Another morning in Rome!This hotel is so freaking cool
We got up kind of late, sort of on purpose: Sam’s clients are mostly on US time, so there’s little point in us adjusting to local European time if she’s gonna be on calls till 1:00AM every night–better for us to sleep in and try to stay more on a US-based schedule. That works better for the stocks too! So we dressed, and immediately went out for lunch.
Lunch appetizer had a fantastic mozzarella ballI had dead fish! Felt like we were back in Napoli, it was so good. I would have eaten this breakfast lunch & supper if I had known there would be no good seafood at all for the next month…Sam had shrimp ravioli which she lovedI’m afraid this fish is beyond resuscitation… We are still loving the Sicilian wines we’d discovered last fall (mostly because we hadn’t learned about the fantastic Umbrian wines yet!)Sam’s dessert was something totally bizarre, but the strawberry was excellent!This was their attempt at a simple apple torte… the common theme between our two desserts was that they were both garnished with lark’s vomit! (From an old Monty Python skit lol)
After lunch we needed to return to the room: Sam had calls, I had the stock market open… we never did much sight-seeing here, but thankfully we made up for it on the back end of the trip.
SO PROUD of myself for getting in a workout! I had every excuse imaginable to skip, but I didn’t!For dinner, I tried yet again to get decent grilled meat in Europe, and I have to admit these lamb chops weren’t too bad!Sam said her four seasons pizza was fabulous, I guess even the Italians ‘way up here can still maka da pizza-pie!Dessert was pretty fab actually
Then it was back to the hotel (more Zoom calls) and we actually needed to be up “early” for breakfast because we had a big travel day! We have already booked train tickets all the way to Todi but there is some confusion about the back end of that trip (naturally). In any event, we need to get up bright & early because the giant Rome train station is sure to be a complete & total shitshow 😀
Our last breakfast at the Anantara Hotel, we will miss this place!Breakfast buffet actually has pretty legit sushi!
We packed up, checked out, vomited our way to the Rome train station in a cab, and attempted to deal with the inevitable confusion
We arrived so early that we had to kill time waiting for our train to even be posted… Our very first beers of the trip BTW!Naturally there is a huge archeological site just outside the train station, and beyond it is this attractive gold dude, I think he probably has something to do with the Green Bay PackersSam optimistic that our train might be hiding around here somewhere
Did I say the Rome station appeared easy & straightforward? Hmmm… we eventually found our platform number and pushed forward to where all the trains departed.. but then the nomenclature suddenly and randomly changed to the alphabet: the numbers were all gone, replaced by a zillion gates labeled A, B, C, etc. Now we had no idea where we should go!
But by pressing our noses up against these glass doors, we could glimpse actual track numbers beyond, and there was our Track 2!!
No train yet but it was DEFINITELY Track 2, so we waited, and a train quickly arrived. Just to make certain, Sam asked the train porter if this train was bound for Terni, and he was completely surprised. Thisa traina?? No no no no!!
Turns out we were completely in the wrong place and needed to scurry over to a completely different Track 2, pretty much across the whole station. Don’t most train stations have multiple Track 2s, just to keep things interesting?
At least we now know the right direction to go! We have approximately eight minutes, and some heavy luggage.
See the sign? Ours was Platform 2…. East! Sam is truckin so fast I’m surprised this picture worked!Our departure platform was really far away!!!See how far back the main station is now?Sam shouting “Keep up with me!! Hurry hurry!!!” We are probably down to two minutes at this pointShe looks pleased and relaxed 😀 At this point she is NOT a happy camper! She should be, cause we at last found our damn train in the nick of time, but this is a tiny local train so we had to traverse a few cars to find any open seating, and the best we could do was to cram her in next to some chick with one of the hugest bags we’d ever seenRandom Italian countryside as seen from the train… we think that sign at the top of the window was instructing passengers to not pour their wine out the window?Better view of Sam’s seatmate’s ginormous carry-on luggage 😀Train beer was from Poland?!?
So the end-of-journey confusion finally sorted itself out: it turns out that, while we were led to believe we were taking a train all the way into Todi, we were really taking a train only to Terni, at which point we needed to switch to a bus.
There’s Sam, in the purple, trying to navigate this… new devilry. The train station guy apparently has no idea about busses, and basically just tells us to head outside and randomly look around…This valuable advice definitely called for beers instead, and look what we found: our go-to beers from Sicily!!!This whole train station is pretty much desertedOutside the Terni train station, there was this… thing, which amused us while we searched for random busses
Eventually a likely-looking bus approached, and Sam talked to the driver about getting to Todi… no no no, back down there, he waved, “go to red!!”
Naturally there was no “red” anywhere in sight but we did eventually catch the right bus somehow.
If you can make out those red signs at the side of the street, that was the “red” we were supposed to find and stand by 😀Terni is now 13 km behind us, but it would be more encouraging to finally see a sign to TodiRandom hilltop town we passed byOur very first look up at Todi!!That’s our bus!And there goes our busAnd the place seems pretty deserted….
Our rental lady was supposed to meet us but there is no one at all. But Sam whips out her phone to get in touch with the property manager and she is now on her way. “We never know where the bus will let them off,” she tells us lol and she drives us as close as she dares to our flat.
First we walk upAnd then we walk down….And then a car attempts to run us overAnd here we are! That’s the door to our flat! And that’s our balcony above! Seriously can’t believe we actually made it here 😀Our flat, while tiny, is very comfortable!View of the street from our patio
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