toscana {2}

Every night a different sunset

What shape do you see?

For more images of skies from around the world, please visit SKYWAYCH FRIDAY

toscana {1}

love this smell...

Appennine view from the garden

ponte regina margherita

{not a full moon yet}

This bridge was dedicated to Italy's first queen Margherita di Savoia, and was inaugurated in December of 1891. It connects via Cola di Rienzo–the Prati district's main thoroughfare–to the Piazza del Popolo. The 3 arches that sustain its structure are concrete covered in travertine marble, and the bridge measures 103,10 meters in length and 20,95 meters in width.

This picture was taken on a typical busy (and sweltering) Roman summer night.

For more images of bridges around the world,
please visit San Francisco Bay Daily Photo,
hosting the weekly Sunday Bridges series.

estate

{in the city}

In the summer Italians leave the city, headed for vacationland. This year sandal and sunhat season came blazing sooner and warmer than ever. Rome once used to be wonderfully breezy. But that was before huge constructed behemoths in the suburbs totally blocked the sweet evening "Ponentino" westerly wind that come 6 pm, would descend from the hills every day, to bring Romans a little relief.

As the summer progresses, more and more people will leave the city. So streets will slowly begin to empty out, traffic diluted. Apartment buildings will be silent, mailboxes stuffed to full capacity. The warm hum and exhaust of air conditioning engines will finally be switched off. Business will shut down, and many restaurants and shops will hang the familiar "Chiuso per Ferie" (closed for the holidays) sign. Crowded airless busses and subways will be a distant memory. And, finally, in mid August–peak vacation season–the city will be a livable and actually fresher paradise again.

In the meantime, July is hotter than Hades.

museo di zoologia

{room full-o-bones}

Visiting the Rome Zoology Museum is like taking a trip back in time. The the Victorian-style display cases, stuffed birds and sometimes extinct creatures, and a background soundtrack of wildlife noises, all make this a bizarre and mysterious place.

My son, the 4 year-old animal lover, loves coming here on Sunday afternoons and staring in awe at the many items on display in the old permanent exhibit. With its five million specimens in total (molluscs, insects, birds, mammals and fossils) this place is always a hit with children. At the end of the tour, two dozen skeletons haunt the large and sunny salon-like room. There are giant towering frames–like the giraffe and the elephant–and smaller skeletons of ancient residents of the Rome conservation zoo. 

The yellowed catalog nametags below each case are handwritten in that typical pointy turn of the century hand. There are roomfuls of taxidermically preserved fauna, so lifelike that my child sometimes asks me, "È vero?"

The tall windows have drapes that sometimes billow in the draft, adding to the mystery.

I personally like animals free and wild, but something darkly romantic makes me like this place. Despite the bones.

Zoology Museum | Museo Civico di Zoologia

Via Ulisse Aldrovandi 18 | Tel. +39 06 6710 9270 | www.museodizoologia.it | Opening hours: 9 a.m. – 7 p.m. | Closed Monday | Entrance fee: €6,00 ~ free admission for kids under 18 and over 65!

via di s. elena

{hand written proclamations}

This shoe store is saving on everything, including corrections on the price reduction sign! 

If I were them I'd invest in a graffiti clean-up

largo di torre argentina

{8:56 am}

Waiting to meet a group for one of my foodie walking tours.

{welcome to my son's swimming class, today's his last day}

{here is the indoor training pool ~ kiddies in the far one ~ seen from the upper floor café}

 {this is where we like to relax and soak some rays after the lesson is over. 

My little swimmer always enjoys a gelato here}

{no more waterwings for him}

il tevere

{low waterline}

Today is the first of the month, and this means a new Theme Day in the City Daily Photoblog community. The theme this month is REFLECTIONS. 

This is Ponte Sant'Angelo, reflected in the Tiber river, which changes color according to rainfall. Today it's brown and murky, but still able to reflect Bernini's angels.

Check the reflections throughout the world by clicking here.