Rome – Part 4 (Final part, plus weird photos)
Sunday – the last day.
I haven’t slept that well and woke up with quite a dry/sore throat.
If truth be told, I think it’s been heading my way for days. My ears were popping on the plane and refused to pop back right, for the whole time we’ve been here. Not sure if they’re right or not now.
Also, it’s quite smokey. Lots and lots of smokers. Much worse than UK. Breathing in that passive smoke all day can’t be good for you. I’ve even seen officials at tourist attractions stood right outside smoking away, and people cooking in restaurants/cafe, fag in hand. Disgusting.
According to a quick google search, the Italy smoking ban in 2005 lowered the number of smokers from 26% of the population to 24%. It doesn’t appear to be enforced either, really.
I’m also not feeling too great after attempting to tackle that big gristly steak last night. I must learn to stick to my guns with my ‘no red meat’ policy.
If there’s one thing I’d add to Rome, it’s the words “with seasonal vegetables” to their menus. What’s with this ‘couple of salad leaves’ bullshit? I’m not going to pretend I always hit my 5-a-day on at home, but I do a fuckload better than this on fruit and vegetables usually. It’s a surprise the Italians don’t all have either scurvy/rickets, or wind up massively obese. Continue reading Rome – Part 4 (Final part, plus weird photos)
Rome – Part 3
Saturday – later
Today I’ve seen the colosseum. It’s huge, and impressive. Sadly also the busiest place we’ve been yet, and I found it maybe a bit too tourist-geared. There was fences everywhere spoiling the look of it (and presumably stopping people getting in without paying), and modern-looking metal rails to stop you falling off bits.
Rome – Part 2
Saturday AM
I’ve just overheard some people in our hotel discussing the tourist tax. This isn’t some sort of political term. Rome has an actual tax on tourists, variable depending on how nice a hotel you’re staying in. There is a sign in the lift of our hotel saying we’ll be charged €2 a day, per person, for being here. I think it goes up to €5 a day per person in the expensive hotels. You pay it when you check out, in cash, which certainly doesn’t sound dodgy. At all. Continue reading Rome – Part 2
Slightly dismissive sounding sign. #Rome
Rome – Part 1
Thursday
I’m a nervous flyer, but I don’t think I’ll ever stop being impressed by the distance you can travel in the time it takes to watch a film.
This is the first trip where we’ve organised it ourselves and we’ve not gone through a travel agent.
We bought flight + hotel from British Airways (they were cheaper than Easyjet and better flight times), and are organising our own transport before and after the plane lands.
All went fine.
There were some noisy kids on our flight (some sort of school trip from Canada), but they quietened down once we took off, and clapped when the plane landed. Which is nice isn’t it.
There had been no option to choose food for the flight, so I had assumed no food/drink included. But they came round and gave every passenger a wrap (Duck, or vegetarian available), and your choice of drinks – or multiple drinks. Tea and water for my girlfriend, tea for me. Some people appeared to have non-alcoholic cocktails. All included in the price, seemingly.
Also we got free newspapers. I (from The Independent), The Mail, or the Financial Times. Not bad, really.
So – Rome.
Continue reading Rome – Part 1
Water and transparent umbrellas: yes. Knives: no. #Rome
I saw a yeti in Tesco earlier. Here’s the proof.
No Milk This Morning
I typically get up for work a couple of hours before my girlfriend. This morning, I got up to discover there was only enough milk for a cup of tea each (we would normally both have cereal as well, at our respective breakfast times). So I had my tea and toast for breakfast, and sat down and wrote my girlfriend a short note about all of this. I’ll save you the hassle of trying to read my spider-scrawl handwriting (which is even worse at 5.30am), and type it up for you now. Continue reading No Milk This Morning
Chocolate roulade. #Success
And here’s another picture, that maybe might be better:
It looks like a swiss roll, and tastes like a very light almost-melt-in-the-mouth sponge cake. I didn’t get the cream very even. Probably could have done with a bit more. And I ate some of it with a spoon before it even reached the roulade (sorry). The recipe is one of Mary Berry’s, and is available on the BBC’s website: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/chocolate_roulade_79152 – if you fancy making one.
It’s quite an expensive dessert to make, especially if, in the case of this one, you use Green and Black’s fairtrade 70% cocoa chocolate, and Yeo Valley organic double cream. Was £6 just for those two ingredients. Still, tastes delicious, and it’s quite big. It’s designed to serve 8.
Second warning: serves 8. And it probably does. It’s surprisingly filling for something made from mostly eggs and air.