All over Rome, Saturday, 1 June 2019

At 2:30am, I awoke to the high-decibel screeching of a mob of seagulls near the window. They seem to congregate near the church, and spend the night fighting over something. It was like trying to sleep next to fighting cats. Even with earplugs I could not sleep. I finally got up at 5:30am, did some email and searched for Colosseum tickets, and then had a nice egg and coffee breakfast with Barney. Then unfortunately the hot water was not working so we had cold showers, and waited for the plumber to arrive.

We then headed over to St. Peter’s to see the square and get our Roma Pass tickets. After a few false starts, we found the right place, got the tickets, and confirmed the Vatican Museum, but sadly the Borghese Museum was booked. St. Peter’s Square was impressive as can be, it of course mobbed with tourists and people trying to sell you various tours and tickets, which is a bit exhausting. I hate having to avoid looking at people in that way.

After St. Peter’s, we walked up to the Ottaviano Metro Red line, so Barney could have his usual new city metro experience. The subway was fairly crowded but the trains arrived quickly. We got to the Termine station and transferred to the other Blue line to the Garbatella station. This area was quite deserted, a bit of a shock after the massive crowds at St. Peter’s, and seemed to be mostly abandoned warehouses and public housing high rises. We walked to the Centrale Montemartini Museum, a former electric powerhouse now filled with early Roman statues and related artifacts, sarcophagi, mosaics, and more. The huge black power generating machinery is still there, and the juxtaposition of the sleek white marble of the heads and torsos is quite a contrast yet somehow fits with the overall mood. There were very few people, we almost had the place to ourselves, and we really had the chance to see the pieces up close.

We then took a 15 minute walk to a restaurant on our list, through a rather depressed area, few people, most stores closed, little activity. It seemed odd so close to the center of Rome. We reached the restaurant, Flavio al Velavevodeto, which had nice homemade pasta but seemed utterly uninterested in any type of service or interaction. We left, walked about 10 minutes to the Piramide station, and took the Metro to Cavour for our 4:00pm Domus Aureus tour.

The Rome Metro has no escalators at street level, only stairs and elevators. They do have escalators lower down, just not at the street level.Perhpas they save a lot on maintenance that way.

Google maps took us to the wrong station, then to a dead end street which stopped at a locked gate, then up a street through a park, all of which the map said would be close to the entrance, none were right. I finally figured out where the tickets office was near the Colosseum, we ran over, and got there 5 minutes after the tour started. The people were very nice, we got our hard hats, and off we went. The archaeological work done there was significant, emptying out 20-25 feet of dirt that had buried this sumptuous palace. Some of the frescoes remained, and there was a virtual reality experience to show what it looked like, which was amazing. In one of the last most luxurious rooms used by Nero, the octagonal space is supposed to have great acoustics, so of course I asked if I could sing, and did a few bars of “Piangero” which did sound nice there. It is an active archaeological site, cool and damp, so rather a relief from the building heat outside.

Afterwards, quite tired, we headed for the Colosseum Metro for bus tickets, saw the new Metro LIne C which is being built through all kinds of active archaeological digs and areas of artifacts. We took the 87 bus back to our area, had a refreshing ice cream at the Frigidarium Madeleine had recommended, and came back to the loft to recharge.

By 8:30, we were hungry, not sure where to go on a busy Saturday night. We found a place called Prosciutteria Cantina dei Papi which was tiny, really a deli with some small boxes for seating and wooden tables. We had a mixed plate of antipasti which was incredible, plus a tricolore salad and a Toscano salad, both of which were huge. We ate mostly the greens we have been craving, and because it is mostly a deli, we took much of the charcuterie and cheese and sun-dried tomatoes back for a lunch tomorrow. The young woman and man running the place were very nice and quite busy, as the place filled up after we arrived with Italians. We felt lucky to find something so authentic and delicious.

Back to the loft, trying to figure out how to get Colossseum tickets, a nd I think I finally figured it out, for 9:30 Tuesday, our last day here. Hope it works.