Feelings of Today: Cities are big. Old cities are full of history. Combine the two and they will always have something to occupy those who are curious. It was time for seeing and experiencing things we like and that which we might like, in a semi-familiar megapolis, on our holidays.
Full Day’s Events: Enhanced with a raspberry filled croissant and a cappuccino we walked around modern Ostia Antica one last time. We will miss this town, but the big city calls. The city with a world affecting ancient life, a hiccup of history in the early Middle Ages, and a whole lotta power grabs by the Papacy and Italian city states before they unified in 1861…Rome!
We had been here 14 years ago, with my mom and her friend, for four days, and returned for another two before flying home. It was a series of brisk days that we hoped to not repeat. To make that prophecy true we booked to stay here for 12 days together, a day and a half in nearby Tivoli, and me staying for three extra days and nights.
Our home base was on Via dell’Orso which was central to just about everything. Our small street has some cafes, two ostias, a liquor store, a wine bar, cool little shops, and two restaurants including one we ate lunch at after checking in…Laguna. While eating our mixed vegetable soup and lamb with potatoes, with cappuccinos afterwards, we chatted with Americans who were nearby. They both said that this was one of the best authentic classic Roman restaurants and one of them has lunch here several times a week (as he lived here). Natalie and I thoroughly enjoyed our meal, with its warm comfortable flavours and quality, that we knew we would return.
After making a nearby grocery run, and settling in, we were off to walk to the Trastevere district across the Tiber River. In the age-old story of the area, Rome beat up the Etruscans living there but waited till the 500’s BCE to allow folks (immigrants and fishermen) to live here. It remains the most multicultural area of Rome, with very windy streets, but that is changing with gentrification.
The purpose of our visit to this area was Devour, a food tour company. We enjoyed our tapas tour in Madrid with the company and planned to do two together. Chiara, our host, met us and gave an overview on the area and a background on her regular day job as a food archeologist. The theme of the tour was late night eating in this district which was equally applicable for eating anywhere in Italy. We went to a wine bar (La Vite, for traditional snacks with good local wines), Suppti (for a fried rice ball with mozzarella and tomato paste inside), Bar San Caslisto (for a spritz in a four-generation old bar and gelateria), Proloco (wine and food on dried bread), Checco Er Carettiere (for tomato and cheese pasta then to the attached gelateria for two flavours of our choice). We both highly recommend this tour company.
The walk back was very enjoyable with a stop at the Pantheon and one of Rome’s authentic 13 Egyptian obelisks. The day was done. 9.2 km walked and 13 flights of stairs.
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