12th May 2000 Rome: Trastevere
Trip Start
Apr 27, 2000
1
16
81
Trip End
Aug 09, 2000
Rome,
Italy
Thursday, February 27, 2003
A very warm day right from the outset. Time to return to St Peter's. As luck would have it, there weren't too many people, and we spent an enjoyable hour at St Peter's. The dome was the highlight, and the Pieta being encased behind glass disappointing. I guess there is nothing for it after the last attack, but it just removes something from the experience. It's not quite real. From St Peter's we caught the bus along the river to Trastevere. We wandered the back streets for an hour. Fortunately many are still in their natural state, reflecting a residential neighbourhood, unaffected by tourism. We stopped at Santa Maria in Trastevere, where we enjoyed the mosaics-this being the oldest church in Rome, dating to the third century. Here we witnessed a disaster. A marvellous Paschal Candlestick (12th century spiralling candlestick with glittering multicoloured mosaics-the work of the Cosmati) had toppled over and smashed. We don't know if a tourist was responsible, but when we arrived, they had the area around it roped off, and workmen were sweeping up the rubble. It looked as though the intent was to save every fragment and attempt to restore it. We actually saw a smaller version of a Paschal candlestick at Santa Maria in Cosmedin, just across the river from Santa Maria in Trastavere a couple of hours later, but that's getting ahead of the story.
We decided to eat at a local restaurant, and spent half an hour seeking out a street devoid of tourists. The trouble is, as more and more tourists seek out places in Trastevere, they become spoiled. It's not always just the fact that there are "tourists" (and I can't help but reflect that this word is not much different to "terrorist"), but it's the fact that many restaurants feel the need to pander to them, and alter their menu's and even the way they cook. Our experience at Gemma de Lupa was a good example. Here we discovered what we knew to be a genuine "local" eating place. We knew because at 12.45 pm it was still empty-the tourists start filling everything else up from midday. Antica Trattoria da Remo served us a beer and water, while they cooked from scratch, with zucchini flowers (the specialty of the house). Ches had actually ordered Tagliatelle with Porcini Mushrooms. Didn't offer to replace with the correct dish, but hey, I figured Ches lucked out. It was delicious. I had a square shaped spaghetti (the name has escaped us) with a walnut sauce. Good, but not as good as Ches's. At this point, we are rapidly reaching the conclusion that we have never really had proper "aldente" pasta in Australia. We don't know if its in the cooking in Australia, or the nature of the wheat or the past itself. We have been cooking with Barilla, and seem to be getting an excellent "aldente" pasta. We shared a Trippa Romano-for which he was happy to provide an extra plate for Ches. At L59,000 it was good but not as good value as the night before. We are beginning to know when to expect a really good meal. It is when fifteen minutes elapse after placing the order, and there is still no sign of the meal. They are cooking many of the sauces fresh. Locals began to arrive around 1.30 as we were leaving.
We walked over the Fiume Tevere (Tiber), hence Trastevere-across the Tiber. Crossed at Isola Tiberina, and accidentally stumbled on Ponte Rotto, the remains of the 3rd century BC bridge, and the Temples Boario. These are two of the best preserved Roman temples; saved from the scavenging for building materials by the fact that they were consecrated as churches in the third century.
Across the road was Santa Maria in Cosmedin. It turned out to be our last church visit in Rome. We left so much unseen, but we were in sensory overload. People won't believe the major churches that we didn't visit, however, after discussing with young American neighbours at our pensione, we are amazed we saw as much as we did. They claimed to be exhausted by mid afternoon most days. If Paris requires two weeks to see comfortably, Rome requires three weeks, at least. We even ran into a young American girl at the Palatine, and she said that she had lived in Rome for some years and still has to return for holidays to see things she didn't see then.
Anyway, back to Santa Maria in Cosmedin. Here we saw several small Cosmati "Paschal Candlesticks". Only about two meters tall, compared with the smashed one which must have been three or so meters tall. They really are beautiful. This church is undergoing a major renovation. The mosaic floors were stunning, but most of the frescoes are too faded to be clearly visible. The ceiling is really plain compared with almost every other church we visited. Brown with a simple single motif star? In the Portico is the wonderful Bocca della Verita, the Mouth of Truth. It is a round marble grotesque slit-mouthed face-almost a gargoyle, assumed to have originally been a drain cover.
We walked up Circus Maximus, which afforded us a great view of many of the buildings we had missed in the ill fated visit to the Palatine. Here they all were strung out along the kilometre length of Via del Circo Massimo. Again our Eyewitness Guide to Italy let us down. Incorrectly marked the location of the Baths of Caracalla. It s a good five hundred meters further up from Circus Maximus than indicated. This turned out to be the most vast and most impressive of the ancient ruins. This was a bath complex conceived of by Septimus Severus (he of the massive palace on the edge of the Palatine running alongside the Circus Maximus They were completed by his son, Caracalla. My studies of Roman History cuts out before learning anything at all about either of them. The baths are huge. Could accommodate 1500 so they say. I figure 1500 would have had plenty of privacy in a complex this extensive. Until recently they used to hold the summer program of the Rome Opera here. That's more like it. Must have been able to accommodate 10's of thousands. Several of the rooms are the size of football fields, some still with either the entire mosaic floor or a good part still intact, Also some large sections of the wall mosaics. Huge sea birds, the size of albatrosses are nesting on the tops of most of the walls, which are a good five stories high. We spent considerable time sitting in the gardens just drinking it all in.
Eventually had to move on, and having decided that we would have to live without the four churches we had originally scheduled, we walked down to the Colosseum for one last time, and in to the Forum. Filmed extensively, and ran into an American girl giving a tour. Loved her coverage of the Temple of the Vesta, alongside the House of the Vestal Virgins. She explained "Caligular was kind of like Bill Clinton, he regarded the vestal virgins much the same as the Bill regarded the "interns". They were there for his picking. As an emperor, he had complete power to deflower the virgins, as a demi-god, he could walk through the temple the next day, single out the girl he had deflowered, and declare her a non-virgin, and expel her from the temple. Nice analogy!!! By now, Ches was spending more and more time sitting on ancient columns of marble and passed on even walking up the steps to the recreated Curia (House of the Senate, as if she cared).
We staggered over the Fori Impariali to the first bus stop in Via Cavour, and home again. We watched the traffic for some 10 minutes while waiting for the bus. There was a gelato bar directly opposite, which must be pretty good because at times there were half a dozen cars double parked while they ducked in for a quick one. Meanwhile on our side of the road, there was a bar that is also popular, because there were at least three cars double parked long term, several facing in the wrong direction. Traffic in both directions just had to make their own arrangements. Filmed an interesting episode involving someone wanting to leave their parking spot, and the jostling for curb space by the car letting him out and new cars arriving. Rome makes Paris traffic look civilised. As it turned out, it was excellent training for me. Wait till you hear about or see the tape of my drive through Napless. No rest for the wicked, we had to cook tea, send our weekly
e-mail report to the family, do the weeks laundry at the laundromat, collect the photos we had finally had developed for 10,000 lira instead of 18,000 lira at the tourist traps. Oh, we also had to pack. We decided to try to escape Rome at 7.00 am, before the traffic started.
