Tuesday, April 30, 2019
We slept in late today until almost 10 am. We have been up so early each day recently and stayed up later than we had desired. So we enjoyed a late morning. We took our time in having a light breakfast. I washed the towels as usual for our morning wash. The washer/dryer combination here takes about four hours to wash and then dry the towels, a seemingly endless time and we have found that doing it early when we usually leave is the best time. We don’t care if they are wrinkled or they shrink a little. At least they are clean and dry.
We usually just wash the clothes and let them air dry on the drying rack provided by the apartment. It takes about two hours normally for the wash but we found a “quick wash” feature that takes about an hour. It includes about 30 minutes of what they call drying. It means that the clothes are not dripping wet but just wet.
We went to the nearby market and got some lunch supplies. I hung around there a while so I could use their free WiFi again. It is very fast but today several other people were in there in the entrance area doing the same thing. It was fast but not as blazing fast as it was without all of us on it at one time. The entrance area has two bar type areas with bar stools so people can eat prepared meals, charge their phones, talk with others drink coffee and like me, use the free fast WiFi. Sandy did some shopping and took her time so I could upload the pictures to the cloud. We want a good backup of our pictures in case something happens to our phones.
We came back to the apartment around 2 pm and fixed lunch. We watched another episode of Midsomers Murders. Around 4:00 pm we went walking and did some window shopping and some shopping. I am again sworn to secrecy as to what was purchased. We have to keep some surprises. I stopped by our local gelato store and got some dark chocolate and dark cherry flavors. Both were great.
There was a nice piazza nearby which we had not been to, called the Piazza Navona. It is large. It has many nice restaurants and shops in and around it. Sandy was looking for a special kitchen store she had read about on the internet before we left home. We had the address and found the store, but the store was not there any more. It was a bar to the restaurant next door. They said the store closed a couple of years ago. The internet just keeps things on it you know. We walked around the area and took some pictures. Seeing large buildings with sculptures on the outside, up on the walls, on the roof and built into the buildings is getting old hat to us and not as impressive as it was when we arrived. I guess we are getting “Romed out” just like we got “cathedraled out” in other cities. The Piazza Navona has a large fountain in the middle of it with a huge oblique with large figures on each side with water running out of some of the figures.
Sandy found a few shops she liked and did some shopping.
We walked around a while. It was cool today, high in the 66 range and slight wind but not as strong as yesterday.
We headed back to the apartment. We stopped at the gelato store and I got a repeat of the dark chocolate and dark cherry flavors and Sandy got pistachio and dark cherry. She really liked her choices as well. After we got to the apartment and used the toilets, I went to the grocery store again to upload more pictures. I had started out at around 1970 or so the day before including the videos from Friday at the Vatican Museum. I got down to 410 when I left today. Some of the videos are long. Sandy also left and did some shopping while I was at the grocery store. We got back to the apartment about the same time.
We decided to go out for dinner but we were not really hungry. We did not want pasta or pizza. There was a burger and steak place on the way to the Pantheon and we went there. They had a large ribeye special with fries, an appetizer and a soft drink for 24 Euros. We got that and split it. I enjoyed some good red meat again.
We got back to the apartment around 10 pm or so. Sandy had figured how to use the washer/dryer just on the dryer setting and dried some clothes. I washed some shirts and clothes and then we went to bed later than we had planned. We had not decided on what to do tomorrow. Tomorrow is May Day and a national holiday. Some stores will be closed.