January 2007 - Western Italy
Italy | Nettuno
January 9, 2006
Buon giorno What a beautiful day! I did laundry to hang out in all this sunshine. It was 84 degrees in the sun (according to my outdoor thermometer) and 74 in the shade. Al and I stripped varnish off all the hand grab rails on the deck. What a job! Actually Al stripped the varnish and I cleaned up after him as he went. We also took the inverter up to the marine store to be shipped. Hopefully it'll be gone before we are. We haven't been too impressed with the postal service. We had an item shipped two day service from Bonifacio, Corsica and it took over a week. Bob and Val shipped us a box over three weeks ago and we still haven't seen it. Hopefully Giorgio will do the warranty work on the inverter and ship it right back. Maybe it'll be here when we return :-) We plan to clean the refrigerator and close the rest of the thru hulls today. We'll eat supper our tonight. Everything needs to be ready tonight as we plan to catch the 7:20 train to Rome tomorrow so this is our last log for a while . We have to be at the airport 3 hours in advance. We can print our boarding passes on the boat so that'll be taken care of today. Can't believe we'll be home tomorrow! Ciao,
Love Sally and Al
January 8, 2006
Buon giorno Al started closing thru hulls on the boat today, empty strainers... We cleaned up the grill and put it away. It rained off and on most of the day so the jeans I washed I had to hang inside. Hmmm Any idea how long it takes jeans to dry? I started packing bags. We removed the invertor and boxed it up to send for repairs. We wanted to be sure to take care of it while it was still under warrenty. We picked up fresh produce. Trying to be careful not to over buy as we hate throwing food away and no one seems to be around to give it too. I made shrimp and sausage rigatoni for dinner, salad and carrots. We've had the best tomatoes from Sicily lately. Just bite size bigger than a cherry but oh so flavorful and firm. Ciao,
Love Sally and Al
January 7, 2006
Buon giorno We were all worn out from our travel yesterday and slept in this morning. Cloudy day. We went grocery shopping and got caught in the rain. Not too bad just a drizzle. After lunch we read and surfed on the internet. Truly we were happy to do very little today. Trying to organize all that needs to be done before we fly out on Thursday. People have been asking about our itinerary so here's what we know so far.
Thurs. Jan. 11 We fly British Airways flight #BA0549 leaving Rome 12:15 arriving in London Heathrow Airport at 2:00. We depart On British Airways BA0299 at 3:30 for Chicago O'Hare arriving at 6:10. Justin 773-991-4241 Chris 312-485-0059 Fri. Jan. 12
Drive to Cottage Grove with Mary and Chris to son Patrick and Nicci's house. 651-330-2288 Sat. Jan. 13 Cottage Grove Sun. Jan. 14 Wedding Shower Connie's house back to Cottage Grove Mon. Jan. 15 Cottage Grove Tues. Jan. 16- Thurs. Jan. 18 Maple Lake Al's Parents Fri. Jan. 19- Wed. Jan. 31 Minnesota (stay with Pat and another visit to Maple Lake, Doctor apts, dentist etc) Thurs. Feb. 1-6 Chicago and Chicago Boat Show. Wed. Feb. 7- Feb. 15 Fly NW Chicago to Detroit/Syracuse New York to visit Grandpa Fraher and Brother Tom and Margaret Thurs. Feb. 15 fly back to Chicago until Thurs Feb. 22 Thurs. Feb. 22 drive back to MN to Cottage Grove Fri. Feb. 23- Sun. Mar. 4 Minnesota Mon. Mar. 5 Fly American 4:40 PM to Chicago 7:55 PM British Airways to London 12:35 PM British Airways to Rome arr. 4:00PM So that's the overview of our plans at this time. Ciao,
Love Sally and Al
January 6, 2006
Buon giorno
We took the train into Rome today. Epiphany is a holiday in Italy so many streets were closed to vehicular traffic. The streets were crowded especially with families. Epiphany is a children's holiday and they receive decorated stockings filled with candies and small toys.
We explored a new section of Rome for us. We visited Santa Maria degli Angeli designed by Michelangelo, Santa Maria della Vittoria with Bernini's St. Teresa's Ecstasy.
Italy | Rome | Villa Borghese
We tried to visit Villa Borghese park (couldn't get into the museum where many of Bernini's sculptures are exhibited, another day...). It was a beautiful day so we enjoyed visiting the park. The grounds are beautiful even during the winter! We walked down via Giorgio Washington dedicated to Rome by daughters of the American Revolution for the Italian support of the revolution.
Italy | Rome | Pizza del Popolo
We had lunch outdoors at a nice little Pizzeria outside of Porto Popolo. We explored Piazza del Popolo but the churches were closed. We walked to Piazza Spagne but our bookstore was closed so we headed for Piazza Navona. What a zoo! Elbow to Elbow Italian families celebrating Epiphany (face painting, balloons, street acts, flea market,) very festive! We walked crossed the Tiber and headed for St Peter's to 5:30 mass. It started with Vespers for Epiphany with about 20 cardinal attending. There was a men's choir. The Gregorian chants were lovely. We processed to the indoor near life size Nativity and then back to our seat for mass. The mixed adult choir sang mass and we heard our first Christmas carols. Lots of people in St. Peters and the piazza.
Italy | Rome | Piazza del Popolo
We caught the metro back to Termini(amazing the number of people who squeeze into a subway car) and the 8:06 train back to Nettuno. Home again, home again, jiggity-jog. We always enjoy our visits to Rome but our feet are mighty tired after walking all day! We have visited Rome twelve times and we still have things to go back and see! I guess they will have to wait until March as we fly home to the states this week. Ciao,
Love Sally and Al
January 5, 2006
Buon giorno Beautiful start to the weekend. Sunny and 62 degrees! We took all the port light screens out (14 of them)and Al replaced a few and cleaned them up. I went after the stainless steel around the port lights inside and out and polished to remove rust and salt. Then I cleaned the windows. A big job but they look great and they're done. We had planned to walk the beach to Anzio but got side tracked. We were eating lunch on deck when a man walked up and asked if we were Americans. Martin was from Toronto and works for ABC and his wife works for the UN World Hunger program in Rome. They've lived in Rome for three years but have a 34 Viking sailboat here in Nettuno. Nice man and we ended up talking until well after 3:00 so no walk today. It's rare we have the opportunity to talk to someone else in English so it was a treat. We plan to go into Rome for the day tomorrow. Ciao,
Love Sally and Al
January 4, 2006
Buon giorno Al was a busy boy today. He figured out the rats nest that is the wiring on board Artemis. He made a wiring diagram and labeled all the wires. Who ever worked on Artemis before would remove the old equipment but leave the wiring behind. It turned out to be quite a project but he feels he's been successful. He also repaired a light and remounted one that fell into the genset compartment. We started putting things together for our trip home. We're making lists of things to do before we go and things to bring back with us from the states. It's nice to have internet on board as we can look for things on line. I can also keep up with my emails. It was another sunny, quiet day so we grilled again tonight. Ciao,
Love Sally and Al
January 3, 2006
Buon giorno The winds quieted down and the boat settled in her slip. It's really not bad movement except when you're trying to get off. We went to pick up fresh produce. We've decided to not buy to far in advance. We'd hate to be throwing food away when we leave. We took a nice walk in the sunshine down the beach for a couple of hours. Then we checked out the work on the breakwall. Perhaps it'll be done by summer :-> Put on some Billy Joel music tonight and grilled some chicken. Ciao,
Love Sally and Al
January 2, 2006
Buon giorno We woke early to howling wind and the boat rocking. The rain passed during the night but the wind stayed all day. The forecast was for Force 7 from the NW and then Force 8. We only saw 30 kts. on our wind speed but then it usually reads low. We had to time our departure from the boat to take our showers. The board would go left, go right, pull in, pull out. At one point it would be too short to reach at all. It was sunny but windy. We read and Al polished the brass captains compass. We just felt like burrowing in today. Sort of like a snow day! I made spinach tortelloni and wrote emails. I checked out the Savage Pacer newspaper on line today. They had a news article about the M.W. Savage Video team that does a weekly video on the M. W. Savage Morning News (where I taught second grade for the past 22 years). They feature a different part of our adventure each week complete with props and pictures. I'm looking forward to stopping in at school, meeting them, and viewing the fin ished episodes. Ciao,
Love Sally and Al
