Taking a Break in Rome’s Campagna

First, some news about this blog:

• On the sidebar, I’ve added a way to subscribe yourself via email if that’s your preference. Just enter your email and it will notify you when there’s something new!
• I just wanted to encourage new subscribers to use the RSS feed from when I redesigned the site – https://www.msadventuresinitaly.com/blog/feed/ – it’s on the sidebar, of course. I will continue to update the older feed (blog.xml) but if you can, switch to the newer one. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, don’t worry, and continue on as usual.
• I mentioned this in the comments, but I added a font re-sizer if you’re finding it hard to read my blog font – go to the sidebar and at the bottom click “Bigger” or “Smaller” as you prefer. Voila.
• Last but not least, I am looking for a good podcast. Informational, entertaining? Any recommendations?

I posted recently about what a hard week I’d had, but last week made that week seem like a walk in the park.

Thank God for Rome.

I spent the weekend not going to tourist attractions, not planning my whole day out to optimize the time available, not consulting schedules or a guide book, not comparison shopping for souvenirs, and not setting the alarm clock.

Che goduria!!! What bliss!

What I did do was spend the weekend with old friends, new friends, a special new baby extraordinaire, and enjoyed an unusually hot November weekend in one of my homes away from home.

It’s been over a year since I was in Rome for my friend’s wedding and two years since I moved up north from Rome. Now my friend’s got a beautiful new baby girl! I was lucky enough to spend quite a bit of time with her and some of my ex-colleagues.

Saturday there was a mini blogger meetup as I met up with Shelley from At Home in Rome and Avery from La Dolce Vita. It was nice to finally put some faces and voices to these bloggers! It’s interesting to meet someone whose blog you’ve been reading for a while or vice versa. You know too much about them for you to be a stranger, but not enough for you to be a friend because you kind of feel like you’ve been eavesdropping! Of course, hopefully being a “friend” is next in line. I had a good time, girls!

Some tourist info I noted:

• The double-decker “Open Bus” that takes a tourist around Rome’s most popular attractions of the city is relatively new, and was added only a few years ago. Now they have two more tourist tracks: the Archeobus which takes you around the Appia Antica, Catacombs and other sites, and the Roma Cristiana which takes you around some of Rome’s most famous churches. Things are shaping up!
• Since October 1st, taxi drivers have displayed and respected the SET fare to/from Rome’s airports and the center. This is a great step forward for tourists. My cousin paid 200euro for a trip one way when he was running late for a flight two years ago. The max they can ask you now is 40 euro to the center. It’s almost worth it since the train costs 10/head.

On Sunday we had the awesome opportunity to go to the country house of the couple we were staying with, a good friend of Sante’s. The sky was perfectly clear and hot and we stripped down to our short sleeves and took off our shoes and were still burning up. It felt wonderful and it was like recharging my battery. It’s a distant memory now as Milan is definitely in scarf+jacket mode.

This part of the countryside in Sabina is absolutely beautiful. Here’s the view from their porch. I like having mountain nearby for some perspective, and it reminds me of home. I had a problem with this when I lived in Texas because I could never find a mountain. Their father in law did all the detailing on the house (he has a small castle-like house just near them) and painted the “fake wood” for their trim. He got a little whimsical because he wasn’t using earth tones but I really like it. The sun really lit up the colors as well.

This was the type of view that made my soul breathe.

Sometimes it’s nice to get away from Milan. But sometimes it’s also nice to get away from Rome. I took this 360 degree video of almost complete silence (except for the crow, Dad) to try and remember how peaceful it was there. (click through to site if you don’t see the video)

They have about two acres of land and are using it well – olive trees, cherries, strawberries, and other crops.

I found the olive that got away from the harvest they had just done to make their oil.

I have some more pictures to share but I thought I’d send those of you celebrating Thanksgiving tomorrow some well wishes!! Happy Thanksgiving, enjoy your holiday and think of me as I’ll be working.