Junk food giant McDonalds is trying (re)open a temple to
processed meat at the place built 2000 years ago to be a temple to all Gods,
and I for one am not happy about it.
The Pantheon was built 2000 years ago by Emperor Hadrian. It has been in constant use ever since.
Italy pioneered the slow food movement, a movement that is about
real food, in season, not processed, as close to farm to table as possible, eaten
at a table with friends and family. Basically the complete antithesis to the
garbage that is McDonalds.
So the American junk franchise aggressively trying to push its way into the sites of ancient ruins is even more offensive than otherwise.
Although there’s a McDonalds on every street corner in America
they are few and far between in Italy. The Fast food culture hasn’t really
taken off in Italy, a country where meals are consumed sitting at a table be it
at home or in a restaurant.
But McDonalds isn’t targeting Italians. Italy is one of the
most touristed countries in the world, and McDonalds wants those tourists, so
it is trying to worm its way into the big tourist sites. Just last week they
got turned away from the Baths of Caracalla, this week they are trying to
pollute the Pantheon.
The Piazza della Rotonda, home of the Pantheon has a variety of eating options, from artiginal gelato, to the most famous coffee shop in the world (Tazza d’Oro) to a variety of trattoria and restaurants. You can sit outside at a table with a view of the Pantheon and enjoy Italian food and culture. McDonalds wants to violate that, siphoning off Americans and Chinese and plowing their tourist dollars into junk-o-rama at the expense of the local businesses.
There are multiple ways the city loses when McDonalds comes to town, but lets look at three of them:
* Local Business Suffers
Italians don’t really benefit too much from all these tourists. Beautiful, historical piazzas such as Piazza della Rotonda don’t charge an entry fee, you just walk in. The only way the city and the people make money is by tourists spending money in stores and at food establishments. Local business benefit from the influx of tourists sitting at their tables, eating their food.
June 2019, Glam Italia Tour at the Pantheon
If a percentage of those tourists are now getting Big Macs instead, those local businesses get hurt.
* The Trash!
American fast food chains generate an extraordinary amount of
trash. Here in the states people walk around eating fast food and then
(hopefully) dump the refuse into trash cans. Look around any American city and
see how much fast food rubbish is littered around the streets. A McDonalds by
the Pantheon is going to create trash around the Pantheon.
Trash in Rome has reached crisis levels since the closure of the Malagrotta landfill a few years ago, then the fire at the Salario landfill last year.
It should also be noted that Rome already has a problem with trash collection and disposal. The city doesn’t need American food franchises adding to the volume and making it worse.
* The Extra Crowds
A McDonalds at the Pantheon will draw even more people into the area as tourists follow the signs to the golden arches. As tricky as it can be to take a photo of the Pantheon without tourists getting in the way, a McDonalds will make it worse.
Bringing American tourists to a McDonalds at the Pantheon also brings more problems, for everyone – you and me included.
* PICKPOCKETS
Whether they are right or wrong, pick pockets think American
tourists have the best and easiest stuff to steal. The average American tourist
is likely to have more cash on them than the average European or Eastern
European. The flash more jewelry, more overall bling, and as a result are
pickpocket magnets.
If you were a pickpocket and didn’t want to hang out at the
Trevi Fountain, a big American fast food chain would be the next best thing.
Easy pickings from distracted tourists busy supersizing their orders and
plowing through fries. I wouldn’t care about that – serves you right for eating
there, but now you have drawn more pickpocketing to the area, and that impacts
all of us.
* TERROR TARGETS
If you belong to some deranged sect and want to inflict harm on
a large group and get your cause some internationally televised fame and
attention, what better place to do it than one where Americans hang out? McDonalds,
Starbucks, Subway – none of them should be in Italy, period. I tell all of my
Glam Italia Tour travelers to stay the heck away from them and with the
exception of two travelers, over the years have been successful.
Although I travel the world without fear of terror attacks, I
do consciously avoid the areas around McDonalds and Co. While writing this I
did a quick google search on terror attacks and McDonalds. It looks like over
the years there have been plenty.
McDonalds had a junk food palace in the Piazza della Rotonda
in the past but was run out of town back in 2011. Hopefully the powers that be
will turn their backs on any kickbacks paying the chain’s way into the piazza.
The reversal on permitting the proposed Baths of Caracalla McDonalds at least
gives me some hope.
If you feel you need McDonalds to be part of your travel experience, maybe just stay home?
Are you thinking about renting a car and driving while you are
in Italy? Or maybe you are wondering if it is necessary to have a car while you
are there?
As someone who rents cars in Italy several times per year, I can tell you there is nothing so freeing and fun as getting behind the wheel of a zippy little Italian car and racing through the hills of Tuscany, the olive lined roadways of Puglia or the lesser traveled parts of Lazio. With Italian music blasting, the wind blowing your hair while you glamorously look at the road ahead through an oversized pair of sunglasses – what could be more fabulous?
I can also tell you the heart pounding stress that comes with
your GPS dumping you into the heart of a busy city, backing up a long line of
cars because you got in the telepass lane at the toll booth by mistake or
finding yourself deep, deep inside the one way street labyrinth of the storico centro in a medieval town that
was built for horses not cars – going the wrong way (all of which I have done)
can ruin a trip or at least leave you a nervous wreck.
First things first, let’s look at your trip and see if you
even need to drive while you’re in Italy. Start by mapping your trip and seeing
if a car is necessary. If your trip is primarily major cities, for example you
are going to Rome, Florence and Venice then no you definitely do not need a
car. If your trip is going to be spent exploring outside of the cities look to
see whether the places you are going are on a train route.
So much of Italy has really fantastic train access that
frequently not only do you not need a car, but a car would be slower and more
expensive.
If your travel plans include aimlessly roaming the hill towns
of Tuscany, or exploring Puglia, Basilicata, Calabria or Sicily, then a car is
going to be essential.
You do
not need a car inside the cities. In fact I emphatically
recommend you do not get a car if you are inside the cities. Public transport
is excellent, and in the big cities taxis are plentiful, so you can get
anywhere you want to go quite easily.
A Fiat driving tour rolled past us while we were lunching in Florence
On the other hand driving inside the cities can be
treacherous, incredibly stressful and very expensive.
It is so easy to get lost and your GPS can be more of an enemy
than a friend, especially inside old towns where the signal doesn’t always find
you.
I was recently walking in Venice with some women who wanted to
go to a specific restaurant that was at best a little wiggly to get to. Walking
through the narrow calle the GPS would drop and a couple of times I had to take
us back into an open campo to let the signal find my phone again. There was
much eye-rolling and snorting from the peanut gallery who just didn’t get it
that there wasn’t a consistent GPS signal.
This is just a nuisance when you are on foot, but when you are
driving it can be really stressful and have you going down the wrong streets
and getting into situations you cannot easily get back out of.
3. Parking
Parking inside the cities can be hard to come by. It almost
always requires parallel parking super-proficiency, and the ability to not only
parallel park in traffic, but with only an inch or two space at either end of
the car.
There are parking buildings here and there but they can be very difficult to find and once inside the individual parking spaces are small and tight.
ZTLs are very expensive traps for unsuspecting tourists. The Zona TrafficoLimitato or Limited Traffic Zone is designed so that only cars with
a special permit can go inside. These are normally, but not always, in the
central heart of a city, as well as in small villages and towns.
Your GPS probably will not recognize a ZTL and will send you
straight into the heart of it. With everything else that is going on chances
are you won’t even see the warning sign. If you are on a one way street you can
be inside the ZTL before you even realize it, or worse still you see it coming
but have no way to get back out of it!
ZTLs are monitored with cameras that catch you the moment you
cross into one. It will take months to arrive but suddenly you find yourself
with a steep fine that nearly doubles if not paid within 60 days. You also get
an “admin fee” from the rental car company, charged to your credit card.
In all likelihood it won’t just happen once – if you are not
on top of it you can find yourself going in and out of ZTLs without realizing
and find yourself with multiple fines. On an Italy travel forum that I was
reading a traveler was fined over 2400 euros, a year after his Italy trip. He
hadn’t known where all the ZTLs were and just drove in and out of them,
somewhere near 24 times!
You wouldn’t necessarily pick up on this sign if you were in Italian traffic with cars honking their horns at you as you try to figure your way with your GPS…
So even if your parallel parking skills are on point and you
don’t get stressed easily, I sincerely recommend not driving inside the cities.
5. Discover New Towns And Villages
Having a rental car and driving around the countryside,
discovering random little towns the tour buses don’t go to is one of my
absolute favorite things to do in Italy.
The trick to it is to keep an open mind, decide ahead of time
you won’t allow yourself to get stressed out, and then go have fun!
On my most recent trip to Italy I flew into Bari, picked up a rental car and then drove by myself across Puglia and Basilicata to get to La Rabatana
It was a beautiful and easy drive, except for one roundabout
that had 5 exits, and that the GPS couldn’t decode. At various points I was
going the wrong way, heading back to the airport, even driving through an olive
grove! The only reason I made it to the correct exit from the roundabout was
that the other 4 were wrong!
It was such a lovely drive though that I forgot to get
stressed out. My feeling about driving around the countryside in Italy is so
what if you get lost or go through some roundabout shenanigans – it’s all part of
the fun. Getting lost just means discovering some incredible little town, and
is actually how I have discovered most of my favorite secret places!
Another good idea is to print out maps of your route before you drive off. You can’t rely on GPS alone, and having a backup little map showing you how to get from point A to point B at least will give you a concept of where you’re heading.
Also, should you lose cell service/have no data/lose Wi-Fi/run out of battery you will be glad you had a back up plan!
7. Look For City Names, Not Route Numbers
This comes back to the way they sign things in Italy. You’re
not looking for the A1 when you leave Florence airport, you are looking for the
A1 Roma or the A1 Bologna. Once you get on that highway it may give you a variety
of different route numbers such as the E185, SS125 etc that can get really
confusing, so think directionally and keep looking for the name of the town you
are going to.
From Florence I take the A1 Roma to whichever roads are taking me to San Gimignano – I don’t get too involved with the route numbers, I just keep looking for the San Gimi signs, which is a much easier way to do it.
If your little town isn’t likely to have much signage, at least know which big towns are in that direction.
8. Roundabouts
If you don’t live somewhere that uses roundabouts they can be
confusing. I grew up with them, so they are second nature to me, but if they
are new or unfamiliar to you, here’s the deal:
Always yield (or give way) to the left. You merge into the
traffic when there is a space.
There are no lanes in roundabouts, so stay in the space you
entered.
Your GPS will tell you which exit to take, such as take the 3rd
exit on the right. Sometimes this is a guessing game as the 2nd exit
could be a dirt track or maybe just the suggestion of an exit. There will be
vertically stacked signs for all the places off each exit, which makes having a
passenger navigating for you so much easier!
If you can’t figure it out just stay on the roundabout, making
loops until you see your sign. One time with my then 12 year old riding shotgun
we looped around the roundabout about 20 times before we found our exit, which
was one of about 40 signs all stacked up, and wasn’t easy to find the first 19
times! Really it’s all just part of the fun.
Most of the motorways are going to be two lanes in each
direction. The left lane is for passing, so stay in the right lane unless you
are passing someone.
10. Watch For Speed Traps
There are camera speed traps along all the motorways/highways.
Just as with ZTLs you won’t know you’ve got a speeding fine for months, and
these fines are hefty.
I have learned the hard way that if my name and credit card
are the ones on the rental car booking, no one else is driving. A year or so
after a trip driving through Puglia I found that my friend who kept wanting to
drive had been blowing through speed traps like a race car driver. Each fine
was for 270 euros, each also came with an administrative fee from Hertz, and each
fine was set to double if not paid in 60 days.
Luckily each fine indicated exactly where the speeding had happened, so I was able to show her that it was all her, but it took some wrangling to get the money wired to Puglia and off my card.
11. There Will Be Tolls
Be prepared for toll roads and toll booths. Just because they
mostly take credit cards doesn’t mean the credit card machine will be working,
so have coins ready.
Don’t go in the yellow line…
Also as you are exiting the motorway into the toll area look
for the yellow telepass sign and then make sure you don’t go in those lanes. My
first time driving alone in Italy I got into the telepass lane, backed traffic
up all the way to the motorway, couldn’t get out of the line, and was somewhere
between a heart attack and bursting into tears when a nice fellow on a
motorbike figured out what was up and came and rescued me.
I haven’t made that mistake twice!
You can’t guarantee that there will be a human working the
toll booth, so have a variety of coins with you.
12. Don’t Trust The GPS
Well not entirely anyway. One time I had the people at Hertz
program the rental car’s built in GPS system for me. Initially it was shouting
at me in Russian, but once I got it to English it started giving me crazy
directions. I was on my way to San Gimignano, a route I have driven a thousand
times, so I knew it was giving me crazy-wrong directions.
On your phone the Google Maps GPS is the worst and will try to
drive you off cliffs. Waze is good but will always take you on circuitous
routes that may save you minutes but will have you arriving with a full head of
grey hair, as it routes you through alleyways and side streets and hair raising
turns. Apple Maps is perhaps the best, but Siri still doesn’t always get it
right.
If you miss a highway exit it can be 30 minutes before you get
to the next one to turn back. With that in mind, mapping the drive beforehand
can be a really good idea, just so you have a general idea of where you’re
going.
13. You May Get A Stick Shift
In Italy I actually prefer driving a stick
shift, especially when driving through the hills. I spend a considerable amount
of driving time in Tuscany, which in turn means a lot of time driving through
the hills! A stick shift gives you so much more control as you are buzzing
around the countryside and is much more fun to drive.
This past summer Hertz put me in an automatic
station wagon, which apart from having zero coolness whatsoever, also was a
pain to drive in the hills as it couldn’t down shift quickly enough.
The mom wagon in Tuscany. Sensible but not a great drive in the hills.
But be advised that most of the rental cars
in Europe are stick shifts. If you require an automatic you need to specify
that when you book your car, but it doesn’t mean you’ll get one. If none have
come back in when you are picking your car up you will be given a manual
transmission.
14. Rent A Diesel
In my experience renting endless cars in
Italy, diesels get much better gas mileage and diesel is much less expensive
than petrol/gasoline.
Expect to pay between $7 and $9 per gallon on
gasoline.
Whenever possible, book a diesel! They run quietly
and efficiently and leave you with more money for shopping.
You will have several insurance options with
your rental car. Choose the Super Cover option. This comes with zero
deductible, so if anything happens to your car you can walk away.
Most rental car companies have a 3000 euro
deductible and will have you paying through the nose for the smallest scratch.
A cursory glance at cars in Italy will tell
you that most of them are covered in dings and scratches.
The chances of someone bumping your parked
car or opening their door into it are huge, so it’s better to be safe than
sorry.
Super Cover is expensive and can add an extra
45 euros per day to your 20 euro per day rental, but can be worth every penny
if you get so much as one scratch on your car.
16. Stop At An Autogrille
At least once while you are driving on the
highways in Italy, stop at an Autogrille. These are something like our truck
stops in the U.S. but oh so different!
Yes you can gas up the car there, but they
also have a full espresso bar, a full bar, and really fantastic food.
Can you even believe this is a truckstop???
Unlike the guaranteed gastric turmoil of the smelly rolling sausages and dubious foods at truck stops here in the states, the food at the truck stops across Italy is tremendous. From fresh panini to crisp salads and much more, a country whose culture is so deeply bound into their cuisine doesn’t tolerate bad food for hungry travelers!
fresh salads at Autogrille
Even after all these years of travel in Italy
I still get a huge kick out of stopping at Autogrilles. Often we will buy
breads and cheeses and fresh sliced prosciutto at a local village market to
bring home for dinner then stop at an Autogrille on the way home and pick up
salad to have with it. You will love it!
It’s hard to imagine that there are still places in Italy that
feel undiscovered. Each year Italy gets somewhere between 33 million and 58
million tourists, but the bulk of them stick to the most famous destinations.
It amazes me that you can escape the crowds and still find totally incredible
places, filled to overflowing with priceless art, history and treasures,
without a t-shirt shop in sight!
This year when my June Glam Italia Tours were done I slipped off down to the deepest south, (very) southern Basilicata, to stay with my friend Martine at her idyllic Orangery Retreat. I wrote about the Orangery Retreat here. (Make sure you check this post out – this place is fantastic!)
In case you don’t know where Basilicata is, imagine Italy
being the shape of a boot. The long, thin heel of the boot is Puglia, the toe
of the boot is Calabria, and the instep, running between the two is Basilicata.
The Orangery Retreat is a series of vacation rental apartments
in historical La Rabatana, a hill town just above the town of Tursi. La
Rabatana was built in the 800s by the Arabs (Saracens), who ran the show for
the next 400 years.
At some point after they left, a church and monastery, known
as the Convento San Francesco, was built across the gorge from La Rabatana,
sitting atop its own hill with its own majestic view.
View of the Convento San Francesco from the balcony of the Mandarin at the orangery Retreat in Tursi, Basilicata
From the balcony of the apartment I stayed in, the Mandarin, I
had a clear view of the convent. Martine told me it was abandoned and had frescoes
dating back 700 years. I live for opportunities like this, so the next morning
we drove over there to have a look. The Convento is only 5 minutes drive from
Martine’s resort, plus another few minutes walk along an undriveable road.
Looking back at La Rabatana from the Convento san Francesco
Standing in front of the convent/monastery I looked back
across the gorge at La Rabatana and my apartment at the Orangery.
I would love to be able to give you the full run down on the abandoned church and monastery, but google as hard as I might, there seems to be very limited information available about it, and that which I did find was both full of holes and what appear to be some inaccuracies. Which just makes it even more fascinating.
My heart was pounding as we walked in – Martine wasn’t kidding
when she said it was abandoned!
It has also been raided.
I saw one blog post about the convent that said it was
abandoned in 1914, but somehow I think it was possibly long before then. This
place has been stripped to the bones.
There are gaping holes in the floor where tombs used to be.
The tomb on the left is where the noble woman was found
Not too long ago a tomb containing a noble woman holding her baby was excavated. Her dress was intact and is in the local museum. I am dying to know who she was, why she was buried in the nave of the church (in terms of hierarchy this is quite significant) and how she and the baby died.
The Art Hiding Inside The Abandoned Church
There are frescoes hiding behind these baroque walls
At some time during the Baroque period, the inside of the church got a retrofit. Huge baroque installations were built over the original frescoes, hiding them for centuries. As the baroque pieces were stolen and carted away frescoes emerged underneath.
Here is where it gets even more interesting. As I researched
the convent/monastery I kept seeing a construction date of 1441. But that
cannot be correct because frescoes freed from behind the baroque fixtures are
dated to 1377.
Fresco dated A.D. 1377
Similar to the artwork in Matera, which is perhaps an hour
drive from Tursi, the style of painting is very Byzantine. This shows just how
cut off from the rest of Italy Basilicata really was. This was the era of Giotto.
Italy was full of artists painting in a gothic, gilded style. Faces had
changed, art had changed. But not in deep Basilicata, where the art movement
was two to three hundred years behind.
Byzantine style fresco, painted in 1377 inside the abandoned church in Tursi
Seeing these frescoes made me feel the same as when I first
saw the frescoes in the rupestrian churches in Matera and at the Crypt of the
Original Sin. It knocks the wind right out of you, leaves you speechless.
And how crazy that these treasures sit unprotected in a church
that has been stripped? Looking along the length of the wall at the baroque
architecture all I could think was how many exquisite paintings are hidden away
behind here?
Italy is full of little towns like this, economically
disadvantaged but with sensational church art that goes unprotected. In my
travels across the country I always get excited to find these churches and have
always marveled at how the local people have taken care of them despite a
complete lack of funds. So seeing the Convento San Francesco in this terrible
state was totally jarring.
Attached to the church is the (also abandoned) monastery. This
has been attempted to be repaired but in a particularly nonsensical, grotesque
way. Concrete, and badly done concrete at that, defies logic.
Ugly modern concrete restorations at the abandoned monastery make no sense at all.
But you can still walk into the monk’s cells and see where and
how they lived, while marveling at their views across the valley below.
Unfortunately they now have ugly concrete floors, but it is still pretty
fantastic to see.
Room with a view. Inside a monk’s cell in the abandoned monastery at Convento San FrancescoMissing sections of floor and pieces of walls, the interior of the abandoned monastery also feels stripped
Another thing I found interesting with regard to when the Convento was built is the dome on the tower. It looks very Arabesque, which makes me wonder if it predates the 1377 frescoes, or if it was a later addition? I will have to add studying the architectural history of Basilicata to my to do list, just so I can figure this one out!
Ugly concrete making for a surreal restoration attempt of the monastery. Look at the dome and its interesting shape
Next time I stay at the Orangery Retreat in La Rabatana (I seriously cannot wait to get back there!) I want to find a local historian to explain everything here at the Convento to me. And then to take me on a walking tour through the fascinating town of La Rabatana. This place is an absolute treasure trove for anyone interested in history.
Did I mention I cannot wait to go back??
Is planning your trip to Italy stressful? Get insider info on everything from finding the best deals on flights, to how long to stay, where. Find out which wines and foods to order in each region of Italy, tips on everything from how to use the trains, the ins and outs of shopping, how to order coffee, what to do if you get sick while you’re away and much, much more in my Best Seller Glam Italia! How To Travel Italy: Secrets To Glamorous Travel (On A Not So Glamorous Budget)
has an entire chapter on all the ins and outs you seriously need to know before renting a car and driving in Italy. If you are planning on driving there I sincerely recommend you read it before renting a car or getting behind the wheel in Italy.
