The Road to Rome

I didn't want to go to Rome. After a week on the Croatian beaches swimming in the clear waters of the Adriatic, Rome seemed like it would be crowded, hot and dirty. On Sunday, we said goodbye to Croatia with a dinner of grilled squid and sea devil before catching the overnight ferry to Ancona, Italy. The ferry originates in Split, so it was crowded by the time we got on. Only the driver could go with our car, so Annette went to stake out a spot on deck for us while I crammed the already small car into a tight space on board.

As I walked from the third floor where the car was parked to the sixth, seventh and eighth in search of Annette, I began to get a picture of just what this ferry was like. And it wasn't what I expected. The two-hour car ferry we rode from Split to Starigrad, Hvar last week felt like a party. There was a big lounge with a bar. People were drinking, smoking, playing cards. Upstairs on the sun deck, it felt like a beach. It was lively. People were sunning, drinking, enjoying friends and family with the joy of a much-anticipated vacation that officially began when the ferry left the port.

This ferry to Ancona, on the other hand, felt like a cruise ship taken over by squatters. Since cabins are significantly more expensive, many people just buy "deck seats." There is airplane seating in various areas of the ship, but the stairwells, the cafeteria, the kids' play area, even the casino and bar has towels and sleeping bags stretched everywhere, as people claim their sleeping spots for the night.

Annette and I eventually find a free wall in the back of the ship under an outlet. We blow our Thermarests up and get comfortable for the ten-hour ride. I begin to download photos from the camera to the hard drive and type up my last few handwritten blog entries. Annette curls up in her sleep sack with a book and soon begins to doze.

The ferry arrives in Ancona around 9 a.m. The port feels industrial and dirty. The morning breeze on the sea, though, is delicious. We joke that it almost replaces a shower. It will have to for now. We forego our planned breakfast in Ancona after an hour waiting to get our car off the ferry, watching the madness from a deck above. The carless passengers exit through the same area as the automobiles. We head for a a small town down the coast, where it is presumably quieter and closer to Rome.

Three hours later we eat overpriced but delicious prosciutto and mozzerella paninis in a small city that only left the first letter of its name in my mind: T. Neither my nor Annette's ATM cards worked on our last stop in Croatia, so we are sparingly living off of 30 Euros and a VISA card. We have no place to sleep between here and Barcelona in two weeks. While that is liberating, it is also stressful. Espeically at times like now when we find out our sandwiches cannot be paid for by VISA and we are down below 20 Euros.

But the stress momentarily washes away with Croatian sweat and ferry dust as we swim and bathe in a beautiful mountain lake. The mountains are five degrees cooler. The lake is near the southernmost glacier in Europe. I would trade the streets of Rome for a night in the mountains, I think to myself. The sun dries my body as I bask on the shore. But Annette heads for the car ready to push on.

The thermometer in the car creeps past 33 for the first time I have noticed. 34. 35. It keeps going to 38 before some long tunnels bring it down again. We stop 30 km from Rome at an Internet cafe. We use our 1 Euro 50 and the twenty minutes it buys us sparingly to see if we have any lodging responses through couch surfing. "Declined" is all we find. We move on to hostels and settle on one of the cheapest - Peter Pan Hostel. In my haste, we don't map directions to it. Instead I try to memorize the major roads (which I do, but cannot find) and Annette photographs its location on a map.

Thirty kilometers and two hours later we stop at a hotel. We have to be buzzd in to get to the reception area. In broken English the man suggests we go back up two lights and take a left. "I don't know," he repeats. BUt he is right. Annette spots a tiny sign with Peter Pan and an arrow on it.

Rome's suburbs are ugly. And this hostel is too. After some discussion and groaning about the price and lack of air conditioning, we use our VISA card, drop some stuff, and search for food. Within three blocks, we find good pizza and wine with a VISA sign for fourteen Euros. It turns out above the VISA sign was written, "machine is broken" in Italian and we spend what's left of our cash.

We find a bankomat (ATM) and Annette's card newly authoried to make international withdrawls works (thanks to her mom). So, we spend some of our new money in the Metro and ride into the city.

We are greeted by the Coloseum lit up beautifully at night as we exit the Metro. Columns, arches, domes, ruins partially lit in the night call me forward. I studied Latin for seven years. In college, I majored in Classics, focusing on ancient Roman literature and Roman and Greek culture and politics. And here it all was before me - Corinthian columns nearly two thousand years old. An arch Roman generals marched through triumphantly, showing off exotic spoils from distant wars. While in the Alps, I often thought about Hannibal marching his elephants. But now, it all began coming back.

Dr. Harl was one of my favorite college professors. He taught ancient history seminars of no more than 18 students. And he taught it as if it was a mxture of a current events and acting course. He once gathered us in a wedge and had us march on our classmates to demonstrate the brilliance of the hoplite phalanx military formation. He brought ancient Rome and Greece to life.

Here, as we walked around the circus maximus, I could see the well-oiled athletes showing off their physical prowess. Ancient Rome was alive. Ancient Rome is alive.

I marvel at how little we have changed. Our governments, our social activities, even our arenas, are similar. The building materials have changed, but humans haven't.

We wander on toward the national museum and the layers of Rome emerge. A sixteenth century chapel stands next to the ruins of a first century temple. The saying, "Rome wasn't built in a day," makes much more sense now. Rome wasn't built in 2,000 years. Rome is still being built. But its magnificence is unparalleled.

Tomorrow, Tuscany.