DC-Rome-Bari

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Buona sera from Umbria Italy!
I have not had much luck accessing the internet in the last week. In Rome- I was too sleep deprived- or too busy seeing the Vatican. In Bari, where we stayed the night before we began our bike trip, I did not try, and at the 3 “hotels” we stayed at during our bike trip, only one “truly” had an Internet connection—and that one had the one computer—for all of the guests at the hotel!
We are having a great time in Italy. We are travelling with our long time friends Jim and Lacey Marchetti. Jim is an Italian speakers- with his family coming from Cuneo in the Piedmonte region of Italy. In Bari we will meet up with our friends the Ritelli’s, where we will do an organized 6 day bike trip with Outdoor Travel Company called backroads. We will then spend two days travelling North to Siena where we will stay in a villa for a 6 nights. This was planned in celebration of 25 years of wedded bliss for Jim and I as of Octobers 1st, 2008. We have completed the bike trip and we are now travelling North. I will try to update in the next few blog entries. We feel like we are seeing the “real” Italy—travelling with our Italian friends (JimM speaks Italian), and having spent the last 6 days seeing the country side travelling by bicycle through the backroads of the “heel” of Southern Italy.
Let me digress- We had a fun flight over- as at the last minute in Washington DC, I got upgraded to Business Class - so I could be with my long legged hubby. I guess they will upgrade you for a nominal fee if there are still seats left an hour of so before the plane leaves. So—I got the last seat in Business class—and we were able to trade seats so I could drool on Jim instead of some poor stranger. I have not ever travelled in Business Class before—but I can tell you I highly recommend it. First off you are not fighting for arm room with the person next to you….you have a little table right next to you…and they fill your water glass constantly—you get real food, booze if you want it , and they don’t make you hold on to your garbage for 3 hours with your tray table down before picking it up!!- plus you can actually sleep on the plane (particularly with a little help from my friend Ambien!).
So we arrived at 8:30 am in Rome feeling relatively refreshed - to a taxi and bus strike! But we were able to get a “private cab- like a limo/car service)- who fit our many suitcases into the back of his trunk. He was very friendly- and with Jim Marchetti serving as translator—was very informative about the sites on our way into Rome. We had a quick shower and headed off to our trip of the Vatican. We took a Cab- and as I think I mentioned in my previous post- the impressive collection and overwhelming beauty of the vatican is almost beyond description. I am so glad to have seen it—It has been a life-long dream to see the Vatican, and as I told my daughter last night, now I can die happy!! We fought our fatigue and stayed awake until after dinner- and slept the whole night through. Other more experienced world travellers had told us to gut it out and stay awake as long as we could the first night—so that is what we all did!! The next morning was very exciting- as we went to get a 9 passenger van—at the Avis place located on an extremely narrow- car lined street about 5 blocks from our hotel. Getting back to the hotel and loaded up was truly an exciting experience. Ultimately there will be 6 - 8 of us travelling in the van together. We had an awesome trip in our “bus” from Rome to Bari—and enjoyed seeing the country-side from the ‘auto strade” the Italian Freeway. We also enjoyed the Auto Grills- where you can stop along the freeway to use the Bagno/toilet (which we call the “peeperias”) - get a ‘panini’ (delicious bread with delicious fresh cheese, lettace or basil and cured meat) and gas up the diesel “bus” we were driving! The trip down was fun as we travelled through the ‘mountains’ (oversized hills by CA standards”, and saw many “thermals” which are hot water/steam vents dotting the countryside. Lots and lots of vineyards and olive groves, in addition to many other agricultural endeavors. We made it to Bari, with basically no wrong turns—and met up in the evening with our Friends the Ritellis. At noon the next day we met our “Backroads group” at the Bari Train Station. I will stop boring you for now. We miss everyone—we are thinking of all of you…hope everything is good- send our love and want everyone to know we are having a wonderful adventure!

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