The Alarm went off and woke me from a deep sleep (not easy on these beds….how do you say “get some memory foam!” in Italian?). I opened my eyes….dark room, still a slight smell of cleaning supplies and an unnatural “fresh” scent….the hotel.
OK, now which hotel and which city…it’s gotta be in Italy….not Siena….Lucarelli was the other night….Florence… Florence? No, Rome…no, wait……..Florence…I think. I sit up and look around….yep, still in Florence.
After the mental calisthenics required to manually ‘GPS’ ourselves, we headed down to breakfast. No one. Wow, we felt a tinge of separation anxiety…no bikes, no group, no coordinator. We sat down and a very pleasant woman took our drink order--we said in unison “Bon giorno!….si, si, si….cafe….grazie!” and flashed our “see? we’re trying…” smiles. We expected (and got) the usual 10w-40 weight we had become accustomed used to.
It was about 8:00 am and we had a 9:28 train to catch…the train station was literally a couple of blocks away so had time to enjoy the croissants w/ honey and peach yogurt (again). “Hi boys!” we turned (again, in unison) and there was Catherine. Excellent, we continued to be weaned off this Blue Marble addiction slowly (I’ve always been one for pulling the Band-Aid off in tiny increments….).
We were chatting away and another familiar voice bounced around the corner... "I know you’re missin’ me already….!?" It’s Jan, and yes, she was part of the separation challenges we were having a while ago. All we needed was Brian and we would have had half of our original group back. We chatted about what was next, flights, the Italian Lakes trip (not fair!), missing our kids/puppies/kittens/Blu-Ray players at home…knowing this would definitely be the last time we saw each other this trip (unless of course we ran into Jan in Rome, which at that point seemed almost a given...but alas it was not to happen).
Time for the train…we did the goodbye hug thing we had practiced so many times over the past couple of days and turned to go, fully expecting to bump into Brian on the way out. [Brian: didn’t see you on the way out, so hope you’re having a good time on your ride].
Elevator…street….station….train….on our way to roam Rome for the day. Less than two hours later we were walking down Via Marsala looking for lunch. We decided to head over to the Villa Medici. It’s one place we hadn’t seen on our last trip, so we thought we would head over there.
At some point we took a wrong turn….we were at the park where the Villa Medici is located, but somehow we’ve ended up on the wrong side of freeway-like street. As we cut through the park to find a way over to the Villa we saw an odd sight. In the middle of an open park area--not all that far from the road we were trying to cross--a woman was sitting on a stool, getting a haircut.
After a couple more wrong turns and a stop at a an overpriced park restaurant for lunch we found the Villa….but no public entrance. Great….of course it was a private residence, why else would they have had it highlighted on the map of tourist spots we had picked up in the hotel (the gardens I guess). Well, when all else fails in Rome, head to St. Peter’s Basilica.
Odd, but there weren’t a lot of people at St. Peter’s…we were through the metal detectors in under five minutes and headed straight for the trip to the top of the Duomo. No line all the way to the ticket booth…paid the extra 2 Euros to take the elevator up (yeah, yeah, I know, but our legs were tired by then).
Went to the top—the Cupola—which was still a couple of hundred steps beyond where the elevator drops you, and we were treated to the most amazing view(s) of the city (yes, the getting high reference in Day 15's post). Of course, as you’re walking hunched over in the spiral walkway to the top it’s hard not to recall the frequent news stories about possibility of earthquakes in Italy, but clearly we were fine.
That night was our final Italian dinner and gelato. We then headed back to the hotel…this was it…the end of the journey! What started as a random read of an article in a travel magazine a year earlier has brought us full circle. We’ve just completed a two-week, life-changing cycle trip through some of the most beautiful lands in the world—and lived to blog about it. Thanks for sharing it with us.
[A special thanks to the folks at Blue Marble…the trip was better than we ever would have dreamed. Your experience and guidance, travel philosophy, and (especially!) your people—Nicolas and Lesley in coordinating pre-trip and our two ride coordinators: Lyn in Provence and Catherine in Tuscany…we can’t imagine having done these trips guided by anyone other than you two. Thank you… for everything!]
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