Friday 9th September- What have the Romans ever done for us?

Well quite a bit really.

We were able to purchase train tickets from the camp site and we could not believe the price of 6 Euros per person for 24 hours which included the train from Bracciana to Rome which takes about one hour and this was following the bus ride from the camp. The bus driver did not have any change whatsoever and we travelled free to Bracianna Station or nearly as he dropped us of in the middle of town with a brief wave as to where the station was. So we headed off in the wrong direction for about five minutes and asked a workman, Scuzi The Stazioni Gracias..which sort of helped as he sent us off in a different direction and we caught the train earlier train which was running at least ten minutes late.

The train was quite busy with both lower and upper decks and the complete train inside and out was covered in Graffiti.

We arrived at the station next to St Peters Square and that was also very busy with tour groups and guides pushing people all over the place and the queue for the  Basilica stretched almost around the complete square, which incidentally is round and perhaps should be called St Peter’s Piazza, and not to be confused with St Peters Pizza.

We were almost knocked over several times by very expensive and very large Mercedes cars with drivers carting the big bishops around and that’s where the money goes and not to the starving children in Africa.

From there we went to the Trevi fountain and then along the river and in to what we though was the nicer part of town with lovely little shops and a wonderful ice cream parlour before then setting off for the Pantheon and also the Coliseum. There was a forty five minute wait to by a ticket but you could get the fast track route which costs 25 Euros plus the cost of the ticket and so we did not go in.

Everywhere around Rome we saw very many Polizei and Carabinierie and so Noel asked why so many police were around and was this usual. The Carabinierie I asked said they were military police and not the normal police and that he did not understand the question. Oh well never mind.

Many shops we entered for a bottle of water or similar had no change, very strange indeed. In the meantime we had found a quiet restaurant with excellent Wifi and we stopped for lunch which was sort of OK but not great.

It had been really hot all day and we thing around 33 degrees which is quite tiring really and so we caught the metro train, also covered with Grafitti back to the main line station and then back to Bracciano where we had to wait 45 minutes for the bus and then it took the long way back via Napoli and so 25 minutes later we arrived back After a quick shower we had a light snack and then some email only the Wifi connection on site is appallingly slow and therefore difficult to use

Then back to bed and to blow the bed up again, we will change this for next years camping.