Beautiful spring day.

This is the pond behind our house.  You can see a turtle stretching his neck out and a couple of cormorants

Lots of sun today

April 4, 2011. Paris.

Last night on the road. We are in a really nice little hotel a couple of blocks from the Eiffel tower. The Marquis de Eiffel. I will be busy when I get home, updating the photos on this diary as we have not had great Internet connections. We left the hotel in Rome before 7:00 this morning and walked to thr train. We were at the airport and all checked in by 8:30 so when we eventually found the lounge we had coffee and took some waters for the flight and just relaxed a bit. Rick is starting to get sick so he slept on the 2 hours flight to Paris while I planned our route to our hotel. Our bags are checked right through to Seattle so we didn't have to worry about them. So nice not to have to drag them around for a day. We found the train no problem and easily found pur connection to the metro so we were all checked in at the hotel by 2:00 ish.

We immediately headed for the Eiffel tower but there was a security issue and they had closed the pillars temporarily so we took a hop-on hop-off boat trip up and down the Seine.   Some scenes from the boat..........

Notre Dame

The Louvre

When we got back the lines were moving again so we took the lift all the way to the top. Fantastic views. Quite a memorable experience. I am really glad we did it.

View from the River Seine when we were on the boat

View from the Elevator on our way to the top

View from the Top.  This is the park in front of the Tower

We found at little restaurant and I had Quiche Lorraine but it was so stuffed with chunks of ham, there was hardly anything else to it.  Meat lovers would love that, so Rick happily ate most of my ham.  After dinner we went looking for a crepe place for dessert and shared an apple crepe and a coconut crepe.  Both delicious.

We wandered around the area and did a bit of shopping but we had to get up early to catch the train to the airport so got back to the hotel around 9 ish.  A beautiful, mostly sunny day and we got to see a bit of Paris.

April 3, 2011 Sunday and last day in Italy

We had yet another new hotel breakfast - so far we have stayed in 5 hotels and 7 different rooms.  A bit crazy considering Rick does not like to do too much and definitely does not like to move around so this was supposed to be the relaxing vacation.  I can't take all the credit for the moves though because this is the eighth day that I have no voice so Rick has to do all the talking.  I cannot believe I have had laryngytis this long.  I have never heard of such a thing. 

We went and got on a hop on bus - the Green Line.  Supposed to have 12 stops but once on the bus they tell you only 5 stops on sunday (and only 7 stops other days-the 12 is the summer)  They did not explain much, I learned a lot more on the bus we took with the sisters.  But I did learn a couple of new things.  For example at the Marie Maggiore church they have the oldest creche in existence-they put it out at Christmas.  It actually has some of the wood from the original manger Jesus was born in.  Now I dont know who paid for that but I have snow in Alaska to sell them.  I am pretty sure the whole stable thing is a crock and most scholars of the bible are aware of that, so who are they trying to impress.  Do people pay more money to that church to protect the wood?  I just cannot believe the gullability of some people.  I also learned of several more things that Michelangelo had a hand in building like the Santa Marie degli Angeli church where the sculpture of St Theresa being pierced by the arrow of an angel resides.  That is another crazy story.  She tells how an angel came to her in a dream and pierced her heart right to her bowels and she was in such pain, the fire within her was ecstasy and she was writhing up and down and the good lord was so pleased with her.  So they made her a saint. I suspect a priest visited her in the night.  I also walked up to the Porta Pia, designed by Michelangelo.

After the bus tour, we complained about the five stops and we got a partial refund.  The we found another Thai massage place and had Oil massages.  They gave us each these little paper disposable panties to wear but they didn't give one a feeling of modesty.  The massage was really nice though.  Then we bought Rick a donair and me a gelato and that was pretty much our day. 

We checked trains times at the station and plan to catch the 7:20am so that will be our earliest morning yet.  And we will have to do it two days in a row.  I hope we get settled in Paris quickly so we have some time to look around tomorrow.

Door and Obelisk from Maria Maggiore church

April 2, 2011. Saturday

Happy Birthday to sister Ruth. Busy day for us. We got a ride from our beautiful Hotel Capri (sure hated to leave) to the ferry.

view of our lounge from upstairs

Arrived in Napoli around 10:15 and got a cab to Napoli Centrale. Caught a train to Rome and after a couple of hours we arrived at Termini. We walked to our hotel as it is only a block away. The hotel has a booklet of walking tours so we went out to do a short one. Stopped at Maria Maggiorre, a church that appears to be a slightly smaller version of St Pete's, complete with a bronze altar and the Sforza Chapel by Michelangelo and a loggia full of medieval mosaics.

Interesting stained glass window in the church  The eye and pyramids seem quite heathen for a christian church

bronze altar designed by Michelangelo

We walked on to the Pietro in Vincoli where there stands the original "Moses" by Michelangelo, the one where he used he his own face for the sculpture.

We saw the Palazzo Borgia where Lucrezia lived with her sinful father the pope.

 We walked through the House of the Knights of Malta and that was way more than Rick had signed on for so I returned him to the hotel and did the second walking tour.
I went to the via Quattro Fontane - four fountains at the crossroads  and from there in each direction you can see one of the three obelisks and the Porta Pia by Michelangelo. I stopped to shop for water and gelato on my way back to hotel.

We were wandering down our Via Cavour wondering what to eat and stumbled upon a second L'Archetto restaurant we of course we stopped to have pizza and spaghetti carbonnara for Rick.  Pretty good but not as good as the one at via Archetto near the Trevi founatin.

One more day in Rome and then we head home via Paris for a day.

APRIL 1, 2011 FRIDAY in CAPRI

Rick on our little balcony at the Hotel Capri

Lovely morning to wake up in our beautiful suite overlooking the ocean. We had our cappacinos and the standard Italian breakfast and then rented a scooter for the day 45eur.  Rick drove and we had helmuts but I was still nervous as the roads are so tight and there are as many buses as anything on these roads.  They are smaller than normal but still take up most of these narrow roads.  It was a great day with no incidents and we had warm and sunny weather as well,  We went over to Anacapri,  The sign as you enter the city limits says Anacapri not Capri.    We drove down to a lighthouse and walked around the rough waters there.  There are no sandy beaches here, just steep cliffs,  but they have created a beach destination by the lighthouse.  They have a swimming pool, and various levels of patios for sun bathing.  I don't think you could go into the water as it is crashing up onto the rocks. 

Afer some walking around at that very southwestern tip of the island, we returned to the town of Anacapri and took a chairlift, single seats, up to the highest point of the island.  Phenominal views all around. 

Rick on the chairlift on our way to to highest point on the island

The ancient Romans left many fences, walkways and ruins all around the island.

signs of the ancient Romans at the top of the chairlift

Augustus Cesare had his summer home here and then his son Tiberious ran the Roman empire from Capri in 24AD until his death.  But there is a Phoenician staircase the pre-dates the Romans and other signs of other prehistoric life and settlements here. So they obviously used this highest point as a look out if not a settlement.  It is possible to walk up and down and if I had more days, I would certainly do so.  We saw a guy using the land under the lift for his terrace garden. 

After that we shopped a bit in town and then took a ride out to the Grotto Azzura (Blue Grotto) but it closes when the sun moves to the other side of the island and we didn't get there until 3:00pm.  We were able to take the steps right down to the water so Rick could see how tiny the opening to the cave is. 
The majority of the island is for walking only and is a very steep limestone mountains, so there are many stairs to everything.  Rick hates stairs but has done more stairs today at each stop than he would ever want to see again.

Yes I took the seat off the wall, used and replace it.  Weird.  I guess Italians prefer no seat.

MARCH 31, 2011 CAPRI, Italy Thursday Day 11

First thing this morning I bought a ticket for a boat cruise around the island.  Originally supposed to go at 9:00 am but that one was not going to the Blue Grotto so the next one was at 10:10 and then 10:30 and when I got down to the dock it was now 11:00 and we actually took off around 10:15.  That is Italian time.

The boat cruise went around the island east to west.  Our first stop was the Grotto Azzura.  A huge cave with only a one meter opening accessed only by boat.  We had to leave our tour boat, hop into row boats and sit on the floor of the row boat ducking our heads.  Thre spectacular blue colour is from the reflection of the sun coming up under the water in the cave with only the small amount of light coming through the opening to see the water.  Being inside a cave, the sound is great and our rowers sang like gondoliers in Venice. 

View inside the grotto.  Beautiful deep blue water and luxurious sound

one meter opening to get into the cave (grotto) Boater pull themselves through with that chain

The boat took only about an hour to circumnavigate the island even with all the stops to check out caves. Our boat would just go into a cave a turn around so we did not get off again.  I took a lot of pics of Romans ruins and steep rocky cliffs.  Beautiful island.  I could live here for a while.

After my cruise, I walked back up to our hotel and they moved us up to a related hotel that has a better room for us.  Super nice of them to upgrade us and drive us back and forth.  The new hotel is right in Capri Centre so we walked around a bit, had lunch again at the same place as yesterday.

Good bye to Hotel Excelsior Parco-the column apparently cam from ancient Roman ruins

   Then I went for a walk up to the Roman ruins.  It is called Villa Jovis and can be reached only on foot but is a nice old stove paved path.  The Romans were here since at least the first century BC.

I was walking around the site and heard a little whine behind me and noticed these two walking on the walls.