Today was really fun and relaxing, and a little refreshing change of pace.
Andrea had a Big Mac attack this morning, so we had a quick, late lunch (avoided hamburgers at local cafes as they aren’t really made of beef, per se) and headed north towards the Piazza del Popolo and the Pincio. We’d never been that far north yet, and we had it in our minds to find some parkland, escape from the urban jungle we’d been caught up in for the last week.
The piazza had yet another Egyptian obelisk…we had no idea the Romans brought back quite so many of these. When we saw the first one it was magical and unique…now it’s kinda commonplace. Still cool, though.
The Pincio is basically a very large ledge that offers a panoramic view of the city. We slowly wound our way up through streets and stairs, taking some time to sit in the shade, take some pictures, and people watch. We took some pictures up at the top of the Pincio, some of which we’ll probably try to stitch together later into a big panorama of the city. We bought a bottle of water (probably for way too much money) and headed east into the Villa Borghese.
Villa Borghese is a huge park area north of Rome. After so many days walking through plaster, marble, and cobblestone, it was refreshing to walk through the grass, sit under trees, and play in the water. We found a little lake in the park with an island at its center with columns and statues. There was a stand to rent rowboats, which we thought would be a little fun, romantic experience. So we paid our 6 Euro to take a boat out onto the lake. I (Matt) took the oars and Andrea took the camera and we drifted out onto the lake. I like to think I did a pretty good job with the oars; I didn’t splash them at all, we didn’t run into anything, and we generally moved in predictable, straight lines. 🙂 Andrea got some great pictures of the lake, turtles, and ducks. It was a fun time.
As we were paddling about, another couple made their way onto the lake. A man was laying across the back of the boat, and a woman was working the oars. Then we noticed a small film crew on the shore and we realized they were filming that couple. We have no idea what they were shooting for (and we probably got in the way of a few early shots as we paddled around), but it was neat to see. We were really glad we chose to do it!
We continued through the park, resting our feet our in a large round fountain, which was amazingly refreshing. We walked back to the hotel past the Villa de Medici, and took a short siesta.
After we’d rested, we headed back to the Japanese restaurant we’d visited a few days before, this time determined to sit at the sushi conveyor belt. So that’s exactly what we did. We ate 12 little plates worth of sushi, and tried all kinds of interesting things like octopus, sea urchin, roe…basically whatever came down the line. It was all very fresh and delicious. Being the only ones in the restaurant, we ran through the 12 plates in about 30 minutes, so we felt like little piggy Americans. But we’re OK with that; it was fantastic, and a lot of fun!
It was bedtime so we headed back to our crappy little hotel room to sleep.
matt & andrea 