Roma

An image from Michelangelo’s painting of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel

Roma

On leaving Termini railway station in Roma we went to a nearby pharmacy where JD bought more tissues and paracetamol, and something he thought was strepsils but was a vitamin C pill you had to dissolve in water.  Then we set out to walk to our hotel which wasn’t far from the Termini, but the footpaths were very uneven and pot-holed.

We walked past a lot of restaurants, with outside seating and braziers, till we found Hotel Sonya. Evidently this building used to be apartments.  Well, they charged us €5 per person per day “city tax”, and breakfast is not free. It costs €15 per person per day. I’m sure I booked free breakfast.

Then there’s the lift, an alarmingly antiquated affair, in a cage.  It’s very slow, and you have to be prepared to wait ages for it. We’re on the 4th floor, so using the stairs is a very unattractive proposition.

There’s a small dark room, with a shuttered window that actually opens, and a bathroom with noisy fan with bidet, toilet and shower. Actually the shower is very good, and doesn’t leak, and the towels are large, thick and plentiful.

There’s a heat pump, which we turn down to 22°C, and thankfully the annoyingly loud fan goes off. There is a hot water jug, and two cups, and a fridge, two bottles of water, but no tea bags!

We go out again and there’s a small supermarket across the road, where we buy teabags, juice and more tissues. They stock alcohol but only have corked wine.

Eventually we go to Ristorante Maestro for dinner. I wanted to go to Tosca, but there looked to be no free tables inside. At Maestro I had Spaghetti Carbonara and JD had lasagne: two “safe” choices. JD asked for whisky and ginger ale: they brought separate glasses for each. I was quite enjoying the ginger ale on ice in a crystal glass, but then JD had some and so I had no more. I’m desperate not to get his cold, although the next day my chest is quite tight. The spaghetti carbonara wasn’t great: I don’t really like the bacon! And the cutlery was difficult to use, although the waitress gave me a spoon.

I sleep till 4 am, which is quite good going for me. JD is not comfortable but it’s quite noisy here so I don’t feel embarrassed about his coughing.

In the morning I have a shower and wash my hair with the new shampoo and conditioner I got in Ravenna. It’s great and I have a good shower. But these vegetable-based soaps (they had them in Ravenna, too) don’t really work for me: they don’t lather up well. It used to be quite a treat getting the wee gift soaps (to keep) from everywhere we stayed.

Then we set out to have breakfast. Most of the local restaurants don’t offer breakfast, or there is the odd one that does offers American-style breakfast. JD wants fruit, which is really hard to come by. We walk 11 minutes to a cafe, and on the way see Roman brick ruins that we’ve seen before. Much of this area is a building site, though. Rome is being rebuilt for a festival in 2025.

The cafe is very good, and despite the queue they are very kind to us. They do set offerings on trays, but don’t seem to have heard of non-dairy milk. I order an espresso instead of a latte, and toast, butter and jam; JD orders a latte, fruit and yogurt and a croissant. They have no more plain croissants so we order a chocolate one, and two glasses of orange juice. They do this so well! It’s all delicious, and the croissant is very chocolaty. t’s a sunny day, and quite warm. We go to another pharmacy and get more cough lozenges, some strepsils and a nasal spray for JD.

Today we have nothing booked but we wanted to see the Borghese Gallery and the Capitoline Museums. I should have checked: the Borghese Gallery is closed on Mondays. But the other one is open. We get a taxi from the Termini, and after establishing that it’s the Capitolini Museo that we want, it’s only €9 to get there. These museums are next to some extraordinary ruins: is this the site of the Roman Forum?

There are two wonderful Caravaggio paintings, the Fortune Teller, which I saw in the Louvre – did he paint it more than once? And a very beautiful young man said to be John the Baptist.

Wow, so many beautiful things. We have lunch in a Terrace Cafe, where we buy a ham and cheese sandwich, fruit, orange juice (they do it so well here), a glass of Prosecco and, of course, coffee. There’s a complicated arrangement whereby you pay for your food at another counter, then collect it. It seems very strange, since one wants to point to what one wants!

There’s a terrace restaurant next door, where you can wait and pay lots extra for table service.  There’s a terrace where we can go outside and look at the amazing view. Only in Rome would you get such a beautiful view of churches, bricks, ruins, some trees, statues of golden horses. This is such an interesting museum.

We get a taxi back to the hotel and nurse our colds till its dinner time.  Somehow the taxi back cost more than twice the amount for the taxi there.

We had dinner at a lovely restaurant opposite the Teat’opera. There was someone playing saxophone. We could sit inside. I had a delicious sea bass fillet in a potato crust with baby tomatoes and black olives. It was so good! I think JD had tagliatelle al ragu. Afterwards he had affogato with rum and chocolate ice cream, and I had semifreddo al limone – a lemon sorbet surrounding a sponge cake. Different, but interesting.

The next day was our visit to the Vatican Museums and Sistine Chapel. I’d pre-booked and kept checking my phone. We got a taxi there from the Termini Station so as to be on time.  When we got there, I have never seen such crowds. The internet or any mobile phone reception was extremely poor, and we could see one ticket which had been downloaded as a pdf, but not two. Even though I’d obviously booked two, and had the receipt, I only had one ticket, on my phone, and as it was on Headout, I couldn’t forward the email to JD. After all the mucking around, when we’d spoken to at least 3 people, with no joy, and we’d missed our time slot, we walked down to another ticket office where JD paid more € for us to join a 10:30 tour. We were able to sit down for the 10 minute wait.

There were thousands of people there, including many tours. Our tour guide sported a stick with what looked like a pair of underpants on the end of it. We collected radios and speakers: this enabled us to hear her, which was actually intelligent and useful. But the tour was a bother, especially as we’d been there before and didn’t really want to look at the animals room, or many other things. We just wanted to do our own thing and see specific exhibits. The tour ended up at the Sistine Chapel, where we could split off. The tour guide was going on to St Peter’s Basilica, where I think JD would like to have gone. But I was desperate – I hadn’t had breakfast, and I was very thirsty indeed, as you are when you have a cold. I had hoped we could buy a bottle of water along the way, but there was no such luck. We did manage to see the famous Laocoon statue along the way. I’d forgotten about Laocoon’s warning in Aeneid 2, about fearing the Greeks bearing gifts: “Dona ferenti”.  It was much better placed than when we were rushed past it in 2010, although there were still lots of people wanting to see it.

It seemed to take forever to get to the Sistine Chapel. When we got there, you could go to a cafe – where there was no seating, not even bar stools!  I sat on the floor on my jacket for a time, hoping the floor wasn’t too dirty. It was such a relief to have something to drink at last. Then afterwards we used the rest rooms, which were quite salubrious, and you didn’t have to queue.  

Then we went into the Sistine Chapel, which was the main thing we’d come to see. People are pushed in, and we went to sit down on the marble steps, but a guard encouraged us to sit on a bench along one wall. With relief we sat there for several minutes. There seemed to be less people, and we weren’t moved. How wonderful!

We found our way out, past the many gift shops, down the beautiful circular staircase, again. Then we got a taxi back to our hotel. Strangely, the journeys back always cost far more than the trips there.

We had intended to visit one of the famous churches later that afternoon, but sadly had no energy to do that.

In the evening, we went to Maestro again, where I had much better experience than our first night here. I had a “virgin mojito”, and spaghetti cacia et pepe: with cheese and black pepper. We also had delicious warmed bread with olive oil and vinegar, and the waitress brought us some delicious chocolate pieces. JD had fried chicken with chicory, which he would not touch.

The next morning we got up and left early to catch our train to the airport.  We had breakfast at the Termini; they still have the wonderful bookshop that I remembered! They did not announce the platform for ages.  There was an electronic barrier for tickets on your phone: that wasn’t working, and we queued up with other passengers to be waved through. Then we waited on our platform. When the train came, people were just so rude! Someone barged in front of me, and knocked my glasses off. Still we managed to get two seats facing forwards, near our luggage, and I was able to charge my phone in the train.

When we reached the airport, there was the same sort of scrummage, with people rushing to get on before we had even got off.

Once into the airport, it was easy to get to Terminal 1, with good signposting and several travelators.

Then we were checked in, given boarding passes, and handed over our luggage.  We made our way through security, which took a while, and then through the first duty free area. Then we headed for area E, and more duty free! We stopped at a very nice cafe for lunch: orange juice and coffee, fruit for JD, and a club sandwich to share. Just as well, because it was plenty for both of us: two big sandwiches, salad and potato crisps. It’s not overly busy here, so it’s nice to sit down and rest. It’s good to be early – navigating everything is quite a challenge.

Finally we leave the cafe, go to the bathrooms, and proceed to Gate 18.  Soon we are called to board, but as we’re flying cattle class our zone 4 is called last. We’re seated in row 18, but someone next to us has the window seat. We’re packed in like sardines.  The flight is fine, although we have to wait a while to take off. En route we served a drink – it seems to be coca cola, orange juice or coffee. The flight is just under 2 1/2 hours. Then we land at London City Airport, on the Isle of Dogs,  alight down some steps, and a bus takes us to border control. JD gets through, but for some reason I do not, and I join the queue of people who’ve been rejected by the ePassport machine. How long am I staying, the surly guard asks. About 2 days, I reply!

Then our stowed luggage arrives on the carousel – what a beautiful sight, and we go to meet our son. It’s very cold in London, and quite a walk to his car. The parking costs him £24.90!!!

He drives us to Canterbury, and we have dinner at a wonderful restaurant, sharing roast lamb shoulder between the three of us with dauphine potatoes, carrots and kale. There is a delicious jus to pour over the food. Yum! This takes me back to my childhood. For pudding our son and I have Christmas pudding, very fruity, with almond-flavoured brandy butter and pouring cream. Oh, how delightful it is. I have a lovely mocktail too. It is nice to eat familiar, predictable food again! I must say.

Then JD and I walked the short distance to our hotel. We are in a different room this time, but it is the same design.  In spite of our weariness, we don’t sleep that well. We’re happy to put on some clothes and go down to Breakfast at 7:30. And it’s nice, predictably nice. I’m even happy to see baked beans again, and the toast is good.

JD and I go out walking to a Boots pharmacy, but it’s full of their Christmas specials! We find a pharmacist, who doesn’t have Prospan lozenges but sells us something similar. We also buy another big box of tissues and some plasters.

Alfred meets us and we buy some lunch from the Moore Wilson’s -like market near the railway station.  We spend the afternoon at his house, doing loads of washing and having pizzas for tea.

Sadly JD and I had a terrible night, coughing lots and hardly sleeping at all. I hope we didn’t disturb the other guests too much. The hotel is very busy, since there’s a graduation in Canterbury.  We have little breakfast, and then try to pack everything into three suitcases plus one backpack, so we can leave the purple wheeled backpack for Alfred. It’s very cold here – about 1°C.  But it’s very hot in our room. The hotel kindly offer to look after our luggage after we check out, and we meet our family for lunch at a vegetarian cafe called Veg Box. I have a jacket potato topped with baked beans and cheese.  Then we go back to our sons’ house for a bit before meeting our taxi at the hotel at 4 pm. The taxi is going to take us right to Heathrow Airport. It’s very expensive, but then trains are expensive too, and there’s the luggage to manage – four pieces plus hand luggage. Eventually we get to our hotel.

Getting in is a bit of a mission – there are no trolleys, but we get to  Reception and they have a booking for us. It’s a room with king size bed and disability access; it also has a couch and things in very strange places, with very complex shower arrangements. I just wanted a wet shower! There are scary alarm bells everywhere, I hope I don’t set one off by mistake. I think this was the cheapest option available when I booked!

What a strange set up. There’s no luggage rack. There are no water bottles! 

Towels are in strange places, and there’s only one hand towel. There are no spare pillows or blankets. The hallway is very dark. Honestly, the more $$ you pay the less you get, sometimes!

The worst feature is that when we get into bed there’s a draught on us.  How very annoying. I wrap a jersey around my neck, but of course JD makes a fuss and goes to get someone to switch it to heating rather than cooling. There is a very British argument with the guard about what he sees on his screen and our reality. Then it’s too hot for me, but never mind.

We ate at the very expensive hotel restaurant that evening. Really, there was nowhere else one could go. He had orange juice and fruit; I had sparkling water and a smoked salmon entree. The waiter was either deaf or had little English and a poor memory! He did not do a good job.

In the morning we had decided to breakfast at the Singapore Airlines lounge. I had figured we needed to leave the hotel by 9 am for our 10:55 an flight, for which I had already checked us both in; now I wondered if that would be early enough. Anyway, we found the Singapore Airlines Business Class check in, and did not have to queue.

Getting through security was another matter. It took ages. And then JD had a problem: he lost his belt! We suspect someone took it in the lengthy melée. I never known such disorganized security. Another belt was there, but it wasn’t his. So we walked through the very busy airport looking for a store that sold belts. The first one he tried didn’t, but he was referred to a Hugo Boss store some way away. All this took time, of course, and our Gate B42 was about a 20 minute walk away. We went along, up, down, until I was so confused by all our perambulations. I had wanted to buy another small suitcase or backpack, but I soon saw that this was impossible. So I was reduced to carrying my handbag, my carry-bag stuffed full with extra things, and my puffer raincoat, since I could no longer pack it in a suitcase.

Finally we reached the lounge, up an escalator, with two boarding pass checks, to be advised that our aircraft’s boarding call would be made in 10 minutes! That made for a very fast breakfast in the busy lounge. JD got fruit, while I got juice; then he got coffee and a croissant for me. I only had time to drink half the coffee before our boarding call came. So we made our way to Gate B42, and boarded our A380 aeroplane for our long flight back to Singapore.

It’s a big aeroplane, an A380, and we’re in the middle of Business Class – we can’t see out at all, and I’ve not idea whether we’re at the front or the back of the plane.

The flight from London to Singapore is a bit shorter than the one over, but it’s still a very long time. But it’s nice to be on the bigger plane, with more room for everything.  It’s far more relaxed to have both my bags handy and a nice space beside my seat for my Kindle, phone and glasses etc.  The seats recline so the staff don’t have to make up one’s bed.

We get to Singapore, where thankfully there is a wheelchair. As we’re not going to a hotel, we spend the next few hours in a lounge. Thankfully it’s not very busy, so there’s plenty of room, and we’re both able to have a shower. When it’s time to go and board our Air NZ 777 flight to Auckland, again we go through security at the Gate. 

The flight home is smooth, but challenging.  By now my cold is quite bad, I have cramp, and a headache, and I’m not really comfortable lying down. There are plenty of coughs on the aeroplane, so I don’t feel too bad about coughing, but I wish I could breathe more easily.

When we get to Auckland, there’s no air bridge available!  There’s some drama at Auckland Airport. After a long wait, we’re advised to alight, and a bus will take us to the terminal.  We get through customs and border control (we’re forgotten to complete the electronic entry form, so have to do it by hand), we get a trolley and walk to the domestic airport. There’ve been big changes, of course, and I think the walk takes longer, although it’s mainly under cover.

By the time we get to this lounge, I’m all in. I don’t actually have another shower, but I do brush my teeth and change my top.

Then we fly back to Wellington, where a wonderful son meets us at the airport.

Coming home was rather grim, especially with us both being so unwell. I went to the doctor the next day, but it took two antibiotics and a course of prednisone before I started to feel better and stop coughing.  So I haven’t been able to see anyone. Now we’ve been back almost a month, and we’re still talking lots about our wonderful trip overseas.

That’s it for now! Ngā mihi nui.

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