See Ya Santorini
Our nifty 5 day vacation from our travels is over. This was a nice break with no big agenda,
good food and laid back atmosphere.
Would we come back? No. There is a unique vibe to Santorini, but it
isn’t different enough to see again.
Sometimes the t-shirt that says “been there, done that” pretty much
covers it all. For this sort of break we
could find somewhere closer to home with a nice cultural scene and maybe
without the cruise ships. The back side
of a Hawaiian Island would work nicely.
We have spaced our breakfast items to come out even this
morning. We have plenty of time to get
ready and packed before Tim, the porter, shows up at 9:15. Again, he throws one suitcase over his
shoulder and grabs the other by hand and up the flights of stairs he goes. We each have one small bag and as usual we
are puffing when we get to the top. Tim
is doing fine.
We are at the meeting point for our pick-up to the airport
at 9:20 and our ride doesn’t show up until 9:45, 15 minutes late. That gives us plenty of time to chat with
Tim. He is a native Albanian (name all
the native Albanians you know) who has lived here for 15 years. He still has family in Albania but seldom
gets to visit there with his children in school here and him busy all
summer. The economic situation seems the
same here as in northern Minnesota with everyone in the tourism business in the
summer and then scrambling for other jobs in the winter. Tim starts his construction job next week
that will continue at least through February.
He has had an interesting life, and it is some of these brief encounters
that are the most educational as we travel.
We wish we had more time to chat but then we would miss our flight.
These travel days are a pain. Yes, it is whiney once again, there are a
million worse problems, but compared to the rest of our travels these are at
the bottom of the heap. The bad news is
that there are long check in lines at the Aegean desk for our flight to Athens
when we get to the Santorini airport.
The good news is that the desk person can get our bags checked all the
way through to Rome with all boarding passes even though we booked the
continuing flight separately.
The flight to Athens is fine although crowded (exit row) and
then the 4 hour layover. We get a couple
bad sandwiches and good beers from a lunch counter and then take turns walking
around the concourse and sitting and reading to break up the time. John threatens to buy a pair of skinny jeans
and a black leather jacket to look truly European but chickens out. That’s how these stores do their business, boredom. Again, our flight to Rome is crowded (exit row
again) and John volunteers for the center seat.
Bad timing as the guy in the aisle seat is wider than he is tall. We get a snack on the plane and John eats
with his face on the tray as his upper right arm is pinned against his torso.
Our bags show up in Rome as promised and our driver (last
one) is waiting in the arrivals area. He
has a nice Mercedes wagon for a smooth ride to the Hotel Santa Maria in
Trastavere. This guy is no Kostas from
Athens—he is not communicating with us but does keep up with friends on his
cell. We weave through the center city
narrow streets and get dropped about 20 feet from the reception door.
What a surprise. This
hotel is a former cloister and is a low slung hacienda right in the middle of
Rome. The 21 rooms are spaced around a
central courtyard filled with orange trees and ours is tucked in a back corner
away from the rest with its own small patio area. Really, this is like something you would see
in rural Spain or Arizona and would normally be impossible in a big city. We’re a couple blocks from the Tiber River, a
30 minute walk to the Vatican on one side and the Colosseum on the other.
Our check-in lady tonight is welcoming if a little
hurried. She takes us through the map
routine and gives us a recommendation for a nice easy casual dinner tonight
before walking us to our room. There is
a chilled bottle of Prosecco waiting for us with a couple glasses and bowl of
nuts because we had mentioned Tripadvisor when we made our reservation. Very smart of them. We unpack and move to our little patio with a
small table, two chairs, our bottle of wine and our bowl of peanuts and the day
seems fine once again.
It is 7:30 when we go down the street to find our restaurant
for dinner. This takes us through Piazza
Santa Maria where there is a couple performing a modern dance routine using a
glowing baseball-sized ball that is tossed and glided back and forth between
them as part of the dance. One of the
best street performances we have seen anywhere.
Our restaurant is La Freschetta, a local trattoria and
pizzeria. The place is pretty crowded
when we arrive and it is fun with a lot of energy. The fellow who seems to be in charge is
moving around the room taking orders, hustling the staff and entertaining the
customers all at the same time. We order
a 7 euro vino rossa della casa and a 6 euro anchovy and tomato pizza. The wine appears in a minute and the pizza
about a minute later. There is a large
wood-burning oven in the front room (we’re in the back) and the pizzas are
cooked in less than two minutes. It is
mostly locals and then a large group comes in to sit all along the back
wall. It looks like a tour group but all
Italian.
Now the place is really hopping and there is a line waiting
for tables. Our pizza is one of the best
we have ever had—much better than the premier pie we had in Naples. We love watching the show and nurse our wines
long after the pizza is gone so we can keep our seats. A little rude but we’re having fun. This turns out to be a great recommendation
from our hotel person and just what we were looking for tonight. We love being back in Italy. Molto Bene!
There are only the young folks hanging out in the square on
our way back through. The entertainers
have all gone home on a Tuesday night.
We get buzzed back into the gated hotel complex and were off to our
little corner of Roma.
What did we learn today?
Our first insight into the long-time communist and isolated Albania.
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