Via Latina, Rome. November 2016
[From FB Post: December 3, 2016]
Once again, FB friends and family, thank you for patiently bearing with all the photos from Rome. As I get older, how I travel is changing. It makes a lot more sense these days to stay in one place or one area and see it in depth rather than do "the grand tour" kind of vacation that hits many places. One issue is just getting older and really not having the energy to be "on the go" all the time. The other is appreciating how much more you can know a place if you just stay there for awhile. After a week in Rome, I can't imagine anyone would spend less time there. There is so much to see. There are so many aspects to the city. I am not so sure I would return -- there are other places in Italy I like much more, but I am happy I went.
After writing the above FB entry, I continued to travel and "base-camp" in different cities: Vienna, Madrid, Bologna, Amersfoort, Bratislava among others. I grew to appreciate a kind of travel that I might not have accepted in younger days. As a child, I had friends who took summer vacations in the same place (same hotel!) year after year. Even at that age I thought "who would want to go to the same place repeatedly?" I understand it more now - the familiarity of a favorite place that deepens with each yearly visit. While not adventurous, there is a depth of understanding and a calmness truly knowing a place different from home.
Similarly, in later years I liked to find a good breakfast place while traveling and then frequent it for the entire stay or even over multiple visits. In the best case scenario in a small cafe, multiple visits permit them to know you and your order. Certainly handy when I caught an early morning train which was often the case. Sometimes these people are friendly and give insights and advice that cannot be found in a Google search or a guide book. Local knowledge surpasses all. Was it boring to have morning coffee at Caribou Coffee on Rigga Road, Dubai every time I stayed there? Perhaps, but I got to know RN there, an energetic and friendly Nepali who went on to bigger and better things in life. Now he is in Kathmandu with his own business. He told me a lot about life in Dubai as a foreign worker. We have stayed in touch and I am happy for his success - all because I had morning coffee in the same place for years.
My time in Rome let me explore places I always wanted to see (like the Forum) along with places I found wandering around - the latter usually being more interesting. One place on my "to see" list in Rome was the Appian Way. In high school we learned about this oldest and most important Roman road that is in use even to this day. I traveled through the city to a section of the Aurelian Walls (I must write about the many walls of Rome) with a small museum to reach the start of the Appian Way. The road ahead after the gate looked narrow without much traffic - it was promising.
The photo above is of the Via Latina, a similar road, even earlier than the "Via Appia". The Appian Way near Rome is still very much a road in use and is lined with an array of tombs and historical sites. This scene of a small section of the Via Latina through a collection of tombs represents more to me what the Via Appia must have looked like when it was still just a road for pedestrians, horses, and carriages. Roman roads were excavated first and then large stones were placed as a foundation. Gravel was added and finally volcanic flat pavers were fit together as the surface, slightly higher in the middle, so the roads had good drainage. Their lifespan is inconceivable - after 2000 years many are still usable. If something lasts 50 years now we are amazed. What will be left of anything modern in 2000 years?
The Via Appia was so important to ancient Rome that the person in charge of its maintenance held an office of both power and great esteem. The significance of the road is clear after walking not even one kilometer out of the old city center. I came first upon the Church of Santa Maria in Palmis, aka the "Quo Vadis" church.
Acts of Peter 35: And the rest of the brethren, together with Marcellus, besought him to depart. But Peter said unto them: Shall we be runaways, brethren? and they said to him: Nay, but that thou mayest yet be able to serve the Lord. And he obeyed the brethren's voice and went forth alone, saying: Let none of you come forth with me, but I will go forth alone, having changed the fashion of mine apparel. And as he went forth of the city, he saw the Lord entering into Rome. And when he saw him, he said: Lord, whither goest thou thus? And the Lord said unto him: I go into Rome to be crucified. And Peter said unto him: Lord, art thou being crucified again? He said unto him: Yea, Peter, I am being crucified again. And Peter came to himself: and having beheld the Lord ascending up into heaven, he returned to Rome, rejoicing, and glorifying the Lord, for that he said: I am being crucified: the which was about to befall Peter.
Peter was fleeing Rome on the Appian Way. He met Jesus on the Appian Way, too. The DC Capital Beltway simply does not measure up by comparison even with the Mormon Temple floating Oz-like alongside it in Maryland.
Walk a bit further and the Via Appia passes straight through the famed catacombs of Rome. Disappointingly, the true history of the catacombs does not match the urban legends most people have heard. No, Christians did NOT live secretly in the catacombs during violent Roman pogroms (and no, Christians were not frequently killed in the Colosseum either). I am always amazed at how much "history" people have come to accept that is so far from the truth. In any case, in times past, to have a tomb along the great Via Appia of Rome was a mark of status. Hence, the catacombs were built nearby along with tombs of nobles great and small. The Via Appia and Via Latina near Rome are kinds of "linear cemeteries". Today we are laid to rest in parklike surroundings far from the hurly burly of life. Back then, the more people who saw your final resting place, the better.
I stopped by more tombs and a ruined villa or two - the Via Appia could have been a vacation all to itself. Finally, I turned off the storied way and headed for the nearest metro. I walked a LOT that day even though on the map I had only scratched the surface of what lay further down the road. It was on the tiring last steps of the journey I crossed the Via Latina and took the above photo. It felt ironic that the Via Appia never gave me the photo of the image I had of it in my mind. I pressed onward to Arco di Travertino Metro which, alas, is a huge, modern bus/metro station and not a triumphal arch (discovered after a short, disappointing search). Soon back at Piazza Bologna I was having aperitivo and reading about all I had seen that day. Appian Way, check.