Baci Baci from Gubbio

Things escalated as I left the International Dinner: I decided I was going to head home after the limbo started. I mean I love limbo as much as the next slightly irritating British tourist, but it doesn't mean I can do it, and I certainly can't do it if I'm wearing a non-elasticated skirt without showing a lot more than I intended.

So I left the party. My friends did not. In fact as we met at the school the following morning, there were quite a few dark-glasses-wearing individuals that were avoiding loud noises and Lynette had some suspiscious scabs on her knees. I quizzed her about this at break time.
'Have a little accident did you?'
'Just a little one.'
'Was it by any chance limbo related?'
'Maybe...'

It turned out things had got pretty rowdy and Lynette, being quite tall, was at a limbo disadvantage and paid thr price with a fall in the last round. Occupational hazard.

That afternoon we were going on another outing. It was week three and I was a little bored of these outings. We'd been to so many places, seen so many churches, had lectures about the Roman conquest of this and the Renaissance revival of that and I was getting a teensy-weensy bit tired of it all. I did hate myself for it - I was in Italy, supposedly living la dolce vita and all I could think of was where I could stop off for a coffee and lose the enthusiastic tour guide.

Gubbio was Roman at some point. The aforementioned tour guide was loving life and going on and on and on and on about why it was so Roman (frankly with the dirty great ampitheatre it wasn't a surprise) and so I kind of stopped listening. Bree and I instead found a more fun pursuit - pretending to be Roman. I don't mean that we adopted the tortoise formation and wore red skirts under our formidable armour - we just pretended to look Roman with our expressions and then take a picture in front of the Roman relic to adorn Facebook - it was a good idea at the time...

After this entertaining chapter of my life, we moved on to a church: I'll do my surprised face, oh wait, I don't have one... That day I happened to be committing a heinous crime in that not only were my provocative knees on show, but my alluring shoulders were as well. It was a mutual decision therefore not to enter the church and so I sat outside looking grumpy with Susan. I wasn't actually grumpy, but after sitting in a coach for over an hour, looking briefly Roman, and the prospect of more uninteresting culture to absorb, all I wanted was that coffee.

Apart from being vaguely Roman, Gubbio was famous for another reason. The town was on two levels and at the top was a quaint old town overlooking the Umbrian plains. Nestled within the backstreets was a well - supposedly a magic well. Yeah, I rolled my eyes too. I think the story went something like, if you visited Gubbio and you didn't want to get mad (as in crazy, not angry) then you had to run round the well seven times. Many, many of my coursemates gave this a go; Susan and I found a Vespa and took pictures of each other on it. We both shared the same feelings of apathy at this point in the course and though we enjoyed visiting new places, taking part in the ridiculous traditions was maybe a step too far.

I was getting on really well with Susan and Lynette; Gaby had cooled off again; and Bree was going through a bit of a rough patch so was cooling off with everyone. Basically her boyfriend was being a bit of an idiot and there was very little we could say to make her feel better about this so she turned to one of the Brazilian guys for a friendly shoulder to moan on. We were still all friends, but I think Bree was suffering from the 'Afternoon at the Pool' syndrome and really wanted some time to herself.

One of the other attractions of Gubbio was a cable car up to the top of the hill on which it resides. Normally I love a good cable car, a beautiful view, and a bit of banter on the way, but on that particular day I really couldn't be bothered. Neither could Susan. The others all wanted to go on the cable car ride, but I could think of a better way to spend 7Eur.

Susan and I went back down to the lower town and found a cafe - admittedly it was quite an expensive cafe, but my 7 Euros were much better off spent on a cup of coffee, a brioche and chats with Susan. We'd formed quite a formidable team in Wendy's classes and when it came to dull lectures all about culture, we shared a very similar viewpoint.

The others returned from their excursion in desperate need of a drink themselves, so they joined us at the cafe for a spot of something before the bus came to take us back to Camerino. They'd enjoyed it, but the enjoyment probably wasn't worth 7Eur and, like the afternoon at the pool, they were kind of regretting not going for the simple option.

We went home that evening after having enjoyed the day, not for the culture, but for the chance to spend it in good company.

Later on that week I emailed my friends and family telling them about my trip to Gubbio and signed off 'baci baci' - kisses. My parents picked up on this: baci baci from Gubbio? Are you secretly in Liverpool?

I said though it sounded like it, I wasn't...

Pub Grub

One of the things I missed about the UK when I was in Italy (and believe me there weren't many) was the traditional British pub grub. I LOVE mashed potato and pie and gravy and roast potatoes and steamed green veg and stuffing with roast dinners, and did I mention mashed potato? This is something that is yet to go viral in Italy.

That said, I love the Italian cafe culture and all the delicious food on offer, however peculiar, and I was in no hurry to get home for a traditional roast. This was not the view of those in charge, and for week three they had scheduled in a nostalgic banquet made up of the very best dishes from our various countries. I confess I was really looking forward to this. Well I was until I realised that it was the students were supposed to provide the food.

The idea was very simple: everyone has the opportunity to make one of their national dishes (official or otherwise) and after presenting it to the group, we would feast on the international delights available. If I were back home in the UK, this wouldn't even phase me slightly: pop down to Tesco and grab everything a girl could need to make the perfect British banquet.

I was not in the UK. There is no branch of Tesco in Camerino. There isn't even an Aldi.

It wasn't long before loopholes were being exploited and several factions had been formed. If it wasn't all in the name of food we'd have a serious problem: the Portuguese lining up against the Spanish; the Brazilians squaring up to Poland. It was a recipe for disaster (don't you love an inadvertant pun).

As Lynette and I were the sole representatives from the UK, it was only natural that we stick together and pool our resources against the considerable might of the other nations. So early that afternoon we sat down with a notepad and began brainstorming cheap and easy British dishes that we could replicate with nice simple ingredients like eggs and flour and pasta...

This was not a terriby easy task and we eventually decided on a meal of Toad in the Hole with jam scones for pudding. Yum. What then ensued was a panic visit to Skype as we both called our respective families for the age-old tried-and-tested recipes from Grandma.

Banquet T-5 hours.

So with five hours to go we had two recipes and no ingredients, we also needed to produce a poster of our recipes all nicely written our in Italian. It's a shame we couldn't knit some time... While Lynette was getting the fine details of her Toad in the Hole recipe, I pressganged a tutor to help me write out these recipes in Italian.

Banquet T-4.5 hours.

Time for a trip to Eurospin, Italy's half-hearted answer to Tesco: flour, butter, eggs, milk, sausages, jam and a spot of whipped cream, oh and some bananas, and a bit of pasta, maybe some more disposable razors and a new hairbrush...

Banquet T-3 hours.

We arrived back at Lynette's flat to do the cooking. My apartment was full of Portuguese people after a nasty incident with internal affairs causing two rival factions to develop. Lynette, despite there being five nations represented in her flat, had the run of the kitchen and chose to shotgun it for Queen and Country.

Susan, the only representative from Croatia, was lacking in motivation because taking on a venture like that solo was quite an expensive operation; so for one day, and one day only, the UK joined forces with Croatia to create something beautiful. Well, Lynette and I cooked whilst making the poster at the same time, Susan ate some of the spoils - you have to be sure it tastes good: she tried a few just to be really sure.

Banquet T-2 hours.

In the Red Kitchen (to use a Ready, Steady, Cook analogy) I was making the scones. I didn't have cutters and neither did I have self-raising flour, or even baking powder: they turned out to be quite an interesting shape... Still, chop them in two, coat them with jam and cream, and no-one knows any different.

Banquet T-1 hour.

In the Green Kitchen Lynette was having some trouble with her recipe. It transpired, after a long time, that the quantities had been wrong. We'd sort of guessed and added more bits as we saw fit, but it wasn't going to be quite worthy of Aunt Bessie.

Banquet T-30 minutes.

With half an hour to go, we were putting the finishing touches to the poster and arranging our goodies in such a way to earn a few more points for presentation. Speaking of presentation, we also had to present our dishes to the group. I'm normally a confident and outgoing person, but I had never done public speaking in a foreign language and I wasn't looking forward to it. Lynette and I prepared a little of what we were going to say.

Banquet T-10 minutes.

We arrived at the banquet venue, a courtyard at the university, next door to my flat. We put our poster up and added our plates to the table. It wasn't long before everyone else joined us with plates of steaming food and the principal called proceedings to order.

Each nation (or faction of each nation) presented their dishes. In the UK the Health and Safety wombles would have a breakdown - food prepared by the unwashed in greasy kitchens that wouldn't know a hygiene certificate if it swept up all the discarded food on the floor and put all the washed dishes back in the cupboards. But we're in Italy and things like that don't matter - no-one got food poisoning so what's the problem!?

It was soon our turn to do the presentation and I think the subtle irony of tea and scones and the literal translation of Toad in the Hole was a little lost on our audience, but they seemed to enjoy the results nonetheless. I saw a Spanish woman manhandling our toad in the Hole so she could get a piece of that batter-and-frankfurter combination for herself; despite being a pudding, all the scones had gone by the time I'd made a swoop of the rest of the table; and the only things we'd be taking home it turned out, would be the dishes.

So all in all it was a success. We didn't win, but then again it was more about the taking part. In this particular competition being outdone by your rivals only means you get a nicer dinner and that's a compromise I'm willing to get on board with.

The banquet soon became a party (started by Poker Face before launching into a Reggaeton mash-up) and I retired early - just as the limbo was getting started...

An Afternoon at the Lake

I have to make an apology. My last-but-one post was entitled 'An Afternoon at the Pool' only it wasn't. This post is entitled 'An Afternoon at the Lake', but for readers who fear a pattern emerging, you can rest easy - we actually spent an afternoon at the lake.

The lake in question was Lago di Fiastra. The course was proceeding nicely and after the afternoon my friends spent at the pool wasn't as relaxing as they had thought it would have been, we thought some TLC at a lake would be just what we needed.

We met at the bus stop in Camerino and, as per usual, shotgunned the back of the bus. It was a kind of twisty journey, one of those vomit-inducing rides where the front of the bus is about three corners ahead of the back. So if I wasn't looking forward to lying in the sun all afternoon before, it was about to become necessary.

If you were wondering how things were going with Gaby after last night, I can't really tell you. It's not that I'm keeping a dastardly secret for her, or that it was so unpleasant I dare not speak of it - the truth is I don't know. She stumbled in bladdered out of her theatrical mind... again... at goodness knows 'o' clock in the morning. I was up and out of the house before her, I lunched with Lynette and Susan, and the first time I saw her was getting on the bus.

She immersed herself (like everyone else, due to the road conditions) in some music and when we disembarked at the lake she suddenly decided that hiring a sun-lounger (like the rest of us) was a silly and expensive thing to do because all the cool people (like the ones in her class) were totes going to rough it on towels round the headland.

So with Gaby out of the picture, Susan, Lynette, Bree and I hired our outrageous sun-loungers (2Eur - woh...) and sat ourselves in the sun. It was a hazy afternoon - warm, of course, but the sun wasn't beating down and frying everything in sight like normal. Conditions were perfect and with the breeze coming in off the lake, I really could have stayed there for hours.

This didn't happen.

Bree was very keen to dip her feet into the cool waters of Fiastra and very keen that as many of us as possible should join her. Lynette did with little persuasion, but Bree wanted to encourage me to get involved as well.

Problem.

I had no pants for my bikini and going without tends to be frowned upon even in Italy (despite the prolific nudity that appears in public places). I was wearing pants, you'll be relieved to read, but not the kind that you can go swimming in. Still, I wanted to cool off and have a paddle, and paddle I did. Not for long - there's only so much time you can kill walking up and down while your friends are swimming about 10 feet away.

It wasn't long before I decided that my 2Eur sun-lounger was more fun and I went back to join Susan who had resolutely denied all requests that she join us in the lake - she was minding our stuff. It wasn't long before Bree and Lynette came back too as splashing about for more than about twenty minutes when you're not eight  can get a little tiresome.

It sooned turned out that lying down on a 2Eur sun-lounger for any more than twenty minutes wasn't to Bree's liking either and she got the mother of all itchy feet.
'Aren't you bored?'
'Not really' I replied.
'Let's do something.'
'Like what?'
She scanned the horizon and soon found something that would entertain her adequately.
'Let's hire a pedalo.'

We all sat up and turned to her.
'A pedalo!?'
A pedalo.

We hired a pedalo.

There were several for hire - six-seaters and four-seaters. There were four of us, so brilliant, let's hire a four-seater pedalo. Susan did not want to do this. She was very much enjoying lying down and was very concerned about the stuff we would be leaving behind for all and sundry to pilfer (she must have been an expert at keeping an eye on things whilst her own eyes were shut...).

So we were about to hire a four-seater pedalo with only three people. We threw the offer out to those around us and soon found that no-one wanted to spend an hour with us on an unsteady craft in the middle of a very deep lake.
'Why not ask Gaby?' said Bree.
We asked Gaby. She thought that with all the money she had saved not hiring a sun-lounger, hiring a pedalo would probably be ok.

We set sail.

Now after having read that relations were a little strained between myself and Gaby, you may have thought that an hour with her on the aforementioned raft of death would have ended in just that. It wasn't nearly as bad. The thing about Gaby is that Gaby is quite like her Desperate Housewives character. Gabrielle Solis was (at times) self-seeking, self-interested, self-ish - anything that has the word 'self' in. It is not by chance that I called my Gaby, Gaby. So though I was finding Gaby a little irritating, she was oblivious to this and a harmonious hour on the lake together would only take a deep breath and new attitudes to tolerance on my part.

We all had a lovely time. If you've never pedalo-ed on a calm Italian lake as the sun set before, you really should give it a go. It actually did wonders for mine and Gaby's friendship and I left the lake a whole lot more relaxed about the situation.

Once we hit dry land, it turned out that Susan was now very bored (and had been for some time), but as the sun-lounger hire people wanted their sun-loungers back, we were left standing around waiting for the bus to come with very little to occupy ourselves with.

The coach arrived eventually and we piled on and took our seats. Gaby wanted to sit on her own with her music and proceeded to lip sync (much to our amusement) all the way home...

Asterix

I'd spent a very pleasant afternoon not at the pool and I was quite looking forward to catching up with my friends at a bar in the square. There were several groups of friends on the course and each of them had a watering-hole. We used to water at Asterix.

It was largely open-air (it is Italy) and it extended into the square itself. It was quite American in style - they served chips (well I suppose you'd call them fries) and extra large soft drinks inamongst the standard Italian cocktails and wines. It wasn't the classiest place I'd ever come across, but it was great to sit out and watch the townsfolk Camerino go by and chat with the other people that decided to water at Asterix too.

Gaby had come home, eaten in a hurry and was busy doing her homework so that she could come out to Asterix with us. I was sitting calmly eating a nice spot of pasta and she was ricocheting off the walls like a pinball in a pinball machine, trying to get everything done in time: she was a tornado of tenses, rattling off the imperfect and the future whilst stirring bubbling pots and trying not to burn even more some already-crucified chicken.

I finished, washed my dishes and walked slowly into the bedroom to begin getting ready. I then did what was becoming normal, and shut her open and overflowing drawer, closed the cupboard door so that if I sat on my bed I wouldn't be sitting in a little alcove of solitary confinement, and wandered into the bathroom.

As I sat on the loo I could hear Hurricane Gaby hurtling around and when I emerged, predictably, the overflowing drawer was open and vomiting all over the floor, and my pillow was once again reduced to a darkened corner away from the rest of civilisation. I collected my bag and told her I was leaving. Hurricane Gaby had one final bustle before exiting the flat with me.

On the way to the bar I asked her what the incredible rush was - she didn't need to stay out too late with us; we were just intending to have a few drinks and leave it there.

'No!' she said indignantly, 'I'm not staying at Asterix, I'm meeting some people from my class later.'

Oh.

I confess I didn't really know the people in her class very well. They watered elsewhere in town and were very much a hermetically sealed clique that turned their noses up at some people and looked down their noses at the others. Together with this, Gaby was becoming more and more interested in blokes. After the incident at Babaloo where she had an incident with one of the gentlemen on the course, she'd used that as a springboard to see what the other the gents were like. The sort-of boyfriend she was ready to run away with at the beginning had now vanished into the ether.

So by the time we arrived at Asterix she decided that she didn't want to have a drink with us at all and she busied off to her other friends. I think I was quite relieved by this and I sighed happily before taking my seat at a table with Lynette, Susan and Bree. Brilliant.

We got the drinks in and I caught up with the girls and asked them how their day had been. They'd had fun at the pool, but it hadn't really been worth the money, and it turns out that my relaxing afternoon in voluntary solitary confinement was much the better option.

Still, no hard feelings and it was great to relax in the piazza. Hang on. What are those guys bringing in? Wait, are those speakers? Does that guy have a guitar? Ok so quiet evening turned into live music in the piazza. But then again I love live music so I wasn't too gutted. So how was it?

Let's say it was a trip down memory lane as I hadn't listened to Green Day since high school. That said it was really quite interesting to hear the singer chew up the words so that all he was really doing was making funny noises. That's what happen if you sing in a different language that you can't really speak in the first place.

Don't believe me?

(I apologise for the quality of the video and the Italian man who seemed to know exactly where my camera was pointing through the eyes in the back of his head.)

Anyway that night turned out to be entertaining after all and it was great to sit and watch the world go by,  laughing at it as it passed...

An Afternoon at the Pool

I went on most outings that there were on my language course. If I'd paid for a trip to Rome, of course I was going to go. There were some that cost a little extra, like the trip to see Madama Butterfly in Macerata, or the trip to the club, Babaloo on the Rimini coast. These were fun outings and the kind of thing you sign up to in the heat of the moment and don't give a second thought.

The whole ethic of the language course was to act now and think about it later - most people were wonderfully relaxed and relished not having responsibility. They loved living la dolce vita, spending break times in cafes, spending the evenings in bars, eating pizza and pasta, exploring beautiful places, making great friends, I could go on.

The experience was amazing, but sometimes all I longed for was a bit of peace and quiet: some time to explore on my own, take some time out to do my own thing. Though I loved the friends I'd made, I knew our friendship would probably benefit from taking five minutes out here and there.

To be honest, things in my house were getting a little frustrating. Gaby, now it transpired she was but-a-girl at 19, was acting her age more and more, and showing that she had no idea about communal living and respecting other people's needs in that situation. My bed was in the corner of the room, next to the wardrobe: she'd open the wardrobe doors to get her clothes out and then leave them open - cue me sitting in a tiny, darkened box, shut away from the world. She'd also leave her drawer open so that in order for me to get my stuff out, I'd have to ram her stuff back in said drawer before I could shut it and open mine.

Woh.

Poxy, I know, but it was the little things that really got to me: she'd bought all this food on our behalf, but had no idea how to cook it. I soon decided that we would cook for ourselves from then on. She would often stay out until the wee hours with friends from her class, and then stumble in drunk putting on all the lights possible and making as much noise as she could.

It was getting to the stage where if I didn't take some time out, I was going to spontaneously combust.

I was given a great opportunity to do just this. The school had arranged an afternoon at the pool for us in our third week. It wasn't free - we'd have to pay about 7Eur for the privilege and I'd forgotten my bikini bottoms. I could therefore go, but I'd have to sit on the side, or buy some pants, or borrow some pants - there is always a solution, but I couldn't be bothered with it.

Instead, I was scheming ways to get an afternoon to myself. Lovely.

My friends were really surprised when I said I wasn't going to go and they offered me all kinds of sweeteners, but my mind was made up. I waved them off on the bus and then wandered into a bookshop. I browsed. I browsed a lot. I was looking for English literature translated into Italian.

I love classic literature and so bought Orgoglioso e Pregiudizio (Pride & Prejudice) and Re Lear (King Lear). It was enough to whet my appetite. I went back to my apartment and then decided that I'd head down to the supermarket. I walked all the way down and all the way back up. It was a long slog and I didn't enjoy the last 500m because my arms were about to fall off, but still it was nice to do it on my own, without having to think about making polite small talk with someone else.

I got back to my apartment and then headed off to the deserted piazza to Skype my family. Not long after my friends arrived back. It turned out I hadn't missed very much at all. Ok so it had been fun, but I could tell they were secretly all jealous that I'd had some time alone.

So with all my chores done and the evening stretching out in front of me, I decided to arrange to meet my friends at a bar in the piazza that evening. I could tell my friends were all in need of a drink for different reasons that I was...

Internet-Gate

There's not doubting that Camerino is beautiful: Camerino, Rome, Assisi, Perugia, Frassassi, Porto Recanati, Macerata, Caldarola, all of it. You can understand, therefore, a) why I decided to take pictures at every opportunity, and b) why I felt I just had to share it with the wider world.

Ok, so I'm blogging about it - but it happened back in 2009, so quite a lot of time has passed since then. What I did in the heat of the moment was to write emails to my family and friends all about my time away. For this to happen I needed the internet. Fortunately the school had a number of computers connected to the internet in the main foyer; unfortunately the room was a complete sweatbox and the computers were all paintfully slow.

My solution came in the form of a brand-spanking new netbook I'd bought for my year abroad: it was portable, had a long battery life, and wireless internet. This meant I could sit in the main piazza (just outside the school) and construct these entertaining emails and Skype my family back in the UK. It was great to be able to share my experiences and catch up on what was going on at home.

There were two downsides to this: quite often many people serendipitously has the same idea and so there was no room to sit in the piazza, and sometimes it rained. I wracked my brain for an alternative and remembered that in my flat I was near the university buildings. Great! I'll just connect to their network.

So there I am chilling in the kitchen. I load up my computer and click on the internet connections. Yes! The university network is listed. Oh. You need a passcode. Oh. Bummer. Still, I asked at the school and they said I just needed to go to IT Services at the university and they'd sort it for me.

It's the start of the third week by the time this happens and to be honest, if it wasn't for the frequent thunderstorms that rendered Skyping in the piazza a bit of a bad idea, I'd have left it alone. Nevertheless, one break time I went down to IT Services and asked them to sort out my computer. There were a couple of guys hanging about and one of them got to sorting my netbook right away. The other seemed to just be chilling there for fun. I don't know what he was doing there during the summer, but he was harmless enough.

They fettled my netbook and I headed off back to the school. The hanger-on decided that IT Services wasn't as exciting as escorting a blonde English girl back into town. Nice. The other guy gave me a look as the offer to take me back into town was made, but I don't like hurting people's feelings so I agreed.

Now this is Italy where guys enjoy female company, but this guy was a bit more English - soppy, wet, not very interesting, certainly not an Italian stallion: I got rid of him before I even reached the main street. But Camerino is a small town and it's quite hard to avoid people. That said I like a challenge and spent the remaining fortnight ducking into alleyways, having loud conversations with my friends, and doing lots of ignoring.

It sounds cruel, but let me tell you it would have been much crueller to tell him exactly what I thought. We had plenty of outings planned over the next fortnight so as long as I could avoid him during the days, I'd be home and dry.

So after all that you would kind of think it was worth it because I got internet in my flat. Well I didn't - whatever they tried didn't work; I thought about going back and thought better of it - Skyping in the rain was a much more attractive prospect.

The Capital City (Part II)

I am currently outside the Pantheon in Rome, well not literally, but considering that my last post was about the first half of my Roman adventure, technically I am just outside the Pantheon about to continue with a guided tour of the capital city.

Our tour moved from the Pantheon to the Fontana dei Trevi made famous by Anita Ekberg who danced in it during Federico Fellini's La Dolce Vita. Our tour guide was one of the tutors at the school but I get the distinct impression she had never been to Rome. The tutor that lectured us on Roman history would have been a fantastic tour guide, but he was unavailable so we got the next best thing, only this woman wasn't the next best thing, she spent most of the tour reading out Wikipedia.

Anyway, things wound up there quite abruptly - our guide decided that the rest of the day was ours to explore because she'd run out of Wikipedia notes, or something similar. This wasn't a bad thing because she wasn't giving us the best tour we'd ever had and to be honest, I just wanted to do a bit of sightseeing without seventy other people in tow.

First things first, however, we needed lunch so Lynette, Gaby, Bree and I went to MacDonalds. I may have introduced Susan into our group but she was keeping one of Camerino's locals busy. To this day I don't know why he'd come with us, but he took a shine to Susan and they decided to go round the city together.

So it was just four of us in MacDonalds and we had two very different ideas about what to do with the rest of the way. Now I was getting on really well with Gaby and Bree, but it was Lynette that wanted to do what I wanted. We hit a bit of a rough spot with this. As had happened in Perugia, we got our wires crossed and the easiest thing to do at that point is walk away.

Now I don't want to moan about my coursemates because I'm still really good friends with Bree even though years have passed since we last saw each other, but sometimes you hit a rough spot with someone and in the interests of community relations, it's a lot easier to take a deep breath, wave a cheery goodbye and then meet back at the coach at the end of the day.

Lynette and I, two lassies from Manchester, started to get to grips with Rome. Our first stop was the Spanish Steps and then we headed over to the Typewriter. The reason for the disagreement with Bree was that she wanted to use the tube and we didn't. The very last thing I wanted to do was go and stand in a sweatbox like the Pantheon, but underground: on a hot, airless day like it was, the aim is to spend as much of it as possible out in the open. Bree maintained it would be too hard to get everywhere we wanted and walk, but I was sure it wasn't too much of a distance to cover.

Anyway we reached the Typewriter and headed down to the Colosseum. We'd seen such a mis-match of time periods and architecture during the day that it was only fitting we saw some real Roman stuff at some point. The road down to the Colosseum is long and so we chatted, paused every now and then and took our time to get there because we still had quite a lot of time left before we had to meet at Termini Station.

We didn't go in the Colosseum - it was quite pricey and I wanted to see a bit more of the city before heading back. We headed up round the back of the Colosseum, where I thought it was a good time to jump, and then we started walking back to the station - via the odd shop or two along the way.

We got back to the station quite early and ran into Susan and her new friend. We went to one of the cafes in the station and got something to eat. I wasn't very hungry - I never seemed to be despite all the walking and touring I'd been doing. After that we headed to the place the coach would pick us up from. Bree and Gaby were there after spending the day with some of the Portuguese crowd and they were full of what they'd done. They'd had fun - to be honest they'd not done a lot more or less than what we'd done, but they'd enjoyed it nonetheless.

On the way home I was thankful that Sunday was a day of rest.