Vacation is over, and xpcdoojk is back. hee hee

[xpcdoojk]

Hi Mike, seeing you reading my thread makes me nervous.


love jc:p :D ;)

[celtic selke]

[quote name='xpcdoojk']I missed your question.

Who is John Elway? That is a question like Reggie's regarding me. All American men know who John Elway is just like all RCI posters at CC know who xpcdoojk is.;) :p :D

John Elway was the quarterback of the Denver Broncos during his Hall of Fame career playing American professional football. As a Scot, you are to be forgiven for not knowing this bit of trivia.;)

jc[/QUOTE]
"All American MEN"????????

Whoa jc, very sexist. Not worthy of you. But I will probably forgive you someday.

celtic

[nosnobunny]

Aw come on jc. I'm Canadian and female and I know who John Elway is. :rolleyes:

Maybe this explains the silence. :p

Beth

[xpcdoojk]

Gee whiz, seal and #2, can't you pick on someone other than poor little me. :confused: :p

Sometimes silence is golden!:p

jc

[nosnobunny]

Now now, you had a rest for a couple of weeks and we had no one to pick on. Now you're back and life can return to normal. :D

Beth

[celtic selke]

Oh boo hoo, jc. If we didn't pay attention to you, you would complain too.

celtic

[Bookit]

Xpcdoojk,

Glad you had a wonderful time. I'm sitting here at work -- a rainy, dreary day in Houston (although I suppose the baseball fans are happy!) As I have often daydreamed of going to Amalfi, I would like to hear one of your installments about "villa life" ... did you have picnic baskets to set in the soft, green grass? drinking wine and eating wonderful cheeses and breads? :rolleyes: Is this too idyllic, or how WAS Amalfi? :confused:

[xpcdoojk]

Bookit!

I have been too busy to finish another installment, although I have about 1/2 of Rome done, Amalfi will probably get finished tommorrow, but Amalfi was wonderful, and our villa exceeded my expectations in all ways.

In your opinion and others trudging thru this, do you want less or more detail than I am currently giving, Badbuoy, don't answer this question!:D

Amalfi was wonderful, it was the best part of the trip.

jc

[Merion_Mom]

[size=4]DETAILS. WE WANT DETAILS. more of the *juicy* stuff, too :D[/size]

Carol

[Elizanessie]

Aaawww isn't it nice when friends get together, just like the old days :D

More jc please I really am enjoying reading this.I suppose because you are actually staying overnight etc in the places it makes it different from being there when cruising.....heck do you get my meaning.

By the way polite people don't say knackered,shattered would be better :rolleyes: " knacker" is buyer of worn-out horses,etc for killing.

Come on no more work.....type man type...please.

Liz

[xpcdoojk]

I wouldn't know about polite, Liz, I learned it by riding the escalator in the London underground. They post posters about every two feet on the side of the escalators and the two I remember was the one that was for a supplement for when you are knackered and the other was Simon from American Idol on a boxing bill with some old woman. I never did understand that one.

jc

[wallie5446]

[b][size=3][color=red]It is all in the 'Details' JC my friend ! So for thoes of us still trying to find the way to finance our lives :D , give us the Details ![/color][/size][/b]
[b][size=3][color=#ff0000][/color][/size][/b]
[b][size=3][color=#ff0000]EW[/color][/size][/b]

[mammallama]

So far, so good. In other words, if it ain't broke, don't fix it! I'm enjoying every word. :D


P.S. If I start to yawn, I'll let you know.:p :D

[celtic selke]

We're waiting------------------------------



Hate to be hanging



celtic

[xpcdoojk]

Unlike #2 or Stretch, I have to work at my job, Seal.:p

It is raining here and I am depressed I am suppossed to play golf tomorrow at Branson Creek with the boys, and I haven't touched my sticks for over a month and the course is challenging, and it is freaking raining. I will work on it after lunch for sure.... I will finish Rome, but Amalfi may have to wait til next week. Amalfi was wonderful BTW.

jc

[celtic selke]

Don't be depressed. Weather.com says partly sunny for St Louis area for tomorrow. Maybe they will be right.
And I am working---just not very hard today.

celtic

[nosnobunny]

I AM working! ;) And just to rub it in, it's a beautiful day up here. Nice and warm and sunny. You couldn't ask for a better day. I even have a round on the links booked tomorrow. :D

There - feel better? :p

Beth #2

[Bookit]

Just managed to get back on the board - baited breath :eek: and all! I think your installments are JUST RIGHT! Love hearing the details, and your aside ;) comments, as well. As one who isn't traveling or cruising soon, I am really enjoying this! :)

[nosnobunny]

My dear Bookit. You really need to book a cruise soon. You're sounding needy. :p

Beth

[Bookit]

Nosnowbunny,

Don't I always sound that way?? :p

Actually, we have Jewel of the Seas booked for 8 Day Eastern Caribbean in April. :) I'm not too keen on flying to cruise -- have been spoiled by that 50 minute drive (home to pier) to Galveston. For the last 3 years, I've had a cruise booked in the fall, and have angst from nothing now. :rolleyes:

[lvcruiser]

jc- are you in the St. Louis area? If so, where? I was born and raised there and am planning on moving back next year. Go Cardinals!

[xpcdoojk]

I live in Missouri, but not St Louis. However, my MINI Cooper S came from St. Louis. We visit regularly and I love St. Louis.

Well I finally got a little free time this afternoon and I have more or less completed the Roma section. So here it is.

[font=Times New Roman][size=3]Section 5 Roma and the Hotel Golden Tulip Mecanate Palace[/size][/font]

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[size=3][font=Times New Roman]Day nine really begins with our arrival at the Termini Station in Central Rome. We start rolling our luggage thru the early morning traffic filled streets of Rome it is the first time we have seen cars en masse since we left England. One forgets the insanity that are Italian city streets. Little cars zipping and weaving, everyone ignores the lane indications, horns constantly beeping, and those silly Vespa scooters that absolutely follow no rules of the road. What fun! We check into the hotel, which was the most reasonable four-star hotel I could book around 200 euros a night that had consistently gotten decent reviews on tripadvisor.com. It seemed very nice, but before 8am we could not yet check into our rooms, and we stored our bags at the front desk and went out into the city. [/font][/size]

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[font=Times New Roman][size=3]We are all in reasonably good shape and from my previous trips to Rome; I know that most all of the city is walk able and relatively safe (as long as you remember it is a huge city with all that entails). We head out to the Spanish steps and we get there about 8:30am, and for the first time in my experience there we were the only ones on the steps. Very few stores are open, so we wander down the Via Condotti (Fabulous high end designer shopping) and off into a little piazza and had some croissants and caffe americano. I had learned my lesson again in Venice, when I ordered a caffe machiatto and got a tiny thimble full of pure expresso with a touch of steamed milk all served in a thimble. While I can drink this, and even enjoy it, it is not what I want for my morning coffee. We sat there for about 45 minutes taking in the pleasant atmosphere before we wandered off to start shopping. A little note about Italian stores, they generally have a very limited inventory, and most everything is visible in the window, and many items are in a storeroom in the back, and they hate it when you touch the displays in the store. Which is not really the norm in America, where we touch everything. My wife was in trouble or getting that look constantly in Italy. I even got it occasionally. We shopped and walked and eventually decided it was time for lunch so we head to the Pantheon area and find a restaurant for lunch and more house wine. On this trip if you ordered the mixed fried or broiled fish entrée it almost always consisted of shrimp and calamari. It was generally good, but I kept hoping for something different, and that never really occurred. We had a pleasant morning despite being sleep deprived, and then started walking back towards the hotel to clean up and take a shower and maybe a nap. When we got back to our room the bags were in the rooms waiting for us. Nice.[/size][/font]

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[size=3][font=Times New Roman]We chilled most of the afternoon in the hotel or went to a nearby internet café and logged on to check my email while drinking a beer, unfortunately, the last good internet café I was to see was the one in Rome. The ones in Amalfi were actually funny (I will explain later). [/font][/size]

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[size=3][font=Times New Roman]Late afternoon we decide to walk to the Coliseum and the Forum and walked on Palatine Hill, on our way to dinner somewhere in the city. It was a beautiful evening, and there was a professional film crew doing crane shots with a cameraman 75 foot in the air being swung around on the giant boom taking shots in spectacular late afternoon lighting that really brought the colors out. Simply, it was a fantastic time of day for filming the Coliseum. The forum was equally fabulous that afternoon with beautiful colors and with the sun setting, an amazing sight. As the light faded, we walked thru the city and ended up at the Pantheon again, and found another restaurant and tried to imagine what happened to this one man’s life that was hanging panhandling still as we had seen him outside another restaurant at lunchtime. The Pantheon was closed and we hadn’t gone thru it at lunch it took 3 trips before we made it thru. We had visited the Pantheon before, but it is an amazing structure, and it is amazing that they could construct something this massive so long ago. Dinner was pleasant, and we didn’t even look at the dessert options, but we headed off towards the Trevi Fountain and had a gelato while watching the mob of tourists throwing coins over their shoulders for the purpose of having their picture taken. The fountain is in my opinion the most beautiful fountain that I have seen. Not that I am a big fountain fan, but every time I visit it I am impressed by its beauty. We bought a few souvenirs before we finished our return hike to the hotel. On the way back to the hotel we stopped in a Bar and the ladies bought some cookies and tarts for another dessert, and I went next door to get a bottle of spumanti (Italian sparkling wine – not necessarily sweet as this was actually brut). The hotel has a restaurant on the rooftop where they serve the included breakfast (which was actually very good for a continental breakfast) and a bar. The concierge had mentioned earlier that the bar was closed on the roof, so I had to ask him to ignore the fact that we were going up there to drink our wine and eat our cookies. He said the bar on the roof is closed and I said, right, we didn’t have this conversation. Whereupon, we went up on the roof and had a delightful evening. At 10pm the huge church across the street from the hotel with twin beautiful domes and a tall clock and bell tower which started ringing loudly. This was very cool. Funnily, it rang way past 10 or even 22 times. All I can figure is that they ring all of the bells of all night at 10pm the last ringing, because it didn’t ring at 11pm. [/font][/size]

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[size=3][font=Times New Roman]Day ten was a little overcast and we were sprinkled on a couple of times, but it wasn’t too bad. We decided that we wanted to go to St Peters and the Vatican, which we have visited before, but you just can’t visit Rome without at least a passing visit. So we went to the Termini train station and caught the underground train to the nearest stop to the Vatican, and we again marveled at the beauty and tremendous size of the basilica. There was such a huge line, however, since we had slept in a little that we did little more than look around and take a few pictures. We didn’t want to go thru the Vatican museum and the Sistine Chapel again, although it is an amazing collection because we just didn’t have time. The treasures held there defy belief. The time we did go thru them by the time I got to the chapel and beheld Michelangelo’s masterpiece, I was so overwhelmed by all of the amazing stuff, that I was actually numb to it. Words cannot describe the collection in the Vatican museum. We then went to the San Angelo castle, which we had not previously toured and did a quick run thru of it. It reminded me of the Tower of London as both have served a similar roll in history as the fortress for an empire and was a place that housed soldiers. We crossed the bridge from the castle across the Tiber and decided that we would go to the mouth of truth, keeping with the complete tourist theme. There was a fashion shoot taking place on the bridge with the castle in the background of a fabulous dark skinned Italian beauty in wedding dress and an old Italian car. [/font][/size]

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[xpcdoojk]

[size=3][font=Times New Roman]It turned out that by following the river to get there added a lot of walking to our trip. We were hungry by the time we got there, which is on the backside of Palatine Hill and there was another immense array of ancient ruins. I am numb to ruins by this time. The church in which the fountain of truth is housed is very modest compared to most of the churches in Rome. There was a line of about 60 people waiting to stick their hands in the mouth to have their friends take their pictures and we joined in with them. When we accomplished this important mission I remember reading a travel book (that wasn’t with me) that there was a really nice restaurant on the other side of Palatine Hill, so I started looking for it as we were hungry and thirsty at this point. We walked and walked and saw a few Bars (in Italy Bars are a place to eat, drink, and dessert, but they are pre-prepared food not made to order, and I wanted a fresh meal), but we didn’t find any decent looking restaurants. So eventually we ended up at the Pantheon again, but this time they had a jack hammer going mad in the piazza so we wandered to the next piazza behind that, and found a nice little pizzeria, and ordered the vino delle rosso, and for the first time it was not very drinkable. Don’t get me wrong we finished it, I just didn’t enjoy it. Guess whom we saw there. Yes, our buddy the 50-year-old panhandler, he didn’t seem quite as crazy today and he had a buddy with him. After lunch we went to the Pantheon, and they were doing some kind of restoration inside, so about ¼ of the dome was covered up. It is still an amazing structure. We left and began our walk back to the hotel. We walked by a furniture store, that I happened to see a Dunoon bone china mug in the window of that had Welsh Terriers on it. We back up to the door and it is closed, but there is a woman inside, so I knock. She lets us in and I buy two of the mugs, which actually had five terriers on them (Wire Fox Terrier on the handle, a Jack Russell, a Welsh Terrier, a West Highland White Terrier, and a Scottish Terrier). I have owned all except the JRT in my lifetime. I actually searched the web for more of these since we have returned and I haven’t seen it on the web. It is very frustrating, as I have lots of friends that would love some of these. They, also, have them with various cat breeds and other dog types as well. After buying my little treasure, which wasn’t cheap, we walked past the presidential palace and on to the hotel. This was our last day and we took an afternoon nap, and packed. We asked for a recommendation for a nearby restaurant and we walked a block away and had an excellent meal. They had an excellent Amarone on the wine list and I was craving a steak with it, and I had the filet with balsamic reduction sauce that was by far the best beef I got in Italy. [/font][/size]

[wallie5446]

JC,
That Rick guy on PBS aint got nuttin on ya ! Outstanding Buddy !
EW

[Bookit]

So interesting to escape into the streets of Rome for awhile. (More so, because I've actually NEVER been there!) Being unsure whether or not I'm a "good enough" traveller to go to Europe ... I am finding your descriptions of the travails fascinating.

Thanks, Xp, for sharing with us. :)