Oh my goodness, how long has it been since we posted? We left you all hanging in Positano. Which, to be honest, is not a bad place to hang. It's pretty close to heaven.
(NOTE: We've actually finished our vacation and are back home. But I'll finish the daily blog so that y'all can get the full story.)
Today we made the final leg of our journey -- from Positano to Rome. We rose, finished packing our cases, ate our final breakfast here, said goodbye to our amazing balcony view, and checked out of the Hotel Savoia.
We've had some pretty incredible luck when it comes to catching buses and trains. Very rarely have we had to wait for anything and today was no exception. With our 50lb suitcases in tow, packs strapped to our backs, we walked the half kilometer up the hill to the main road through Positano to catch a bus to Sorrento. When we were almost to the top of the hill, we saw the SITA bus sitting at the stop, the last few people in line filing through its doors. So we RAN -- yes, RAN, uphill, with luggage. Okay, I'm being dramatic. It was about 10 meters. But that's probably farther than I've ran in probably a year and a half. Heh.
Once aboard the bus and in our seats, Hannah and I each took a piece of our seasick gum. It was supposed to help us with the motion-sickness that typically accompanies a voyage on these buses. You can sort of see what I'm talking about in this video that I took along the way: http://youtu.be/ti7sZ4KWcRM. It doesn't really do it justice but you can have an idea.
In the video you can hear a guy talking -- John -- who was traveling on his own and liked to talk. About pretty much everything. The entire way there. He was very nice, but it's difficult to focus on someone talking when your stomach is itching to re-upholster the seat in front of you.
I didn't get sick, but Hannah wasn't so lucky. She kept it down, but just barely, poor thing. So when we arrived in Sorrento and prepared to board the Circumvesuviana city train to Naples, she opted to take a motion-sickness pill. Which makes you oh-so-sleepy.
We took the train to Naples. Hannah slept. Then we caught a high-speed train from Naples to Rome. Hannah slept some more.
In Rome, things got a little tricky. I arranged for a B&B about 3 blocks from the Colosseum. But the B&B was owned by a couple who weren't in town. They needed for me to call and let them know when we arrived, so that they could have their neighbor let us in. Unfortunately, we did not have phone service in Italy. So I ended up having to find a pay phone and explain to a stranger in my bastardized Italian that I couldn't figure out how to use a phone. I started impressing the Romans early-on.
Oh -- Hannah took a nap on the sidewalk while this was happening. :)
Obviously, it all worked out. Our room was clean and spacious enough. The bed, similar to most of the beds we experienced, was sort of like lumpy plywood. But other than that it was very decent.
After we checked in and woke Hannah up, we decided to walk. We walked by the Colosseum then the Monumento Nazionale a Vittorio Emanuele II, which is a giant monument created to commemorate the first king of a unified Italy at the beginning of the 20th Century. It is elaborate and made of solid marble. Some call it the Wedding Cake. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altare_della_Patria
I'd like to point out how different Rome is from Naples. Both are very large and busy cities. Both have what Americans would call "crazy drivers" and crazier pedestrians. But Rome has an elegance about it that seems to be absent in Naples. It is full and busy without being dirty. You can't spit without hitting something ancient. It is full of tourists of course, so it is also full of languages. Every other person that you pass is speaking Italian, German, Spanish, English, Greek, Russian, etc. Rome is GRAND, in every sense of the word. It is huge. It is old. It is timeless.
We walked a bit further and decided that our first dinner in Rome would be Chinese food. Sometimes a little break from pasta is required, so we opted for rice and chicken which was delicious.
After dinner we walked to Trastevere (a bohemian part of Rome which features lots of restaurants and night life), and watched the sun set over the Tiber river. On the way back, we had THE BEST pear gelato -- you could feel the tiny bits of granular pear in its smooth sweet texture. Sooooooo good!
Not a bad first day in Rome. :)
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