They say all roads lead to Rome, and when you’re there, you certainly believe it. Much like New York City, it feels like the center of the universe, as if anything and everything can and will happen there. This was my fifth visit to Rome, and after three days I feel that yet again, I barely scratched the surface.
On Wednesday I left Positano, transported by private car & driver (thanks to Seahorse Car Services) to Napoli, where I met Erik and Lenore to catch the train to Rome. On the way, I made a two-hour stop in Pompeii, an ancient city that was destroyed in a massive volcanic eruption in 79 AD. Though all of its residents were killed, the city was fairly well preserved, thanks to the heavy coating of ash that blanketed the city.
I spent about two hours exploring the ruins, but frankly was frustrated by the massive hordes of tourists – apparently Pompeii is considered the Disneyland of Italy, in spite of the lack of rides and life-sized animal characters. I did my best to see the key sights while avoiding the crowds, and my favorite was the brothel, which featured tiny rooms with stone beds and interesting and explicit frescoes on the walls. Apparently prostitution was so common in ancient Pompeii, they actually had signs – shaped like male genitalia, to overcome the language barrier – that would point out-of-towners to the nearest brothel.
After my quick tour of Pompeii, I found Lenore & Erik at the Napoli train station, and we set off for Rome, where the fun began. And by fun, I mean pain-inducing saga with “Hotel Suck-Ass,” as Erik likes to call it (the actual name is Hotel Antica Roma – I encourage you to never stay there). Upon checking in, the self-proclaimed hotel manager (who it turns out is merely the night receptionist) showed us to what was supposed to be a two-bedroom suite. Instead, we found ourselves in a double room with a cot added for the third person.
Apparently this is where my travel writing gig turns bad, because it seems that someone (any odds on it being the night “manager”?) decided that with the low rate we were getting, we must have been mistakenly put in the suite, and thus corrected the problem by puting us in the quasi-triple. As they had already given away the suite to a higher bidder, our only option was to tough it out for the night. And an interesting night it was, with mustiness that left us all stuffed up, a power outage, and best of all, a bathroom door that came off the hinges, so that when one of us needed to use the bathroom, the other two had to leave the hotel room. Good times.
Needless to say, we checked out of Hotel Suck-Ass the next day, and checked into the nearby Hotel Barberini, which caught my eye in our search for a better hotel because of its similarity to my name. Turns out Barbara and Barberini are both synonymous for quality, friendliness and outstanding service. ;-)
At the nearby Piazza Barberini, we found a great Internet café that offered both computer rentals and Wi-Fi. This was an exciting development for me, as the Amalfi coast was far from a hotbed of hotspot activity. In Ischia and Capri I’d had to use the hotel computer to get online, and transfer photos and blog entries using my USB memory stick. In Positano I could get online at an Internet café, but was out of luck when it came to uploading any files.
In between playing musical hotels and checking e-mail & blogging, we also managed to get in some sightseeing and shopping. We took a great archaeological tour of the Forum and the Colosseum with Scala Reale tours, and checked out Trevi Fountain, the Pantheon and Piazza Navona on our own – three of my favourite spots in Rome. Our major shopping accomplishment was procuring a few very believable Prada knock-off purses, though Lenore and I showed great restraint and agreed to save the bulk of our shopping for Florence.
Probably the best part of our stay in Rome, however, was getting drunk on cheap red wine after dinner one night and proceeding to “drunk dial” our friens Jen, April and Tashana back in the U.S. I’d actually managed to forget the phone calls until the next day, when I got an e-mail from Jen, my roommate, that read: “Feeling a little hung over today? Your little drunk dial-up was freaking hilarious. I've never been drunk dialed from ‘Roma’ by people with braids that look like tiles.”
I could try to explain that last part, but really, when has drunken hilarity ever made sense in the cold light of day? =)
Until next time,
Barbara
I'd be willing to bet that the sucky hotel manager is a cousin of the "doctor" at the spa.
Posted by: Jan | September 15, 2004 at 09:40 AM
Don't worry about trying to explain the braid thing...I've told everyone. :P
Posted by: neefs | September 17, 2004 at 01:01 PM