West Coast Tour - part 5

We woke up early on Day 8 to start our self-guided wineries tour. We wanted to hit all three major Oregon AVAs along I-5 within 2 days: Rogue, Umpqua, and Willamette Valley. Our first planned stop was to the perfect trio of shops in the Rogue Valley. All next door to each other was a winery, cheese shop, and a chocolate shop. Our plan was spoiled when we arrived at the wine tasting room, Daisy Creek, at 11am and it wasn't open yet. I guess some Oregonians don't drink before noon. At the chocolate shop, Lille Belle Farms Chocolate, we purchased an assortment of chocolate truffles with our favorite being the Smokey Blue Cheese. We were a bit skeptical about the blue cheese and chocolate combination, but WOW! It was really good. We liked it so much we're already planning a return trip.

I don't know why we ended up skipping the cheese shop, Rogue Creamery. I think it had something to do with the warm weather, the long road trip, and no refrigeration. Now that we have more time and can research a bit more, we're disappointed we skipped a place that gets such glowing reviews in so many food blogs. Plus, I think every Oregon winery we stopped at afterward said something like "if you haven't been, you need to go to Rogue Creamery". Our only consolation is that we were able to try their blue cheese in the Lille Belle truffles.

Driving further north, we stopped at two wineries: Del Rio winery, in the Rogue Valley AVA and Henry Estate winery in the Umpqua Valley AVA, before finding a hotel in the Willamette Valley (~20 miles south of Portland)....

Day 9 was a Monday and it turns out that Mondays, as a winery host put it, are the "winemakers holiday". Fortunately, we found that not all the wineries were closed. The first winery we went to was Archery Summit. The tasting fee was a whopping $15 for only four pours (and no souvenir wine glass), but it was worth every penny. The wines are amazing. However, at around $100 per bottle, they were a bit pricey for our budget.

Views from Archery Summit....

The next stop was Winderlea (also in the Willamette Valley). The wine was good, but the ultra-modern tasting room and views were even better. The place looked like a Mac store....

We couldn't pass up visiting Argyle Winery. It's not everyday that you get to do a "champagne" tasting. There was a room at the winery filled with framed letters from the White House showing that the wines had been served to every president since the first Bush to Obama.



There's been a lot of buzz lately about the Portland food cart scene. Check out this map to see how many there are. We were so excited to try some of the more popular ones only to find out that like the wineries, a lot of the food carts are closed on Mondays. We ended up getting some very good spicy green papaya salad with grilled chicken and a crêpe....



Multnomah Falls (~30 miles east of Portland)....

The Vista House in Crown Point State Park. It offered great views of the Columbia River Gorge, especially with the cool clouds. Oh, and on the other side of the river, that's Washington State!




For dinner, we drove back to Portland for McMenamins Kennedy School. This place is an old elementary school converted into a hotel, restaurants, bars, movie theater, and live music venue. If you've been following the blog, you may remember my post titled "Table for One". What I didn't mention in that post was that I had driven to the Kennedy School two nights in a row, I walked inside, and both times I was too embarrassed to eat there alone. Instead, I drove back to the crappy hotel diner. Needless to say, I felt like I had some unfinished business. With Brooke and Ryan with me, I finally had my chance to eat at the Kennedy School....



Crossing into Washington! After dinner, we made the 175 mile drive back to Seattle!

Italy - Day 15 (Rome)

We started our morning with an easy half-mile walk from our hotel to the Colosseum where we met our new local guide, Francesca. All of our local guides have been great, but Francesca was even better. At some point in the tour, I actually saw a couple of women get teary-eyed from Francesca's great story telling.

Prior to the tour, I didn't know anything about the Colosseum (aside from what I learned watching Russel Crowe in the Gladiator). Here's a few things I learned:

1. The Colosseum was once covered with travertine and marble, all held together by iron clasps. Notice the small holes on the existing stone - this isn't due to wear, but rather where the iron clasps were fitted.

2. Being the site of public executions of Christians, the Colosseum was not held in high regard by the church. The marble and iron clasps were all taken for the construction of St. Peter's Basilica and other buildings. It wasn't until the 1700s that Pope Benedict XIV declared it sanctified by the blood of Christian martyrs and therefore off-limits for further plundering.3. The Colosseum is oval-shaped, not round. The arena floor is nearly twice as long as it is wide (~280 x 165 ft).After the Colosseum, we toured the adjacent Roman Forum. Everything here is HUGE! (Check out the size of the people in the 3rd picture down.)Next we continued our walk to the Pantheon. It was neat to see, but the interior wasn't as exciting as I was expecting. The front of the building is beautiful and iconographic. The interior is basically just one large room with a hole in the ceiling. We had couple hours to ourselves after the Pantheon so we decided to have lunch. We went to a place in the same piazza called Antica Salumeria. They served basic sandwiches that were good, but bit salty. They were also a bit small for our big American appetites (and especially for 5 Euros). After lunch, we still had an hour before meeting up with the group again. We decided to go see a few sights that we had only seen at night during the day. We also had to stop by our favorite Gelateria again. Brooke at the Spanish Steps (with her two backup singers dressed in red)....It wasn't part of the standard tour, so 8 of us decided to visit the Borghese Gallery on our own. To reach the gallery, we had to trek across the Villa Borghese Gardens (the Roman equivalent of New York's Central Park). Look how big it is compared to everything else....
The gallery only accepts 360 people for a given 2-hour time slot. Reservations are necessary and everyone needs to arrive a half hour early to check all bags and cameras. This place is definitely worth the extra hassle. We learned from the gallery audio tour that Cardinal Scipione Borghese (the garden and gallery's namesake) was a total asshole. He would go to someone's home, see a piece of art that he liked, and simply demand to have it. This behavior allowed him to amass a great collection, especially if you like Bernini.

As I've said in a previous post, I like Michelangelo's David for its ambiguity, leaving his thoughts up for interpretation. But I love Bernini's David too, and for almost the opposite reason. Bernini's David (below) couldn't be more clear. He is mid-battle, with a look of determination, in a comic-book-like exaggerated body position of the Baroque style....Bernini's Apollo and Daphne. As the myth goes, Apollo was shot with a golden arrow that caused him to fall in love. Daphne was shot with a lead arrow causing her to be repulsed. Just at the moment Daphne is caught by Apollo, she turns into a tree in defense. I couldn't find a good picture showing all the detailing, so you'll just have to trust me, Daphne's hair and leaves are amazing. I would go back to the Borghese Gallery just to see this sculpture....
That night we met our entire tour group for our final dinner together; the Last Supper if you will. It was a fun meal, especially with the surplus of alcohol and the live music. We presented our tour guide, Cecilia, with large photobook of Michaelangelo's Pieta (she had said it was her favorite)....Group photo in front of Santa Maria Maggiore....I'm helping 3 Ohioan tour members complete the O-H-I-O. Those crazy Ohioans are all the same (and I mean that in the best possible way)....
Parallel and perpendicular parking....

Italy - Day 14 (Rome)

So far on our trip every hotel had offered us the same small, but quality, breakfast of fresh fruit, juice, pastries, and some very good espresso. Our Rome hotel, Il Granaio di Santa Prassede, offered the same types of food, but they definitely didn't uphold the same quality standards. The most glaring problem was their watery coffee that came from a self-serve vending machine. Although this machine didn't have the poker-print paper cups that drop down from the machine, it did serve coffee the same way: one squirt of concentrated coffee, one squirt of cream, and finally topped off with hot water. It was bad even by American standards.We found it fun to visit an Italian grocery store. Immediately, we noticed that their carts and baskets were different. From what I observed, they had 4 ways to carry their groceries: (1) a smaller, cuter version of the US shopping cart, (2) the same handheld basket, (3) the same basket set atop a walker, (4) a larger basket that is towed like luggage.

We were already fully stocked with wine from the previous day's vineyard visit, but we were hoping to find some new, more authentic, brands of pasta to bring home. This plan was spoiled when we found the pasta isle. By the look of this store's inventory, it would appear Italians eat Barilla more than any other brand.
By 8am, we had to meet our group for the Vatican Museum and St. Peter's Basilica tour. When we arrived we saw that the line was easily a 1/2 mile long, wrapping around the Vatican walls. Fortunately, our tour guide had purchased tickets ahead, so we got in within a few minutes of arrival. (We later found out from friends that their Contiki tour didn't get to use the tour group line, so they waited in line like everyone else)....Inside the Vatican museum....I was surprised to find out that photography was allowed inside the museum. A big plus for photographers, but a definite minus for all the other people who get stuck behind people who photograph and pose in front of every exhibit.It wasn't hard for me to restrain from taking too many shots since most of the museum is one long, winding corridor of mediocre art. I'd be happy to never see another museum tapestry....
The wait was well worth it though. At the end of this corridor was a series of Raphael paintings. Here's Raphael's The School of Athens.... Immediately after the Raphael area, we entered the Sistine Chapel. The paintings were beautiful, but maybe due to the dim lighting of the entire room, the colors were not as vibrant when seen in person. A little bit disappointing.

No talking or photos are allowed inside, so I've taken this photo of the Sistine Chapel's ceiling from Wikipedia....From the Sistine Chapel there was a nice shortcut leading directly into St. Peter's Basilica, skipping yet another long line....This was the only time it rained on us during our entire trip.....St. Peter's Basilica. This is the largest church in the world, but compared to a large gothic church with its tall vertical elements meant to overwhelm the visitor, this place almost feels cozy. It's not until you walk around and look beyond the large pillars that you really get a sense of its size. My photos below don't do it justice. There are far better photos from the contributors on Wikipedia.St. Peter's Basilica is impressive in size, but it's not really beautiful. However, just inside the main entrance of the church, stood the much more beautiful Pieta by Michelangelo....Our first Swiss Guard sighting as we left the Vatican....After St. Peter's Basilica, the tour group disbanded, so Brooke and I found a nearby restaurant to have lunch and wait out the rain. For you to get a sense of the food prices, here's an itemized list of our lunch (which was fairly typical for our trip).....

8.50 Euros Meatballs w/ tomato sauce
5.00 Euros Sauteed artichoke hearts
8.50 Euros Pizza w/mushroom, bacon, mozarella
2.00 Euros Bottle of water
5.00 Euros 1/2 Liter of the house wine
4.00 Euros Cover charge (some places list it on the receipt as a "bread charge")
--------------
33.00 Euros (~ $46 US Dollars)
When we left the restaurant, the weather had cleared up, so we set out to visit a couple of churches, Santa Maria degli Angeli and Santa Maria della Vittoria.
Santa Maria degli Angeli (former home of the Roman baths)....
Inside Santa Maria della Vittoria is Bernini's St. Teresa in Ecstasy. I love Baroque sculptures and Bernini is definitely the best. Can you see the light coming from above? I had to pay 0.50 Euro for one minute of that....We had to go back to the hotel to get a new camera battery, so while we were in the area, we decided to visit just one more church: the Basilica Santa Prassede. Although it was just a small church, Brooke loved the Byzantine-style mosaics....Now that we had seen 5 churches already, we couldn't just stop. Instead, we set out on a walking tour of churches. Our next stop was San Pietro in Vincoli (St. Peters-In-Chains Church) which houses Michelangelo's unfinished tomb of Pope Julius II with the famous statue of Moses and the chains that imprisoned Peter....Our next stops were the Church of San Clemente, Church of San Giovanni in Laterano, and finally the Scala Sancta (Holy Stairs) which may only be climbed on the knees. Brooke and I used the adjacent staircases.....City wall or aquaduct. We still don't know....We took the subway back to the Trevi Fountain area. As you can see it was fairly crowded that night.... The Pantheon (we'll talk more about it in a future post)....

By the Pantheon, at Osteria de Mario, we ate the worst $45 dollar meal of our lives . For every dish, salt was probably the #1 ingredient by mass. Our moods improved after we visited Gelateria Valentino. Of the 20 or so gelaterias we tried in Italy, this place was definitely the best, not only due to their amazing yogurt flavor, but also great fruit flavors that we hadn't had other places.

The Triton Fountain by Bernini. I loved seeing this fountain every night as we went to the Barberini metro station.....