We have been in Shkodër three nights. It was supposed to be a quick stop-over, but, at about 4am on the first night, Blaine and I awoke independently of one another and were, shall we say, ill. It must have been dinner, but whatever it was, it was decidedly unpleasant for two days. Our hotel had no air-conditioning, our room was on the fifth floor, and the elevator seems permanently out of order. At least we had a western toilet. Luckily, Blaine recovered first and was able to venture out for supplies; otherwise, we may not have eaten for two days.

But let me not mislead you! Albania has been an amazing adventure. So let’s back up a ways.

When we left Tirana, we decided to take the train north. It is very slow, double or triple the length of a bus ride of the same distance, but also very cheap and more fun. At the station, we met an interesting Albanian family. The father had worked in Italy for ten years and spent four in an Italian prison (we couldn’t figure out why). He was covered in tattoos, including a large Statue of Liberty on his leg. The little girl was adorable and made friends with me over a bunch of grapes. The mother was very sweet, but explained to us that her infant son was blind at birth but could easily be cured by a transplant if he were an American child.

On the train we met a young farmer who learned english in school. He writes poetry (in english!) and desperately wants to leave Albania to either go to university or to work. He begged us to help him make contact with schools in the States with agricultural studies departments. Honestly, I don’t know that there is anything we could do to help him, especially since he is already thirty, but it was hard not to feel for him.

We got off the train at Lezhe, where the national hero is entombed, and hopped in a minibus headed to Schengjin to stay the night. Unfortunately, the driver misunderstood us and took us to Rreschen, an hour in the opposite direction. He felt terrible and bought us coffee and even called his daughter, who spoke some english, to sort things out. He must not have felt too terrible, though, because when we finally got back to Lezhe, he charged us full price for both directions before sending us towards the proper minibus.

Schengjin is a bizarre beach town, mostly filled with domestic tourists. From the beach it looks like a rundown version of any touristy beach town, with high-rise hotels and apartment buildings. The view from our hotel window, which looked out the back of the building, away from the beach and into a parking lot, told a different story. There was a group of young, shoeless boys playing soccer next to a massive pile of trash. Wild dogs lurked along the edges of the parking lot and, in the middle of the trash pile, three cows foraged. Still, the water was very beautiful and we had a lovely walk on the beach in the evening.

The next day we headed back to the Lezhe train station. I was reading in the waiting area when two teenage girls came and sat next to me. I was confused as to why they were sitting right next to me, since almost all the other seats in the room were empty, but I ignored them and kept reading. After much giggling and whispering, I heard one of them sat “goodt mornink?” I glanced up. She was thrilled and grabbed my arm and started chatting away. They were sisters and, between their italian and english, we managed to have quite a chat. Apparently, both go to gymnastics school here in Shkodër and were in Schengjin to go to the beach with their family (at this point we were introduced to father and brother and several other family members scattered around the room were pointed out). The younger sister, who was 17, was extremely excited to meet us and stayed with us until we were settled on the train. The younger brother, probably only about 12, hung around for a while longer to make sure we didn’t do anything exciting, before rejoining his family. All in all, it was pretty awesome.

And then we arrived in Shkodër, where we went to a hotel recommened by our farmer friend. The Hotel Rosafa looks like a building from the movie “Brazil”. It is massive and grey, with a huge empty lobby and wide concrete stairwells and many broken windows. The walls of our room were covered in graffiti and, as I said, the elevator was permanently out of order. The good things? It is very cheap, the room was clean, and the beds were comfortable. Still, next time I get sick, I hope it’s at the Radisson.

We went directly from Sofia to Skopje, the capital of Macedonia, which is pretty much the center of the country. I would have liked to explore eastern Macedonia more, but there is almost no information on this country as it is largely unexplored. What I could find seemed to indicate that the only things to do in the east were hiking and camping. The only way to access this part of the country, unless you have a car, would be a series of local buses. We decided it wasn’t worth it.

Skopje is an amazing city. It has all the marks of eastern Europe: the massive Communist bloc apartments, the scantily clad women, and the general disrepair. What makes it interesting is that it also has a strong Turkish influence. For every church, there is a mosque. For every woman in hot-pants, there is one in a headscarf. Despite a devastating earthquake in the 1960s, there is a well-preserved original section of the city, which predates the Communist era buildings. It has small quaint buildings that look exactly as you might picture old Europe (imagine those building where the second story is a little bigger than the first and supported by wooden beams at the corners). Apparently, it also has a thriving arts community, which was evidenced at our hostel, where every wall was an art project. The tub in the bathroom was spray-painted with green and black spots and painted animals and plants covered many rooms. (Yes, I know my last blog said that there are no tubs, but this is the exception to prove the rule!)

From Skopje to Ohrid. Again, we considered visiting some of the places in between, but Macedonia just doesn’t have much for tourists. Ohrid, on the other hand, thrives on tourism. It is the spiritual capital for the Orthodox in Macedonia. The town of Ohrid sits on the edge of Lake Ohrid, which is ringed by monasteries. The water of the lake is incredibly pure because it comes from several springs in the south and flushes out the Black Drin river in the north. I don’t know why the river is called “black”; it is one of the clearest tourqoise rivers I have ever seen, deep enough for people to dive off the bridge in town and yet you can see the bottom. The town is the epitomy of a beach town, with cheap crap sold on every corner and people wandering around in nothing but bikinis or speedos. Still, it is very old and retains quite a bit of charm. We visited the St. Naum monastery to the south, where some of the springs are, and it was really beautiful. We both put our heads to St. Naum’s tomb and listened for his heartbeat. The church is tiny, but really gorgeous.

We are now in Tirana, Albania. We had wanted to go from Ohrid to Pogradec, which is just around the other side of Lake Ohrid, but, according Macedonian transit, there is absolutely no way to do this except a fifty euro taxi. In the end we decided to just take the bus to Tirana, which is in the center of Albania. The ride was ridiculously long (more than nine hours for less than 200km!), but it was good to see some of this strange country. So far, this is the least rebuilt place we have visited in this part of the world. There is construction everywhere, but people are very poor. This means that they will complete either the first or second floor of a house and move in before starting on the rest of the building. It is strange to see people living literally above or below a construction site. A huge effort is going into beautifying Tirana, which is the capital city. Sadly, it is largely unfinished at this point, so we are seeing half paved roads, bulldozers, and massive holes in the ground. I have never visited anywhere where the history feels so fresh. The deteriorating apartment buildings are decorated with socialist slogans and brightly colored designs. Until the 90s religion was banned, so most of the churches are under construction, though a few survived and were used for other purposes. One mosque still stands, which we visited. It was preserved because of its beauty, and it is very different than other mosques we have seen. It is also tiny. Apparently, 10,000 people went to pray there in 1991 in protest. The police chose not to stop them, and it has be an active mosque ever since. Its a really interesting city, but the “sights” are few. Still, we have been enjoying it here.

1. Dryers: most of the world doesn’t even use them. That’s ok. But those dryers that do exist outside the US are sadly inadequate. Hours after you put your clothes in, you find them still wet, though perhaps a bit warm. I don’t understand.

2. NYC’s subway map: the NY subway map is easier to read than any other system, mostly because it is superimposed over a map of the city. Other maps have a network of colored lines with only the stop names marked. It doesn’t help that most cities do not have numbered streets.

3. Sponges: laugh if you will, but this is one of the small irritations of difference. A sponge in the rest of the world is a non-absorbent square block that holds neither water nor soap. This means constant reapplications of dishsoap. Score one for the American corporate scientists!

4. Window screens: there is no comparison for this one; Americans got ‘em, the rest of the world don’t. I’m sure there are some places, perhaps parts of Africa, that do have them, but it does not seem to correspond to the mosquito population. Places that have mosquitos seem to think a mosquito net will suffice. It won’t.

5. Ice and water: order a beverage, aside from beer or wine, in the USA it will come with ice. I sort of miss that. Also, restaurants do not bring water when you sit. In Italy, several times we were actually denied water when we asked for “aqua di grifo” or tap water. “No. Only bottled.” We Americans have sued for less!

6. Refridgerators: the phrase “bigger is better” was surely coined by an American traveller in any country other than the US. These foreign fridges are little more than large mini-fridges. We stayed with an English couple in Italy who, after living in America, found the international variety so inadequate they special ordered a refridgerator from America. Score one for the yanks!

7. Bathrooms: this one may have something to do with the fact that Blaine and I have partaken exclusively in lower tier establishments, but here goes.
-Toilets seem strangely smaller than their American counter-parts. Flushing them is a new skill to be mastered with each new country. In many places, tp goes into a trash can, so the toilet’s flush is far less powerful, often taking several tries before one can respectably leave the area.
-Bathtubs are beyond rare, even in personal homes, and the shower stalls seem to have gotten smaller and smaller the further east we travel. (Am I getting fatter?)
-Sinks. I like to wash my hands with hot water. It’s a sort of comforting feeling. I am sad to report that hot water is reserved solely for the shower. (Often there is no hot water in the kitchen either!)

That’s all I can think of now. I’ll keep adding them as i thinknof them. I won’t make a list of the things the rest of the world got right, as it would be considerably longer.

When we returned to the bus station the next morning, I asked Blaine to go buy bus tickets. He was gone so long that I was beginning to worry, but he eventually returned. He had had a bit of an altercation with the vendor. Apparently, she didn’t want to sell him tickets. He would say “I need two tickets to Popovo,” holding up two fingers. She would shake her head, saying something in Bulgarian. Blaine would gesture and repeat himself. Then she would say “Popovo” and hold up two fingers. Blaine would nod and say “yes”. She apparently then became rather upset. Blaine was confused, and also becoming a bit upset. In the end, she gave him the tickets. We sat and pondered this. Quite a while later, it finally dawned on us. In Bulgaria, you nod your head for no and shake for yes. We knew this, but it has been consistently impossible to remember when it counts.

Finally, after a day and a half of travel, we arrived in Popovo, met our hosts and were whisked off to Palamartza, where we spent nearly the last month. Our hosts, Jeni and Jordi, are a young (about our age) English and Spanish couple. Bulgaria is so cheap that a young couple can buy a house with some land outright. It’s a tempting idea.

We were there to do some gardening and work on the house, though really they mostly needed help with the cooking and cleaning, which was awesome for us. Some cooking highlights include: we had an all-american meal including potato salad and devilled eggs; I made stuffed summer squash and chocolate chip cookies in the traditional wood-burning peschka (stove); Blaine made perhaps his best stir-fry yet; we dyed our hands purple picking mulberries for mulberry sorbet.

Jeni and Jordi were fantastic as hosts and are now new friends. They included us in everything going on in the village and in their lives. They are surprisingly integrated into the community, even dancing tradional Bulgarian dances with the other villagers at a national competition in Varna (they won some metals!). Since we were there for Jeni’s birthday, we got to see how the Bulgarians celebrate. All day long, she had a parade of women visiting and bringing her flowers, crockery, and tablecloths. Her birthday party was full of good food, good drink, and enthusiastic dancing. We even learned some steps!

The same weekend as Jeni’s birthday, we attended a double christening. The parents are another young couple. The mother, Daisy, grew up in New York after her Serbian father and Bulgarian mother fled communism in 1988. Zollie, the father, is also from the states and is a true expat, having returned from the Iraq war with a strong sense of horror and anger at our government. Really interesting people. In any case, one of Zollie’s friends was to be the godfather of Mila, the baby girl. Cliff (a great banjo player we hope to keep in touch with when we return) hadn’t been previously baptised, hence the double christening. It took place in Palamatrza’s tiny country church. Of course the whole ceremony was in Bulgarian, so we didn’t really know what was going on, but Daisy told me later that when we had all turned to face the back of the church we were actually spitting at the devil.

Speaking of Daisy, one night, when we were at her house she “threw the beans” for us. This is a traditional form of fortune telling, using numerology similar to the i ching. Daisy learned if from her grandmother and uses a set of beans passed down to her that are at least fifty years old. She answers a question the seeker asks silently and I have to say some of her answers gave me goosebumps!

There is so much more to say about our time in Palamartza, but these were some highlights. As always, we were ready to leave, having gotten the travel itch again, but we were also very sad. On our last night we all went out for pizza, with some of the other English folks and Jeni’s mom, Viv, who also lives there. It was a lovely night, and having Viv there was nice, since she was sort of our temporary mom (in all the good ways).

And now Sofia. It was a long train ride, but huge parts of Bulgaria are covered in seas of sunflowers, which are all in bloom this time of the year, so it wasn’t so bad. Sofia is very much another big city, not very different from other big cities, except that there are sex shops everywhere. We will spend two days exploring it and then on to Macedonia!

We wandered the bazaar district, avoiding the Grand Bazaar, and saw hundreds of headscarf vendors selling every imaginable pattern and style. We strolled past a barrel-maker and more pots, pans, giant lighters, and glass blue eyes than I thought possible. When we got too hot we stopped for soft serve and then headed back to the touristy world of ancient cisterns. This particular cistern has two massive Medusa heads holding up a couple of pillars along the back wall that were especially interesting. Historians think they were stolen from the Romans. What they can’t figure out us why they put one on it’s side and one upside down. Don’t worry, we took pictures. In fact, you can see them in the Istanbul section of our flickr page by clicking here

We also stumbled upon the hip and funky Tünel neighborhood, which is full of cute coffee shops, a million musical instrument shops, awesome graffiti, and a healthy quotient of “freaks”, complete with colored hair, dreadlocks, funny clothes, and lots of body mod. That pretty much cinched the deal; we loved Istanbul.

It didn’t hurt that on our last night, after a full belly of delicious pilav (cheap, delicious, nutritious!), we found a nargile (aka hookah) cafe by the river that seemed to only serve locals but was more than welcoming. We sat and drank tea and smoked nargile, which is about as relaxing as you can get. They don’t us the self-lighting charcoal in Turkey. Instead, there is a place next to the cafe where they have a smoldering fire creating charcoal. A man comes around with a metal bucket and switch out your coals on regular basis. Let me tell you, it tastes quite a bit better.

From Istanbul we caught a bus to Edirne,the last major town before Bulgaria. We were there for Kirkpinar, which is an oil-wrestling festival in it’s 649th year. Edirne is a lovely town with a surprisingly European feel. We arrived on the second day of the week-long festival. The wrestling is only on the last three days, but there was a pleothora of dance demonstrations, musical events, and, best of all, a home cooked foods competition. We were quite literally the only tourists at the event and Blaine was the only man over the age of 12 who was neither a judge nor journalist. We oggled the foods until the journalists started chatting Blaine up and encouraging us to taste things. Once the mayor and governor were finished sampling we got over our shyness and dove in. We managed to taste a few things before the women swarmed the tables making it all elbows and we backed off. I tell you, the baklava was the stuff of legend and the cook has a silver spoon trophy to prove it.

Friday was the big day, the first day of wrestling. We attended the opening ceremony and spent about two and a half hours watching the wrestling in the Kirkpinar stadium. The men wear long leather shorts and are covered in olive oil. When a set number are properly greased up a group of referees spreads out on the field and a bell sounds. All the wrestlers march out swinging their arms. Some stop to kneel on one knee and pray. When they reach the end of the field they head back and find their ref (the refs all wear numbers) and start wrestling. At any given time, there were about 25 matches going on at once. Each match continues until one man is flipped over onto his back. There is no chance of a draw. It they get too tired they will just sort of lean on each other until the ref yells at them. If the match goes so long that the ref is needed in his next match, the fight is put on hold until the next round. Since both men are all slippery, they must use their opponent’s shorts as a point to grab onto. Let’s just say there were a lot of arms down shorts. Pics soon. As I said, we stayed for about 2 1/2 hours and would have stayed longer if we hadn’t gotten hungry. It was absolutely fascinating.

After the oil wrestling, we headed back into town to watch the sumo demonstration. There were real sumo wrestlers from Japan and we got to see a full warm up routine and a bunch of matches. Those guys are tough! The sound of the initial impact at the beginning of each match is really shocking. One of the guys had a bruise on his shoulder at the beginning of the demonstration. By the end, it had swollen up literally like he had a baseball under his skin.

Since it was our last night in Edirne, we had decided to camp instead of paying for another night at the hotel (which, by the way, had by far the worst smelling bathroom I have ever encountered in my life). We are still a little timid about putting up our tent for fear we will be run off by property owners or the cops, but since it was the festival people were sleeping everywhere. Any place with grass had tents or bedrolls. We found a nice spot outside the main mosque. It was in a field owned by the archeology/ethnography museum and full of old headstones and other monuments. I have never done urban camping before. It was a bit noisy and a bit bright, but otherwise fantastic. When Blaine got up in the middle of the night, he discovered the entire field was full of people sleeping. Most were gone by the time we woke up.

Today, we packed up our things, said goodbye to Edirne, and headed to the Bulgaria. A nice man picked us up and gave us a lift to the border. He was a border gaurd heading into work. We walked the border, which was a first for both of us, but they didn’t give us any hassle. On the other side, we caught a bus to Svilengrad and are now, several buses later, headed to Popovo in Targevishte. It’s a little intimidating being somewhere were even the alphabet is foreign, but so far the people are extremely warm, friendly, and, above all, helpful.

Hello new country! Hello Eastern Europe!

What a fantastic week! Pisa is actually a small town, but we enjoyed our two days there. We visited the leaning tower, of course. We didn’t actually go up into the tower (not at a whopping €15), but we did snap some pics and oggle it. It leans. It’s much smaller than I anticipated. Not much else to say.

The next day we headed to the beach! It was the first really hot, beach-worthy day and it was a Sunday so the place was packed. Most beaches here charge admission. We were having trouble finding the free beach so we checked the price. €25 for two chairs and an umbrella. I think that is insane, and apparently I’m not alone. The pay beaches were empty and the free beach was completely packed. It was the best people watching. There were no tourists, just a sea of Italians sunbathing and sunburning on the sand. The Mediterranean is still a bit cold, but it was otherwise a perfect day.

From Pisa to Bettola, a small town in the province of Piacenza where my very distant cousin, Simone, is mayor. Simone showed us the town, literally and figuratively. We ate and drank incredibly well, sampling typical foods and local wines. He knows everyone, so we actually got to meet local people! This is surprisingly rare when you are travelling, as the only people interested in chatting up the grubby backpackers is usually other grubby backpackers. Simone took us sunbathing at the river above town, borrowed a jeep to take us to a gorgeous nearby valley, and out for an amazing night in Piacenza where a local band was playing their 200th show after several international tours. We spent five days with him and were very sad to say goodbye. Luckily, that was not the end of our family connection; Simone sent us to his brother in Parma, which was our next destination.

For those of you who know NY, going from Simone’s to Fabio’s was like going from Manhattan to Brooklyn. Simone is the mayor, Fabio owns a lovely, hip coffee-shop and, thus, knows just as many people, just a different set. We ate and drank more amazing meals. I think we ate better with my cousins than any time since we left my mom’s in January. Fabio took us to see his grunge cover band practice, which was tons of fun. Grunge is alive and well in Italy, so much so that is made me wish it were still kicking in the US. Our time with Fabio was too short, but we had a plane to catch, so we sadly said goodbye. I am thrilled to say that I not only gained two awesome relatives, I made two new friends (not to mention the rest of the band!). I can’t wait to have a house again so I can return the hospitality!

From Fabio’s we took a train to the Bergamo airport and a plane to Kos, Greece. A quick word of advice, Bergamo is the worst airport for sleeping in ever. Kos is a little slice of paradise, and for a week we lounged on the beach and swam in the Mediterranean. We rented scooters for a day and drove all over the island. We found a tiny nude beach down a long, steep, winding dirt/sand road which was terrifying on a scooter, especially if, like me, you had never ridden one before. Since we were there we decided we had better take a (skinny) dip and cool off in the perfect clear water. It was amazing. The only down side (aside from some creepy guy trying to take pics of all the naked people) was that we had to use Blaine’s underwear as a towel, since we hadn’t brought one. I definately plan to return to Greece to do some island hopping when I have more money. So beautiful!

We caught a ferry from Kos to Bodrum, Turkey, which was just 4km. Leaving Greece was a bit nerve wracking as we had over-stayed our time in the Schengen states by almost three weeks. Luckily, after much passport examination, use of a calculator, and a consultation with his superior, our passport control officer gave us a strict admonishment not to return to Greece and sent us on our way. Better an admonishment than a fine, but a tense few minutes nonetheless. Of course, if we wait three months we can return without an issue.

Bodrum is horrendous. I don’t suggest a visit unless you have a hankering for bland overpriced tourist food and shopping for not-particularly-discounted designer crap. There is also an assortment of pricy beach bars and massive clubs (€20 cover anyone?) but we weren’t really in the market for such things. We did find a really fantastic grungy little locals-only restaurant, but it couldn’t offset the rest.

From Bodrum to Pamukkale to see the calcium deposits. People have been bathing on the calcium-rich springs here for all of history, and there are the ruins of a sizable Roman city, Hieropolis, to prove it. The real draw, however, is the calcium itself, which has completely covered the mountain. It looks like a glacier, but the warm spring water and the boiling sun insure that it is anything but cold. Many pictures to come.

We took a night bus from Pamukkale to Göreme, which is in the region of Cappadocia. Our hotel there was called Flintstones, aptly named considering the landscape. Imagine Tent Rocks in NM. Now imagine that, for at least the last 2000 years, people have been carving houses and churches out of the rock formations. As you hike through the valleys, you see windows all around you. Most are inaccessible, but with patience we were able to find a few entrances to scramble into. We also found a wild cherry tree with the most delicious fruit. On our second day of hiking the camera broke, so we couldn’t get pictures of the most impressive church we visited (complete with secos), but we took plenty previous to that.

We left Göreme and headed a bit north to visit one of the underground cities. When the Muslims decided to attack to Christian Byzantines, the Byzantines fled into a series of tunnels and rooms under the ground. Some had 19 or more levels, with massive stone doors to seal out enemies. It was fascinating, if a bit claustophobic at times.

We had decided we would camp in the area around the city, but when we started looking for a place to stash our things we were called over by a cafe owner across the street from the city entrance. He told us to camp in the orchard behind the cafe, which was incredibly peaceful. We set up under a huge walnut tree and that was were Blaine woke up on the morning of his 27th birthday.

Sadly, it wasn’t until we were settled at the bus station waiting for our bus to Ankara that Blaine checked his watch and realized it was, in fact, his birthday. I still feel terrible about that. Bad bad girlfriend! I will have to make it up next year. When we reached Ankara we searched around and found him a birthday beer. It was quite a mellow celebration.

Ankara was a bit of a wash. We bought a new (used) camera and visited the mausoleum of Atatürk, the founder of the new, non-Ottoman Turkey. The mausoleum was interesting, if a bit full of propoganda. Immediately after our visit, Blaine came down with a stomach bug, which took another day in the hotel and a day on the bus to shake. Luckily, he seems healed, if not yet 100 percent.

So that is it. We are now in Istanbul. We visited the Blue Mosque today, which was beautiful. We also went to the Grand Bazaar, which was a bit dissapointing, especially after having been to the Morrocan medinas.

Whew. More soon.

I only wanted to write a quick note to say that we rode the train up the coast to Pisa today. As I looked out the window at the mediterranean I realized that four months ago we were standing on the beach in Barcelona staring at the same sea from the other side. It’s a remarkable feeling.

After some lunch, we headed towards Piazza San Pietro to try to secure tickets for an audience with the pope. We figured getting blessed by the pope would, at the very least, be an interesting experience. It turns out Piazza San Pietro is also the location of the massive and famous Basilica, so we went in for a look and to try to figure out where to get the tickets. We never managed to get tickets, though we did eventually find the line, but the Basilica was very impressive.

What blew both the Vatican Museum and the Basilica out of the water was the modest little church we visited at the end of the day. It’s “cemetery” consisted of four small rooms off the church that were completely full of the bones of 40,000 Capuchin monks. The bones are arranged in patterns on the walls and ceilings: a sacred heart made primarily of collar bones and vertebrae, a pinwheel of jawbones, sculls flanked by shoulder blades to look like the classic image of the winged skull. The rest of the bones were carefully stacked to form walls and arches. Several skeletons in each room were intact and wearing monks robes, some reclining, some standing stooped as if in prayer. It was one of the strangest places I have ever been, but it was also strangely beautiful. At the end was a plaque stating (paraphrased), “We were what you are now, we now are what you will be.”. If you ever come to Rome, this is an absolute must. (thanks to Ruby for the tip)

Today started out with a major treat; we went out for sushi! We looked up a restaurant and getting there took us through areas we would not have had any reason to visit. It is so good to see the side of Rome that involves normal people leading normal lives. It’s so easy to see nothing but tourists and history. After lunch we found the most incredible gelati. I had white wine cream, strawberry and spumante, and sage and rasberry. Blaine also had the sage as well as coffee and an intensly dark chocolate and red wine flavor. I don’t normally write about food but this was extemely noteworthy, especially after our recent diet of bread, cheese, salad, and rotisserie chicken (the place we are staying doesn’t have a kitchen.

Aside from eating, we visited Carravagio’s St. Mathew paintings at a church, which were really beautiful. We were heading towards the church when we saw signs for the Pantheon, so we added that to our day. It’s dome is incredible. The best part is that it has an open top and it started to rain while we were there. We stood for a long time and watched the circle of water pour into the center of the church. I would have liked to see it before it was a church, but of course that was a very long time ago.

We ended our day by visiting the Spanish Steps, which were not very amazing. However, we popped into the church at the top of the steps and while we were looking around evening mass started. The singing and the organ were incredibly beautiful so we stayed for nearly an hour.

You may find it odd how much religous stuff we’ve been doing these last few days, but that’s Rome. We stop and look at whatever we come across and that seems to be mostly related to Catholicism here.

Our second stay was with Annie, another English lady. Or so we thought. It turned out we were actually staying on our own in Annie’s idyllic vacation rental. We did some painting, gardening, and cleaning and spent the rest of the time enjoying the kind of vacation we will not be able to afford for a long time. A converted millhouse, babbling brook, fields of daisies, and a pool were among the perks. It’s the kind of place you go to “get away from it all”. In our case, this was quite literal. The house is several kilometers straight up a mountain and with no car, we only went into town twice in the ten days we stayed. Add to that no tv, no internet, no english language radio, no newspaper, and the pool wasn’t yet open: let’s just say it’s a miracle we didn’t die of boredom. But somehow we found ways to fill our days and it ended up being a really blissful time. Annie was a very strange and uptight new-age type, but our interaction with her was minimal.

Our final stay was with, you guessed it, more English people. This one was a housesitting gig with some very well-off folks named Tim and Louise. It’s not a world we are familiar with, the land of second homes and expensive cars, at least not quite so up close and personal, but they were very nice people and they let us use the car while they were away. Aside from a lost dog scare, it was really nice. We did a few day trips to Firenze (Florence) and visited Assisi, Perugia, and a few other Umbrian and Tuscan towns.

While all this was lovely and it was amazing to spend six weeks in Italy without spending any money, Blaine and I are thrilled to be on our own again. Finally, we are actually interacting with Italians! In Italy! Imagine that!
Rome is incredible. There is so much here. In just two days we have seen the forum, the colosseum (sp?), several churches, the catacombes, a religious festival, and still found time to drink too much wine with a bunch of other travellers. The highlight yesterday was the Bocca della Verita (Mouth of Truth). Today we climbed the Holy Stairs on our knees. It is a long and painful journey, but also an amazing experience. They are supposedly the stairs that Jesus walked several times on the day he was sentenced to death. Empress Helen had them moved here in 334. Wow, right?

All this has left me pooped, so I leave it there for now. More very soon now that I actually have something to write about again!