Sunny in Rome

Rome has had some fantastic sunny weather these past two days.

Monday, a public holiday here for Epiphany, gave us blazingly blue skies and the city was buzzing, with families celebrating the last day of the Piazza Navona Christmas market, and street performers and musicians playing to huge crowds.  It was all a bit hectic, and impossible to keep on the “legal” sidewalk due to so many people, making it necessary to walk along the edges of the streets (no doubt frustrating to all the motorists and scooter riders, but hey {Roman shrug}..)

I took a walk down to the other side of my neighbourhood to see the church of Santa Cecilia and found myself in a maze of medieval streets – incredibly quiet compared to the more touristy side of Trastevere where my apartment is.  Here’s the serene and beautiful S.Cecilia in Trastevere, which is a mishmash of styles cobbled together from ancient to middle age, renaissance to baroque.  There’s been a church on this site since the third century, and the present structure sits over the supposed-house of Saint Cecilia (who endured three days locked in a steam bath and a subsequent decapitation attempt by the Roman authorities).

The little piazzas around the church are extremely beautiful, with ivy-clad houses in sepia and dusky pink and small restaurants and artists shops.  It is so peaceful over here, hard to believe the city centre is 10 minutes away on foot.

Up on the Campidoglio today, the hill that runs down past Michelangelo’s piazza to reveal the Roman Forum, Rome is dazzling in the sunlight.  I climbed up the 112 steps to the church of S. Maria d’Aracoeli to take some photos of the skyline – see below.

 

And in the morning, I skirted past the Largo Argentina, the Roman temples excavated by Mussoli, and once part of Pompey’s theatre (and the site of Julius Caesar’s assassination).  Surrounded on all four sides by traffic, this oasis shelters perhaps 50-60 homeless cats at any given time, cared for by the Largo Cat Sanctuary.  The future of these cats was under threat a year ago (historians claim they are damaging the site) but the cats are still there, preening themselves in every available bit of sunlight.