Category Archives: Roman Ruins

Mainz, Germany and Gutenburg Bible

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Day 35    Saturday,  October 4, 2025

It is a 45 minute drive to Mainz, and Bob has several items on our ‘must see’ agenda. First stop is the market. The flowers at these markets are always so beautiful and very reasonably priced.

The main sculpture in the main square (market) of Mainz is the Heunensäule, or Hay Column. It is a 1,000-year-old sandstone column with a bronze casing, depicting various symbols of Mainz’s history and culture like a fool’s cap and bishop’s miter. It is in the market square in front of the Mainz Cathedral. 

I like this wishing well and we both toss in a coin and make our wishes.

We both like the interestingly shaped squash…we might have to try growing some next year.

We have seen these coloured eggs in the grocery stores and wondered what they were. Turns out they are hard boiled eggs that are coated in a tinted resin that keeps them fresh for months! The colour helps to identify them as being hard boiled.

Gorgeous sunflowers!  I am definitely planting some of them in our garden next year.  They are so cheerful. Next stop in the Mainz Cathedral.  We are met at the door and told that there is a concert starting and if we enter the church we have to stay for the 45 minute concert.  Sounds perfect as it is raining and cool outside!
We spend the next 45 minutes listening to an amazing organ concert to commemorate the new cathedral organ.  The musician, Alexander Grün, is only 25 years old and has three Masters Degrees!  He plays some traditional organ music and then music that is innovative. The 45 minutes absolutely flew by.  I sketched for a bit while listening to the music.  Loved it. I wish I had recorded more of the music, especially the finale of the concert…it gave me goosebumps!      https://youtube.com/shorts/HykSsp-S-9E

There are fall foods displayed on the steps to the altar to remind people to give thanks for the harvest, and to share with those in need.  

The Cathedral cloister has a beautifully tended garden,

Bob liked this statue statue of a man holding his head. This is probably Saint Denis, who was beheaded but picked up his head and walked some distance, preaching the Gospel.

The buildings surrounding the market square are tall, narrow and decoratively painted.
Next on Bob’s agenda is a visit to a small museum underneath a shopping mall. We see Roman ruins from before the fall of the Roman Empire in the 5th century. These ruins were discovered when excavations began for the shopping mall. The area was thoroughly excavated and recorded, but ultimately the mall was built and most of the ruins were destroyed.

This little museum has the reconstructed ruins of a temple, under a ceiling of constellations. Some of the items found when the ruins were excavated.  Well endowed males were well represented.

Our final stop in Mainz is to visit the Gutenburg Museum, which is connected to a small Natural History Museum. This display in the entrance is quite striking.

We start with the Gutenburg Museum which shows the impact of Johahannes Gutenburg’s invention of a moveable type printing press in 1440.  This press allowed for the printing of 3600 pages a day, compared to 40 by hand printing and only a few by hand copying. There were  several beautiful ancient books on display. This Atlas of the World was printed in 1482.

The World Chronicle is from 1493.

An ornate Columbia Printing Press from 1824.  

We are given a blank card that has a chip installed inside the paper when we entered the museum.  We place this card into a machine that takes a selfie of us. Then we take the still blank card to a modern printer and this is what we received.

Entering a small room with dim lighting we see the Gutenburg Bibles. Only 49 of the approximately 180 printed Gutenberg Bibles have survived and the Gutenberg Museum owns two. The complete two-volume Bible shown in the bottom of this photo was added to the collection in 1978. The second Bible is incomplete, with only the second volume surviving. The book in the top right is a calligraphed manuscript.

The Bibles were only printed in black ink – two or more colors would have been too time-consuming and expensive. Spaces for colored ornamentation were left empty and the books were handed over to an illumination workshop. As a result, all surviving editions have different ornamentation.

The Missale Moguntinum, was hand written on parchment between 1453 – 1459.

I love that the guide lines are still visible. Imagine writing this huge book. Gutenburg’s press changed how books were produced and made them available to so many more people. Seeing these bibles in person is special but I am still in awe of beautiful hand written and illustrated books.  

In the mid-15th century before printed books were readily available, the demand for books could not be met. One solution was to produce books faster. This was why copies of the “Speculum Humanae Salvationis” or “Mirror of Human Salvation,” were created in cursive and quick pen-and-ink drawings. The volumes are dated around 1450, making them approximately the same age as the printed Gutenberg bibles.

We wander through the Natural History Museum. I wonder how archaeologists are able to reconstruct skulls and bones from a pile of fragments.  It must be a very difficult puzzle.

The Wooly Rhino had a huge head compared to the rest of its body.  There are samples of real wooly rhino hair on view that were found preserved in permafrost.

I thought these fossils were really beautiful.  The plants, insects and other animals are preserved in the finest detail. They are incredible.

We forgot to check what this prehistoric creature was.  

There are a few more displays of stuffed animals.  I thought this one of different types of rabbits was interesting. It is a small museum so it doesn’t take too long to see everything.

I know this is a strange photo, but this is the handicapped washroom at the museum.  I’ve never seen a public washroom like this.

We walk along cobbled sidewalks with reminders that summer is over on our way to see the next sight on the agenda in Manz.

This huge fountain is the Fastnachtsbrunnen, or Carnival Fountain. It is almost nine meters high and has over 200 bronze figures from the Mainz Carnival Mythology. Every year on November 11, at 11:11 pm, people celebrating Carnival in Mainz gather here. When the clock strikes 11:11 pm the carnival officially begins.  

Our last stop before heading home is St. Stephen Church. This is the only German church for which the Jewish artist Marc Chagall created windows.

In 1978, the first window by the 91-year-old Chagall was installed. Chagall completed the final church window shortly before his death at the age of 97! Although all the windows are beautiful, I didn’t find the blue light in the church appealing…it felt too sombre,

Time to drive home…this was a very full day!

Fontoy, France to Frankfurt, Germany

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Day 30    Monday, September 29, 2025

Today is a travel day to Frankfurt Germany and we have been travelling for month already. Bob says we have to stop and see another Eiffel Tower along the way but it is not quite as impressive as the one in Paris!

We had no idea that this is wine country.  There are vineyards on both sides of the road as far as we can see.

The hills around each town we pass are all growing row after row of grapes.  We see the odd group harvesting grapes but the main harvest occurred earlier this month.

We stop in Trier and have our picnic lunch on a bench with this view.

The breeze blew water spray and made a rainbow just as I took this photo.

This foot of Emperor Constantine is a replica of one of the largest marble foots to have survived since antiquity. It was part of a 12 metre high seated statue of Constantine.

The Roman Baths are considered to be the largest Roman baths outside of Rome. 

The ruins are impressive!

We are able to walk through the underground tunnels that would have been used as a service level for the maintenance of the bath’s heating system. This is the entrance to the tunnels.

There was a group of schoolchildren ahead of us…probably the loudest group we have encountered on our travels! We took a side tunnel to avoid walking behind them. There are a maze of tunnels and we are free to explore as we wish. That is Bob peeking around the bend in the tunnel.

We do get a bit lost down here, but it was a lot of fun exploring these interesting tunnels.

Which way should we go!

This photo shows the size of the original baths, although they were never actually completed. The ruins of today are superimposed on the original baths.

The ruins are impressive, but they are only half the height of the original structure! We pass this lovely garden on the way to visit Trier’s cathedral.

Photos really do not show how beautiful and enormous the trees are. I wish we were able to grow trees this large back home. These trees wouldn’t survive our colder climate.

Trier Cathedral is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and the oldest cathedral in Germany. Construction started in the 4th century and it was built upon the foundations of ancient Roman structures.

And yes, the inside of the cathedral is very impressive.

It has one of the most ornate organs we have seen… and many huge sculptures with multiple figures. We walk up these stairs for a view of the nave. This beautiful blue and white Baroque stucco work decorates the choir loft of the Cathedral. It is stunning and unusual. This is the first time we have seen anything like this in a cathedral.

We pass this building on the way to the Nigra Gate. There are many ornately decorated buildings in Trier.

I love watching the bubble makers, and the children trying to catch the bubbles. This fellow made huge bubbles…

and lots of smaller bubbles.  I would love to know how to do this.

At the end of the street we can see the Nigra Gate, another UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The Porta Nigra, or Black Gate, is the largest Roman gate in Northern Europe.  It was part of the defensive walls and gates that surrounded Trier in 200AD. It is  incredibly well preserved, especially when you consider that it was completed around 200AD, and it almost two thousand years old!

We pay 6€ each to climb inside the gate. This ‘window’ has a pile of coins, perhaps people making a wish?

A view inside the gate.

We can see the Trier Cathedral from the second level of the gate.

Grafiti has been around for a long time.  Some of the dates on the walls are hundreds of years old.  I do really hate this practice of defacing monuments.

There is Bob, I sent him down to the street so he could take a photo of me in one of the gate arches.

Here I am.These carved decorations are still in remarkably good condition.

Walking back to our car we stop for a photo of the Electoral Palace. We had our lunch in its beautiful gardens which have many white statues and small ponds.

Another gorgeous tree.

The clouds are moving in on our drive home.

Big black ominous clouds.

We arrive at our Airbnb in Frankfurt. It is smaller than our last place but cozy and has everything we need.

Nîmes, France

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Day 59, Thursday, October 26, 2023

Nîmes is a pretty city.  It the most Roman city outside of Italy, and it was the regional capital during the Roman Empire.  Today it has a population of about 150,000.

On our way to the center of town I peek inside this open window and I am surprised to see a boxing ring!

I love this door knocker and it even looks a bit ‘Halloweenish’.

We turn the corner and there it is.  The Amphitheater of Nîmes, or the Arènes de Nîmes.  It held over 20,000 spectators and is the best preserved Roman Amphitheater in the World.  It is so well preserved because it has been in constant use since it was built.  In the 6th century it was turned into a fortress, and in the 14th century it was filled with houses, workshops and warehouses.  In 1809 this was all demolished and work was done to restore it to its original state.

Today, the amphitheater hosts bullfights, concerts and sporting events.  It host many cultural and festive shows all summer long.  We will come back and visit the interior another day…today we are just strolling.

Today it is also offering shelter for this homeless person. The Maison Carrée is a very well preserved white limestone Roman temple that is about 2,000 years old.

Here is another view of the the Maison Carrée from the street opposite to it.  It is impressive.  Both the Amphitheater and the Maison Carée are UNESCO World Heritage sites.

In the 1700’s canals were built to supply a better source of drinking water and to power textile mills.  These mills made ‘serge de Nimes’ or as we know it today ‘denim’ (‘de’ or ‘from’ Nimes)!  Today it is a beautiful park with exotic plants, statues and walkways.

We walk along the canals and find some Pétanque players.  This is a popular pastime everywhere in France, although we have only seen one female player. It is more common to see elderly men playing when we are out and about in the afternoon.  We noticed this extraordinarily tall man on his bicycle which Bob says is the tallest bike he has ever seen.  The men around him barely come up to his armpits!

A Pétanque game in progress, with observers and critics!  The players are incredibly skilled and can knock an opponent’s ball out of the game with one throw.

On the way home we pass St. Paul Church and go inside.  I really liked the sculpture right by the entrance and the dome is beautiful.

One more view of the amphitheater on the way home.  This is only a couple blocks from our Airbnb.

As we were waiting to cross the road two vehicles with fully armed military drive by.  There were four soldiers in each vehicle and they were scanning the surroundings as they drive by.  The sign on the side of their cars says Vigipirate Operation Sentinelle.  They are part of the 10,000 soldiers that are currently active in this operation to defend and protect the French.  As France is currently on high alert the Vigipirate Security Alert System has been at its highest ‘Emergency Attack’ level since October 15th.   This means that our bags are searched when we enter tourist sites, museums and other places where there are lots of people.  We stay aware of our surroundings and we certainly avoid anything that looks like a protest, or large gathering of people.  So not to worry, we are safe.

Walking Tour of Vienna

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Hi, as you may have noticed, I have fallen behind on my blog posts.  We have had several busy days and I just haven’t had the energy to work on a post late in the evening. We are actually in Budapest right now, and it is raining for a day or two so I am going to try to get at least a little bit caught up.

Day 69, Saturday, November 2, 2019

Bob found another walking tour online so we are off to check out Vienna this morning.  First stop is the Naschmarkt, a local outdoor market that has been operating on this same site since the 1500’s!  There are colourful stand with fruits and vegetables, olives and antipasto appetizers…as well as all sorts of candies, dried fruits and some rather exotic looking products in the fish market section.Near the Naschmarkt we find this interesting tribute to the Orson Wells movie, The Third Man.  It is possible to tour the sewers, right under our feet, where part of the movie was filmed, but we pass on that today.

I take a photo of some wedding dresses in a shop window and a short time later we see a bride and groom.  The bride seemed annoyed and her pretty dress was getting all dirty as it dragged along the street. I wanted to tell her attendants to pick up the back of her dress!  Not my idea of a nice way to spend part of your wedding day, hiking along the streets towards a place for your photo shoot. There is a statue of Mozart, right beside a Hop On Hop Off bus station.  We sit and have our picnic lunch and watch tourists jump off the bus, snap a photo from quite a distance, and then jump back on the bus to get to the next destination.  This sure isn’t the way we do it!  We sight-see very slowly and leisurely, stopping often to look at the sights, people watch and just enjoy where we are and what we are seeing. We are very slow tourists!
This equestrian statue of Emperor Joseph II, erected in 1795  is the oldest equestrian statue in Vienna.

It stands in front of the Neue Burg (New Castle) Wing  of the Hofburg Palace.  Notice that part of the palace is still in need of cleaning.     We make our way to the Albertina Museum, which we will visit another day.  There is a Durer Exhibit I am looking forward to seeing.  This is a street view from a corner of the Albertina.

The Gates of Violence remembers victims of all wars and violence. The statues are a montage of wartime images: clubs and WWI gas masks, a dying woman birthing a future soldier, victims of cruel medical experimentation, and chained slave laborers.  It is on the site of an apartment block that was destroyed in an air raid during the Second World War.  Hundreds of people had sheltered in the apartment basement and their bodies were never recovered from the rubble of the destroyed building. Of course there are several churches on our walk, and we visit all of them! This broad pedestrian Kärntner Strasse is packed with people and lined with shops and places to eat.  This road dates to 97AD when it was a Roman road that went from Vienna to the border of Italy and Slovenia, and eventually all the way to St. Petersberg, Russia! I thought that the Zen-Doodle like designs on the clothing in this shop were interesting.  The modern Haas House offers interesting reflections of St. Stephen’s church. The St. Stephen’s Cathedral is huge, and ornately decorated, outside…  and inside. Just behind the cathedral we see a group of people taking part in a drinking game.  The guy in the blue jeans drank his big can of beer twice as quickly as the guy dressed in brown! The Stock im Eisen is part of a tree that has hundreds of iron nails pounded into it and dates from 1440.  No one is sure why the nails were pounded in but it is thought that is was for good luck. It is located on the corner of a building and is protected behind plexiglass. The Holy Trinity Column, located on a street in the inner city of Vienna, was erected after the Great Plague epidemic in 1679.  It is one of the most well-known sculptural pieces of art in the city.
St. Peter’s Church has an oval dome and its open layout makes it feel bigger than it actually is. I thought it interesting the way the paintings on the dome extended over the sculptural trim around the round windows.The end of each pew is beautifully carved with different finials of three children’s heads.  We sat for quite a while listening to the choir practicing.  Back outside, there are interesting details everywhere I look, like these sculptures holding up balconies.I loved this building. It looks like a castle.  I wouldn’t mind living here! Back out on the Kärntner Strasse, there are lots of famous brand name shops, like Jimmy Choo…
where the customers are served champagne as they shop!  Sigh…an experience I am sure I will never have!
There are Roman ruins…  and beautiful statues on the corners of buildings.  This is the building that houses the Austrian National Library, the Österreichische Nationalbibliothek, as well as the Spanish Riding School with the world famous Lipizzaner stallions.  We will visit both of these on another day,  It gets dark earlier now, at about 5;30.  The buildings look pretty all lit up. This is the other side of the Neue Burg Wing of the Hofburg Palace.  We saw the backside earlier in the day. Time to head home.  This subway station has colourful murals.  Our apartment is very well located on the U6 subway line, so it takes less than a half hour to get home.  Somehow even our ‘easy’ days end up being quite long. We left before noon and it will be after 7:00 by the time we get home.

The Borghese Gallery, Rome

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Day 95, Friday December 8, 2017

On our way to the Borghese Gallery today we see a truck double parked on a busy street. This is not unusual in Rome, but what caught my attention is that he was selling flowers from the back of his truck, and had no intention of moving any time soon.The Borghese Gallery was built in the early 1600’s.This informative five-minute video gives a bit of the history of the Villa and the artists as well as a tour through the gallery. We are very lucky there is a special Gian Lorenzo Bernini exhibit here in addition to all the other artwork usually on display. This 25th century silverpoint portrait was exquisite.The gallery is as interesting as the artwork it contains. All the doors are decorated.A familiar sculpture. We have seen copies of ‘the Boy with the Thorn’ in Paris and Florence. The Rape of Persephone (also known as The Rape of Proserpina) is amazing. I know this is carved from marble but Hades hand gripping Persephone’s leg looks like human flesh, it is so life-like. Oh, and in this context rape meant kidnapping. Oh and Bernini was 23 years old when he completed this masterpiece!The Villa is a piece of art in itself. Here are some of the rooms where the artwork is displayed. Now just imagine living in such a place!

Wood, slate, terracotta and plaster were used for this model of Bernini’s Four Rivers Fountain that we took pictures of in Piazza Navona.

Bernini was only 20 when he carved this sculpture of Aeneas, Anchises and Ascanius, which shows Aeneas carrying his elderly father and son from a burning Troy.

This Caravaggio painting, the Madonna of Palafrenieri was thought to be indecent when it was revealed and was removed from St. Peter’s Cathedral after only two days and was purchased by Cardinal Borghese.A famous Bernini sculpture, the Damned Soul.

This sculpture of Paolina Bonaparte, as the Venus Victorious, by Antonio Canova was completed in 1808 after she married into the Borghese family. The drapery is all carved in stone but it looks like real cloth. 
Bernini’s very determined David is magnificent.A quick peek at the gardens from one of the gallery windows.This fellow made me think of the winter weather we will be returning home to in a few days.

Apollo and Daphne is a Bernini sculpture that tells the story of Daphne being turned into a laurel tree to escape from Apollo. The details of her legs turning to bark and her fingers growing branches and leaves is remarkable.This Bernini painting was intriguing as there are visible traces of where Bernini painted a different hand. This is known as pentimento. On the ride home we see one more obelisk and another column. I think we might have managed to see most of the obelisks and columns in Rome. We also saw another stretch of the old Roman Aurelian Wall that protected Rome. These walls were 52 feet tall, 11 feet thick and had a square tower every 97 feet, which was 100 Roman feet. They are remarkably well preserved.

Herculaneum, Italy

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Day 93, Wednesday December 6, 2017

We are up early to take the train to Herculaneum, which is another ancient town that was destroyed by the eruption of mount Vesuvius in 79 A.D.

We are a bit early for our train so we visit the church in Pompeii. Yes, another church! I should be tired of them but it seems that each one we visit is so different for the others that there is always something new and amazing to see.

The Shrine of the Blessed Virgin of the Holy Rosary is an international place of pilgrimage.  It is considered the most important shrine consecrated to Mary in Italy.  4 million pilgrims from all over the world visit here every year.

The church has many hallways and rooms covered in thousands of ex-votos. These devotional images were created in thanks for the fulfillment of vows by those who survived an illness or disaster because they prayed to the Virgin Mary. I keep seeing images in the marble. What do you see here?

Every town we pass on the way to Herculaneum is crowded with apartments. I think just about everyone in Italy who lives in urban areas must live in apartments.
We can see the smog over Naples. There seems to be more smog here than in Rome.Believe it or not, this is the ‘street’ that Google maps tells us to walk down to get to the archeological site.  It was long, narrow, dirty and full of garbage!This is our first view of Herculaneum. Unlike Pompeii, which was covered by about 4 meters of ash, Herculaneum was buried under more than 20 meters of mud, ash, and other pyroclastic material. This thick layer preserved wooden and other organic-based objects such as roofs, beds, doors, food and even skeletons.

Until these skeletons were discovered inside boat sheds near the shore of ancient Herculaneum it was thought that most of the residents escaped the town. However excavation of the boat sheds in 1981 revealed over 300 skeletons. It is thought that they were waiting for boats to take them to safety but they died before this could happen. Please take a look at this excellent five minute video from the Smithsonian which explains all about these skeletons.

I understand that the skeletons on display are replicas of the originals but they still make a powerful impact.
These walls were painted from dark orange-red changing to light yellow…and the column’s construction was interesting.There were more places for buying prepared food…and this is one of the many water fountains we saw both here and in Pompeii.Many beautiful mosaic floors were well preserved because they were covered with the hot mud that flowed down from Vesuvius.

This is part of a huge sport centre here which had a pool and areas for other types of recreation.Herculaneum is especially known for having well-preserved buildings with upper floors.It is possible to see carbonized charred wooden beams. doors and shutters…as well as railings and shelves inside the buildings.There are several of these ‘balconies’ along the streets.The College of the Augustales was an order of freemen dedicated to the Imperial Rulers of Rome. The big carbonized beams that supported the upper floor are still in place.

It is possible to see how the modern town of Ercolano was built on the buried remains of Herculaneum, and there is Mount Vesuvius in the background.More preserved areas. Unfortunately many of the largest and best preserved villas were closed to visitors today. It was disappointing but not much we can do about it. We read a sign that said that it was not possible to properly look after the site for many years, and that by the year 2000 two-thirds of the site was closed to visitors due to safety concerns. With the support of the Packard Humanities Institute, work is now ongoing to restore this site and reopen areas to visitors This building is particularly well-preserved…and has a carbonized bed inside.The doors in the back of this photo are the original wooden doors that were carbonized, which really just means to be changed to carbon by burning.Some of the villas were very grand and must have been incredibly beautiful homes.

We were able to peek into the entrances of the closed sites.

As we leave we look down on this ancient town one last time. The arched rooms in the bottom of the photo are the boathouses where the skeletons were found.I read that the peak of Vesuvius has been reforming and there is danger of another eruption sometime in the future. The volcano is closely monitored and the hope is that there would be enough warning to evacuate nearby residents if this happens. I wonder about that.We did find a longer but more appealing route back to the train station. We see some interesting graffiti along the way…and roads paved with large square stones, laundry hanging right on the sidewalk and streets, some interesting buildings, and finally we are at the train station just as the sun is setting.

So, to answer the question of what I saw in the marble, it was a cartoonish horse figure, standing up on its back legs looking straight out at me.

I forgot to post this video titled A Day In Pompeii yesterday. It is a reconstruction of what likely happened in Pompeii during the eruption. I found it helpful in trying to make sense of what we see now in Pompeii. Take a look if you are interested.

Pompeii, Italy

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Day 92, Tuesday December 5, 2017

We start our visit to Pompeii with the colosseum which is the oldest surviving Roman amphitheatre. It had a capacity for 20,000 spectators. The Colosseum in Rome was built over a century later.

A display nearby had these 2,000 year old charred loafs of bread, dates and almonds.

One of the first houses we visit is called the House of Venus in the Shell because of a fresco on the end wall of the garden.

We are amazed at how well preserved and how brightly coloured the frescos on the walls are. I took almost 300 photos. There was so much to see and I want to remember it all. I won’t subject you to all those photos and I am not going to try to identify all the different houses by name with a lot of information. If I do that this post will never end! So just come for a walk through Pompeii with us, and see the sights.This was a fast food restaurant. Only the rich had their own kitchens, the rest of the people ate at these shops.Maintenance is an ongoing project here, along with new excavations. These structures were never intended to survive for 2,000 years and be exposed to not only the weather but also to the damage caused by 2.5 million visitors every year. In many areas we walk on the original mosaic floors!These big stepping stones kept pedestrians’ feet dry, as the streets were often used to dump sewage. Water from fountains overflowed onto the streets and helped to flush them clean.Tucked in to the corner of a house we see skeletons of some of the victims of the Mount Vesuvius eruption in 79 A.D. I felt quite emotional all day, walking through the streets and homes of the people who died here. I imagine the panic they must have felt when the volcano erupted.In the back room there are stairs to a second floor visible.

This is a view down into a room from a second floor. Most of the rooms in the houses were quite small, often between 7’x 7′ to about 10′ x10′, although the villas of the rich people also had some very large rooms.Some more well preserved frescos.  Red was the most expensive pigment so it was used by the wealthy.The decorated walls have some lovely small panels.One of the large rooms in a villa with a pool and an open skylight to collect rainwater.We find a high spot for some great views over Pompeii and have our lunch.

There are temples,

marble floors,and a theatre which we thought was the main theatre in Pompeii. Then we discover this one…
with this practice area for the athletes and gladiators. This is a bit of info on the plaster casts of Pompeii.

These cast are in a house near where they were found. These casts of the victims of the eruption of Mount Vesuvius are powerful. Their features are clearly visible and their contorted postures reveal the moment of their deaths. I have been feeling emotional all day and seeing these body casts has a strong impact. 

The next building we enter is the Lupanaro (the brothel), named for the cries of the prostitutes calling to their customers. They were thought to sound like she wolves! There are paintings on the walls above the doorways that were thought to have been sort of menu of the services available.The rooms were small with short stone beds and pillows. They certainly don’t look very comfortable but they would have had with cloth mattress and pillows on top of the stone.
A bakery still has the stone mills that were used to grind wheat and…an oven that looks very much like a modern day pizza oven.The long, straight streets were lined with shops and rooms that we think must have been houses for the common people.One of the large houses has some rather startling imagery, however we discover that they are simply letting the viewer know that along with wealth, fertility was also necessary for true happiness.The Pompeiians were masters at faux painting. The walls of their homes were covered from top to bottom with paintings and faux architectural details and finishes.Looking into a courtyard.At the end of a street I notice a building closed to the public and go take peek into the windows. I am rather startled to find more body casts. A child is frozen in time, as is this dog  who is caught in the moment of his agonized death.We walk through a necropolis with tombs for the dead towards…  the House of Mysteries.The house is named for these frescoes. This is an interesting article about the frescoes.The floor is a different sort of mosaic. The surface is very even and smooth, and yes, we walk on this ancient floor too.

The wooden doors and shutters of the House of mysteries are petrified.As we head back towards the town of Pompeii we see Mount Vesuvius. I read up a bit on this volcano and it is expected to erupt again. I don’t think I would want to be living anywhere nearby, yet 3 million people live within 20 miles of Mount Vesuvius’ crater. There is an evacuation plan in effect in case of another eruption but I wonder how effective that would really be. This is an interesting posting about why people live so close to a volcano.As we leave the archeological area there are several large outdoor rooms filled with amphoras and other pieces of archeological finds.  In the midst of these there are some more body casts. I think it seems disrespectful to see them displayed this way. The sun is setting and the light rakes across the ruins…giving everything a golden glow.There is a bookstore and museum near the far entrance so we have look around before heading back through the park towards the entrance near our apartment. There are more body casts here. It is a strange feeling looking into the faces of people who died almost 2,000 years ago. We walk through another necropolis on the way back to where we started our day.
When we exit we notice that there is a building with even more body casts on display that we missed seeing this morning.Again I have the feeling that there is something not quite right about how these are displayed, but I don’t really know what would be a better way of doing it.

Rome to Pompeii

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Day 91, Monday December 4, 2017

Bob wanted to take the high speed train from Rome to Pompeii to see what travelling 250 km per hour felt like but the schedule didn’t work for us, so we are taking the bus. I don’t mind, as we don’t have to transfer trains in Naples, and I like looking at the scenery. I think at 250 km per hour everything would be bit of a blur! There are lots and lots of greenhouses outside of Naples.

I see a mountain and then it dawns on me that this must be Mount Vesuvius!
Naples seems ‘grittier’ than Rome. At least the area we saw as we drove into the bus station seemed  rather run down and not all that clean.Near the bus station there were people selling clothes and other items on the sidewalk.

Like Rome, there is no parking anywhere. Take a look at this street, lined with cars on both sides with barely enough room for the bus to get through. We went down some strange roads to get back on the freeway. They looked like alleys lined with ramshackle buildings on one side and fancy hotels on the other.

Walking to our apartment in Pompeii we pass some tree pruners. They certainly mean business when they prune trees here!After we settle in to our new Airbnb we go for groceries and we get our first glimpse of the archeological site of Pompeii with Mount Vesuvius in the background. It is only two blocks from our apartment.

Museo Nationale Romano and the Capuchin Crypts

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Day 89, Saturday December 2, 2017

Saturday was a quiet rainy day. I worked on catching up on my blog and Bob went for groceries, several times! It isn’t easy to find what we need in one store so shopping sometimes requires several attempts to find everything on our list. I don’t know how Romans manage. Even something as simple as spinach is often not available.

Day 90, Sunday December 3, 2017

We thought today would be a bit quieter, just a little walk about but we ended up doing quite a bit. Bob found out that the four Museo Nationale Romano museums were free today so we thought we would visit the one near the train station. It was much bigger than we thought and we spent several hours there. This museum had lots of information on the history of writing and…lots of examples of writing on stone. What made it interesting was that all the pieces on exhibit had Italian and English translations. There were lots of informative videos and other kinds of information but it would have taken more than a day to do all that. There was a very interesting exhibit about the Fountain of Anna Perenna. Anna was an ancient nymph and the fountain was a place of magic. It was discovered in 1999 when work began on an underground parking facility. Many ‘magical’ objects were found in the well including several curses. This one is for a man called Cassianus who was cursed because he hired some women to rob the author of the curse. It shows a demon flanked with magical symbols. There were many curses on display as well as directions for casting spells.We tend to forget that ancient statues and reliefs were painted in bright colours. There was lots of pottery from settlements from the 9th to the 7th century B.C. The large pots held cremated remains.

This is a model of the Museum. The large green square…is this courtyard  and the buildings around it house the museum. This was built in the 15th century. Bob found a few interesting statues here. The large animal heads are located around the fountain in the centre of the courtyard. There were also horse heads, a ram, a camel, an elephant and a rhinoceros!
The complex behind the courtyard is the Baths of Diocletian which were built in 300 A.D. They held 3,000 people! It was hard trying to take pictures as the baths are so enormous.
This room was somehow used as a water reservoir. 
 Here is an aerial view taken from a film about the baths showing their location in modern day Rome. The big white building in the corner is the Termini train station.Here is a close up of the baths. The building with the cross in the lower left is the best preserved section of the baths. The tepiderium was restored and converted into a basilica using Michelangelo’s architectural designs in the 16th century. It is now the Basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli e dei Martiria. This sculpture is on the door to the Basilica.The basilica interior gives us a good idea what the interior of the baths would have looked like with all their decorated walls and ceilings.

The basilica is a place of worship, art and science. I liked this enormous head on display. It is about three feet long.

We find one more obelisk!Republic Piazza is beside the baths.  Many of Rome’s streets are cobbled and it has made for some very rough bus rides.

Another branch of Rome’s National Museums, the Palazzo Massimo is right beside the Republic Piazza so we decide to visit it as well. There are some wonderful works inside.  The Discus Thrower and…the Boxer at Rest are amazing and..this sculpture of a hermaphrodite is interesting.The massive Portonaccio Sarcophagus from 172 AD is unbelievable. It is five feet tall, and most of the complex intertwined carvings are still intact.
This room with garden frescoes was discovered in 1863. The frescoes were moved to the museum in 1951 as they were in danger of being damaged from water seepage. There are more well preserved frescoes from an Imperial Villa on the banks of the Tiber River.We still want to visit the Capuchin Crypts which are a short walk from the museum. Everywhere we walk in this city there are interesting buildings and piazzas.The sun is setting but there isn’t much traffic even though it is 5:30. I find that rather curious.There is a famous Caravaggio painting, St. Francis in Meditation, in the Capuchin museum. We visit the Capuchin Crypt but there is a strict no photo policy and I restrained myself and didn’t take a single photo. So, do check out this link for a trip through the crypt. It was certainly different. I liked it but Bob didn’t.

The church ‘Our Lady of the Conception’ is above the crypt and after a quick visit we are more than ready to go home. Our short day out turned into a bit of a marathon!

 

 

 

All Roads Lead To Rome

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Day 82, Saturday November 25, 2017

The Appian Way was Europe’s first super highway. It is the reason for the saying “All roads lead to Rome.” Built in 312 B.C., it connected Rome with Capua (near Naples), running in a straight line for much of the way. Eventually it stretched over 600 kilometres to Brindisi, on the east coast of Italy. Today is Bob’s birthday and we are going to walk the Appian Way.

We take the metro and then a bus to the outskirts of Rome. Before we start our walk back into Rome we walk a bit further in the opposite direction to visit the Villa Dei Quintili. We buy our €5.00 tickets and when we walk up to the building below it is all locked up and under construction!

Turns out this isn’t the villa, and we need to walk along a dirt path behind this building for a ways to the ruins. The Villa Dei Quintili was the largest villa complex in the suburbs outside Rome. It was built by two brothers, who were later executed by Emperor Commodus who took over possession of their villa. It was then expanded and used by emperors until the 5th century. There are boardwalks in many areas but sometimes we are walking on the original mosaics floors! Hard to believe that this is allowed. There are baths here with a calidarium (hot water) and a frigidarium (cold water). Many of the rooms have remains of mosaics and floor tiles. A few even have traces of frescoes on the walls. 

This all covers a huge area and it was all one villa. When it was first excavated it was thought to have been a town!Back on the Appian Way we are ready to start our walk towards Rome, on the same road that was used by Romans almost 2,000 years ago! We are going to walk in the footsteps Roman Emperors, merchants, saints and maybe even St.Peter! Julius Caesar travelled this road along with thousands of soldiers, and now we are too.
 Romans did not allow anyone to be buried inside the city walls so many people were buried along the roads leading out of Rome. Wealthy people built impressive tombs for themselves. The remains of many of these tombs are visible today.  Sometimes there is as little as a mound of earth but there are also still quite impressive remains of the larger tombs.These are the original stones that were used to build this road. These stones were set upon a bed of gravel and cement. Lime cement was then used to fill the gaps between the stones and the road was said to have been so smooth that the joints between the rocks could not be felt. In the foreground the ruts made by ancient chariot and wagon wheels can be seen.One of the many ‘reconstructed’ tombs along the Appian Way…and a couple more.

The day started out cloudy and cold but the sun came out and warmed us up.There are many grand modern villas along the Appian Way. This is looking down just one of the many long tree-lined driveways we see along our walk.Getting closer to Rome. It is a bit tiring walking on these original paving stones. The cement that made the road smooth has long worn away. We saw lots of people bicycling along here and it looked bone jarring.                                 

This is a small archeaological area along the road that used to be a farmer’s field. Some of the floor mosaics show where they were damaged by the plows used to till the fields!Fall has arrived. The leaves here were a beautiful golden yellow.Inside the Tomb of Cecilia Metella, one of the best preserved tombs along the Appian way, there is an exhibit of modern sculpture by Paola Cream. I like this bird man…and these vessels. The exhibit sign said the show only runs until November 11th, but this is Rome and not everything is what it says it is.

This is the outside of the Tomb of Cecilia, who was noble woman in the 1st century B.C. Inside the hollow round tower is where her body is thought to have been buried.

That was our last stop of the day. The ruins are closed at 4:00 and we still have a a walk and then a bus and metro ride to get home. we ran out of time to visit the catacombs so we will have to return another day.