Day Three: Borghese Gallery

       When you go out for breakfast in Italy you won't find a restaurant offering pancakes, bacon and eggs, and french toast. You have to go to a pastry shop (pasticceria) where you can choose from a variety of delectable pastries to go with your espresso or cappaccino. Mark fell in love with the espresso (just café to the Italians) and cannoli. I preferred the cappaccino since it comes in a larger cup, and I tried a different pastry each morning. 

Our first pasticceria breakfast. Mark had cappaccino, too, because he'd already made espresso at the apartment to go with our fruit and yogurt. We bought our bus tickets at the same shop.

       It was Sunday, and we had a 1:00 reservation at the Borghese Gallery where you have an allotted two-hour slot to view the museum. We studied the map on our apartment wall to figure out how to get there, but still weren't quite sure which bus to take. At the bus stop we met a friendly woman who spoke English and asked where we were going. She told us that she was from the Seychelles Islands, had married an Italian and lived in Rome for twenty years where she works in a gift shop at the Vatican museum. We told her we were going to the Vatican the next day, but today we were heading to the Borghese. She had never been there herself, but she was determined to help us get to our destination. She told us to get on the bus with her and then spoke to the bus driver and some of the other passengers to figure it out. Then she told us where to get off and which other bus to take. Her name was Rosy - our guardian angel for the day! 

       Even after getting off the bus stop near the Borghese we had a long walk, and then had to wait in line to get tickets, even though we had a reservation. By the time we entered the museum it was 2:00, but as it turned out, one hour was just enough time for us to enjoy the exhibits. 

       The ceilings and floors in the Borghese are all works of art, just as they are in all of the churches we visited, and the Vatican. It's a bit overwhelming!

       Here we are in front of Bernini's statue depicting Daphne changing into a tree in order to escape Apollo's advances. Mark remarked on how sad it is that women have always been vulnerable to the unchecked acts of self-centered men. 

  

       It was 3:00 when we finished our tour of the gallery and we hadn't had lunch yet. The museum restaurant was packed, so we decided to go out and see what we could find in the neighborhood. We walked for half an hour, not finding anyplace to eat. Finally we came to a store where we bought a couple of pre-made sandwiches to eat outside. It started to rain again, and it was a long walk back to the plaza where the bus stops are, and a long wait for the right bus to show up. If we Had been on a Rick Steves tour we would have seen more than one museum that day, and wouldn't have spent so much time looking for and riding buses. But we did enjoy a late dinner at the Brevata restaurant where families eat at 10:00 pm!