CHAPTER 20 ITALY CONT.

It is time to leave Rome; we go to a bank to change money and they don’t change until afternoon, so we try a “cambio” and get lire faster and at a better rate than at the bank. We pick up our rental car at the RR station and start near noon. It is a sunny day and a little warmer as we make our way out of Rome traffic with no problem, take the freeway north, and after a fair lunch at a rest stop we pay the toll fee and exit at Termi. We get a room at the Hotel de Paris, a big room with two chairs, desk, sofa, and coffee table, and there is even a little heat! A visit to the RR station fails to get us a HT paper.

We drive to Assisi and the Roma Hotel thru pretty green country, with towns on the top of hills, and lots of flowering locust trees. We have a pleasant large but cold room; we are told heat will be on at night, but it isn’t. We eat good food at the small Trattoria Oegli Orti. After a rest we go to see the main plaza where bleachers and a sound system are set up for a 3 day festival that starts tomorrow. We find a Herald Tribune, so we catch up on world news this evening.

We misguess the way to go to St. Francis’ Basilica; the bus drops us where there is a long walk up, and on the walk back to the hotel it is uphill almost all the way. There are big crowds everywhere, at the Basilica, and on the streets. It is an interesting church, with frescos of St. Francis’ life, and not much evidence left of damage from a recent big earthquake. We have an excellent veal scaloppini meal at the Oegli Orti; it is served with no salt, but a salt shaker, because we had sent food back yesterday that was too salty. A young man in a colorful costume, part of the festival, comes in the restaurant. At 8 PM there is heat on in the room, hurray! But the antibiotic isn’t improving Glenn’s chest congestion.