Pantheon

I do love the Pantheon. Here it sits, nearly 2000 years old in a busy piazza with its enormous inscription Marcus Agrippa built this – a proud boast. In its huge dome there is a central hole open to the sky and on a sunny day the light streams through this hole and lights up the frecoes and artwork inside. Today, it’s raining softly and the centre floor is roped off with a puddle an inch deep.

Inside there are some beautiful works and my favourite is the Annunciation by Melozzo da Fiorli. I love the scene depicted by the annunciation of the Virgin Mary, including the white lily that Mary holds in her hand. We know this lily as the Madonna Lily, and it is a pure, fragrant white flower that lights up any room with its creamy fragrance.

My guide book tells me that no matter what street I take in the area of the Pantheon I’ll eventually end up in this square itself. The streets wind about crazily, and it’s very easy to change direction and find yourself quite some distance from the piazza. Right now I’m looking for a café called the Tazza d’Oro, or Cup of Gold, which reputedly has the best coffee in Rome. Eventually I find it; a rather an ordinary looking place from the outside but indoors it is lovely, with a marble bench and industrial-sized coffee machine. As with all cafes, except the small local affairs, Madame behind the till takes your order and gives you a docket to take to the bar.

90 euro cents gets me a good cup of coffee and the barista is very quick. I can’t discern whether the coffee is of especial quality – hard to get a bad coffee anywhere in Rome. Mostly my requests for coffee get me an espresso but today I ask for it americano style, closer to a long black.

Last Sunday when I arrived at the apartment Biancamaria insisted I try the Café San Eustachio for a gran caffe so that’s my next coffee-shrine visit. In the meantime, I like the slightly scruffy but welcoming café at the end of my street. By my third morning the barista has made my 2/3 long black, very strong, to perfection.

Being happy

At­­­ about 5pm every day I start wondering where I’ll have dinner. Maybe it’s all the walking but I’m feeling my first pangs of hunger by then. Last night, I deliberated between the Sant’Anna (v. close, but mostly pasta and seafood), La Carbonara (hadn’t booked, and it always looks busy) or Roscioli’s (end of Street, great wine by the glass). Roscioli’s won.

I’ve got the hang of spingere (push) and tirare (pull) now, having had a few slapstick-like moments in Italian shop doorways. On tirare-ing my way into Roscioli’s, I wait for my man at the till to finish his conversation and show me to my table.

Its 7pm and there are a sprinkling of people about, all enjoying wine and ‘small plates’ – cured meats, cheeses and the like. Instantly I am allotted my three handsome and theatrical waiters and peruse the wine and food list. It’s very tempting to have a glass of the Nobile di Montepulciano but at 10 euro a glass it’s like drinking liquid gold, so I settle for a glass of Prosecco. Yum yum. With it, I have a plate of smoked swordfish, tuna and salmon.

All very pleasant sitting here planning tomorrow’s excursions. Am feeling very much like a local. Unfortunately, my attempt to ask for another glass of prosecco gets me the bill instead, so I leave after a nice dawdle over food and wine.

A left turn from my wine bar takes me towards the Campo, and it’s lively at night, families and tourists strolling about, people sitting under outdoor heaters at the bars and restaurants around the square. There’s even a busker, doing a complicated mime routine and the usual sprinkling of dogs and kids.

Heading homewards, I meet one of my neighbours on the stairs up to the third floor, and we wish each other buona sera.

I’m full-to-the brim happy.

Borghese

Before I left on my trip I booked a ticket for the Borghese Gallery online. This was a bit tricky as I wasn’t sure which day and time would be best. Anyway, today was the day and allotted time 11am to 1pm. So I headed out at about 10am, thinking this would be plenty of time. It wasn’t.

After yesterday’s chilly visit to Navona, I thought I’d do a quick revisit. More people about today, particularly art students sketching the Fountain of the Four Rivers. Imagine what it must be like, sitting on one of the marble benches for some time; five minutes and the cold was seeping through my coat and jeans to my bones.

Anyway, off to the Borghese Park. I headed up the Via del Corso to the Piazza del Popolo and started to climb up to the park. Hundreds of steps, all this walking has got to be slimming.

The park is starkly beautiful in the winter; incredibly green and damp, mossy trunks and bare branches. Around every corner there are vistas to stop and admire, and there’s absolute silence – hardly a soul around. Eventually after a few false turns I found the Borghese, now 45 minutes late. Which meant a too-short visit to the ground floor (sculpture; Bernini’s) and the first floor (pictures; Caravaggios). Nonetheless, a small and exquisite gallery and a highlight.

Later, same day: Via dei Chiavari

Returning with dinner from Rosciolis, I’m asked if I have the time, in Italian. Fortunately I don’t wear a watch so was able to reply ‘Non so’. I have arrived!

Monday, Feb 2nd: Campo de' Fiori

A few steps up on my street is the Roscioli Forno – one of the best bakeries and food specialty stores in Rome. The Rosciolis are *the* Rome foodie family, with other family members running the restaurant a few paces up on the Via dei Giubbonari. Bianca has told me to try their take-out for those evenings when cooking for myself is just too much trouble.

Despite its very appealing display I head off to the Campo itself. The time is 9am and the stall holders are busy, busy – washing salad leaves at the fountain tap, arranging produce or gathering to gesticulate wildly and discuss events of the day. The Darth-Vader like statue of Giordano Bruno looms over it all. I know Bruno was burned at the stake for heresy, including his ridiculous contention that the earth wasn’t flat but that’s the extent of my knowledge.

I’m very hungry, having had no dinner or breakfast. I stop at a café on the edge of the Campo and try out my ‘un café e una pasta’ line on the waitress behind the bar, who speaks excellent English. She humours me, anyway, and I sit inside and have a scarily strong double espresso and a crema-filled cornetto and try to read the International Herald Tribune in the half light. In the time it takes me about two dozen locals come in, order at the bar, drink their coffee and leave. My bill is 2.5 euro, which is a bargain.

In season at the market are blood oranges, artichokes, fennel, zucchini blossoms and radicchio. There a few mobile butcher and delicatessen vans, selling cheeses, cured meats and preserves. Some stalls sell only olive oil and balsalmic and there is a very colourful spices stall including all grades of pepperoncino. I stagger home with laden bags and a bottle of red wine under my arm. Fortunately I’m very close to the market.

Despite being in the middle of the city, there is a close neighbourhood feel to the Campo area. There are lots of dogs unleashed, and they lay on the cobbles while their owners make purchases. I’m particularly taken with a golden retriever pup who’s obviously quite at home lounging by the fountain tap. He tries drinking from the tap a few times and is shooed away but I wonder who’ll give in first.

In the afternoon, I take a right turn from my front door and cross the Corso Vittorio Emanuel II at the traffic lights along with a huge crowd of exchange students; they’re all carrying travel guides and cameras. I think they must be heading to the Pantheon as we part company on the other side. The traffic is completely indifferent to whether the pedestrian walk light is on, so there’s safety in moving with the scrum.

I get that pure pleasure surge at first sight of the Piazza Navona and actually it is very beautiful in the cold crisp air, with sightseers rugged up in coats, hats and scarves. There are stalls set up in the middle of the Navona selling watercolour and charcoal sketches of Rome, and some black African street vendors with the latest gimmick – singing stones that make a sort of screeching sound as you toss them in the air.

It’s really cold in the Piazza. I’ve got my wool scarf wrapped around my neck and chin and my collar is buttoned and turned up. The wind is icy, too cold for any lingering and I survive about 10 minutes on the marble bench by the Nile side of the sculpture before heading home. Mental note – buy very warm coat tomorrow.

Sunday Feb 1st, again: Dubai-Rome

This is an enormous plane. I’m in row 20 and I can’t see the back seats. I have the entire row to myself so I’ve stretched out over 3 seats, with my back to the window. Its bliss. The flight attendants continuously check to make sure we all have enough refreshments, pillows and blankets.

I’m reading Vita Sackville-West’s ‘Passenger to Teheran’ about her journey out to join Harold Nicolson in Isfahan. It’s highly evocative and I can follow the route she took in 1926 (over several weeks and via the bandit-infested mountains by car) on the inflight tracker. As we take off from Dubai I can see the incredible skyline of this city, with the most fantastic shapes of the skyscrapers; but soon we are crossing over the desert, on and on.

Only 6 hours for this journey. Eventually we reach the heel of Italy and I can see snow on the Apennines. I wonder how cold we’ll be when we head south to Basilicata and Puglia? About ten minutes out of Rome our Captain pipes up to announce our descent, in case we hadn’t noticed our ears popping. We land 5 mins early and I’m through passport control and at the baggage claim in record time. Gino, the driver arranged by my landlords, is holding an enormous placard with my surname on it. He hefts all my bags and we have a fast journey into Rome through deserted streets. Its siesta time. Current temperature is 17 degrees and I’m sweltering in my wool layers.

Amazing how cars can squeeze into these tiny maze-like lanes. Gino negotiates the Via dei Chiavari with inches each side of his very shiny Mercedes car. Massimo and Bianca arrive about the same time as we do, and they are instantly hospitable; Massimo races ahead to open up the apartment and Bianca and I take the tiny lift to the 3rd floor. This lift is so tiny I’m holding my travel bag over my head.

The apartment is lovely; enormous windows in the sitting room and bedroom with views of terracotta tiled roofs, roof gardens and sky. It’s a dream turned reality, and I’m so glad to be here. M & B give me a tour, show me how everything works and then tell me where to have the best coffee, where see the Caravaggios, directions to their favourite shops and galleries. I’m writing this all down in a shorthand I know I’ll be unable to decipher later on. We all troop downstairs to look at the gas and electricity meters and the wooden postbox for my apartment, Apartment 7. I wave them off in the little piazza opposite my front door and am alone for the first time in 24 hours.

Sunday, Feb 1st Perth-Dubai

I’m sitting in the Emirates Terminal 3 at the Costa Café with the world’s largest coffee (cost 23 dirham; have absolutely no idea of the exchange rate so could also be the world’s most expensive). Am actually feeling quite exhausted as this terminal is so big and I’ve been walking for at least 20 minutes to find my connecting departure lounge. Its 6am in the morning and every duty free shop, coffee shop and restaurant is teeming with people. I’d like to see outside as I could be on a space station for all I know. I’ve got a window seat flying out so more of a view then, hopefully.

I go up to the top floor of Terminal 3 where there is a sort of day-hotel lobby/Qantas Club that is open to all – marble everywhere, comfy cushions and power points to plug in your laptop and keep in touch. There are 2 free networks to connect to. I sit next to an English guy who comes back with a heaped plate of food and a grin from ear to ear.

I managed 3 hours sleep or thereabouts on the 11 hour Perth-Dubai leg thanks to sleeping tablet. Absolutely hassle-free travel and good service (all female flight attendant crew, not making any point here, but surprising). Via the in-flight entertainment system Emirates has this neat option of viewing the forward or underneath plane cameras so you can watch the landing approach. I try this for a while but the horizon veers so much I feel a bit wobbly.

It’s sinking in that I’m actually going to Rome, and all the work hassles that have dominated my life for the last year are slipping away. I’ve got great expectations that this trip will help restore some balance, and I realise that I’m extremely lucky to be supported by my nearest and dearest in this.