O Solo A Roma - Alone in Rome

Just my cap on the bed.  Alone at Hotel Relais dei Papi in Rome

I don't mind traveling alone.  I've done it on many occasions.   Mark and I had planned a trip to Rome.  We were very excited about it.  We have talked about it for years.  I had never been to Rome.  Mark had been in Rome when he was eighteen and traveled there with his sister when he graduated from high school.   We really wanted to go together so he could show me all of the places he visited with his sister.   His sister died very young in her forties.  So there was a lot of nostalgia for him going back to Rome.  Mark is Italian and he speaks Italian fluently.  So I was also looking forward to watching him talk to the waiters and bartenders in Italian.  We really had planned a very special and romantic vacation to Rome.   But things don't always go as planned.  Mark's parents were both elderly and  having major health issues.  Just a couple of weeks before our planned trip his father took very ill with pneumonia and was hospitalized.  With only one child still living his parents needed him home so there is no way we could do the holiday together.  Do to some complications with our travel insurance we were unable to cancel without losing a lot the money we had paid in advance.  So we decided I would go alone to Rome and not lose the entire investment in the trip.  I hated going without him and although not thrilled with losing the money on his part of the trip he was very supportive of me going.   That brings me to this holiday in Rome I called The O Solo A Roma Trip.

Rome had never been on one of my must see lists.  I had not really thought much about Rome at all.  I had lots of thoughts about Rome but they did not include visiting it.   I had read many times online  and in guide books that Rome is well know for petty theft and pick pockets.  I had one friend who was in Rome for an extended period tell me how her husband was pick pocketed within an hour after arriving in Rome.  She told me if you've never been pick pocketed then you've never been to Rome.   I had also read it's always very crowded with tourists.  There are lines for everything.  So Rome was always on the back burner for me, someplace I would see someday but not today.

I was very conscious of being alone.  With my history of bizarre accidents when I travel I was somewhat concerned what might happen to me if I had any problems and no one there with me.  Suppose I tripped and injured myself, which I have done in the past.  Suppose I do get pick pocketed and lose my credit cards?   I would be alone with no one else near with money.  So I was extremely cautious when I first arrived.   Then I took a walk my first afternoon in Rome.  Just a few blocks from my hotel I found Piazza del Popolo.

And with that Rome had captured me.  I forgot all about my concerns and doubts.  Rome was beckoning me.  And then there was this restaurant in the Piazza and they had this excellent wine and pizza.

I returned to my room happy and full.   I was ready to conquer Rome.   And then I realized I had lost my credit card.   My first day.  The art, the piazza, the pizza, the wine.  It all distracted me. I let down my guard.  It all worked out though.  It was my error not Romes.   I immediately called my credit card company and notified them and then went on to my back up credit card the rest of the trip.

My second day in Rome I walked to St. Peters Square.  It was only a few blocks from my hotel which was convenient for me.   I was expecting  massive crowds.  I went early and it was not crowded at all.  I had plenty of time and space for photos and selfies.   You never quite get over that first glimpse of St. Peters Basilica.

Every where I looked there were sculptures.  There were nuns.  There were Swiss guards in colorful uniforms.   It truly was awe inspiring. 

Leaving St. Peter's Square it was time for some lunch. I found a small restaurant just across the river from Vatican City called Mela Stregata, Mela stranslates to apple and the pizzeria was decorated with a Disney Snow White Theme dealing with the evil queen and the apple. Not what I was expecting in Rome near the Vatican but interesting to say the least.

So here I sat surrounded by Snow White's woods

Drinking wine and eating lasagna.

The lasagna was very good. So I guess Snow White must have a little Italian in her ancestry. Leaving the restaurant I had a car stop next to curb and the driver called out to me. He asked for help locating something on his map. I had just been approached by my first scam artist in Rome. He offered me a leather coat from his store in Paris if I would be kind enough to help him locate a near by location on his map. Luckily for me this was the only scam artist I would see in Rome.


Castel Sant'Angelo was also nearby so this was my next stop. The views from the top of the castle were amazing.

Castel Sant'Angelo

Flemish sculptor Pieter Van Verschaffelt's bronze angel on top of Castel Sant'Angelo

View of the River Tiber from Castel Sant'Angelo

Viewing Vittoriano from the top of Castel Saint'Angelo

There was a small cafe inside the Castel Sant'Angelo. And yes they did have wine.

I did see some unusual things my second day in Rome. Nothing too shocking but still interesting.


I saw a bear begging for money.

I saw a man napping with a rubber duck on his stomach

And I saw a blonde Jesus in a gift shop.

Because I was alone I made sure to take my selfie stick with me to make sure I could get photos of myself during the day I had a great deal of fun with it. I know they drive people crazy when you are in crowded tourist areas trying to use a selfie stick. But I am a tourist. And i was alone. So I ignored everyone who was offended. My first tries with the selfie stick came out a little awkward. Yes I know you are not supposed to see the stick in the photo. But I was just getting the hang of using it. I got better as the week progressed.

I was still a little jet lagged from the time change so I had an early dinner before returning to my room for an early sleep. I had supper at Pizzeria San Marco. This was located very near my hotel. I had a delicious pasta with cheese and bacon and some wine of course. For dessert I had an excellent panacota with another shot of grappa. A pattern is forming here. Good food, good wine, and a shot of grappa to end my day.

I ended my day back in my room. I took so time to text with Mark and tell him all about my day and what I had seen. He had lots of questions and was very excited for all I had seen. He did ask me did you go to Trastevere. I had not. He insisted that I make sure to go there. We had this same conversation every evening when we chatted. After talking to Mark I reviewed my thoughts on the day and I was glad to find that I had not lost any credit cards. I had avoided getting ripped off by the con artist with the leather coats. And then I looked at my camera bag and there was no selfie stick attached. I had lost it. My first full day in Rome and my selfie stick was gone.

Don't Trip Over That Mountain - Hiking in Uetilberg Switzerland

View of the Alps surrounding Uetlberg Switzerland

If you have read any of my blogs or if you follow me on Facebook you probably already know that I love Switzerland.  You will probably also know that I have a tendency to trip or fall when I am on a vacation.  I've tripped in Paris.  I've broken my ankle in Chiang Mai, Thailand.  I broke my camera falling over a sand dune in Ocean City, Maryland.  I don't consider myself clumsy.  As a matter of fact I think I am quite agile.   So after three visits to Switzerland it was just a matter of time before I tripped over a mountain. 

We visited Zurich, Switzerland in 2017.   I was excited.  I had first visited Zurich in 2003 several years before I had met Mark.  I fell in love with Zurich.   While there I took the train up to the top of Zurich's only mountain Uetilberg.  I had read there was an easy hiking trail there with a beautiful view of Zurich below.  There was also a famous restaurant at the top of the trail name the Uto Kulm.  Before out trip in 2017 I had told Mark all about Uetilberg and Uto Klum so he too was looking forward to going there.   Our trip to Zurich was part of one of our Virtual Tourist travel group meetings.    Most of our friends in the group had planned a day trip out of Zurich.  We decided instead of taking the planned bus tour we would take the day to hike the trail at Uetilberg and convinced our sister from across the pond, Gillian, to go with us. 

Mark and Gillian on the trail to the top of Uetilberg

It was a beautiful day and the weather was perfect for the hike.  It was not a long trail and was an easy hike.  There are other more aggressive trails from the bottom of the mountain that can be taken, but we took the train to the Uetilberg station and walked from there instead.  As you can see I am usually behind Mark and Gillian when we go somewhere taking photos of everything.  I have many photos of Mark's back in cities, trails, and beaches and quite a few of Gillian also.

In the photo of Gillian and Mark walking you will notice some  unusual deer like sculptures with lights on their antlers lining the trail.   I became fascinated with them on my first visit to Uetilberg in 2003.  During our brief train ride up the mountain I think I must have told Gillian and Mark about them too many times and about how excited I was to see them again.  The sculptures are odd and unusual and that's probably why I like them so much.

Bruno Weber Fantasy deer sculpture on the trail in Uetilberg

Bruno Weber was a Swiss artist and architect.  From 1991 to 2003 Weber was responsible for the sculptural decorations on Uetilberg mountain leading up to the Uto Klum.  The decorations include the fantasy deer street lamps and the park benches on the summit.

Larry on Bruno Weber bench 2003 - Uetilberg

Mark, Gillian and I had fun arguing about what the sculptures were supposed to represent.  I said moose.  Mark and Gillian said they were deer.   We decided they were Dermoose's.   When we returned home my internet research proved that I was wrong.  They are fantasy deer and not moose.  But to me they will always be a moose.  Art is how you interpret it. 

After hiking the trail we found ourselves on top of Uetilberg where I had promised Gillian and Mark a beautiful view and a glass of wine at Uto Klum. 

Viewing Zurich from Uetilberg

And there is the view I had promised them.   You can see all Zurich from the top of the mountain and you don't need a drone for the photographs.

Uto Klum - 4 star restaurant and hotel on the top of  Uetilberg

Then to keep my last promise we had a wonderful lunch and that glass of wine at Uto Klum.  It is a beautiful 4 star restaurant with a beautiful view of the Alps behind it and Lake Zurich and the city below it.

Wine with a view - Uto Klum on the top of Uetilberg above Zurich

We took some time to climb the tower on the summit also.  There is a small fee to climb the tower but it is worth the cost for the view.

Larry climbing  the tower at Uetilberg 

After lunch it was time to start our decline and follow the trail back to the train station.   The trail is not too steep.  But still I took my time and was cautious.  With my history of tripping while on holiday I did not want to take any chances.   We laughed at the deer/moose sculptures once more on the way back down.  And we reached the bottom of the trail without incidence.  There were some small steps at the end of the trail which should not have been an issue for any sane agile person.   But we are talking about me here.   I reached the very last small step and turned around to say something to Gillian and Mark and it happened.   The very last step and down I go.   I ripped the knees out of my pants I was wearing and cut and bruised my knees.    Gillian went into the train station to get some wet paper towels and Mark helped my put the wet towels on my sore knees and helped stop the bleeding.   So I spent my last two days in Zurich limping and grumbling about my knees hurting.  But the good part was that I had a great story to share with the other Virtural Tourist friends at dinner that night.  We went out for fondue at a very nice restaurant in Zurich and I got to share the story of me tripping over the mountain in Uetilberg.

Mark and I are traveling with Gillian in November 2019 to Hawaii.  I am requesting she bring bubble wrap for me so she and Mark can wrap me up for protection.

Larry with the Bruno Weber deer in 2003

Larry with the Bruno Weber deer in 2017

Two Crazy Guys In Milan - Due pazzi ragazzi a Milano

Milan's Awe Inspiring Duomo

Mark and I made a last minute decision to travel to Milan in March 2019.   This was truly a last minute decision.  We had been planning for a year to travel to Bulgaria to meet with our Virtual Tourist friends for their annual Euromeet in June.   Then suddenly Mark had a drastic change in employment  The bank where he works was sold and we had no idea what he employment situation would be for the rest of the year so we put all travel plans on the back burner.  Fortunately Mark found a new job before his current job ended.  He was to start his new job the end of March.  So there was no way we could still plan the trip to Bulgaria in June.  He would have no time accumulated for a vacation and let's face it, it's not good practice to start a new job asking for vacation two months later.  So we decided to take take a brief vacation between the ending of one job and the starting of the other.  But we only had two weeks to make the plans and leave for the trip to make this work.  And how do you plan, research,and book a trip in that short of a time span?  The easiest thing would be to plan a car trip locally.  Maybe the Blue Ridge Parkway, maybe North Carolina's Outer Banks.   Even a flight to the the western US using airline mileage and a rental car would not be too difficult to pull off.    So what did we end up doing?   We went to Milan, Italy.

I always like to name my vacations.   It makes it easy to label the file folders for my photos in my computer.  It gives me an instant reference when thinking about the trip and reflecting on it months  later.  Since this was such a crazy last minute idea I named this vacation Due Paazi Ragazzi a Milano which is Italian for  Two crazy guys in Milan.

When we plan vacations we brainstorm ideas of places we might both want to see, especially places neither of us have visited before.  Many times we mention places to visit and then realize one or the other of us have already been there and we always say "But you have already been there. Let's find someplace we both have not seen."  So I was hesitant to mention Milan at first as I had been there in 2002 long before I knew Mark.   And also Milan is not always the most popular choice of cities to visit in Italy.   I fell in love with Milan on my first visit although most of the guide books warned me there were more exciting cities to visit.  Even at the airport when I was checking in for my flight the woman at the Alitalia ticket counter questioned my choice of visiting Milan.  So it may have been that I was not expecting a lot when I arrived which caused me to be pleasantly surprised.  But I thoroughly enjoyed my time there and have always said I wanted to return one day.  However I was concerned when Mark agreed on Milan.  I knew it would be his only major vacation this year and I did not want him to be disappointed.   I warned him Milan was not Rome or Venice or even Florence.  It was unique to itself and its treasures were not obvious.  You had to walk the street, keep your eyes open and explore the back streets to find the hidden treasures of Milan.  Other than the beautiful Duomo not a lot screams at you Stop Now in Milan.   You have to go find it.  I think this is what sold Mark on Milan.  He loves to walk and explore.  Give him a map and he is thrilled to see what he can discover.

People watching in Milan

We found many churches to visit of course.  However we did not get to see DaVinci's The Last Supper.  You have to make reservations way in advance.  So after two trip to Milan I still have not seen the masterpiece.   Maybe I will get back one day to to eventually see it. Instead I saw lots of interesting people like this romantic couple in the photo above.  The girl is obviously in a romantic mode in this beautiful city and the guy is obviously more interested in his cell phone.   She  has no idea.

I also discovered a new beer which became a favorite.  I have not seen it here at home so I made sure to have plenty while in Milan.

We stayed at a kooky hotel named Allegroitalia Espresso Hotel.  It had a strange subway map motif in the hallway.

Our hotel room had a wine cork screw design on the door.

And the hotel had no morning breakfast which is common is so many European hotel.   But we were not disappointed because they had a free dinner buffet in the evening  instead.  This hotel did everything out of the ordinary.   They had a huge lounge area with the food and also a bar.  There were huge flat screen TV's where we got to watch soccer live.  The employees were encouraged to interact with the guests.  So they watched the games with us.  Ate at the dinner buffet and also played table top and video games with everyone. 

Free food and soccer at 2100 hours in the hotel

Next subject.  Food.  We love Italian food.  It is my favorite type of food  And Mark is Italian so he knows good Italian food.   We loved Rome two years ago.   We had great meals in Rome.  But we both agreed we were more impressed with the food in Milan.  We ate most of our meals in our little neighborhood where the kooky hotel was located.  And we found a favorite bar and restaurant which was on the unusual side also.   It was named Le Biciclette.   Small, ecelectic, and very much a small neighborhood favorite.  We had great food, interesting drinks and laughs with the bartenders.   I love a good Aperol Spritz when in Italy.  But I have never seen one made with an olive and a cherry.  Always just a cherry.  But the bartender added an olive each time and it elevated the drink to a very different and interesting level.

Le Biciclette 

We sat in a rooftop bar near the Duomo on another day for another Aperol  Spritz, this time without the olive.   But look at my view in the photo.  Could there be a more picturesque location for a mid afternoon cocktail?

Other than Aperol Spritz's and Ichnusa beer we also found time for some of our favorite foods in all of Italy.

We could have planned for months in advance.  We could have booked reservations for The Last Supper.   We could have taken hours visiting churches and monuments we found on internet searches instead of just finding them by surprise on our daily walks.  But we would have missed the soul of Milan.  I think this is why so many people do not find Milan to be a favorite.   It's a city with a hidden soul.  It's a city that is waiting for you to take the time to discover it's secrets.   And it was so worth the effort.   So if you are planning a last minute trip and only have two weeks to book the trip do something different.   Discover the back neighborhoods and side streets of Milan.

A room with a view.  The view from our hotel window

Vittorio Emanuelle II memorial in the Piazza del Duomo

Be like the Due pazzi regazzi a Milano, the two crazy guys in Milan.

The two crazy guys at Le Biciclette

Thrilling Cities

Growing up in a small town in a lower middle class family I dreamed  of  traveling and seeing exotic locations.  But I never believed it was any thing more than a dream.   My grandmother never saw the ocean until she was in her late 60's although it was only three hours away from our home town.   I tried to convince my parents to go to Italy and revisit the places my father was in during WWII.  We knew my father was developing early dementia and I thought it would be one last great experience for them.  Instead they never got any farther than those three hours to the Ocean City, Md where my grandmother had finally seen the ocean.

Growing up I watched the James Bond films.  I was thrilled with James Bond and all of the fascinating locations he explored.  I'm not sure what I liked more.  Sean Connery or the beautiful and exciting places he visited.   I thought about those places for years and like my grandmother and parents I never thought I would ever see them.

Photography became my escape.  I had my first camera at the age of eight.  I took photos of my town, of my younger sister, my cousins.  I loved photography.  But I never became a photographer.  Perhaps I should have.   It truly is my passion.   I am just a man with a camera who might get a great shot on a 10 gig chip.  I am reading a book by Ian Fleming called Thrilling Cities..  This brings all of this back to those James Bond movies I saw as a kid.   As an adult I have gotten to see many of those Thrilling Cities Fleming wrote about in his novels and in the book I am reading now.  And I am realizing I will never be that great photographer or that expert on foreign travel.   Or a great writer.  That is my third great passion.  I wanted to be a writer.   I have many great novels buried in my head that I have never written along with the great photographs I have never taken.

Fleming writes in Thrilling Cities "Zurich came and the banal beauty of Switzerland, then the jagged sugar icing of the Alps, the blue puddles of the Italian lakes and the snow melting down towards the baked terrazza of the Italian plains."   My photo above is taken from a plane flying over Zurich and Switzerland headed to Italy.   I could never have described it like Fleming.  I saw it.  I loved it and I photographed it.  Reading his book today I can see his words in my photo. 

I have been to many of the Thrilling Cities Fleming describes in his book.  I'll never have his words to describe them.  I'll never write the great travel blog and take the perfect photo about them. But reading his book today I have discovered a thread that takes me from a little movie theater in 1962 watching the movie from his novel Dr. No that leads me to my travel adventures today.  It's been a long journey.  But I have gotten to travel across that ocean my grandmother finally got to see before she died.  And I have gotten to visit the locations where my father was located in WWII that my parents never got to see.   And today my daughter is writing a novel based on my fathers  war experiences that I never got to write.   So it all goes full circle.  And we all have seemed to fulfill hopes and passions our parents never completed. 

I still have a bucket list of Thrilling Cities I want to see.  Thank you Ian Fleming for sparking that flame inside me.   And thanks to my Aunt Louise who bought me that first camera at the age of 8 which is still my inspiration.   And I am thankful my daughter has been inspired to write about the exploits of my father in WWII.  My oldest daughter is also a writer.  She has many wonderful ideas and journals for stories she wants to write also.   My mother once started a journal with the words "the flowers were in disarray."  She never completed the sentence.   The journal remained empty.    But we all have visions, dreams, hopes and inspirations.  To my two daughter I say :   Follow the dream, take on the fantasy, and follow the inspiration of those who were unable to complete their fantasy and leave a little unfinished work to inspire those who follow behind you.

Thrilling Cities await you.  Don't hesitate to find them.

My grandmother at Ocean City Maryland seeing the ocean for the fist time