ROMAN BIRTHDAY!

Rome! What a place to celebrate a birthday!

I had never been to Rome. Somehow it just never happened while we traveled. But now I was not only be in Rome, but on my birthday – and I am not telling you how old I now am.

Ken pulled out the stops – A Mercedes Benz waited for us at the bottom of the gangplank with a driver who said we would pick up our guide in Rome – about an hour drive away. Sure enough, an hour later our guide, Patricia, a French woman who has lived in Italy for 25 years, was in the car and helping us figure out what we wanted to see. Patricia turned out to be an archeological professor and a professional guide. She was wonderful and we were in sync from the beginning.

We had only an 8 hour span to see Rome. One of the bad things about a cruise is you have only enough time for a mental snapshot of the places you visit. Ken told me to pick!

I chose to pick 3 places to see in the morning. I did not want to spend my day running around like a madwoman seeing places I would hardly remember. After that we would have lunch someplace with good food, and then just drive, walk and stop where we wanted. Patricia was onboard and we were off.

My choices: the Pantheon, St. Peter of Basilica Square (not inside as the wait would be 2 hours), and the Forum. The good news was that as Rome is fairly compact we actually got to see the other stuff, too, as the Coliseum (or whatever) was on the way to somewhere we were going.

I am not going to describe what I saw. Most of you have probably already been to Rome. I will say, though, that I am thoroughly impressed with Hadrian and his ability to design and execute wonderful things! Patricia has recommended a book about Hadrian I am going to read as we cross the Atlantic back to New York.

I got my way about the day (happy birthday to me – with many thanks to a very patient Ken!). We ate at a wonderful restaurant tucked away in an alley-like street and owned by a French woman and Italian man. Beautiful food, beautiful venue, and nice wine. After lunch a few stops to take in something wondrous to look at and learn about, ending with a stop at a small, luscious perfume shop. We dropped off Patricia, and the driver got us out of Rome with minimal delay and no damage to the car! I don’t know how, in such tiny streets with so many cars and scooters, he managed that. And he was a whiz at getting us parked exactly where we needed to be during the day.

As we got back to the ship it started to rain, but the gods had been kind and it was the most perfect, wonderful birthday a girl could have.

Grazi, mi amore!