum was dotted with cats that lived among the ruins. Most of them stayed away from the human-populated areas, far out of reach of the retaining chains, but one was sitting right next to the walkway, and when I knelt down, she walked up and rubbed on my hand for a minute before politely (but firmly) walking away and sitting on the other side of the fence.

The forum cat decides that it has had enough of Nicole (Photo/Jason Rafal)

After a visit to the Jewish ghetto, near the Fiume Tevere, we started the long walk home. Jason’s feet are not in great shape, but hopefully we will be able to continue adventuring tomorrow. We have sampled pizza and pasta, but we are behind on wine.

Sunset in Rome (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Italy, Day 1: Benvenuti a Roma

November 06, 2014 by Nicole Harrison in Italy

Story by Nicole

We didn’t learn any Italian before coming to Rome.

The closest we got was when we boarded our second plane, from Newark to Rome, and Jason realized that the screens on the seats in front of us had games, among them a language learning game. We quickly became masters of arbitrary nouns—gatto, carne, etc. But 12 hours later, as we were sitting at lunch at a ristorante near our hotel, I could not remember how to ask for the bill. I checked the book five times, and each time, I thought I could remember the simple phrase. Then, when I put down the book and tried to repeat it to myself, my mind was completely blank. Sleep deprivation is a funny thing.

We spent an entire day traveling. We flew out of Denver at 10 a.m., landed in Newark at 3 p.m., took off for Rome at 6 p.m., and got to Rome at 8:15 a.m. I still have no idea what time it is anywhere.

Landing in Rome. (Photo/Jason Rafal)

Rome has been rainy so far. It goes in waves—varying layers of clouds, then a light drizzle, then pounding rain. The streets are flooding in places; cobblestones may not always be the best way to channel water. The city is wet, somewhat dirty, surprisingly quiet. I love it.

Our hotel is a Holiday Inn Express, which is annoyingly American, but the receptionists put up with my disorientation and terrible accent well so far, which is definitely a plus. Our balcony looks out over rows of working-class housing in various stages of dilapidation, as well as a metro station. We are just southeast of the city center, possibly in Municipo V. It’s hard to tell on the map.

The view from our hotel balcony. (Photo/Nicole Harrison)

Tomorrow will (hopefully) be a day of interesting adventures and better pictures. Maybe I will even make some progress with my Italian phrases.

Leonardo da Vinci-Fiumicino airport. (Photo/Jason Rafal)