It feels great to not have to wake up and do something in the morning! Then again, we had a tough time getting to sleep last night due to the traffic in the street outside.......particularly the motorbikes......guess we are just country bumpkins at heart. We are used to hearing peepers, not police sirens!
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| Morning view out our bedroom window of the main entry to the Academy |
Anyway, we awoke to another sunny day. We goofed around for a while, but finally got organized enough to head out for some breakfast. We have this nice kitchen but have not had enough time to go shopping yet. We decided to try the Bar Gianicolo, which was in the same location decades ago when we were here. It is a crazy place in the middle of a traffic intersection. It sounds nasty, but is really a fun place to go. The guys behind the counter are very nice, and the bar has both indoor and outdoor seating. It is sort of fun watching the cars hang a hard right turn at the intersection! Seriously, a fun place to hang out. After la prima colazione we wandered around the neighborhood and found a small grocery to get a large bottle of water for the fridge.
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| Perfect! |
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| table in the small courtyard at Bar Gianicolo |
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| Italian for "dog friendly!" |
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| Flower stall near Bar Gianicolo |
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| The wisteria is in full bloom all over the City......amazing fragrance! |
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| Back to BG for lunch! |
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| BG |
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| This street scrubber was going up and down the street all day! bizarre...... |
We had to be back at AAR for an orientation session at 11:00, which in the end was partly useful, but mostly tedious.......you know italians......talking and talking! After that we headed back to the apartment, feeling like the day was slipping away. We got a little work done on our computers and then grabbed lunch (again at Bar Gianicolo). Great panini with fresh roman artichokes, prosciutto and cheese. After lunch I had to go back to have an additional orientation for the main library. It is quite an amazing resource of classical literature and art books.......and there are fairly tight restrictions regarding security and access. I now have special fob that gives me 24 hour access.
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| AAR Cortile with the main library floors beyond |
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| View of our apartment building from the Academy roof terrace |
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| AAR Entry courtyard |
We took a quick rest until about 3:00.......already having put 4,000 steps on the fitbit so far today. Our next adventure was a trip down to Trastevere, one of the oldest sections of Rome that is down the Janiculum hill from us, before you reach the Tiber River. The challenge is that you need to traverse a very steep hillside. While the roads are serpentine and meandering over a great distance to make the grade change, pedestrians can navigate a series of staircases. Going down was the easy part!
THE STAIRS
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| The Fontana d'Acqua Paolo is at the backside of the AAR grounds. This is where the stairs start. |
TRASTEVERE
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| Immediately ran into three goldens!!! |
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| Most of Trastevere is pedestrian oriented without cars |
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| urban wall art at its best! |
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| missed the biggest bubbles.......but there are some small ones if you look |
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| we arrived just as school got out! check out the guards in the right background with machine guns! |
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| Andrea found what is supposed to be the best gelato in Rome! |
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| One of our favorite follies.......Il Tempietto by Bramante in San Pietro in Montorio.........a perfect renaissance chapel, almost Disney-like in scale. |
After that trek, we needed another break......so hit the sack for a quick nap. At 6:30 we needed to be back in the lecture room for a presentation by Annabelle Selldorf, a prominent architect from New York. The lecture was very interesting.......better than the night before! Afterwards, there was a reception in the main salon with lots of prosecco! We connected again with several of the folks we had met a dinner the night before, and a couple of new couples that also arrived this week.
Dinner was very nice. It was so good that even Andrea ate two helpings of lamb (abbachio)! which she never eats! We hung around and talked after dinner and I had a chance to introduce myself to Annabelle. It turns out that we have lots of common background and connections......very nice chat and maybe some work together in the future.
Off to the apartment and a few minutes on the blog before hitting the sack!
10,643 steps today.........4.4 miles.......down and up a mountain!
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| our doorknocker! |
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