Meandering With Murphy

We all arrived safely and a little tired. Jacob got a great shot out of his window and I enjoyed a glass of bubbly. I treated myself to an upgrade.

We found our ride into the city and went directly to drop off our luggage. Since we had 5 hours to wait until our check-in, our Airbnb host suggest a service called Radical Storage where we could drop off our luggage. It was a godsend. The location was a photo service shop and he took the luggage, marked it and off we went. It is a prepaid service so we did not have to find a bank right away.

We went looking for a place to have coffee so we could decide what to do next. We found a place to have a nice refreshing coffee. We needed it. An iced cappuccino and Sprite were the perfect drinks.

Above Jacob, Katelyn, Beth and Glenn. Below Grandma and Jacob.

We decided our next stops were and ATM and then lunch. We got some money and by that time it was time to eat. We found a place, La Locanda di Bacco to have lunch. We all had watched Stanley Tucci in Finding Italy on CNN. When he was in Rome he said there were four pastas: Amatriciana (guanciale, a cured meat from pork jowl or cheeks), tomato sauce, pecorino Romano and chiles), Cacio e Pepe (pecorino Romano and parmesan cheese and pepper), Carbonara (includes eggs in the sauce and often pancetta or bacon) and Gricia (no eggs in the sauce but it has guanciale and Pecorino Romano cheese).

This restaurant had all four plus others.

Each of us had a different one of the four pastas and Beth got the melon and Procsciutto. We all shared as we wanted to taste them all. They were delicious but the pancetta and guanciale were a little salty. We did manage to wash them down with a little rose.

#1 Carbonara, #2 Gricia, #3 Cacio e pepe, # 4 Amatriciana, and #5 melon and prosciutto.

After lunch we still had 3 hours to kill so we walked around and found L De Angelis a Butcher shop, deli and market. Looked like a great place.

We saw parts of the wall around Rome, saw a museum down the street and went to take a look.

A little about the walls of Rome. The Aurelian Walls (Italian: Mura aureliane) are a line of city wallsbuilt between 271 AD and 275 AD in Rome, Italy, during the reign of the Roman Emperor Aurelian. They superseded the earlier Servian Wall built during the 4th century BC. The Aurelian Walls still surround the historic centre of Rome and are among the longest and best preserved ancient walls in the world. The Romans built massive walls to defend their cities and sometimes their military camps. The method with which these walls were built changed as construction methods evolved. Initially walls were built using tightly-fitting massive irregular stone blocks similar to the walls built by the Myceneans. Nowadays, the Aurelian Walls are the largest ancient monument in Rome and can be traced throughout the city. Parts of the wall have been seamlessly absorbed into the modern city (see above) and some sections have even adapted into homes and apartments. The mura aureliane are still also used as a demarcation of the historic center, even though the suburbs of the city have long since sprawled beyond the ancient walls.

We continued our walk and found interesting door bells and we ducked into a kitchen store to cool off and we still had time to kill (a very long 3 hours.

At 2:15 we found a coffee shop near our apartment and Beth, Glenn and Jacob went to get the luggage. The place was called Strabbioni Bar Pasticceria dal 1888. It was a cute place. The ceilings were very interesting. The cut outs looked like tapestry. When most people came in they just ordered their coffee and stood at the counter.

Finally it was time to check in! The apartment is in an old building but it is very modern. Unfortunately, the elevator was not working. The door did not open on our floor but fortunately we are on the floor 1. The apartment is very modern and it has amazing air conditioning! There are three bedrooms and two nice sized baths. The person who checked us in gave us a couple of restaurant recommendations and said, don’t eat in this neighborhood! Although the lunch we had was good and we found out the next day, the coffee shop a few doors down was good as well.

After we unpacked we took a little nap and then Beth and I went to the grocery just a few doors down. It had everything we needed (water, snacks, cheese, salami and of course some wine). Beth was impressed that they had Lagunitas beer and I was impressed they had Amaro so if I was so inclined I could have made one of John H’s black Manhattans.

Our next order of business was to decide on a place to eat dinner. We decided to try the recommended, Osteria de Fortunata. An Italian/ American guy in the airport recommended this and it was on the Airbnb list too. Osteria de Fortunata is located not far from Piazza Navona. They actually have two places around the corner from one another. It was super busy but you stood in a line and the host asked the number in your party and when a table opened up he’d yell across the street and you went in if your sized matched his.

Translated it says:

“If you go in a hurry, you can’t eat here if you want

you have to wait because our stuff is done

by hand and the intrusion we don’t make them”

The other draw to the restaurant is that a woman is making pasta in the window. She made pasta the whole time we stood in line until after we left. She kept making trays and trays of pasta. It looked like tagliolini.

We ordered a great rose and Beth had a Burratta salad with anchovy and the rest of us had pasta.

Our pastas were: Mary: Tagliolini pomodoro, Jacob: Sugo pasta, Glenn: Gnocchi al ragù and Kate: Tagliolini al pesto. We tasted all and they were good. Mine was so fresh.

Because I was falling asleep at the table (not a new activity for me (HA!) and there are no pictures I decided to head back to the apartment. The Goodman’s made their way to the Pantheon and then to the Trevi Fountain and they managed to find some gelato! Then it was off to bed to start another day.