The Ancient Eternal City

Wandering through the Forum, I came upon the home of the Vestal Virgins.  They were females from elite families, chosen between age 6 and 10 to serve Vesta, one of Rome's chief goddesses.  The virgins enjoyed luxurious accommodation and many grew wealthy through influential contacts, but there was a catch...they had to serve for 30 years, and they COULD NOT SHAG during that period under any circumstances.  If they did, their male lover was flogged to death and the (no longer) virgin was buried alive, since their blood could not be shed.  After their 30 year hitch was over, then they could get married, still in early middle age, and many did, into prominent families.  Massive carrot and stick setup here.  This is a statue of one of the virgins...they had high status in Rome.

 

 

Climbing the Palatine Hill, Rome's swish 'hood two thousand years ago.  The emperors had their palace here; Augustus lived here all his life, even before assuming the purple.  You can see the Arch of Titus and the Colosseum from here, both constructed about 65 years after Augustus.

Glowering skies in front, sun in back, made for a nice shot of Rome.

This is a reproduction of a painting depicting the scene at the Colosseum in its heyday.  It's almost all brick now...back then it was almost all marble.  Seats were free, but they were rigidly assigned according to your standing.  The common folk sat up in the Uecker seats near the top.  The corporate and government bigwigs got the ancient equivalent of luxury boxes midway up.  Knights sat down in the lower sections.  Blow this pic up and you'll see that the blokes are doing typical bloke things...drinking, wagering, arguing, talking smack.  The donni are a bit grossed out by all of it.  But they still show up to see gladiators fight each other, or wild beasts.  The critters frequently came out poorly.  When Titus dedicated the Colosseum in AD 80, the games lasted 100 days and resulted in the deaths of at least 5000 lions, tigers, and other critters.  Sometimes the critters got the best of things...at least temporarily.  They were used to dispatch condemned criminals, frequently at lunch break during the all day "festivities".  BTW the meat from the deceased critters was given to the public. 

A view of the interior of the Colosseum.  The floor of the arena was usually a wood base with sand on top.  The subterranean passageways visible at lower left were used as warmup areas for gladiators and as holding pens for animals in cages.  When the critters' turns in the arena came, their cages were hauled up to ground level by pulleys and they were then released into the arena.  The painting illustrates this nicely.  At lower right are a few reconstructed seats.  Almost all the original marble seats were cannibalized and recycled into other building construction between about 500 and 1500.  The Colosseum was badly damaged by earthquakes in the late 4th century AD; then Alaric and his Goths sacked the place in 410 when they invaded the city.  Restoration didn't start until Napoleon captured the area about 200 years ago, and is still ongoing.

When I first entered the Colosseum I had the odd feeling of "So?  Just another stadium."  The curving, high ceilinged concourses are just like countless baseball and football stadiums in the US and elsewhere.  The difference, of course, is that the Colosseum was the first such stadium...by well over a millennium!  In the US a 40 year old stadium is ready to be replaced; one aged 100 is a relic.  The Colosseum, opened 1933 years ago, is on a different time plane altogether.  By the way, it had a retractable canvas roof!  It was used for about 500 years until the barbarians let it go to seed.

This is gate 53 at the Colosseum.  There were 80 gates; 76 for the spectators, the other four for the emperor, his entourage, and the folks putting on the show.  Every ticketholder was assigned a gate.  With staircases throughout, the arena could be emptied of 50-60 thousand people in a few minutes.

Roaming Rome

I have fulfilled a long time wish and am in Rome!  I've been a Roman Empire buff since about fourth grade.  Here's the interior of the Pantheon, first built by Marcus Agrippa in Augustus' time around 27 BC, then enlarged by emperor Hadrian in 120 AD.  It has been the largest unreinforced dome in the world since then.  Built as a shrine to paganism, it's been a Christian church since 608. 

Looking up at the Oculus, a hole in the roof that admits light.  The top of the dome is exactly as high as the interior is wide...43 metres.  It's huge. 

Il Vittorio, a monument to king Vittorio Emmanuelle II, was begun in 1885 as a celebration of the unification of Italy.  It wasn't finished til 1925 under Mussolini, and became a symbol of his fascist regime's power...or wannabe power.  Erected on the Capitoline Hill, it displaced some very old, historic neighborhoods and is visible for miles around.  Check out the people on the steps to get an idea of its scale.  Il Duce wanted to restore the Roman empire, and encouraged grand architecture like this.  It worked until he actually went to war, at which time it became apparent that, except for a small elite corps of professional soldiers, most Italians wanted to drink wine, eat pasta, and make love instead of fighting.  The Italians were especially cool to the idea of helping Hitler on the Russian front...imagine tromping through the snow, 20 below zero, mean people shooting at you, versus tending your fields in a mild 60 degree winter, then going home to your wife and a bottle of good wine.

This is detail from Trajan's column.  Trajan was the last Roman emperor to make major conquests, mostly in Mesopotamia and Dacia...todays Romania.  The artwork mainly shows his Romans kicking Dacian ass.  After Trajan, future emperors realized that it didn't make economic sense to conquer more territory, far from Rome; better to trade and conduct diplomacy instead.

The arch of Septimius Severus, in the Forum.  Emperors tended to construct columns, like Trajan and Marcus Aurelius, or arches, like Severus, Titus, and Constantine.  In the background are the remaining columns of the Temple of Saturn, which was Rome's version of Fort Knox.  Lots of gold and silver was stored there.

In Severus' case, he kicked Parthian ass.  Ruling a century after Trajan, by that time Rome's chief concern was repelling invasions from other empires such as Parthia (today's Iran, basically) and keeping the barbarians out (Germans and Goths, later Huns and Vandals).

Wandering Cal's 'Hood

I spent another day roaming around central Vermont.  The leaves are stunning in many places...there are endless art photo ops.  Rather breathtaking, actually.

I'm at the Pogue, a pond in the hills above Woodstock.  A peaceful, brooding spot.

Classic Vermont.

Stopped at Calvin Coolidge's place.  This barn had a variety of conveyances used about a century ago.  In summer, Cal and his buds had the trusty Model T, in the background.  But Vermont is covered by snow a good four months each winter, and the locals used a vehicle alien to most Californians...the sleigh.  The one in the foreground was used for Rural Free Delivery mail service.

They even had hearse sleighs!

This is the house where Cal was born...on the fourth of July, 1872.  Very rustic on the outside, but the interior is quite cozy.  Cal's dad was a prominent citizen in his town and worked at the general store attached to the house on the left.  When Cal was five, his dad bought the store.  Though he worked hard, Cal lived fairly comfortably, in a loving family, in a beautiful, peaceful part of the world.  He said he had a great childhood, and it's easy to see why.

Increased prosperity allowed the Coolidges to move into this pleasant home across the street from his birthplace in 1876, when he was four.  Cal was the vice president in 1923, vacationing here, when the word came that president Harding had died in San Francisco and therefore the local boy was now President of the United States.  Cal took the oath of office right in this house, sworn in by his father, who was a notary public.  I had a nice chat with the docent, a WWII veteran...always love to talk to those guys.  We swapped a few sea stories as we had both been in the Navy.  Cal was known for being taciturn...not unfriendly, just loath to waste words.  The story goes that when he was president, a woman came up to him and said she'd bet her friend that she could get him to say three words.  Cal's reply..."You lose".

Fall in the Green Mountains

I'm staying in Woodstock, Vermont, a classic New England town with old, tidy homes, a funky, even foofoo downtown, and at this time of year, glorious fall colors.  These trees are right on the main drag, highway 4.

Woodstock is known for its elegant homes, most dating from the 19th and early 20th centuries.

Like most New England towns, Woodstock has a fine town green.

This covered bridge in Woodstock is fairly new...built in 1969 to replace an old steel span that had been in place since 1877.  This bridge is constructed of Douglas Fir, imported from Oregon...which has about 100 covered bridges of its own.

The impressionists would revel in the Vermont countryside during autumn. 

Flaming red maples contrast with golds, greens, blues, and whites.

I stopped in the town of Brandon.  They're having some kind of a festival where everyone puts up these scarecrow type things.  A wee bit spooky, actually.

Blow this pic up and it almost looks pointillist.  Come to think of it, digital photos are made up of pixels, each of which captures a point of light.

I love the shades, colors, and the mosaic of the branches here.  It's very stimulating in Vermont this time of year!  The weather is crisp and refreshing; and the colors are uplifting and inspiring. 

Two Trips

A couple weeks ago I was returning from a trip to the Seattle and Denver areas for weddings, along with many other ramblings.  Just in California, across the border from Primm Nevada, I came upon this huge solar power array.  I think the three brilliant lights in the pic are reflecting the sun onto thousands of solar panels.  To give a sense of scale, the lights are at least a mile apart from each other. 

The East Mojave National Preserve looked lush and healthy...lots of green grass and some out of season flowers.

Back home, I went down to Big Sur for brekky and encountered a hillside of pampas grass.  It's an invasive species, but pretty when backlit by the sun.

An old growth redwood in Nisene Marks SP with a labyrinth of branches.

Now I'm off on another ramble.  This is Lake Winnipesaukee in New Hampshire.  It's large, with many islands and nice mountain views.  I'd seen it on maps for many years so decided to take a look.

Overall, it's 1-2 weeks before peak autumn color in this part of New England, but the trees are starting to turn nicely.

A hillside lights up.  The diversity of fall color hereabouts makes New England awesome at this time of year.

This is the mountainside that used to hold the Old Man of the Mountain, the rock formation that was a symbol of New Hampshire for almost two centuries.  Formed late in the Ice Age, the rock formation became unstable in the 19th century.  Preservation efforts worked for awhile, but in 2003 the whole thing came tumbling down in seconds.

However...

The locals came up with a precision scheme to replicate the Old Man in photos.  Stand in this plaza at the right place according to your height, and you can photograph a new profile of the Old Man with an array of steel plates providing the silhouette.  A close look at the pic shows the steel shaft.

A hillside in fall glory.

More Stormy Scenes From Fabulous Southern Utah

Last night, I stayed in a cozy log cabin in the hills just south of Torrey.  The rain poured down, hammering on the roof...one of my favorite sounds.  I slept well.  The rain's effects on the countryside were less favorable.  Here, highway 12 just north of my cabin required a ford in order for me to get gas and brekky in town.  As the barriers hint, the water was only a few inches deep so I made it OK.

There is lots of slickrock country on highway 12 south of Torrey.  Geological forces have contorted the rock in many forms.

This morning the Escalante river was flowing briskly, but causing no problems.  That was not the case yesterday, as the soggy landscape on each side of the stream indicates.

This rock formation was highlighted beautifully by a sunray.  Wet weather is a photographers dream...the lighting is dramatic and dynamic.

And, approaching Escalante, I drove into another frog strangler.  I took refuge in a Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument visitor center in town for about half an hour...it was raining so hard I couldn't reach my car without getting totally soaked.

Finally the rain let up and I continued westward.  It wasn''t long before I came upon this spectacular water/mudfall.  It's at least a hundred feet high!  Blow up the pic for the best effect.

Didn't have time to go to Bryce today, but I caught an Oh Wow! glimpse of Cedar Breaks National Monument.  Look at the colors!  It's been said that if Cedar Breaks were located anywhere but Southern Utah, it would be renowned as one of the world's natural wonders.  As it is, it's just as spectacular as Bryce and Zion, but not as extensive.

Cedar Breaks has colorful hoodoos, like Bryce.

Blow this pic up and be overwhelmed by the myriad of shapes, shades, and contours.  At 10,400 feet above sea level, erosion from rain, snow, wind, freezing, and thawing masterfully sculpts the land.  It was 42 degrees and raining here...but I was comfortable in my jeans and parka.

One thing about red states...they let you drive fast.  Blow up this pic and you'll see that the speed limit on this stretch of I-15 north of Cedar City is 80!  Given the rain I usually drove a few mph slower than that today, but it's nice to know you can.