Battles, Beaches, Books and Boneyards

Tomorrow marks the start of Eid-al-Adha, (Festival of the Sacrifice), commemorating Abraham's willingness to obey Allah's command to sacrifice his beloved son, Ishmael. The hubby and I are off to Dubai for the week and we are both looking forward to another trip, although I can't bear leaving my little Mila cat-child alone again so soon after our European holiday. 

 

Speaking of which...

The Italian leg of our previous travels was definitely the highlight of our holiday.  Having an ice cold glass of Prosecco on the roof of our hotel situated right next to the Pantheon and watching the sun set over the Vatican in the distance, I worked out that I seem to visit Rome with seventeen- and eighteen-year intervals, having been there for the first time when I was seventeen, then twenty-nine and now again at forty-two. Hope it does not take that long for my next visit!

 

Sunset over the Vatican City

This was truly one of the best vacations I have ever been on and I was not sure how to share the experience without writing a novel, so I selected a few highlights from the trip to share with you.

 

We stayed in Frascati for the first two nights of our visit, because it put us closer to Lake Albano, where André wanted to show me Castel Gandolfo, the Pope's summer residence, as well as where his (André's) father lived for a couple of years.  So, up the hill we went for hubby's trip down memory lane.   After driving around the lake and stopping for a lunch of porchetta
(por-ke-ta:  mouth-wateringly delicious stuffed, roast pork) I pointed to a spot on the map and demanded to be taken there:  Anzio.

Lake Albano

Castel Gandolfo, with the Observatory on the right

A very shy porchetta di Rocca di Papa (porchetta from Rocca di Papa) vendor

 

I had heard of D-Day, when the Allied troops landed on the beaches of Normandy on June 6, 1944.  What I did not know about, was something called Operation  Shingle that took place earlier that year, on January 22.  On that day, Allied troops invaded Italy by landing on the beach at Anzio in what later became known as the start of The Battle for Rome, which ended on June 5, 1944, the day before the now infamous D-Day.

 
I managed to find two pictures of the January 1944 invasion and, purely by chance, took this picture of my gelato on more or less the exact spot as where the troops first landed.  Had I known about the history before my visit, I probably would have taken a picture reflecting more of the surrounding buildings, than just of my yummy ice cream! Hindsight...

See that platform on the right? That's where my gelato restaurant stands today!

 

As always where beaches are concerned, I had to take the shoes off and do some toe-dipping to test the waters.  The little town of Anzio is very charming.  The beach, however, not so much. The water was cold and dirty, with plastic bags and odds and sods floating in it, the sand seemed oily and the beach terribly overcrowded, so no swimming for me, thank you very much! A girl has her standards.  But, there must be something to the place, given how people flocked to the beach for a swim and to take in some sun. 

Wonder if this is what hell looks like? Too many people !

 

We had just left Anzio on the way back to Frascati when we realised our GPS (Sat-Nav, as some people call it) was broken and I had to navigate using the maps on our iPad, which was quite fun.  I did, admittedly, miss a couple of turn-offs because I tried to navigate, look at the gorgeous countryside zipping past us, while simultaneously trying to solve the social problem of prostitution. 

I was amazed at the... erhm... in-your-face-ness of the scantily clad women sitting next to the road, some with half-empty Coke bottles next to them, some looking very young, some not, all of them looking haggard.  This led to a lengthy discussion on supply-and-demand, as well as those missed turn-off's I mentioned earlier.

 

Off to the Eternal City the next day for the final (and best!) leg of our trip.  As Rome has narrow, overcrowded streets, we left our little Fiat 500 rental car behind.  When in Rome... Walk!

 

After having left our luggage in a hotel that made the Bates Motel look like a five-star establishment (we checked out the very next day and into the beautifully situated Albergo del Senato next to the Pantheon we went) we headed straight for the Piazza di Spagna (Spanish Steps) and a visit to the Keats-Shelley Memorial House.

 

The Spanish Steps consists of 135 very steep, slightly slippery steps  that link the Bourbon Spanish Embassy and the Trinità dei Monti church. At the bottom of the stairs you find the Keats-Shelley Memorial House. Well worth a visit if you love books, like both my Grammar Police hubby and I do.

Piazza di Spagna

 
English Romantic poet, John Keats (1795-1821) moved to Rome in September 1820, seeking warmer climes to treat what was widely believed to have been tuberculosis.  He moved into the apartments that is now known as the Keats-Shelley Memorial House and Library with his good friend Joseph Severn, an English painter.  Keats died in this very house, aged 25.

 
 

Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822) was one of Keats' greatest champions.  It is said that he was found with a volume of Keats' poetry in his pocket when he drowned but a year after his good friend Keats died.  I have no idea if this is true or not, but the romantic in me wants to believe this to be true.  


Shelley left behind a grieving Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein, a novel that was the result of a competition between Mary Shelley, her husband Percy, and Lord Byron.  The Shelleys were visiting Lord Byron at his summer home and one rainy evening Lord Byron challenged his writer friends to a competition to see who could produce the best ghost story.  Frankenstein was born (1818), a novel that has never been out of print since it was first published.  Take that, boys!

 

But back to the museum.  The Keats-Shelley Memorial House is not only a museum, it is still a working library, dedicated to English Romantic poets.  It houses over 8 000 volumes of Romantic literature.  Can you imagine the smell of all those wonderful books!  I fell head over heels in love with this place and must, must, must visit again, if only to inhale that wonderful aroma that old, really old books have.

Just one of many book-covered rooms in the library

 

Having visited the house where Keats died, the only natural next step would be to visit his final resting place:  The Protestant Cemetery of Rome. 

 

First stop on our Cemeteries of Rome tour:  The Pyramid of Caius Cestius.  This marble clad tomb stands 36.4m high and measures 29.5m on each side.  It is thought to have been built sometime between the 18^th and 12^th Centuries BC and became part of Rome's defence system in the third century AD when it was incorporated into the Aurelian Walls which protect the ancient city of Rome. I downloaded this picture so you can get an idea of what it looks like, as it was under construction during our visit and I thought taking pictures of a scaffold-clad pyramid was pointless.

 

Just behind the Pyramid lies the Protestant Cemetery, aka the Non-Catholic Cemetery of Rome and final resting place of John Keats, PB Shelley, Mary Shelley and Joseph Severn, to name but a few.  Definitely a must-visit if you, like me, find old graveyards fascinating.  We spent quite a lot of time looking for first the grave of Shelley, then the rest of the ones mentioned above.  Must admit, I became side tracked by many of the inscriptions on other tombstones, wondering who those people were, what their lives would have been like, day dreaming of a simpler world. 

Angel of Grief

Tombstone designed by William Wetmore Story for his beloved wife, Emelyn

Love the inscription

 

I have to be honest and say that, although I found the cemetery fascinating in itself, I also found it a little bit too busy to my liking.  It seemed almost disrespectful to traipse around some of these stones, lovingly placed by grieving family or friends.  But such is the nature of the beast, I guess.  On the one hand, I scoffed at the group of tourists with their flashy cameras and very loud tour leader, but at the same time, how was I any different?  I hope, in some small way, it did make a difference that we spoke in hushed tones when discussing the graves, that we did not stray off the paths between then, that we paused and pondered, not only on the graves of the famous, but that we spared a thought to the unknowns.

Keats and Severn's tombstones

Keats only wanted "Here lies one whose name was writ in Water" on his stone.

His friends felt otherwise...

Keats memorial plaque

 

Final stop:  The Rome War Cemetery.  It is said that the Protestant Cemetery is the most beautiful burial place in Rome.  Yes.  It is beautiful, but I loved, in as much as one can love a boneyard, this War Cemetery, dedicated to Commonwealth soldiers who perished during WWII.

 

Four blocks, twelve neat rows of similar, all-white graves rests within lush, peaceful gardens.  Even the birds chirped in hushed tones and André and I whispered to one another as we read the inscriptions of those 426 casualties of war, of which only four remain unidentified. 

 

I deliberately did not take pictures here as it felt somehow sacrileges to do so.  I did, however, download a couple of pictures off the internet to try to share the tranquillity with you.  One inscription specifically, stood up, touched my soul and lay down again, ready for the next visitor:  "In the garden of memories we meet every day"...