rome

rome.we're in rome! the city whose inhabitants once gave us central heating, amazing aqueducts that carried water for miles and endless straight roads of which many remnants still exist all over europe. Plus the most gruesome cruelty when pitting man against beast! the love of straight roads must be in the genes as most of the autoroutes we travelled to get here were straight across some of the flattest and widest plains. to start with we drove through nearly as many tunnels as on the way to sestri. the monotony of them was leavened by the exiting into yet another glorious view of mountains and/or sea sparkling below us. there are many huge greenhouses lining the slopes all along the coastal route and I wonder why. there is plenty of sun to ripen stuff! is it to conserve water as all the panes of glass were steamed up. google? at one point we travelled past acres of tree nurseries, serried ranks of small to medium sized trees. conifers cut into balls and pyramids, indian lilacs trained into standards. that particular region must supply the garden centres of europe! our shady campsite is alongside the tiber and there is a rally of dutch acsi members from holland taking up half the pitches. we find ourselves next to a small british dormobile and in front of a tipi and two three wheeler elderly morgan cars!

yesterday we swam again to cool off after the journey and were able to 'eat out' at last as there is a restaurant on the site. the very efficient girl in the bureau gave us maps and instructions on how to take the free shuttle bus to the nearest station for a 20 minute ride to the city centre. we'll be doing that when we've got ourselves sorted. lou is fighting with the wifi system so this may or may not get posted today! so I shall be studying the map and the rough guide to plan the day. i've asked lou what he fancies seeing and it is the pantheon so that could be the starting point. ciao! (written evenign of 8th september)