Part 2 – Around Rome
Thursday, 15 June, 2017

Of course it was already the 15th when we landed in Zurich and then Rome but I decided to break it up this way. We have 3 days in Rome before our first formal tour commences, so this Part is about that.

First, a little about our apartment. It is an old building not far from the Pantheon. It is up some 20 stairs, it is small and an old apartment which has been quite renovated. We knew all this in advance and although small has everything that we need including Wifi and air conditioning, which is especially nice as it becomes very hot.

I am feeling quite scheiss after the rigours of that long, long travel and decide I will stay inside while Julie prances around Rome. I try to have a nap but am way to tired for that so get onto the PC and discover there are over 100 emails to clear. I start doing that but realise I have left my Mouse at home. This is a serious issue as I am not very good with the touch pad and involuntary moves happen such as emails getting deleted that I did not intend to. In the mean time, Julie is prancing and has taken a few photos along the way.

Julie got hungry in spite of our much food on the planes so stopped for a snack of:

Julie comes back around 5:00 PM with supplies, wine and water. We decide to go out for a drink. We go away from the Pantheon to a place not far away that had helped her find directions early in the day. We ordered a bottle of wine, a Chianti which was very nice, not bad for my first try with Italian wine on this trip.

Since Julie had had a late lunch, it was not clear whether we would eat there or not but eventually we decided that we would. Julie orders a light meal of:

A bit of a misnomer as the “lobster” were small scampi, more like a Yabbie. There was not much meat on them. The sauce on the Spaghetti was a tomato cream sauce – I quite liked it for a change. It was still quite early so we decided to go over to the Pantheon for another drink. On our way there was a single guitar player/singer who had a big amplifier and sound system behind him. He played a lot of vintage Pink Floyd and one could not tell at a distance how much was him playing and how much from the sound system. It sounded very good, resounding around the Pantheon square and had a decent crowd watching him. We got seats at one end of the square and ordered gin and tonics.

After our drink and the Pink Floyd has stopped, we go back to the apartment. To say I was tired was a bit of an understatement.