travelswithalice

April 23, 2022

Florence

Friday, April 22.

We’re slightly damp when we check in at the Hotel Santa Maria Novella

having walked the few hundred meters from the train station, wheeling our suitcases through a light rain.

The room is pretty and has a great view of the basilica and the square.

Saturday, 23.

In the morning the rain had gone. Buon giorno, Firenze!

Breakfast in a beautiful room is a lovely way to start the day!

But is this any way to be on holiday?

Not a lot of people here bother with masks, so, away with masks!

Now, how did that tree get up there?

We don’t usually eat lunch but walking has made me hungry. We just happen to be standing outside this cafe so it has to do.

Lucky choice. Food is good. Tuna poke for me and avocado toast for Stuart. Nice jazz music too- they even played our song!

A Casa Ca.Fe at Via della Spada 47.

Dinner is always in the restaurant in back of our hotel. Trattoria Marione al Trebbio at Via delle Belle Donne 49.

Our menu choices include spaghetti alle vongole, porchetta, risotto al lampredotto (similar to tripe), and pappardelle with cinghiale (wild boar), spaghetti with baccalà and roast beef.

We first discovered our all time favourite dessert cantucci e vin santo here several years ago.

Sunday, 24.

Too early in the day to be in the Bar?

No, we haven’t fallen off the wagon completely. The breakfast room is full so we’re having ours here all by ourselves.

Intermittent rain. After walking around for a while trying vainly to dodge puddles on Floremce’s beautiful stone slab streets, ruining my blue Loewes in the process, there was nothing else left to do but get out of the rain and eat.

Found a quirky little restaurant called Quinoa.

I had what looked very much like one of Laura’s meals: fried eggplant patties on a thick bed of red and white shredded cabbage. She wouldn’t have had the tzatziki sauce though.

Stuart had the roast chicken.

In the evening…

It’s cold and wet outside and I’m much too comfortable in bed to even think of dinner so Stuart got take away from Morione. They were full but they rushed our order of ribollita and ricotta ravioli. They even included a spoon for the soup- a proper one, not plastic!

Monday, 25.

Having booked a 2:45 walking tour, we thought we’d take it easy and walk around a little before then. Well, that little walk was enough walking for me. We had a snack of canneloni with roasted zucchini and capsicum.

The hotel’s sitting room has a cozy fire.

Stuart went on the walking tour. I stayed and did my laundry.

I always look forward to dinner at Trattoria Marione. Stefan as always the good host made sure we get a good wine. He also let us sample their ham and desserts: cantucci e vin santo for 2 and a grandmother’s pie- milk custard with pine nuts- for me.

Tuesday, 26.

Lunch at the roof top restaurant of Rinascente.

At the Uffizi.

My personal favourites.

Ceiling fresco depicting the Basilica and Square of Santa Maria Novella, our present day view from our hotel room.

Dying Alexander.

Marble, Roman, late C3 or early C2 BCE.

Leda and the Swan. Two versions.

Francesco Melzi, 1505-1507.

Andrea del Sarto, c. 1520.

Bacchus.

Caravaggio, c. 1596.

And finally, Caravaggio! Spectacularly staged in a near- empty room.

What a gift from fabulous Florence as yet not fully populated early on in a post-pandemic world.

Dinner as usual is at all-time favourite Trattoria Marione. Stefan made our last evening in Florence extra special by starting dinner with prosecco. Vin santo came later. Then limoncello too! Even our wine was from a premium wine he opened specially for us.

I’ll miss coming to this restaurant. It’s a very special one. Good simple food, unfussy, always delicious.

But it’s the staff that makes coming here such a pleasure.

With Stefan and Veronica.

posted by Alice Dimalanta Jones # April 23, 2022

Rome

Easter Sunday, April 17.

Our Qatar Airways flight was great. I think they’ve rightfully earned their awards. The new seats are comfortable and spacious. The service, particularly the Manila-Doha sector, was exceptionally good.

We arrived in Rome at 2pm.

Two Immigration officers very eagerly led us through an empty arrival hall, one helpfully removing rope barriers for me and personally putting me through the passport clearance himself. Wow, what a welcome change from the normally surly arrival procedure!

It’s wonderful to be back in the Cavalieri Hilton where you get all of Rome laid out in front of you.

Too bad the much awaited full moon rising over the Eternal City was a complete washout.

Next day’s sunrise however was well worth getting up for.

At the Imperial Lounge, there’s whimsical Easter decor and we’re happily back in the swing of hotel living.

Monday, 18.

Bach and Vivaldi in the beautifully austere Episcopalian Church, St Paul Inside the Wall.

Tuesday, 19.

I Puritani at the Teatro dell’ Opera di Roma.

Stuart was disappointed that our box seats had a restricted view. I didn’t much mind as neither the staging nor the performers were really anything to look at.

Afterwards, we had a lovely supper at Maestro Bistrot & Cocktail Bar next door. At Via Torino 144.

Food and wine were good. We had a nice Sicilian red wine, tuna tataki, and a seafood pasta. Our chatty waiter provided welcome entertainment for us and a young Argentinian couple at the next table. We were the only diners left, very late on a cold night.

Wednesday, 20.

On a Hop-on Hop-off bus tour. We did a round trip, not bothering to hop off, staying on board all the time.

Thursday, 21.

Rain was forecast for the day so we went to MAXXI. It’s the national museum of contemporary art Art of the 21st century. XXI. At Via Guido Reni 4 A.

Stuart was keen to see the photographic exhibit on the Amazon.

More a political manifesto than an exhibition, Amazônia by Brazilian artist Sebastião Salgado is an immersion in the sights and sounds of the Amazon rainforest.

The enormity of its ecosystem, its power, its beauty. The sounds made by its animals, the wind, the leaves, the rain, the rivers, the storms. The singing of its isolated indigenous communIties. Their collective voice as a people, their pleas, their petitions, their remonstrations, their outrage.

Two other exhibits were not to our liking so we sped right through them. One was a noir-ish film involving dead people and hallucination. We actually walked out on that one. The other had unremarkable photographs of Tokyo scenes and unerotic erotica.

I lingered most of all in the Architecture Collection. I’m endlessly fascinated by architecture models.

Walk thru model

I was interested mainly in the Zaha Hadid-designed building, itself the museum’s star exhibit.

You stand outside by the entrance and listen to sounds of a rainforest. This, by design, sets the mood.

Inside, quirky turns and sculptural vistas.

There’s a garden restaurant set off from the building. Mediterraneo. I rushed in to select a table beside a window only to be told very apologetically that the restaurant was closed for a private function.

____

Afterwards, we had a late lunch in Ristorante Arlù. At Borgo Pio 135.

A very Roman meal of straccetti with anchovies and burrata, cacio e pepe pasta, and saltimbocca.

Arlù was one of two restaurants Annette and I discovered when we stayed in the area for our Vatican tour four years ago.

Later, I showed Stuart our hotel. Hotel Della Concilizione at Borgo Pio 163/166.

Then we had ice cream at Sublime at Borgo Pio 40, another one of our discoveries in the area.

posted by Alice Dimalanta Jones # April 23, 2022

travelswithalice

April 23, 2022

Florence

Rome

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