Our next day in Madrid broke sunny and cold. Really this whole first part of our trip was marked by pretty low temperatures compunded by frequent, stiff breezes. We weren’t letting that stop us (although John at least had to screw his courage up before stepping out; Lisa has always handled the cold weather better). Off we went to one of the must-sees of Madrid: the Royal Palace, official residence of the King and Queen of Spain and one of the largest palaces in Western Europe. It’s pretty amazing, evoking Versailles, Belenheim, and the Grand Opera of Paris.

(Warning this is a graphic heavy post.)

After a security scan, we walked through what was once the carriage entrance and into the central courtyard.

The main hall is imposing, although if you look at the picture below you’ll see something strange. The two figures, one on either side of the window, seemed to have been added later than the original decorations and it is… not done well. Our best guess is that some descendant of the originators of the Palace wanted to bring the feel of the fresco on the ceiling down into the room, but the painting was done on the existing surfaces, which had those same textures you can see in the otherwise-exposed bits. There’s no way that the artists assigned to the task had to bite their tongues and do as they were bidden, because this is in line with no thinking person’s aesthetic.

But it’s the Throne Room that takes your breath away with it’s ceiling mural giving the illusion of opening into the blue sky and heavens.

Each corner boasts a gilded bas relief and painted scene corresponding to each of the four seasons.

A gilded railing illusion runs around the room, giving the sense of characters — mythological and historical, peeping in and keeping an eye on the goings on. It’s really one of the more astonishing effects we’ve seen in these sorts of places; not just the beauty of it but the precision of the layout, having the railing affect going in front of some images and behind others, and it’s not just paint there’s a texture to it with plaster or something. Truly amazing.

Unsurprisingly, the Royal Palace is filled with magnificent treasures from the 17th century onward.

I especially enjoyed the crystal chandeliers, each unique in size and shape.

Several rooms were particularly special because of the quality of the craftsmanship. One was the Porcelain Room, made up of 100s of hand cast porcelain figures mounted on wood panels and fitted so carefully that it looks seamless. This and one other room in another royal residence outside of the city are the only examples of these all-porcelain rooms, considered the masterpieces of the porcelain studios of the era. When you see it, you can’t help but agree.

It is a truly opulent and beautiful place. We enjoyed ourselves greatly.

It being Christmas Eve, the city was closing down pretty quickly. We made a grocery run to lay in supplies of grapes, apples, juice, and (of course) some wine. With room service rounding out our gatherings by bringing us hummus, pumpkin soup with soft shell crab tempura and a chicken caesar salad, we felt well feasted.

We have been pinky-promising each other that we would take our Portuguese-language class seriously; it’s important for our future happiness here for a couple of different reasons and we really want to knock it out. However, part of that commitment has been that we wouldn’t take any trips that would keep us out of class, which has meant that we’ve been curtailing some of our more far-flung adventures. Because of some unforeseen complications we ended up having to drop from the class last year and are retaking it again this year…. which means we’re in year two of having ants in our pants. (If you’ve been following along here on The Ramble you know we haven’t exactly been housebound, but still, it’s been a different vibe.) We recently decided that we wanted to work a little harder at carving out some adventure time, and the first opportunity for that is the Christmas/Holiday/End-of-Year break. Freed from the restrictions of our language class, we began a nine-ish day trip to Spain; olé! And so, at 0-dark-thirty on a Tuesday morning we took a quick (100 min) flight to Madrid, dropped our bags at the hotel, and immediately joined the exceptional tour guide Amanda of Gather To Travel for a walking tour of the historic center. Well, a walking and eating tour.

Meeting Amanda was easy, as we exchanged coat and scarf colors via text that morning. It was COLD, sub-ten degrees (mid 30s F), so we were all bundled to the brim. We started at The Plaza de Cánovas del Castillo, a very pretty Neptune fountain and roundabout just outside the Museo Del Prado. From there we walked a short distance to the Congreso de los Diputados which, if we understood correctly, is a political hub for the country despite being a relatively modest building.

Along the way, we passed a bronze statue of a blind man in a suit, Dubbes The Lottery Seller, In the neighbourhood of Las Letras, specifically in Calle del Prado on the corner with San Agustín and in front of the Spanish Parliament building, there is a sculpture paying tribute to “Fortunato”, the seller of lottery tickets in support of ONCE (Spain’s national organisation for the blind). Cast in bronze by the sculptor Santiago de Santiago, the sculpture commemorates those who for 75 years, since the foundation was created, have sold lottery tickets and luck, becoming emblematic figures in the streets and squares throughout Spain.

Across the street from the Congreso is a statue of Miguel de Cervantes, which was actually the launching point for much of our next couple of hours in the literary district. We meandered along the Calle de Cervantes, discussing his life and legacy as we admired the various plaques, tiles and other homages to this most revered of men. (John’s personal favorite piece of trivia is that the musical could easily have been called “Man of Manchego Cheese”, although admittedly it’s not quite as catchy.) We passed by the location of his home in Madrid, although the building itself had long since been replaced.

Turning onto another street, we admired the bronze centenary plaques scattered about, marking stores and craftspeople who had been in business for at least 100 years. The first one that Amanda pointed out to us was for a pharmacy that had been in business since the 1700s! Each is different and marks a unique presence.

We also observed the regularly-spaced quotations inlaid into the street pavement, each honoring a different Spanish writer. This whole area is known as the literary district and has many interesting sights and stores supporting Madrid’s long enthusiasm for the arts. As we were strolling along we got excited by a statue that we saw at the Plaza de Santa Ana, drawing Amanda over to it – given that we had given no indication that we were particularly well-educated on Spanish literature she was bemused that we were so enthusiastic about a memorial statue to Federico del Sagrado Corazón de Jesús García Lorca of all people.

(Short-ish version of a longer tale: in 2003 we saw the premiere of Nilo Cruz’s play “Lorca In A Green Dress”, which is about, yep, Frederico Garcia Lorca. It was a mind-blowing experience for us, not least because John had practically no theater experience prior to that and it was an especially surreal production. The memory has stuck.)

In any event, it was amusing that we went from wide-eyed tourists being shown around to being, for a very short moment, subject matter experts. Then we resumed our roles and she explained far more about the man than we had known before. About this time we entered the nibbles portion of our tour, as Andrea took us to a couple of her favorite spots for tapas; more on those later. We rounded out the day with a stop in the Perta del Sol, currently the home of a large Christmas market.

We thought we knew what goes on at Christmas markets, but in Madrid the Day of the Innocents (December 27th) has become a day of children playing “practical jokes” on the level of whoopie cushions and little snapping firecrackers…. all of which was on display in the market. Egad. Clashing with the fart toys and joy buzzers were the shops catering to another Christmas passion in Madrid – creches. Apparently even more than usual the people of Madrid go nuts with elaborate nativity scenes, sometimes taking up whole rooms of their homes for the season(!). We saw “kilometer zero” which is the spot that Franco decreed all the highways he was ordering the construction of would emanate from. Apparently it’s a true thing and they still measure all distance markers from it on the national roads; it was such a popular tourist spot that we didn’t even try to get a photo.

She walked us to a taxi stand by way of some lovely pastry shops. Now, about the tapas.

The first, Alimentación Quiroga (Calle Huertas 19, Barrio de Las Letras, Madrid, ES 28014) is a tiny place with limited seating. We managed to snag a high-top table in the back and quickly ordered a dish of Alcachofas plancha (artichoke hearts in a lemon-olive oil sauce with a bit of pepper, topped with shaved ham) and another of toasted bread spread with fresh tomatoes and Iberico ham. A coke, cerveza, and glass of rioja rounded us out well and we happily munched away. The artichokes were perfectly sweet, contrasted by the grassy oil and sharp lemon, the beef added a rich depth, quite unlike the typical preserved ham. The bread dish was simpler, with a very light (almost schmear) of spread of fresh tomatoes providing the background to the ham’s salty yumminess.

Our other stop was at Prada a Tope (Calle Principe 11, Madrid, ES 28012), a larger establishment that was expecting large parties, so only bar seating was available. (‘Tis the season!) Here we quickly grabbed a high top and ordered the Verduras a la Plancha (grilled eggplant, asparagus, onion, peppers, tomato, and zucchini) and Cecina (shaved beef). The vegetables were smoky and almost sweet from the grilling, drizzled with the Spanish olive oil and the beef was delicious. Chewy texture and a burst of intensely flavorful ***beef*** in the mouth.

It was a fun, tasty, and informative walk that we recommend without hesitation. (Any errors are entirely our fault for not remembering Amanda’s information correctly!)

When we first heard that there was a museum of coaches in Lisbon, we were perplexed. First, it had to be explained (to John at least) that we were talking about transportation compartments pulled by horses, not athletic team leaders. Then, it had to be explained that they weren’t kidding and there actually is such a thing as a coach museum. And then we had to learn that it is, in fact, one of the more impressive buildings in the entire city, dedicated entirely to a coach museum. (Well, and miscellaneous sundries.) And finally, when we first encountered the National Coach Museum, we learned the hard way that it is closed on Mondays. Whoops.

As relayed in our first sojourn to Lisbon, we stumbled upon the building with more than a little mix of surprise and suspicion. It is a huge building, designed by Brazilian architect – and Pritzker Prize winner – Paulo Mendes da Rocha. We don’t claim any special architectural expertise, but clearly this was a big gun that they brought out for their… coach museum. Learning this also blew a hole in my ginned-up theory that the museum was originally something else, and was repurposed so as not to have a huge derelict on the waterfront. Nope! The government raised funds, worked through committees, the whole 9 yards… for the coach museum.

So, ok, I’m leaning pretty heavily into the “coach museum can ya believe it?? herp derp” attitude, but here’s the thing: it was actually pretty cool! The coach sets date back several hundred years and are kept in fantastic condition. (There has to be extensive restoration to look this good, but I’m caring less and less about that as the years go by.) There are coaches that were crafted by the Portuguese, but some of the finest examples are French carriages that arrived here as the transportation for various princesses that were marrying into the Portuguese royal family. Still, Paris to Lisbon in horse-drawn carriage? Wooooof.

After walking the wildly impressive first hall, the second hall with its nearly uniform small, black carriages as engines were visible on the horizon just didn’t hold the same pizzazz. Car aficionados would probably get a kick out of it as a walk through of the early evolutionary stages of automobiles, but otherwise it was kind of a dud. Still, the first main hall with it’s twenty-ish examples from several centuries was, and I still can’t quite believe I’m saying this, entirely worth the visit. It’s great.

We have remarked before (probably here, certainly in conversation) that we have been much more thorough in our exploration of the greater European continent than we have been of our adopted home country. We’ve dug into the capitals of England, France, Italy, even Greece… more than we have the fair city of Lisbon. That all changed recently, when personal business required us to visit the U.S. Embassy in Portugal, located iiiiinnn…. that’s right, Lisbon. Since we had to make the effort to get there anyway, we decided to stretch the trip out a few days and actually poke around a bit. See the sights, that sort of thing. We consulted the oracles (aka our friends) to prioritize our options, then hit the road.

We’ve actually done a little bit of touristing in Lisbon before, but that trip was short on actual experiences and long on “peering through the locked gate” experiences. This time we double checked that thing we wanted to see were open on the days that we wanted to see them, the way real people do it. Our first item up for bid was the Museu Nacional do Azulejo, aka “the tile museum” to us English-speaking heathens. (That’s extra clever if you’ve read about the origins of the word “heathen“.) I suspect this is common knowledge but just in case: the Portuguese have a deep cultural appreciation for decorative ceramic tile that goes back hundreds of years. They aren’t unique in this but they are particularly well known for it. Decorative tile (“azulejo“) is to Portuguese culture what marble statues are to Italian. Thus it is hardly surprising that there is an intense gallery in the capital city dedicated to outstanding examples of this craft, both from a technical standpoint as well as examples of cultural significance.

While there are numerous exhibits within the converted convent, we felt you could broadly think of the entire museum on a continuum, with “historically significant” on one end and “just plain beautiful” on the other. The earliest examples go back to the mid-1400s but, kind of unsurprisingly if you stop to think about it, they aren’t really the peak of the craft. It’s fascinating to see how far back this art form goes, but the techniques have advanced so far since then, as has the evolution of technique in craftsmanship, that the early examples are just kind of plain looking out of context. (NOT saying they aren’t worth the examination, just that… well, if you were tiling your house tomorrow, you probably aren’t going for reclaimed tiles from 1491 unless you’re a history buff.) By the time you get to the samples of the last few decades there are some truly spectacular works of art.

Click on the images below to see just a few of the exhibitions in more detail. Which, alas, is about as good as it can get for you for the near future, as the museum closed for renovation at the beginning of November with an anticipated re-opening in June of 2026. Fingers crossed!

Lisa often plans our trips. (This is all me this time, my bride is “on assignment”…) She’s great at it, and she likes doing it. There are specific moments in the planning process that I play a key role in, but she has said for years that in another life she would have been a travel agent, so mostly I stay out of her way. That said, who doesn’t like taking a break once in a while. So, this whole trip was my baby, soup to nuts. Flights, lodging, restaurants, I took all of it off her plate. (I am not trying to play the hero here; if you know me well this should sound more ominous than heroic.) I learned everything from her so really there isn’t a lot of difference in me doing. Excceeeepppt, I am unhealthily attracted to the corners of maps. There are a couple of spots I’ve had my eye on for years, and this trip was an ideal opportunity to check out the Isle of Man.

Granted, the “ideal opportunity” still involved some careful timing of multiple ferries and three different cities; when you’re dealing with micro-nations you have to grade on a curve, ok? Still, the pieces of the trip were dovetailing nicely. We landed in Dublin like we said last time, and took a bus to Belfast. Next we’d be taking the “Isle of Man Steam Packet” to Douglas on the Isle of Man and then ending up on another… er… steam packet?… to Dublin. What is a steam packet, you ask? Well, it goes back to the 16th century and… whatever, it’s an antiquated term for the ships that brought mail and stuff to the island, and now it’s your typical ferry for cars and people. The trip takes 2-3 hours depending on which leg you’re talking about; there are also flights but at least one member of my family doesn’t care for really small airplanes. So, what’s the deal with the Isle of Man? What’s the attraction?

My dirty secret is that I knew very little about the place before we made our plans to go. I first poked around it years ago along with places like Inishmore and Islay (both small islands although not nations). What I knew back then was that it had a scattering of the old megalithic sites we enjoy visiting, aaaaannd they speak English. However, by the time I was actually setting this trip up I knew that the weather was that same crisp, cool weather as the rest of the British Isles, the terrain looked absolutely beautiful, and there were just enough historical curiosities to keep us interested if we end up feeling tourist-y. Plus, there’s the curiosity of the “nation” of the Isle of Man. Even more than Ireland or Scotland, Isle of Man exists in a liminal state, with its own governing body and kinda-sorta self rule, but they use the pound as their currency and still kind of “collective bargain” with Great Britain, e.g. they also are not part of the European Union. They have leveraged their strange legal existance to become a tax haven, not that this pays off for the average tourist.

We arrived in the capital town of Douglas, picked up our rental car, and headed for Port St. Mary on the southern end of the island. We were booked into a charming bed & breakfast, Carrick Rooms, which was honestly one of the nicer places we’ve stayed in quite awhile. Charming hosts, a comfortable room, and centrally located in walking distance to dining and transport. We didn’t use the car at all on at least one of our days. Instead, we checked off an extra bucket list item thanks to a famous literary inspiration – a genuine steam engine. Tell you all about it…. shortly.

We’d no sooner got ourselves unpacked from our brief jaunt to Vila do Conde then it was time to pack ourselves right back up for another journey. The last getaway was a near-spontaneous escape from the heat, but we’d been planning this one for quite some time. We’ve told family and friends back in the States that if they make it across the Atlantic we’d do our best to close the gap if they were up for a visit. We were happily being taken up on our offer by Lisa’s sister and her family, who were taking a rare vacation overseas to visit Ireland. Us being us, we plotted a trip that ended with our rendezvous in Dublin and then worked back to include not one, but TWO bucket list items that we could finally check off.

So off we popped on a short flight to Dublin, although for now this was just a waypoint. Directly from the airport we hopped onto a commuter bus that would drop us in downtown Belfast. (Unlike the last time we pulled this maneuver, we did not start at 1AM nor did we arrive in Belfast at 4AM. Go us.) Arriving while the sun was still up, we had no difficulty navigating to the lovely Fitzwilliam Hotel; three cheers for flash sales on booking.com.

It was a wee bit surreal as it turns out that the Open was happening. (Us Americans would call it the British Open, the oldest golf tournament in the world, held over four days.) The City was festooned with golf-related events and experiences, and waiting for us in our hotel room were little party favor / welcome gifts – golf balls made out of white chocolate. Sure! After checking out the room and unpacking a bit, we headed out to dinner at Mourne Seafood Bar. Total yum! It’s a great place for oysters in particular and the mussels were excellently garlic-y and tender. (We did think the dough on the lobster gyoza was a bit too thick.) We slept very well.

You may remember that we enjoyed our visit here in 2022, we ran into . . . difficulty . . . seeing the Giant’s Causeway. If you’re an OG Sasha’s Doghouse fan you may even recall similar difficulties on our honeymoon in 2012. This time we were by gosh and by gum going to succeed! Making it completely easy (and not our usual style) we booked with PaddyWagon Tours for a day trip that would leave all of the planning in the hands of locals. We scored quick breakfast and then let them drive us all around for a day.

We started with the Dark Hedges, which have been made famous by the Game of Thrones TV show, and which we found underwhelming. No matter how atmospheric and cinematic the location may have been on the show, when its swarmed with people and vehicles it’s … just a bunch of trees. Instead, we took this picture about 100 meters away from the overrun hedges. It may not be fancy or featured on the television, but a) it’s prettier in our opinion, and b) we had it all to ourselves.

Much more interesting was the dragon door at a nearby Inn carved from the wood of fallen trees in the Hedges, which has apparently suffered significant losses from immense tourist traffic. There are a few of these doors scattered around the world and you can even get stamps in a little passport thingy to show when you’ve completed your collection. Sorry, there’s probably more lore here to unwind but as you’ve probably gathered by now neither of us are particular fans of the show.

From there we went on to Dunluce Castle, a glorious ruin set on the edge of a basalt outcropping. The views are lovely and it was wonderfully scenic. John had a moment of cognitive dissonance as we grappled with the fact that the vibe was of an incredibly ancient site but the castle actually only dated back to like the 1700s. That’s what being on the Irish coast will do to a place; eek. He got over it and enjoyed the visit immensely.

And, finally, we arrived at Giant’s Causeway! The natural element is interesting and worth seeing, but not during the summer when the rocks are covered with people. Frustratingly, the Visitor’s Center is an expensive 15 pounds and is the easy way to get to a cafe and souvenir shop. However, there is no need to pay the fee, you can just walk through a tunnel (that looks like the way to a car park) and then down about a mile to the rocks themselves. However, there is also a tram for a small fee that takes you one, or both ways. (Good idea, especially on the return trip uphill.) By the by, this was our main gripe with the Paddywagon tour. While an incredibly close reading of the text probably reveals that they never said boo about the visitor center, they go to great lengths to sell you on the idea you were being ushered along to all of the spots. (We didn’t pay an entrance fee at Dunluce, for example.) At the Causeway, however, we pulled up along the curb just outside the place and were dropped off with instructions to meet back there in am hour and a half or so. “Nah, don’t worry about the Visitor Center, who needs to be bothered with that nonsense?” Us. We need to be bothered with the nonsense. Sigh.

It wasn’t actually the end of the tour, as we stopped for lunch at the “Fullerton Arms” which was a huge disappointment. We didn’t get there until after 2pm — so bring snacks to tide you through the many hours between pickup and lunch. The food was bland and very “industrial”. When they drop you off at the Causeway you peruse a terse menu and then you choose fish and chips, shepherd’s pie, ceasar salad, and option four whatever the heck that was, which would then be waiting for you at the inn. The food was “meh” and also not at all cheap, which is particularly irritating when it was not discussed ahead of time and there were no other options presented. It wasn’t terrible, just managed and presented badly which just got us off on the wrong foot. All that being said, the tour accomplished what we wanted it to. It was back to Belfast for us, for a quiet night before catching the Steam Packet the next day? What the heck is a Steam Packet? Tune in next time!

Rome puns! Who doesn’t love ’em? Anyway… by this point in the trip, I had my sea legs under me so I was ready to get out and about. Which was fortunate, because the whole point of the trip was coming up on the agenda. A Caravaggio exhibition is a tricky thing, it turns out. Between the muddy authenticity of some of his signature works and a PR machine that has been working steadily since the artist was first brought to prominence (which is not to say ‘discovered’, merely touted) by Roberto Longhi in the early 20th century, making sure that Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio remains installed amongst the artistic firmament, getting a grip on what exactly is going on with the artist can be tricky. After all, I’m no art historian; I’m a passionate amateur who has the dumb f#*@ luck to be indulging an art education with a so-far-endless series of A+++ field trips. So, ok amateur, what did you get out of your latest expedition?

There’s two ways to look at this, and I tend to prefer the second. The first, for completion’s sake, is that the exhibition is somewhat overblown. The exhibition contains 25 works ascribed to Caravaggio from all over Europe… but 25 is also the number of Caravaggio’s paintings that are permanently on exhibition in Rome. Not the same 25, but still… it is not an exhaustive undertaking. Compare it, for example, to the Donatello exhibition Lisa and I went to in Florence a number of years ago – that one took up two separate museums that worked together to curate the thing. This was four modest rooms. Then there was the thematic break-up of the rooms, which seemed a bit helter skelter. “Making a Name in Rome” seemed to set us on a historical look at his work, but then you had “the sacred and the tragic” for themes and “invigorating the darker shades” to highlight the techniques he is most admired for. All fine, but scattershot. Not that I’m an expert, but I will say that Lisa and I have been around the block enough times that we have actually had long discussions about the curation of some exhibitions we’ve been to. I’ve got some chops, at least. So, yes, there’s a case to be made that museums gonna museum, magnets aren’t going to sell themselves, and maybe this isn’t quite the generation-defining show that they want you to think it is.

The other way of looking at it, though, goes something like this: relax. It’s four rooms full of some truly amazing work. You had to go to Rome to see it. This is not a bad way to spend your time. So yeah, take it easy and enjoy yourself. And the truth is I did enjoy it. Experience-r of field trips or not, I hadn’t seen a lot of these paintings, and certainly not in the context they were in, placed next to each other as they were.

Of particular interest was one of the most iconic “Judiths” we’ve ever seen (although I had seen this one before, who cares?). We’ve talked about this before, but in brief: the biblical story of Judith and Holofernes has been the subject of numerous works of art through the years; given its position in the Bible, it has been “allowed” by most regimes and patrons, but it provides artists a pretty wide-open opportunity. Do you feature the demure wife taking on a burdensome task? Do you minimize the murder as almost besides the point? Or, as some artists have certainly done, do you take this as a chance to depict a woman exerting her power fully in a way they rarely ever get to do? Those are the best ones, including Caravaggio’s. And yes, I even bought the magnet.

The exhibiton happily consumed, I spent the rest of the day wandering my neighborhood which, as we were adjacent to the old Borghese estate, was not a bad place to kill an afternoon. I even made it over to the Galleria Nazionale d’Arte Moderna, which is fairly modest as far as state-owned art galleries go, as they forsook a dialog between the artists of Europe to instead focus on Italian artists. Totally fine, obviously, and I was in Italy, but if you scratch your memory you’ll probably come up short on a lot of notable Italian artists who participated in, for example, the Impressionist movement. This is not an error of omission. (Ahem.) Not that everything in there was bland or anything, far from it.

Heat, art, and Italian food, not actually that bad a combination really. You will not be surprised to hear, however, that I was quite ready to return home to my bride after all of this, and so I did.

A man alone in the city of Rome… summertime, when men and women dress for comfort rather than modesty. Yes, a fella could get up to a lot of hijinks if we were disposed to doing so. On the other hand, a fella might just be disposed to hiding in his air conditioned lodging and watch movies for a couple of days when he’s all by himself, in his 50s, and it’s hot as hell outside. So, with an angel on one shoulder and a devil on the other… actually that sounds like two devils; typical… anyway, with two whispering critters on my shoulders, what exactly did I get up to in The Eternal City? What wonders of the ancient world did I partake of? What fabulous adventure could possibly roust me from the coolth of steady air conditioning?? You guessed it!

Hop-on, Hop-off.

I know I/we are a broken record at this point, but we are total converts to the hopping way of life. If you’re on a mission or tourism they serendipitously go exactly where you want to go. There are several different lines of these buses in Rome; I went with Green Line Tours but I’m no expert as to which are better or worse. Green Line did just fine for me, but honestly it looked like most of the stops I saw had signs indicating that several different companies stop in identical locations. Thanks to our perfectly located accommodation (good job, sweetie!) I had about a 4-minute walk to the piazza, then on to the bus and into the center of the city.

However, before you roll your eyes at John and another one of his all-bus-all-the-time posts, stay your fury! This time, I was using the HOHO as actual public transportation. After riding for a half hour or so I scooted back on to the pavements for my key destination of the day – the Capitoline Museums. I’ve been to them before but it’s been quite awhile and the place is just stuffed. Even on a second visit I’d likely see things I missed the first time (or, to be perfectly honest, forgot I saw it) and some things are worth a second look anyway, right? Especially baby Hercules. This unforgettable piece of work (on display to the left) seems to be an artist’s attempt to reconcile two different inspirations – one, that Hercules is reputed to have displayed feats of great strength when he was just a baby. And two, shouldn’t a strong person look like a big strong man? Thus the compromise: a full grown, somewhat muscular man who has been mushed together with, you know, a baby. It is unsettling, but in a way that I can’t look away when I’m anywhere near it. And to paraphrase my sister, if I have to look at it, you have to look at it.

Behold!

The strange thing is that it is a total outlier. Baby Hercules is the only “oddity” like this in the place. It is otherwise a trove of art collected by the leading lights of Rome for nearly six hundred years, starting out with a gift from Pope Sixtus IV. He wasn’t the last. The ways of the rich and powerful are inscrutable, but on an irregular schedule over the centuries a pope or other richie rich type would drop off some portion of their accumulated wealth; I’m not Catholic but I have my suspicions. In any case, that much wealth sluicing through over that much time is going to yield a heck of a museum.

After a lovely few hours tromping through the Museums I pondered getting a meal, but there are bizarrely few dining options a quick hop from the museum, and I didn’t feel like longish walk in the heat, so instead I took my trusty HOHO back to my neighborhood for a nice spot I’d spotted right around the corner from home. Ristorante Rossini doesn’t seem to have much of a web presence, although it does seem to be attached to Albergo Ottocento hotel. The restaurant had a whole submenu featuring truffles – in the risotto, in the salad, on your steak… many styles. I went for a salad (a promise to wife to not eat *only* meat and pasta on the trip) and then the truffle-sauced beef tenderloin, because who doesn’t try that once? It was one of the best pieces of beef I have ever had.

One day down, I’m feeling righteous about not just being a lump, and the next day brings the whole reason for the trip – Senor Caravaggio.

“Time and tide waits for no man,” a phrase that comes to us from Geoffrey Chaucer – as one of the earliest documenters of travel and travellers, we’ll draft him as a spiritual ancestor of this blog. See? We’re not all dumb puns around here. How is this relevant, you ask? Um… did you notice the cool literary reference? Ok, fiiiine. The point is, we were enjoying the trip even more than we had anticipated, but the end was rushing up on us and there was no helping it. One last descent into the depths of Amsterdam (not hard, considering the city averages -7 ft. below sea level. See? We’re not not dumb puns around here, either…) before a cab gets us to our direct flight to Porto.

We needed to check out from our hotel after breakfast but still had a day in the city, so we left our bags with the accomodating staff. Honestly, we short-changed this place in our last post. The Hyatt Regency Amsterdam was an exceptionally great hotel. The reception area is spacious and full of comfy over-stuffed furniture, offering a cozy place to hang out. The overall vibe is green and jungle-y, with loads of houseplants, solid wood desk/tables under glass lamps, and green plant themed wall decor. It’s an outstanding antidote to the gray outside.

We had access to the Regency Club, an upgrade for Hyatt members. This gave us loads of free amenities like a continental breakfast, all-day snacks and coffee, and a “happy hour” complete with several kinds of salad, Indonesian rice, sweets, fruit, cheeses, champagne, wine, sodas, and juice. The Club is a great place to hang out instead of the lobby, much quieter (except during happy hour!), and full of plugs for working.

Our room was standard for this property, but top of the line. The shower was huge, had both a rainfall and handheld hardware, with great pressure, and got as hot as you could wish. The closet was well-thought out, with plenty of hanging space (and proper hangers!), room for our big suitcase, a shelf above and below for shoes and whatnot, PLUS (ta da!) five good-sized shelves. In the room was a good chair for reading, with a tall back and lamp nearby, a desk and chair for work, a king bed, nightstands, and an ottoman perfect for sitting on to remove shoes. Of course there was a good-sized TV, and reading lamps for each side of the bed. The mattress was great, although the pillows were fluffy rather than supportive. SIGH. Its my ever-lasting sorrow that hotel guests seem to like poofy pillows. Maybe I’m the only traveling side-sleeper?

This whole trip, we’ve looked for interesting-sounding dining opportunities; casual or dressy, simple food or funky. Regardless, we always try to be respectful of the establishment and present ourselves nicely. Not ballgown and tux but, you know, nice. 100% of the time, we’ve overshot the vibe and come in at least a little overdressed. You’d think we’d be used to the dress-down nature of most of Europe, but alas. So finally, on this last big meal day, we say “screw it”; we’re going to be doing some sight-seeing after lunch, so let’s keep it simple. So naturally, when we walk into Bridges we see that, at the table next to ours, the men are in suits and the woman is in Chanel. Flippin’ perfect. Of course, in the manner of truly fine places (as opposed to pretentious) no mention was made nor merest concern observed. Nope, it’s cool. Probably not the first tourists to walk in like that, but we try, ya know? Anyway, we forgot all about what anybody was wearing, or even what clothes are, as we settled into a truly scrumptuous five-course tasting menu while looking out the window at the traffic, aquatic and otherwise, in and along the canal. We seriously could not have enjoyed that meal more if we’d been paid to do it.

After lunch at Bridges we crossed several more…. bridges that is (herp derp), to scamper to our canal tour (Pure Boats’ Ultimate Canal Cruise) shortly before it left. The weather continued to be kinda gross, so the semi-transparent plastic covers stayed in placed, which meant we saw some interesting things but decent pictures were hard to come by. Everyone else in the boat (there were about 9 of us) were Americans, either immigrants or tourists, and it was lovely to sort of catch up on the vibe back in the States while answering the usual questions (“Wait, where do you live? How does that work?”). This isn’t the most evocative description, but honestly while it was a pleasant way to pass a couple of hours, it didn’t blow our minds with information or anecdotes.

Our time thus passed, we began the process of unspooling our travels and getting back home. Now this was an evocative experience, starting with a lounge at Amsterdam Schiphol Airport. Thanks to… I dunno, a credit card, we have a benefit called “Priority Pass” which gets you access to ostensibly-premium lounges in airports all over the world. Sometimes you end up getting into the business class lounge of an actual airline, and those can vary in quality but are some degree of “fine”. The Priority Pass lounge at AMS (aka “Aspire”), however, is in serious need of updating. Many pseudo-leather seats are ripped exactly where one would put their bottom. Packing tape holds edging to walls and baseboards. Most of the food and drink comes from machinery, although there was some selection of hot food (soup and noodles) available when we were there at 19:00. It was… rough. Staff were unable to keep up with necessary clearing of dishes, leaving people to clear vacated spaces by moving used items to nearby flat surfaces (see photo for an example). They were moving as quickly as possible, but I would say there needed to be at least one more person (and probably more) to help. The lighting was 70s fluorescent, and not in any of the good ways. What made it seem worse was the lovely natural look-and-feel lighting over the food areas and in tiny 2-person booths around the periphery. Clearly the coveted spaces for those in the know. On the plus side, there were plenty of plugs to charge with, people in the lounge were pretty respectful of space and noise levels (even the children were pretty much quiet). And, ranking very high on the “made it ok” vector — it was NOT the gate.

Pleasant or not, it gave us a place to wait out an hour or two, and from there we were an easy delivery. The flight was fine, with no troubles, and the steadfast Orlando (seriously, this guy needs a spotlight shined on him when we get a quiet minute) met us at OPO to ferry us home. We’ve said it a few times now, but this was a lovely trip that accomplished everything we wanted. The only downside is we now have “longer trip to Vienna and Amsterdam” added to our to-do list.

Our foray into bite-sized travel has been a success in a lot of ways. We’ve been to two cities we’ve never visited before, in two countries we’ve never visited before. In fact, this represented the first new (to us) countries we’ve visited since we moved… well, unless you count Portugal. Smashing success! We’re out of our comfort zone, and are feeling more comfortable about poking our hands into even more virgin territory. (Hush.) The only even slight downside is, since now we know we like it in these places, we would like more time in them. Well, as we frequently say to each other, “next time.” For the nonce, we have exactly two days in Amsterdam and this was it. Cultural icons, varied food choices, and a good old fashioned walk-and-gawk made for a good first day.

We began our one full day in Amsterdam with breakfast in the hotel. We’re still not sure why, but we’ve been having better luck than usual with breakfast on this trip; maybe we’ve been hitting places with more business travelers without even realizing? This is one of the places where we still fail, or at least don’t acquit ourselves very well, when it comes to embracing local customs. We see a plate of cold cuts and a basket with yogurt cups, with maybe slices of white bread, and it just deflates us. The warm buffet is often not much better, with runny eggs and sausages of uncertain provenance. But lo! On this trip the choices have been more varied, the eggs have approached firm, and we’ve even seen the glint of recognition in servers’ eyes when we bring up waffles or pancakes. Good heavens.

Our morning is given over completely to the Rijksmuseum, which is the official, state museum of the Netherlands. As such, it gives pride of place to Dutch artists. Oh no, we must content ourselves with Rembrandt, Vermeer, et al… (Van Gogh is slightly represented, but he’s kind of like impressionists at the Louvre; the clear message is that there’s a whole ‘nother museum next door, beat feet if that’s what you want.) The Rijksmuseum is in the same glorious arts park that we visited yesterday, so we know the way just fine. By now we had sorted out the mass transit, and the weather was el gross, so we took light rail from practically doorstep-to-doorstep. Amsterdam has been surprisingly busy for February but we got in and ticketed without too much trouble and were soon being led by audio guide on a three-hour(!) “highlights” tour.

It’s a beautiful museum that can easily absorb as much attention as you’re prepared to give it. We were prepared to go until sore tootsies and empty bellies spurred us onward. Speaking of culinary peculiarities by region, the dining options in both museums we’ve been to in Amsterdam have been “cafeteria chic” without much in the way of “chic“. Sadly, our alternative for lunch turned out to be not much better. The Cafe in de Waag (“the weigh house”) is housed in the preserved remnant of the fortifications of Amsterdam and is the oldest non-religious building that exists in the city; it dates to the 15th century. Whatever value it once offered to the city has been slandered by what goes on in there now, with the Epcot version of old Amsterdam for decor and not-all-that-spiffied-up versions of pub food to eat. We don’t often get lured to our doom by tourist traps, but this place blew. (And now you know what it sounds like when we really don’t like a place.)

Post-lunch we had a nice block of time with which to do nothing in particular. We wandered the streets of the central district, poking around and generally just taking in the atmosphere. Amsterdam is a happening place; for all that there’s a lot of interesting old things to see, it isn’t propped up by tourism a la Venice. This is a fully functioning city that just happens to also have some cool stuff.

We meandered near and far but generally towards our hotel, where we kicked our feet up for a spell before heading back at for dinner at Ron Gastrobar Oriental Downtown (whew, such a mouthful of words!).

Billed as Amsterdam’s best night out made us leery. But Lisa had it recommended to her as a great place to get the classic many-dish rijsttafel, (literally: “rice table”), described as dozens of small, shareable dishes ranging from mild to spicy, in all colors of the rainbow, served with rice. So we settled in, ordered cocktails (high test and unleaded ) and perused the menu with interest.

We both thought the rijsttafel sounded like a great way to try lots of dishes in one meal. According to the menu, we could expect satay skewers – both chicken and goat – various curries (meat and fish), boiled eggs in sauce, vegetables in peanut sauce (wonderfully named gado-gado) and fried bananas. Yum.

But.

We are spice wussies.

So we took it to our waiter, and he was great. He thought a few dishes would be way too spicy for us and even asked the chef if substitutions could be made . . . but no. It was too much of an ask (which is utterly fair, and I respected them for being upfront about it!).

So instead, we started with dim sum, the classic shrimp and pork. So delicious. They do seven different flavors including Dai Tie Sieuw Mai (scallop, Chinese mushroom and spring onion), Who Ngau Sieuw Mai (Wagyu steak with bone marrow), ha kau with tobiko (prawn and wasabi mayonnaise), Beef Bao (steamed oxtail bun and foie gras, and kauw choi kau (steamed then fried chicken). Served with a thick soja and fermented leek sauce. We also had a gyoza of shredded duck (so good!) and the boneless spare ribs, Pai Kwat. No sticky fingers or mess, just very tasty sticky soft marinated pork meat, so full of flavor. We finished with the satay — to die for. The chicken and goat meat were perfectly moist yet charred on the outside, and the sauces spicy (for us) yet sweet. We’re pretty sure we had dessert, but we can’t remember what they were, except delicious! Every dish was perfect, luscious, and fun.

It’s hard to describe how truly marvelous this meal was. We never felt rushed, although the energy (and music) was definitely high energy (and increasing as the evening rolled on). Everything was great, and we will absolutely go back here the next time we visit Amsterdam.