Following the Early Settlers

The drive from Estes Park upon to Medicine Bow Forest (Laramie) was a very smoky, hazy drive. The sun was trying to shine through all the smoke which was messing with my eyes. We’ve never been to this part of Wyoming before so it was a surprise to see the huge expanse of grasslands. I don’t know how the cattle survive on this dry grass. We drove to Cheyenne and west through Laramie to Hwy 130 Scenic Byway. Once west, we followed the Overland and portions of Oregon Trails … the early settlers continued north away from the mountains and then turned southwest to go over Bridger Pass (anyone remember Jim Bridger mountain man?).

I was making up stories about the early settlers with their wagon trains as we drove. Imagine those eastern folks making it this far and how exhausted they would be. By now they would have thrown out their pianos, chests of family heirlooms, fine china, books, etc. you get the idea. Some decided to stay and build their lives around Laramie/Cheyenne in the open plains. Others head out and get attacked by Indians, bitten by rattlesnakes, killed by robbers – quite a few die along the way and their bleached bones probably still lie out there today!

On historical tidbit of this area is the Sand Creek Massacre. There were 32 Indian attacks on record. These resulted in the death of 96 settlers, 21 being wounded, and 8 being captured. Between 250 and 300 head of livestock were stolen, 12 wagon trains and stagecoaches were attacked, robbed, and/or destroyed, and 9 ranches and settlements were raided. Eventually they rounded up the various Indian Tribes and created the reservations.

Wagon Train landscape looks the same today

As we drove into the mountains, we didn’t have any reservations for this portion of the trip. First we stopped at the ranger station to view the map and grab a paper map. The ranger was in so she provided us with camping information and informed us that some campgrounds were closed because of a new fire that started at the lower elevation of the Snowy Range (Savage Wilderness).

We camped on highest mountain pass off of Hwy 130

We were lucky enough to get one of the last two spots at Brooklyn Lake. The view is amazing at 10,606.96 ft. This is the highest place we’ve ever camped and I find myself out of breath walking around the campsite. Still no campfires, which is ok because we are seeing the huge black plumes of smoke. The campground is right at the tree line so the smoke is really dark in the sky – I thought it might rain but it was thick smoke. The sun is a bright almost fluorescent red. Even with the smoke, its so nice here we decided to stay three nights (later decided to stay only two nights).

Huge smoke plumes

Brooklyn Lake

Brooklyn Lake

Today is our day off – which means hiking around Brooklyn Lake, reading my book (American Dirt – excellent highly recommend), and Sean hiking trails with even more elevation.

It turned into a really windy day so it wasn’t pleasant sitting outside. We cozied up in the camper after our afternoon hiked and left on Sunday. We decided it was time to get into a lower elevation and I wanted warmer weather. The camping spot was absolutely unbelievable gorgeous!

Glaciers- we saw guys rappelling down glacier ledge. Watched them for hours using binoculars.

We stopped in Laramie to visit the Wyoming Territorial Prison which once held Butch Cassidy the only prison that ever held him. He was there for two years. Next, we decided to keep on moving through Wyoming due to the excessive smoke and headed to Nebraska. I really wanted a campfire to hang around.

Prisoners made brooms

Wyoming Territory Prison

Using the AllStays App we found a nice location – Nebraska State Forest in northwestern area. The Sand Hills of Nebraska! A really unique landscape and beautiful in its own way. We didn’t stop at Lake McConoughy because we wanted a woodsy setting and finally a campfire!!! 🔥

Whoever thinks Nebraska is flat definitely has not been off Hwy 80. This area is dry hilly grasslands with many cattle ranches. The Nebraska State Forest was planted in 1902-1908 to validate Professor Bessey’s theory that tress can grow in this desert area.

Bessey Recreation Area

View into vast grasslands

Dinner from Sinclair Gas Station.
Fresh homemade pizza!
We had to drive 15 miles for a dinner night out. Only a couple of places to find food on a Monday so we settled for 🍕.

After dinner we drove for 10 miles of a four wheel drive road through the forest. Interesting to see the forest, no hills and grasslands ecosystem. Had a great night of watching the sunset, beers around the fire, and stars in a dark sky. Still hazy from fires but much better than Wyoming.

Same view for hundreds of miles

Heading East now towards home. We hope to stay at Dolliver Memorial State Park in Iowa to look at the buffalo bones.

The USA is so vast and it’s been fun fun fun to go to both touristy places and off the beaten path to discover the history of these little western towns. Not having a firm plan has been great because it gives us more freedom and not worrying about getting to a certain place for camp reservations. I route out a new potential area to explore every two days and we go. When we started out I sure didn’t think we would now be in Iowa for a few nights – LOL 😂

Rocky Mountains

We finally got back on the road about 4:00 pm Monday. One day wasn’t too bad but waiting another whole day about drained us. We were so excited to be back on the road. Finally we had a bit of luck go our way because we decided to go to Estes Park East Portal campground and get a first come spot. Not only were we able to get a spot, we got the same spot we already had reservations for Tuesday – Friday #6.

Our home for four nights. Water and electric. No campfires allowed!

View from our window

We took a small hike to explore an old cabin before heading into RMNP. I could feel the lack of oxygen mostly in my legs. I shall see how I do later today.

I can’t believe the amount of changes since I was first here about 12 years ago. The Stanley Hotel was still on the countryside. Not anymore, the town has grown quite a bit.

Stanley Hotel from The Shining

Our campground is a busy kind but it’s nice to have a home base.

Neighbors the the left of me and neighbors to the right of me. At least it’s in the mountains!

We had a wonderful day at RMNP on Tuesday. The mountains are majestic. We saw a few Elk hanging out in various places.

Bull Elk was bugling. He had quite the harem.

Estes Park herd of Elk

We also saw the fire fighters keeping an eye out in the distance. Lady Luck was shining upon us because they opened the Trailridge Pass. We were able to drive up to the top and down towards Granby Lake and then turned around and drive back. This is our third time to RMNP so we went to a few places we hadn’t seen before.

This is at top of RMNP. I pointed out some of the burn area.

Firefighters are stationed on the pass watching the fires n the distance.

It’s been daily hazy out but cannot really smell the smoke. Some days are a bit clearer than others depending on the way the wind blows.

It’s so hard to find the words to describe the beauty so in the words of John Denver: Rocky Mountain High I seen it rain fire in the sky – friends around the campfire and everyone is high – Rocky Mountain High … Here are a few photos of our drive.

Pick up sticks! This is what is burning.

Beautiful view – hazy out

Irene Lake – The serenity of a clear blue mountain lake! Life is full of wonder

Elk jam

On Wednesday we drove highway 7 peak to peak. Here are phots from the day.

Scottish Highlander’s

We went Boon docking into the National Forest to check out dispersed campsites. A truck pulled up besides us because they saw our wisconsin plates. Two guys out deer hunting that both graduated from the UW!! Lots of Badgers in Colorado 😀

In Estes Park today for sweatshirt shopping and then doing a local hike. Beer stop at Rock Cut Brewery

Beer time and dogs are allowed!

Tomorrow we are heading into the Snowy Mountains in Wyoming.

So with that one brief public service announcement.

Fort Morgan

Last night in our parking lot camp turned out ok. We had everything we needed minus a working tow vehicle 🚗. There was a bright orange sunset over the plains. The fires are to the west of us but we aren’t impacted with any smoke. The sky was full of stars and today was a beautiful bright blue sky.

One of our views

We’ve now seen multiple police go through the drive through at Arby’s – LoL! They didn’t bother with us at all. All the locals have been so friendly and laid back.

I have great internet although a little to far away to use Arby’s guest wi-fi so using up my iPhone data plan watching the Packers beat the Vikings!

We found the part we need at AutoZone part and a 24 hour mobile mechanic; problem is he is the only one working on Sundays and he’s busy. We are keeping our fingers crossed that either him or The Toyota dealership can help us.

We are relaxing, walking around town and making the best of it.

Hanging out

It turns out we are actually camping at location of the original fort!

Here is some history of Fort Morgan:

• Fort Morgan was Constructed in 1865 a half mile from the South Platte River on a strategic tract of land know as Morgan Flats, Fort Morgan gave a commanding view of the entire river valley, as well as the north side of the South Platte River. As the only army presence between Julesburg to the east and the populated regions of the Rockies in the west, it was the United States’ largest organized armed presence for miles. The fort no longer stands.
• Glen Miller the famous band leader spent his high-school years in this farm-ranch community on the eastern plains of Colorado
• Fort Morgan lies on the old Overland Trail. The Overland Trail was one of the main thoroughfares pioneers used to cross the vast expanse of the rolling plains, and thousands took to this dusty trail. Wagon ruts are still visible along much of the prairie here.
• The Pawnee Indians settled the plain around here and nearby is the Pawnee National Grasslands
• The Rainbow Bridge is one of the celebrated Marsh Arch Bridges and one of the last bridges of this kind left. It has 11 arches and crosses over the scenic South Platte River.
• 

Turns out it’s quite an interesting place with a lot of eastern plains history. Plus it’s absolutely gorgeous out!!!

Colorado Wyoming Travels

Colorado Camping!!!

Sean, Piper and I are on our way out west to do some camping. It’s the best thing to do during the Covid pandemic. Our plan is to stop in Nebraska somewhere the first night and then possibly stay in Brush Co at a municipal park (electric site and free) the second night. We have reservations at Estes Park East Portal campground for 4 nights to explore Rocky Mountain National Park. After that we plan on going north to spend by a couple of nights in Poudre River area, then through Laramie WY into Medicine Bow National Forest and finally Lake McConoughy in Nebraska before heading back – two weeks total.

Covid Travels 2020!

Anyways … that WAS the plan.

First change of plans was due to the Cameron Peak forest fires. Portions of RMNP are closed and HWY 14 on the Poudre Canyon Area is closed. No problem – we will bypass Poudre and go straight up to Medicine Bow. We already knew we would not be having campfires but that was ok. Our idea is to put an led lantern in the fire pit and gather our chairs around 😀 and pretend we have a 🔥.

Next change is due to Covid. We can only buy a daily pass with a specified time slot to get into RMNP. The early morning slots were already gone by the time I went to purchase so we have a 12:00 – 2:00 spot. In a normal year you would pay $25 for a week. Again, no problem because a partial day in the park is better a day at home!!! We will explore the area around Estes Park.

Now things are really starting to heat up in the calamities category. One day prior to leaving I narrowly missed being a storyline on 1000 Ways to Die!!
The Plot: Middle aged women is out in her garden at dusk in a misty rain picking tomatoes. Her t-shirt is bunched up holding the tomatoes as she swats at mosquitoes. A tomato drops to the ground and as she stoops forward to pick it up BAM!! A tomato stake through the eye!!! Tomatoes 🍅 fall all over the place as she stands up with the stake piercing her eye and up into her brain. She falls flat on her back – dropped dead instantly. The End!
LUCKILY it missed a direct eyeball hit but it did cause some damage. It caught the corner of my eyelid and inside eye. It hurt a lot. It was really swollen and bruised. Ironically it’s almost a year to the day when I tripped in Bulgaria and smacked my cheek bone on marble stairs to give myself a nice shiner. This time it’s the other eye that is black and blue.
Classic example of shit happens (especially to me)!

Bruised ugly eye.

Little did I know that this was only the beginning of bigger things to come!

The day we leave was suppose to be cloudy but no rain. That’s not the way it turned out – it poured all the way to Nebraska. Feels like deja vu when we drove back from Moab last year. It snowed in late May and rained all the way from Nebraska to Wisconsin. This time it poured in the opposite direction and two days ago a foot of snow dropped around Estes Park.

It makes us a bit nervous driving in downpours; however, it stopped around the time we had enough driving for the day (Sean did all the driving)! We found a campsite in Seward NE for $15 night with electric located about ten miles from Lincoln.

I love the RV AllStays App! It helps me find little camping areas off the beaten path. I would give it a 2.5/5.0 rating because it has electric. It turned out it was a gravel parking lot. It didn’t really matter though because it was nice and cozy in the camper. I had chili already made so we heated it up and watched a western (Sierra) on Grit TV. It seemed very fitting since we were in the area. This was a “good day”!

First Times

This trip has included quite a bit of firsts for me. First time drinking Belikan which is the local beer. These are ~ 7 oz bottles and the glass is heavy so as you tilt it up towards the end you think you have beer and all of a sudden it’s empty. We got a good laugh out of this because it was so deceiving.

Drinking Belikan at Cahal Pech Resort

After our stay in San Ignacio in western Belize we headed to the island of Ambergris Caye. Originally we were going to take a 1.5 hour ferry ride from Belize City. But after our spelunking tour I decided I didn’t want to add sea sickness on top of my sore muscles so we decided to book a flight over. Now this is a big deal for me because it was one of those single prop planes and I always said I was never flying on a puddle jumper. Well I changed my mind and off we went! It was really kind of cool because the plane only seated 12 people and the flight was 15 minutes. It was a nice clear sunny day so we enjoyed our view. I was amazed to see the ocean floor and loved seeing the little houses.

Our little plane

Belize jungle from above

Heading into San Pedro airport

Once we landed we were picked up and taken to our condo via golf cart which is the primary mode of transportation around the island.

Pictures of our condo area

It’s so beautiful and the weather is perfect. We are located about a five minute walk to the main part of the town. First night here we walked along the oceanfront and went to Palapas for a rum punch and a bite to eat. It was a punch in the gut when our bill came!!! $15 dollars for one drink. Outrageous!

Rum punch 🥊

We did get a laugh out of it though because it was lit up and looked so pretty from a distance — go the pretty lights —

It was one of the ‘it’ beach bars and they make BBQ on Sundays. When we got there it wasn’t that busy and they were out of BBQ. Walking back home we ran into some Mardi Gras dancers. It’s Carnival time on the island!!!

A few dancers in the street

We missed the Saturday night party but plan on going to the square for celebration on Tuesday night.

The next day we too wanted to cruise around in a golf cart so we decided to rent one for the next four days. Now we could have lined one up through our condo but we decided try to save a little money (for more $15 drinks) so we went with a different rental company (rental places are everywhere). The advertisement said they have 25 of the best carts on the island. That may have been true 10 years ago!!!

The Blue Booby Bouncer

Island Traffic Jams

Our Blue Back Breaker Booby Bouncer was delivered! It came with a cracked windshield, one working headlight, no working brake lights, slow pickup speed, and barely working brakes. HaHaHa – we saved $80!!!

OMG did we have fun driving around today. We cruised ~ 7 miles to Secret Beach. The roads are full of sped bumps and gigantic potholes. Every time we hit a speed bump we would almost get stuck on the top and would have to fling our bodies forward to give it more ooomph! Or we would go over it almost full speed and up in the air we’d fly! I thought Amy was going to have to get out and give it a push us a couple of times.

This is a very nice beach and we got a FREE Rum punch and a FREE chair massage. I took advantage of both and tipped them of course!

I did forget to mention how friendly everyone is in Belize. I’ve been to many other places and I think they are the friendliest people by far! They love tourists! Primary source of income for them and they are not pushy!

Not sure what adventures we have for today but I’m sure we will have a blast!

The Blue Hole

Adventures

We haven’t even been in Belize for 24 hours and decided to go to Guatemala to visit the Mayan Tikal Ruins. The Mayans created a city of 100,000 peeps between 600 BC and 900 AD before they vanished. The Spanish explored the area in 1525 but passed right by Tikal despite hearing of an ancient city. As luck would have it, the ruins were not discovered until 1848. Tikal is now a designated as a UNESCO world heritage site and is also the tallest ruins in Central America. Bigger than Chitzen Itsa in Mexico.

Imagine the lives of the Mayans back then … being the first here and having limited knowledge. One story goes something like this: the people notice the sun always sets in a certain direction so they gathered a few hunters out on a journey to find the end of the sun (like searching for the end of a rainbow). Bushwhacking their way through the jungle a Jaguar 🐆 (which are native to Belize) crosses their path. They see Mr. Jaguar go into a cave just as the sun goes behind a mountain. As they come closer to the cave all they see is glowing eyes. Therefore they believe the sun turned into the Jaguar. So they built the Jaguar Temple as a worship to the sun god. 🌞

Here we are worshipping the sun god at the Jaguar Temple

Top of Temple II overlooking what was once the city

To go to Tikal we signed up for a tour which happened to only be the two of us. Our hotel gave us a ride to the border 30 min) and we were handed over the “the man” who walked us into the immigration building were we filled out a form and got our passports stamped. Cost $20 US.

Border control Guatemala side

Henni walking is back into Belize

We were then handed off to our guide for the day Henni a 23 year old Mayan descendent who drove us 2.5 hours to Tikal. Henni is quite an enterprising young man; he is a subcontractor to “the man” and also rents land for his own farm. He is one year away from having an Agronomics Engineering degree. He is currently raising fish (Tilapia), chickens and other animals and is doing quite well. It was really interesting to learn how he makes his money and runs his farm. Average income in this area is ~$5000 per year and most of this goes to food. Leaves little for other items.

Large cedar tree

Once at Tikal we climbed a couple of temples, walked through the jungle where we saw a couple of Toucan Sams, a Parrot, spider monkeys, and some kind a strangle raccoon type of animal and heard the howler 🐒. The majority of the city is still wild with jungle growth covering and is quite large. We saw the highlights.

Animals in the jungle

Checking out the local Guatemalan beer on our lunch stop

Actun Tunichil Muknal Tour.

BTW – no mishaps for me! I wasn’t proud – I held the guides hand at times so he could balance me. Once we got to the end of the cave a few of us started feeling the lack of oxygen. After all we are we are back in there and with about 30 people in one spot. Too much carbon dioxide. As soon as we went back down the big rock shown in the pics and into the water again I was fine.

Amy on the other hand stubbed one of her toes and it started bleeding. She’s afraid she is going to some type of flesh eating bacteria.

The next day we arose early again to go to the ATM cave. Truly amazing trip! We were a group of 8 all from our hotel Cahal Pech. We traveled about 1/3 of a mile into the cave to reach the artifacts. They are all in the original positions as when the cave was discovered. This cave was rediscovered in 1986 so hasn’t really been around too long.

We are ready for adventure!

Spelunking

Swimming into the cave

Artifacts the bowl on right would have held circumcision blood that was burned as an offering. The bowls were then broken on purpose. This was around 900 AD.

Crystal Maiden with broken pelvic bone and purposely positioned. This is the third set of bones we saw in the cave. All artifacts are in the same position as they were in 900 AD!

This tour was the most exhilarating strenuous exhausting travel activity of my life!
Pick up at 7:30, drive 1.5 hours, hike through the jungle for 45 min including three river crossings (one swimming). Reach cave entrance and swim into cave. Spent next 2.5 hours spelunking through the cave river, up and down boulders, squeezing through narrow cracks in the rocks (only head above the water), and climb up a 15 foot ladder. And then back again.

I ache all over but just amazing to be able to do this!!! I highly recommend to anyone to do this while it’s possible. Pictures are stock photos cuz no cameras allowed (some idiot dropped their camera on a skull and broke it so I couldn’t take pictures of the show the more strenuous portions. I was dead tied by the time we got back out.

San Ignacio

We were aching from the past two days so decided not to go zip lining today plus we really didn’t feel like getting up at 6:00 again. So instead we hiked down the hill into town and went to the farmers market. I stopped for lunch and had a chicken taco $1

Frying up the homemade tortillas

Chicken taco

Came back and spent the day at the pool. It was an overcast day so pleasant out until the sun comes out and then it’s hot! So we do the typical wisconsin thing and start drinking. Belilan is the local beer.

BEER!

Trip Top Ten’s

Traveling is an experience and I learn something new every time.

Here are my top ten discoveries for this trip!

Bulgaria Tour

Likes:

1. Our tour guide Stefan
2. The traditional folk performances
3. Great prices (the Lev)
4. Nice people and many in Sofia spoke English
5. Food: Bulgarian Mashed Potato Salad and Tomato mozzarella salads
6. Kaminitsa Beer
7. The Black Sea towns such as Nessebar and Veliko Trarnovo
8. History / Buildings especially early history followed by Soviet history
9. The Balkan Range
10. Rila Monastery

Dislikes:

1. Bugs in Bed Biting Me!!! Rios Monastery

1. The Bus!
2. Falling down and hurting myself
3. No bathrooms on the bus
4. Getting up early

1. Being on a schedule – tours are too structured for me

1. Not enough chicken
2. Rakia traditional drink like a type of moonshine

1. Unable to drink a few beers at night
2. . Constantly on the move, this one is two sided because I saw and did so many great things but it was at a fast pace.

Roma

Likes:

1. Seeing famous works of art and buildings – churches, towers
2. Pompeii
3. Our own apartment and our own rooms!
4. Our own schedule
5. Walking around and getting lost on purpose
6. Nuns and Priests
7. Public transportation
8. The smell of Italian leather
9. Roman Ruins
10. . Spaghetti, Pizza, Lasagna, Tiramisu, Orange Fanta (real juice) and Peroni Beer 🍺!

Dislikes:

1. Crowds and Tour Groups
2. Walking on Cobblestone streets which make my feet ache
3. Hot Weather
4. People not queuing and shoving their way through. By the end of this trip I finally said F-it! and did the same, I was tired of being nice and waiting

1. Higher prices (the Euro)
2. Getting fined for not doing advanced checkin on Ryanair ($62) and not validating train ticket ($5.50)
3. Two days too long in Roma
4. Stinky people in crowds
5. Wearing the same travel clothes (at least they were washed)
6. Being too tired out from the heat and crowds to do a fun activities such as wine cheese tasting in the evenings

Another trip in the books!

All-in-all a great experience. I miss my puppy, family and friends! It’s time for me to come home!

Arrivederci!

The Vatican and Pompeii

Crowds at The Vatican were terrible!!! Average 40,000 per day.

People! I will let you know right now that if you take a tour of Rome to see only the highlights you are missing out! Rome is an amazing city if you can take the time to enjoy it. We tried to schedule one major event a day so we had plenty of time to explore the city on our own. Around every corner was something amazing whether it was an ancient Roman ruin, carved water fountains, archways or towers! We found the local shops versus the tourist souvenir shops. We shopped like the locals at the market and grocery stores. The laughter of kids playing soccer and Marco Polo drifted up into our double door open windows.

No crowds here!

The Vatican

We had a tour scheduled for 12:30 at the Vatican tours. We were herded through like cattle without time to stop and even take a picture or stop to look at an interesting painting, statue, tapestry, jewelry, marble animals, etc! There were about 24 of us following an Italian lady waving her little flag on a stick. Now days we are given audio devices and earplugs so we could hear the guide speaking in her lyrical accent “Annnnd da noooowa we arrrra entering-a the galllllerrriaaa”.

Images from the Vatican

In the middle is The Creation of Adam

Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel painted by Michelangelo. It took him four years (1508-1512), he had to put up the scaffolding and paint on his back. I knew this prior to seeing the painting because years ago I read a book about the life of Michelangelo. So I became familiar with his sculptures and paintings. He considered himself a sculpture more than a painter but in retrospect he was certainly multi talented!

On this trip I also saw his sculpture of the Madonna and Child. I sure am glad I studied art history because it gives me an appreciation of all the artworks I’m seeing! I’m in awe!

Pompeii

Another awe moment.

Pompeii was really cool to visit. As we all know the city was buried under 20ft of volcanic ash and pumice when Mount Vesuvius erupted in AD 79. It rumbled for about 18 hours before it blew its top so people could have left and found safety. Some of those who did not are immortalized as stone casts. These were made by pouring plaster into areas were people died. As their bodies turned to dust a void was left in the volcanic rock – hence the plaster figures.

Child

Man found in the Granary

This is a large excavation site. It is an actual city so very large to walk around. The things I find most amazing is how much actually survived such as floor mosaics, marble statues, majority of the casa’s (homes), and everyday life like the granary, bakeries, and the brothel.

Brothel was one of a handful two story buildings that remain today

Funny story we wanted to make sure we saw the brothel before we left the site. Like I said this is a city so it takes awhile to walk around. Since we were doing this on our own (no tour group) we had find things on our own. We walked into one building and there was a tour guide pointing out a wall painting that survived. So I asked him if this was the brothel since I knew the brothel painting showed what a man could get for his money 🤪 and he was pointing out what looked to me was a naked women.

He laughed and said “no no” the gods would be mad for me to think this angel was a prostitute.

So Paula and I walked out and I’m laughing pretty hard by this time at my mistake. I couldn’t tell the difference between angels and prostitutes! To me they are both naked men and women!

Anyway here is are the comparison pictures!

Angels

Prostitutes

Concrete bed- they did have a mattress thrown done

Another portion of Pompeii I thought interesting was the many roads. For a two way road there were three stones and the chariot axles were able to fit between them. You can see th ruts in the road!

Roman road for chariots

Paula with Mount Vesuvius in the background

It was a very long day and our most expensive day to visit Pompeii. 14 hours $100

I would say it was worth it but honestly after awhile all the ruins start looking the same. If I let my imagination run wild that’s when it becomes very riveting.

Last Night at Apartment

Paula and I went out for a nice dinner on Craig (her significant other)! We shared a bottle of Chianti and I had spaghetti and meatballs! The house specialty. She had a type of ham and mashed potatoes. The meal was excellent! Some restaurants don’t open until 7:00 pm so there was a line when we got there. It went pretty fast though I think we were seated within a half hour. Italians eat late! And Thursday nights seem to be very lively (this was our second Thursday on Rome). People come out in droves and stroll the neighborhood.

Here we are with our dinners.

TodY we left our apartment to get closer to the airport. This turned out to be a bad move. It’s a weird area we are staying Leonardo de Parco. When we arrived there are a bunch of condo buildings but no one around! It was so desolate I told Paula it was like we were one of a few survivors of a Zombie Apocalypse! Strange thing is there is a huge mall that in passing you may not know it. We did go inside and found the Italian version of a Walmart store plus there were very nice shops and store. Who knew?.

Where are all the people?

This store has Green Bay Packers shirts’

I think romans are Packer fans because I went into a leather shop earlier in the week and was asked where I’m from. When I said Wisconsin he made fun of my accent and then said knew of the Green Bay Packers and Aaron Rodgers. And now I see this in a mall that sells mostly soccer shirts! I wonder what the connection is?

This has been a long trip! We came, we saw, and now we are leaving!

Pretty Paula

Not so Bad Becky

—-

Side Note: When introducing ourselves on tour we had to think of an adjective to describe ourselves starting with the same letter as our name. When put on the spot all I could come up with was “Bad Becky”.

This is outside of a ceramics shop where everyone crowded in so I stood outside and was laughing at another person inside and goofing off.

Little did I know I was caught photobombing Carla’s picture of this women making ceramics. She said I was living up to my name 😂 and thought it was pretty funny she caught me sticking my tongue out and emailed this photo. I will never grow up!

Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum

Monday we took a virtual reality tour of the colosseum and the Roman Forum. Nothing particularly funny happened I just wanted to say it as the title of this blog 😏 so it gives me incentive to watch the musical.

I loved the VR portion of the tour. Seeing the building in color as it was originally is amazing! I actually liked walking through the ruins of the forum better than then colosseum. Back in the day there were 1 million citizens of Rome and quite a few slaves from their many wars. Slaves were typically used to build new monuments for the Emperor. Isn’t it just amazing that at all this was happening in about 29-44 BC! It boggles my mind that we have this testament to history standing, some which was built in 497 BC! A lot of buildings were covered by earth and only tops of columns were visible. Even today they are still finding new artifacts.

Interesting tidbit …It’s hard to see but there is a carving if the Jews carrying the menorah on the archway. The menorah from the Second Temple was carried to Rome after the Roman conquest of Jerusalem in 70 AD during the First Jewish–Roman War.

Another cool thing was seeing the grave of Julius Caesar and where Brutus and Marc Anthony spoke on that fateful day. Brutus talked about giving everyone freedom whereas Marc Anthony offered every man $1000. Freedom or money? They took the money (smart move) because freedoms wasn’t really going to happen.

I’ve now seen the following graves of past leaders:

1. Julius Caesar (Italy)
2. Napoleon (France)
3. Ho Chi Min ( Vietnam)
4. Lenin (Russia)
5. Citizens of Pompeii
6. Plus many,many, many mausoleums of people I can’t remember

The first emperor though was Constantinople who introduced Christianity to the masses. Being an Emperor was a dangerous occupation. Almost 80% were assassinated in some manner.

What Happened to Us?

20 years ago Paula and I backpacked around northern Italy sometime spending only a night in one place, taking trains and busses. We would go out drinking at night and stay up late. We walked everywhere or took the metro when possible. Getting lost and booking rooms on the fly was considered an adventure and part of the fun.

Now we have to add an agenda item just to go out for dinner once it’s dark. We left our apartment at 7:15 went two doors down for spaghetti dinner and wine, then back home by 10:00. Paula is much more of a planner than I am now that there is Google maps. I still like to get lost and explore. Although Google Maps sure does help! Now we plan our route and buy tickets in advance, so many more people these days too!

Best pizza place in Rome! So we’ve been told. Dar Poeta! A little tricky to find but well worth traversing the back cobblestone alleyway streets.

Pizza and Peroni

The heat and walking is tiring. We’ve spread out our activities to one major sight a day since we are figuring out transportation on our own. In most cases we bought tickets and tours in advance so we can skip the lines. It has worked out well for us. The cobblestones are now hurting my feet! I bought new Sketchers for the trip and up until three days ago they were working out. Now the bottoms of my feet ache and I’ve worn down the soles. It may not seem liked much … walking about five miles a day on average. It’s the 90 degree sunny blues skies that are wearing us out. I can’t believe the sunny weather we’ve had! It is nice but in the middle of the day it’s just extremely HOT! We started drinking orange Fanta soda as a pick me up, it’s really good because here it has real orange juice in it. Maybe that’s how they do it in the states, I wouldn’t know because I don’t drink soda at home.

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My eye bruise is mostly gone now, but my orbital bone is still sore. It is better though. Yesterday I saw a lady crash to the pavement and smack her shoulder, side, and maybe side of head. I felt really bad for her. She was in a tour group but luckily paramedics were right there to help. It was in Pompeii and the old Roman roads are tricky to walk on. Needless to say I’ve been trying to be really really careful.

Best Sunday!

This is from a Facebook post I shared. Best Sunday!

I had a wonderful day wandering by myself today! Walked many cobblestone streets, saw an ancient castle, went to church (twice), had the Vatican to myself, was overwhelmed in St. Peter’s Basilica, admired works of rat, took. Selfie with three nuns ( black, white, and brown), got lost in an old neighborhood, and then found my way back to enjoy a gorgeous sunset.

I dipped Mary’s cross in holy water to get it blessed in this church

Inside St. Peter’s

Fountains

When I went to find Castle Sant Angelo I come upon a street to go right to the castle or left to some big building that I didn’t know what it was. So I decided first to see the building. As I walked down the street it got bigger and bigger before I finally see these huge rows of columns with statues on top. I took a few pics and walked around for a bit. Then I see these people standing in line so I join them not knowing what I will see but given the line it must be something good. Finally I ask the people in front of me what is this? They were young Americans and they chuckle because I’m in line for St. Peter’s at the Vatican. lol 😂 I didn’t know what the Vatican looked like and I couldn’t quite recognize the dome from where I was standing. So I left and came back even later in the day and got right in – no crowds!

Interesting story about towers in Rome. Families built towers to show their wealth. Soon it became a competition off keeping up with the Medici’s 😁 so tower building was banned. I’ve been seeing them all over Rome which is nice because rather than tearing everything down to build new, Italians incorporated them into their new buildings.

I had a great day! Paula was still sick with a cold so she stayed home and rested.

Vatican guard

That’s all for my ramblings now … off to more adventures!