Arrivederci, Roma. We didn’t throw coins in the Trevi Fountain because we probably won’t return to the city (note the cause-and-effect confusion there). We spent seven nights in the Tiber Camping and had no trouble filling our days with easy trips into the city. One of the museums on our list--the Borghese Gallery--was booked until Tuesday, so we decided to make a reservation and do everything else at a more leisurely pace while waiting for Tuesday to come. The museum is in a large park, originally owned by a noble family intent on impressing other noble families, and the collection includes some of Bernini’s most famous sculptures (David, The Rape of Persephone, and others so famous they won’t let you even take a camera in with you). Equally memorable was David being shat upon by a pigeon roosting above the entry door.
On Monday we visited the Vatican, thinking everyone else in town would have been there on Sunday to see the Pope. But apparently the other Lutherans in town hadn’t bothered either, because we stood in a line a quarter mile long on Monday to get into the Sistine Chapel. The line moved quickly, and, remarkably, they just keep the doors open and keep directing people in. It is a labryinth path to get to the actual chapel, through musuem rooms, tapestry rooms and art galleries, with as much art on the ceilings as on the walls.
The chapel itself is not overly large, but we must have shared the space with at least a thousand other people. We are told that 25,000 people visit the Sistine Chapel every day (at €15 or $20 each). It was dismayingly crowded but impressive nonetheless. After lunch with a British couple who shared our table, we visited St Peter’s.
It’s simply big: very, very BIG, and full of buried popes in every side chapel. We had to go through airport type security in both places, but were free to wander once we were inside, especially in St. Peter’s where there was plenty of space for the crowds. No one was selling anything inside, but you didn’t need to get very far to find the bookshops and official and unofficial souvenir shops (Pope John Paul still has his own shop). So for a couple of days we returned to the campground a bit earlier than usual and a bit less exhausted, did some more laundry and relaxed.
Before we left the campground we were able to give Rover her first real bath in a long, long time. This is the first campground that provides a place for camper washing, and it’s a good thing it did: the cottonwood trees had really made a mess. It rained almost every day, and when it rains on cottonwood fluff it turns to a slimy, stringy mud (not unlike pigeon s--t). Our awning was full of it. We swept off as much as we could and then rolled up the awning a few inches to sweep off some more . . . all this standing in swampy grass. Then we took Rover to the camper wash and put the awning down again to hose it down. It was quite a messy wet job and we both got soaked and took showers when we were done.
Most Americans are not aware that many campgrounds in Europe offer rentals of small bungalow cabins. The cost is very reasonable compared to a hotel. The cabins at Tiber are around € 40 ($52) a night. We paid € 105 (or $135) for our seven nights for the motorhome site. We would not have found a hotel in the city for one night for that price. And of course we didn’t buy gas for six days in a row.
On our way to Assisi today we paid $7 a gallon for gas. Along the autostrada we heard a loud bang and immediately our hearts stopped. We neither saw nor heard nor felt anything, but we pulled over at our first opportunity (after driving through a tunnel). We found nothing, but in the distance we could hear fireworks. We don’t know why, but we often hear fireworks during the day--the loud banging ones, not the colorful ones we associate with the Fourth of July. We heard them every night in Pompei. So we decided nothing had exploded, we still had all six tires,our hearts resumed a healthy rhythm, and we continued on our way.
We have a beautiful view of Assisi, this town on a hill, right out our front window from the campground.
We visited the crypt where St Francis is buried. When he died in 1226, a modest little crypt was built around his grave. Later a small but impressive church was built over the crypt, and later still, a basilica was built over the church, after which Giotto filled it with murals of scenes from Francis’s life. It all attracts thousands of visitors and pilgrims every year, but today wasn’t at all crowded. The city is very hilly, clean, quaint and lovely. It was a welcome change from the busy-ness and litter and grafitti of Rome . . . in spite of the wild taxi/bus ride we had from the campground into the town.