Italy, Day 7: Siena to Rome
(written April 11)
My day started badly with several early morning trips to the bathroom with ... how shall I say it delicately? Montezuma's Revenge without Montezuma. I couldn't say what caused it, but Margo suspected the plate of greens may have exacerbated it.
Today was mostly a day of travel. We arose casually and had breakfast (just a bread roll and banana yogurt for me, though I didn't pass up my Americano). We checked out and got help calling a cab.
I didn't mention it before, but the cab rides through Siena (both ways) took us right through the busiest streets. (On the way back, we even cut across the Campo.) In the old city, inside the walls, there's no pavement, just paving stones; no sidewalks either. So pedestrians must constantly get out of the way of the taxis, cars, delivery trucks, small buses, and scooters that continually travel the streets as fast as they can (which is to say, faster than I probably would). There are no traffic signals in the old town, but it's an organised chaos: nobody is held up and I didn't see proof of any accidents.
Once at the train station, we had less than an hour to wait for our next trip: a train toward the west coast to the city of Grosseto, where we would then take another train to Rome. The ride to Grosseto was easily our nicest in Italy. Unlike the earlier Trenitalia trains we'd taken (including our overnight from Paris) this train was newer than the 1960s. We also had about eight cars that were mostly empty, and our route took us through gorgeous Tuscany countryside.
I started noticing patterns in the landscape. The rolling hills are green, sometimes in rows, sometimes just cut, but never wild. Trees are planted in lines along roads and borders, often tall, narrow, bushy trees. Houses are on hilltops. Houses have terracotta roofs and narrow windows with shutters. The walls are thick stone, if our hotels were any indication. The masonry keeps temperatures cool inside. Wall colours are light orange, creamy yellow, and tan. There are lots of arches over doorways, terraces, and passageways. It's common to see clothes hanging to dry.
I wasn't feeling energetic but was okay, though most of the morning my stomach felt like a hard drive being defragmented.
We had about an hour to wait in Grosseto before boarding our train to Rome. This was an older coach again, but all the seats were in compartments. We joined a compartment with just one other passenger. Sarah stretched out.
After a while we started getting our first glimpses of the Mediterranean. We never got right next to it but did see it often between buildings and industrial plants.
I also started noticing more palm trees and swimming pools. The architecture become more plain and modern.
We arrived in Roma Termini station around 5 pm. I was on edge because I'd read about the pickpockets in the station, as well as other tourist hotspots like the Colosseum. Getting off our train, we got even edgier as a large bunch of loud young men were congregating on the platform next to us. At one point it looked like a fight was imminent but nothing seemed to come of it. The station was hugely busy. I was glad to get into a cab.
Rome has much wider streets than the other cities we'd seen, and the buildings are much more what you'd expect in a huge city: tall apartment blocks and other similar-looking buildings were mostly what I noticed. We did pass a large, attractive park on the way. The traffic was quite slow at first but sped up as we got away from the station. There were lots of exhaust fumes in the air. Scooters and motorcycles darted in between cars. Even now, sitting in our room, it's quite noisy outside.
Our room is high up in another apartment block. This apartment was broken into hotel rooms. There are maybe four rooms in this unit. So it's like staying in someone's apartment: we have a gated from door, then a door to our unit, then a door to our room: three keys. This is the view across the street. At the top of the hill you can see the walls of the Vatican.
I'm not feeling up to dinner so I've found a supermarket down the street and brought back litres of juice, bananas, and slices of provolone cheese. Margo and Sarah are about to go to dinner.
My day started badly with several early morning trips to the bathroom with ... how shall I say it delicately? Montezuma's Revenge without Montezuma. I couldn't say what caused it, but Margo suspected the plate of greens may have exacerbated it.
Today was mostly a day of travel. We arose casually and had breakfast (just a bread roll and banana yogurt for me, though I didn't pass up my Americano). We checked out and got help calling a cab.
I didn't mention it before, but the cab rides through Siena (both ways) took us right through the busiest streets. (On the way back, we even cut across the Campo.) In the old city, inside the walls, there's no pavement, just paving stones; no sidewalks either. So pedestrians must constantly get out of the way of the taxis, cars, delivery trucks, small buses, and scooters that continually travel the streets as fast as they can (which is to say, faster than I probably would). There are no traffic signals in the old town, but it's an organised chaos: nobody is held up and I didn't see proof of any accidents.
Once at the train station, we had less than an hour to wait for our next trip: a train toward the west coast to the city of Grosseto, where we would then take another train to Rome. The ride to Grosseto was easily our nicest in Italy. Unlike the earlier Trenitalia trains we'd taken (including our overnight from Paris) this train was newer than the 1960s. We also had about eight cars that were mostly empty, and our route took us through gorgeous Tuscany countryside.
I started noticing patterns in the landscape. The rolling hills are green, sometimes in rows, sometimes just cut, but never wild. Trees are planted in lines along roads and borders, often tall, narrow, bushy trees. Houses are on hilltops. Houses have terracotta roofs and narrow windows with shutters. The walls are thick stone, if our hotels were any indication. The masonry keeps temperatures cool inside. Wall colours are light orange, creamy yellow, and tan. There are lots of arches over doorways, terraces, and passageways. It's common to see clothes hanging to dry.
I wasn't feeling energetic but was okay, though most of the morning my stomach felt like a hard drive being defragmented.
We had about an hour to wait in Grosseto before boarding our train to Rome. This was an older coach again, but all the seats were in compartments. We joined a compartment with just one other passenger. Sarah stretched out.
After a while we started getting our first glimpses of the Mediterranean. We never got right next to it but did see it often between buildings and industrial plants.
I also started noticing more palm trees and swimming pools. The architecture become more plain and modern.
We arrived in Roma Termini station around 5 pm. I was on edge because I'd read about the pickpockets in the station, as well as other tourist hotspots like the Colosseum. Getting off our train, we got even edgier as a large bunch of loud young men were congregating on the platform next to us. At one point it looked like a fight was imminent but nothing seemed to come of it. The station was hugely busy. I was glad to get into a cab.
Rome has much wider streets than the other cities we'd seen, and the buildings are much more what you'd expect in a huge city: tall apartment blocks and other similar-looking buildings were mostly what I noticed. We did pass a large, attractive park on the way. The traffic was quite slow at first but sped up as we got away from the station. There were lots of exhaust fumes in the air. Scooters and motorcycles darted in between cars. Even now, sitting in our room, it's quite noisy outside.
Our room is high up in another apartment block. This apartment was broken into hotel rooms. There are maybe four rooms in this unit. So it's like staying in someone's apartment: we have a gated from door, then a door to our unit, then a door to our room: three keys. This is the view across the street. At the top of the hill you can see the walls of the Vatican.
I'm not feeling up to dinner so I've found a supermarket down the street and brought back litres of juice, bananas, and slices of provolone cheese. Margo and Sarah are about to go to dinner.
posted by Michael Nelson at 12:35 pm
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