Friends, Romans, Countryman, lend me your ears... home tomorrow

I forgot to say that some where on this trip we did the Spanish Steps and the the Trevi Fountain, we wandered the bars and night spots of Trevestare and ate an enormous amount of pizza and I drunk quite a lot of red wine - we are on holiday innit!!

The airb&b has delivered yet again although it said quiet location with garden and actually its on a very busy road and the outside area is tiny. but we have sat outside in among the trees having a night cap and it was all molto bello...

We had three very long days travelling and sight seeing, so day 4, our final day, was supposed to be very laid back - late rising, slow brekkie, and finally out to explore the modern art museum. After so much classic history its interesting to hit modern art and be brought back to the present.

Its a great gallery - wonderfully spacious and after yesterdays complete manicness at the Vatican sooooo peaceful and empty of people -and full of really interesting art. it was a great mix of contemporary work dating from early 20th century to present day. Not all of it was my cup of tea, I had to walk through a room exhibiting dead horse corpses hanging from the roof a piece apparently titled ''we are all flesh'' the animals came from the abattoir no creatures were harmed in the making of this art work.. I didn't like it!

I cant find a credit for this but am looking - they were just amazing sculptures

I did love a lot of the work though there was lovely Klimt and some more beautiful sculpture. I was intrigued by some of the very modern art - the stripey elephant with a tiger coming out of its bottom.

http://lagallerianazionale.com/mostra/bric-brac-the-jumble-of-growth/

BRIC a brac the Jungle of growth by Gerardo Mosquera and Huang Du.

I really loved the lions outside the museum, all very majestic and just lying there, watching and playing - there were more lions beautifully drawn onto the wall inside the gallery looked like they were done using pencil and graphite.

I did find credit for this but have lost it will update as soon as I find it....

There were many stunning pieces by Modigliani, Miro, Boldini, to name but a few .... quite a number of works by various impressionists dotted about - an (in my humble opinion) average Warhol and lots more - really worth a visit...

Klimt

And then that was the end of our relaxing day... it had been our intention to have a picnic in the park and relax, read a bit sketch a bit haha ... but somehow we ended up wandering again - right back into town - being fairly aimless because we were beginning to lose the will to sight see - we did find a very nice place for lunch but really we were being hopeless and eventually recognized this, gave up and headed home via a supermarket for food in case we felt we wouldn't venture our again.

And this was indeed the case - we sat in the garden among the pomegranate trees and ate a nice supper drinking beer and wine and enjoying a very balmy evening.... the traffic raced by on the other side of the hedge but we soon got used to it, its an early start to head to the airport and home and we have had a brilliant few days and I don't think we could have fit any more exploring Rome in!! (about 30 miles wandering in 3.5 days!!!!)

Rome has been wonderful, three days of intense culture - this is the problem with short breaks there is no time for a day off - but its been very splendid and time enough to relax and look at the hundred of photos I have taken over the coming chillier months!

Vigo

We left the ship to explore Vigo. Its a much larger place then we expected... although tbh I hadn't given ut a lot of thought. Its a real mish mash of old and new and having got a map from tourist info we decided to follow the walking trail to the Monte Castro... the highest point of the town. Most of the town was pretty much as everywhere else... lots of traffic... lots of people... one or two interesting buildings and a lot of shopping. We headed to the art gallery - this has been a year of gallery visits so we we seen o reason to change now. The Museo de Marco is housed in the towns ex prison building and its very grand. In fact, I think that on this occaision the building might have been more interesting than the art.... Although the visiting exhibition by Susanne S D Themlitz was strangely compelling. It was a huge varied collection of eclectic items... found, salavaged, manipulated and arranged in lots of ways - weirdly inspiring - and mostly enjoyable to look at...

verdant lushness

Its a never ending island hop... today we hopped of the boat at Kingstown, on the island St. Vincents and Grenadine. Once through the usual port duty free - cheap booze and diamonds to go milarkey we were straight into the town... crazy noisy smelly chaos... refreshingly no tat shops for tourists, just local markets and street traders all vying for local sales. Music blasting from everywhere, cars (very battered and often very pimped) all over the roads - parked in the middle of the street, loading, unloading, chatting seemingly oblivious to the total traffic jam caused behind them... We walked through this mayhem - the temperatures were rising probably about 30 degrees - tourists evident by trying to walk on the shady side of the street - even when we turned off the main drag and there were less people it was still like carnival time with music blasting everywhere. Its very atmospheric and mostly promotes a good vibe although I have heard '3 little birds' everywhich way a...

Almost last chapter... In which our Go Stargazing team watch Astonishing Aurora Borealis seen from the deck of the Astonishing Borealis!!!

The weather brightened considerably and the snowy peaks lining our sail down the fjiords looked glorious and sparkly in the sunshine against a (mainly) blue sky back drop. More awesome scenary.... the Go Stargazing team wrapt up their lectures ... only searching for the illusive Northern Lights remained. The tension from the night before dissolved in the sunshine the forecast for Aurora borealis was looking fairly positive - it was the captains farewell cocktsil party so everyone had their gladrags on.. We ate dinner and sky remained clear so we headed back to our room and donned as many layers as we could move in and proceeded to deck 10 in anticipation of stars and northern lights..... it did not dissappiont - just we got there as the bridge announced that the lights could be seen on the starboard side of the ship. It was stunning. Slowly the intensity built. The auroral green became brighter and bigger areas appe...

Planet Ruby Starrs

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