August 9

Today started with a bit of a disappointment as Amy discovered the plane tickets we had from Rome to London weren't for August 12, they were for July 12. D'oh. Since we couldn't really do much about that we had breakfast. Hey, we've got to eat.

After our meal we piled into the rental car and headed north to Florence. Of course, a free ride, why not? No! We were hunting for the Gucci and Prada factory outlets. The stuff of legends, really. We had only the vaguest of directions to the Gucci outlet and even less for the Prada outlet so we chose Gucci as our first stop.

Previously, the Gucci outlet was an actual outlet at their factory outside Florence. Greed knows no borders so it's now very difficult to tell the Gucci outlet from a good old outlet mall in the USA. Icky. (Yeah, I know, the entire North Bend economy is based on cheap crap at the outlets, but oh well.)

The outlet didn't appear to be completely finished with a bit of construction yet to be done. It was crawling with security and a mall manager type of guy who threw a hissy fit when Dan took a picture. Oh no! We'll sell it to the other outlet mall designers! I thought we'd have a bit of old-world-new-world-rumble, but he stopped short of asking for Dan's film.

For all the trouble of finding the place and dealing with stuck up Italian mafioso-wannabes you'd hope we bought a ton and saved even more. The sad reality is that Serina came away with a souvenir (a scarf) and although Amy was tempted by a wrap she held back. Had they been a tad cheaper, I might have considered the Gucci flippers (seriously), but alas, $400 is perhaps a tad much for yellow flippers that'd wind up scaring the fish anyway.

We headed south to find the Prada outlet which promised a more sensible selection, but we couldn't find it to save our lives. Oh well. In the end we gave up and headed off to Florence.

Ah, Florence! The birth place of the Renaissance and the only place you need reservations for museums. All right, that's not strictly speaking completely true. We did get into one without a booking after only waiting in line for an hour or so, but we had to forego the Ufizzi Gallery.

We did get into the Academia which houses Michaelangelo's Prisoners, Pieta, and of course, David. In the end I discovered that I prefer sculpture to all other art forms. Down a long hallway the Prisoners flank the crowds as they head straight for David at the far end. We spent time like rocks in a river as the crowds streamed past in front of these "minor" works before joining the mass below David.

Meant to be seen from several hundred meters below, the statue is enormous. His head and the hand holding the rock he'll use to slay Goliath are over sized, but would only just have stood out atop the Duomo. We sat in quiet awe for a few moments before leaving the rest of the museum essentially untouched. Nothing else could really compare.

We filled out the remainder of the afternoon according to the program laid out in our guide books. We saw the Duomo which had a great bell tower and dome, but was otherwise inferior to Sienna's. The Baptistery, however, was great. It told the story of the world in gold mosaic on the roof and amazing doors. Heck, we even saw a replica of David where he actually stood.

Another boon for the guide book was the recommendation for the best gelati in Italy. Although Vernazza's gelataria had a certain small-town charm, the nod for best icy treat needs to go to Florence.

Our train to Rome left about 7pm, arriving well after dark, but it was still amazingly hot. We muddled about in the confusing area around our hotel for a while before finally finding our place which was quite nice and air-conditioned. Ahhhh.

August 10

Plane tickets? Who needs to worry about plane tickets? Not us. Although the night guy had a hard time pointing us in the right direction the main day guy had no problem seeing that it would take only two additional characters to turn my gibberish into a legitimate address for the BMI office. We found it with only a moderate amount of trouble (don't even get me started about Rome's addressing scheme) and the Lufthansa guy that takes care of BMI in Rome took care of us at no additional cost. Hurray.

With a valid way home we found an internet cafe that was open 24/7, but really wasn't. Instead we hopped on the Metro (just two refreshingly simple lines) and arrived at the Coliseum. For the first time, Rome felt like Rome. Up until this time Rome was just another big city. Arles felt a whole lot more Roman.

The Coliseum stood four stories tall and was surrounded by throngs of tourists and modern day Romans posing as ancient Romans hoping to cash in on suckers like us with too much money in their pockets. Although it seems hard to believe, the best deal on the baked pavement was the guy selling bottles of frozen water to tourists for 7,000 lira. Standing in line was made perhaps a little more tolerable by holding the frozen core of the bottle against our necks.

Eventually we did get in and were both struck by the same thought. "It's smaller than I thought." From the outside the walls loom above you and on the silver screen the field of combat is huge. In real life, however, it seemed more like a basketball arena than a football stadium.

Most of the original marble is gone, but it's been filled in with bricks and cement to give the impression of the structure in all its glory. The wooden planking that was laid down for the combatants is gone as well, though they've reconstructed it at one end. It's almost spooky to walk on the floor of the coliseum with sand under foot and the sun beating down. Where the floor hasn't been rebuilt you can see down into the multi-storied ready rooms below the arena.

After we had our fill of gladiators we moved on to the political arena by walking the short distance to the Forum. All the important buildings were there on a scale that was mammoth. One meeting hall was 150 meters tall and 100 meters wide. Even the single wall still standing today dwarfed all the other buildings and ruins nearby. We saw the sights and sat on collapsed pillars. We walked the Via Sacra where Julius Caesar walked 2000 years ago and I tripped on many of the same stones.

One bit I was unaware of was that the Forum was buried under 20 meters of debris until the very recent past. Even today we saw areas that were being activity excavated and, presumably, new discoveries being made.

We trekked over the Capitol Hill, past the tomb of unknown soldier, stopped (unfortunately) at a pizza wagon, and found ourselves in a tiny piazza outside the Pantheon and a tiny McDonalds. In a world where good food is hard to come by the next best thing is consistent food. I fear we have come to rely on the Golden Arches one more time for both a taste of home and a quick snack to take the edge off.

The Pantheon today is a Catholic church which accounts for its excellent condition. Virtually all the ancient Roman buildings still standing do so with a cross upon the top. Before the Pantheon found God, however, it was a pagan temple catering to all the gods. Its huge dome with open top was the model for the Florentine Duomo and later St. Peter's Basilica. Although it's been a church for many centuries something about it still feels more at home with animal sacrifices than the Holy Communion.

Our plan called for us to walk from the Pantheon to Trevi Fountain, but on the way we stumbled across another Roman building, though even today we're still not sure what it was. A small square faced the long building. There must have been 15 or so columns visible, but the interior was hidden by walls that had been built between the columns. There were a few Italian signs to explain the structure, but my ability to say good morning and order gilati did not help me to understand its original purpose.

Trevi fountain was beautiful, though not particularly romantic mobbed by tourists. Dodging folks taking pictures and seeing Jack in the Box standing there didn't help much, but we finally got a seat on the edge, even if it was off to one side. Tradition has it that if you flip two coins over your shoulder you'll return someday. I held the coins and Amy gave motion to my arm so we ought to be due for a return trip. We had a quick little kiss before heading out.

Although early, we returned to the room for a bit of a nap, some showers, and a spot of packing. As our last stop Rome got the joy of seeing us unpack and repack. In the end Amy had her big pack, the daypack, and her straw bag with the wine in it. I had my backpack, the glass box, and the platter. It certainly seemed a lot to carry until we realized we had only to get it as far as the airport at which point the big packs became someone else's problem.

We finished packing and headed out to a delightful restaurant recommended both by the hotel and the guide book, but it was closed. We wound up eating at a cheap tourist place instead. We probably should have gone back to McDonalds.

August 11

Our last day was all about the Vatican. We flowed off the subway with three thousand other people all heading to the Vatican Museum and joined the quickly growing queue. It wasn't until we were at the ticket counter that we discovered the Vatican didn't take credit cards. To add insult to injury there are not ATMs in the Vatican so we exited. To add yet more insult to our already sizeable injury I missed the close ATM and walked halfway to Egypt before I found one. On my return, I found Amy lounging where the line once was.

Inside were the most wondrous objects collected by the papacy in the last 1500 years. It's no wonder the Protestants became fed up with the lavish lifestyle of the Church. Still, between the things on display and the buildings themselves it was hard to keep the flies from buzzing around inside my mouth it hung open for so long. No one thing stands out in my memory of the collection. That, of course, was before we got to the Sistine Chapel.

Finding your way through the Vatican Museum is no easy task. Our guide book is a couple of years out of date so some approaches are blocked and some exhibits have been moved. Then there are the tour groups. The big problem is not the groups themselves, but the guides. They seem to think the museum is their office and us? We're trespassing. They'll do as they please and damn anyone who gets in their way.

The best example of this is our attempted exit from the Raphael rooms. Since the museum is all one-way everyone must exit through a single small door. Just to the other side of this door was a decision point where you could go down stairs through a modern art exhibit and skip the hall of busts. The former was really a short-cut for us so that's the way we wanted to go. Unfortunately, traffic came to a complete stop just before the doors. Amy wormed her way through, but I was stuck in the stifling heat. I tried to follow a vigorous tour guide who was pushing through and eventually made it to find the whole problem was caused by a guide who wanted to pause for a moment with his whole group. Argh.

This was the frame of mind I was in when we entered another crowded room. In here, however, everyone was silent and looking up. We had arrived in the Sistine Chapel.

I don't know what I was expecting to see. Perhaps a small room with a painting of God reaching out to Adam in the middle. In the Chapel, however, it was more like the entire Bible exploded inside covering every surface with a different story. It was busy, chaotic even, but all drawn together by what I now recall as a bright blue.

We stood for a bit and then sat in a corner to contemplate what may critics think is the greatest single work of art of all time. Even with the frustration boiling inside me I found myself completely at peace in spite of the continued annoyances.

At length we left and exited the museum and found ourselves just to the side of St. Peter's. We headed out into the square to see the basilica in all its majesty. When we turned and looked we were embraced by two great arms of columns extending out from a stern facade and brooding dome in the background. Saintly statues looked down on us as we headed back the way we had come to the entrance. We saw the Swiss Mercenaries and the Holy door with Jesus' knees rubbed shiny, but nothing prepared us for the main body of the church.

The impression I'm left with is of brown and purple marble. Rich gold mosaics and shafts of light penetrating the veil of shadow to illuminate spots on the floor and explode the colors of those that walk beneath them.

Everything inside the church was built to be bigger than any other. There are marks on the floor that mark where other buildings would be if they were overlaid. The dome is bigger than the Pantheon and Florence's Duomo. Looking up we couldn't see any people looking down, but they were there. The canopy over the alter used when the Pope says Mass is seven stories tall made of bronze taken from the Pantheon.

We spent a long time wandering about before we were facing the Paieta. This was another of Michaelangelo's masterpieces which shows Mary holding Christ in her arms. Even protected by thick plexiglass it was a moving piece.

We ended our visit by exiting through the crypts below the Basilica where all the Popes and St. Peter are entombed. From there we climbed 320 steps along an amazingly tight staircase to the top of the dome looking down on all of Rome. Our trip officially ended atop the dome because that's where we ran out of film. We climbed back down, exited through the square after using the Vatican Poste, and departed the tiny nation.

We retrieved our bags from the hotel and trained to the airport. We had difficulty finding the right platform and even when we arrived at the airport weren't too sure we had found the right one since the name was different than we had expected. We couldn't get the box with the vase in it into the overhead compartment so it was taken down below to be converted into the little glass gravel you saw on walkways in the 80s.

The flight from Rome to London was short and uneventful, but when the box didn't arrive at the baggage claim we were a tad concerned. We did find it, in one piece, at the odd-sized baggage window as Amy was preparing to file a report.

Heathrow was completely shut down, of course, so we found a couple of benches and slept for a few short hours. We repacked the vase box and had no problem getting it through to Chicago. Seattle arrived a few hours later and suddenly our trip was over. Where had the time gone?

We found Tokul a bit rounder than we had left her, but otherwise ok. It took her a few moments to recognize us and a few weeks to return to her old self, but soon she was misbehaving as if we'd never left.

So that's how it ends. Oh, yeah, I suppose there's one last thing worth mentioning. Upon my return to work the next day I found my coworkers had turned my cube into a farm scene complete with hay, a scarecrow, and a soundtrack of dueling banjos and farmyard animals.

Now it's all just a memory. A great memory and one we'll try to relive some time in the future. I'm impressed you got this far. Hope you had fun.

(If you want to see the dispatches we posted on moosefish.com during the trip you can check out this PDF or search moosefish.com.)