La Vita Romana: Buses, Monsters, and Villas...Oh My!

Good news -- the test went well! I wasn't too worried though. After my test, I spent the rest of the day relaxing -- working on the Sistine Chapel puzzle in our apartment, taking a leisurely nap, kind of assisting in making a cake for a friend's birthday, and then going out to eat for said friend's birthday.

Today (8 July) was a great day! We actually left Rome for a couple of site visits about an hour and a half away. We left Campo de Fiori around 8:15am and got to our charter bus for the day. It's always interesting driving around in a very large bus on streets that make Smart Cars look large. As such, my tradition of having near-death experiences (not really) during every time I've been on Italian road continues. I couldn't drive here. I'm not chaotic enough; I would follow the signs too well. So, after that small narrative digression, back to the story. We drove about an hour and a half to a small town north of Rome called Bomarzo where we visited Sacro Bosco (or the Sacred Forest). Sacro Bosco was basically the equivalent of a 16th century themepark. With a combination of statues and engraved riddles in the stone, one would eventually find there way to the "Temple of Wisdom." There were probably about 20 large statues of monsteresque figures carved out of a single piece of stone. It was amazing to see! The "Temple of Wisdom" was also carved from one stone as well. After about an hour there wandering through the garden and a lunch break later, it was time to traverse the hairpin turns of the hilltop towns to get to our next destination: Villa Lante at Bagnaia.

Villa Lante in short was spectacular! A Roman family from the sixteen century built a large villa north of Rome in the 16th century. What was amazing about this villa was not the villa itself (one couldn't actually go inside), but rather the spectular gardens! Beautiful fountains and impecabbly trimmed hedges made this a great site to visit on a sunny day.