Sunday

Sunday in a nutshell

Amsterdam Airport - so nice, we nearly stayed!
Rembrandts at the Schipol Airport Museum
Land in Rome
The Coronet Hotel pics
Pizza at Tosca
Piazza Navona and Bernini's Four Rivers Fountain
Tartuffo at Tre Scalini

We got off on the wrong foot on Sunday. There were several hours between flights, and for reasons I can't explain, we curled up in front of CNN and missed our flight to Rome.

Our pain was exquisite.

But, it gave us a chance to enjoy all that Schipol Airport had to offer, including a really nice exhibit of Rembrandt sketches in a mini-Museum.

Many hours later, our new flight took us to Rome. Dad nimbly led us out of the train station to the bus area, and a quick ride took us to the center of town where we were staying.

We get to the door, and Dad knows to press the buzzer. But we don't know that it's a two-way speaker thing. Not a good one either. The hotel guy is fuzzily trying to find out who we are, so I go back and press the buzzer button again, thinking I have to hold it down to talk to him. No. I deafen him instead, so he realizes that he's dealing with imbeciles and comes down to get us.

	The Hotel Coronet is in the Palazzo Doria Pamphilj. It's in the back, where I imagine the service entrance was (is?). There are a number of businesses in the Palazzo, including the Associated Press of Italy, but the Doria Pamphilj family still resides there, as evidenced by the bajillion dollar car parked in the interior courtyard.
	The room we had was two beds and a fold-out cot. The cot turned out to be the worst bed in history, and Rome has a lot of history! There is a picture of the Cot From Hell on Thursday's page, because that was the morning after I slept in it. (This is perhaps the dimmest picture. If you can't see Dad sitting on the bed, turn up your monitor's brightness.)
	The hotel is on the third floor of the Palazzo. From the window, here's a view looking to the left.
	Looking right.
	In the immediate neighborhood, there is one of the oddest sites of Rome. On the Via de Pie Marma, which I think is translated as "Street of the Marble Foot", there is, indeed, a marble foot. That's it. Nothing else left. Just a foot. It's got a building built right next to it, and people park there like it's no big deal. And maybe it isn't when you're surrounded by ancient ruins... what's one more?
	Going the other way from the hotel, is the ugliest statue-thing in Rome. A mini-fountain of some old dude holding a barrel. But time and tides have stolen his beauty. And his nose. (12/02/2003) Ok - now I've read The Fountains of Rome about this guy. He's called Il Facchino, "The Porter", and is attributed by tradition to Michaelangelo. It's "one of the best-loved fountains in Rome" and is still fed from an aquaduct. Go figure. As you can see, Romans have a rather cavalier attitude about fresh water. This, like pretty much all the fountains in Rome, just spills its water out, and it runs continuously day and night. A few brave souls would fill up their water bottles from these sorts of fountains.

After checking in and unpacking, we head out for a night on the town. We went to have pizza at a great place that Mom and Dad had been to before, called Tosca. The pizzas, as they are all over Rome, are very thin-crust, almost a cracker, and usually just a couple of simple ingredients. Many have no tomato sauce. All are fantastic!

After pizza, we walked to the Piazza Navona - a big plaza with three fountains. The central fountain is Bernini's Four Rivers fountain.

Piazza Navona is also the home of the Tre Scalini gelateria, where we had an amazing thing - Tartuffo. It is dense and chocolatey and smooth and intense, and it has a cherry in the middle. What's not to love?

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Monday