A Full Day in Rome on the Hop-On, Hop-Off Bus

Boy, what a day. A good night's sleep prepared us for a full, information-filled, photo-filled day. We decided the best way to tackle the city was to do a hop-on, hop-off tour. We use hop-on, hop-offs quite a bit in other cities. They are easy for hubby since he can sit downstairs and listen to the narration while I can head upstairs and take the pictures. We typically do the entire loop first without getting off, then do a second loop where we do the hopping off. That was the plan for the day as well. But with us, like usual, plans change. And that's okay.

There are several bus companies that run throughout Rome. We chose the one requiring the least amount of walking to get to - the one that has their stop across the street from our hotel.

Right out our hotel window

We rode the entire route. There was so much to see and learn. 

Some impressions...it is busy here. Not just dozens of people or hundreds of people congregating in the touristy areas/sights but what looked like thousands of people. When hubby saw the lines inside and around the Colosseum he decided there would be no hopping off the bus today. It was difficult to get any photo without tons of people in them. Lots of cropping had to happen on these pictures!

Even a bird had to get into the picture.

Streets are wide in some areas and buses and taxi and motorbike drivers are moving in and around each other. And the roundabouts? Whew. Glad I wasn't doing the driving. Other streets are super narrow and I still can't figure out how they all shared the road.

Motorbike anyone?

There are sights we couldn't see from the bus that would require walking but hubby wasn't up to it so we skipped those. But we were surprised how close some of the sights were to the main roadway.  

Amazing that this is where chariot racing used to occur

We saw several bookstores set up along the streets. Our daughter would be in love.

Can you tell what that is in straight in front of us?

That's the Colosseum. The bus drives so close you can't get the entire thing in the picture.

Unless you're paying a pretty penny for a tour specifically for the disabled, much of Rome is off limits for the mobility challenged. Just looking at the steps made us a bit sad and made us realize we should have come here when we were younger.

We had expected the weather to be colder. We had no rain today (yay!) and didn't really even need much of a jacket. Leaves are changing and fall is here, though.

Like Vickie from Vickie and Bernie Travel mentioned, there is a large security presence. Vickie and Bernie are also in Rome right now and are pretty darn adventurous. Check out her blog here to find out about their activities.

When we saw these vehicles we thought our bus was parking for a stop. Nope. We were waiting our turn to get through the area. They are there to keep vehicles from plowing through the area. So stop at the planters, veer left, pull forward. Veer right to get around the first vehicle. Stop. Veer left to get around the second vehicle. Veer right to then carry on.

We encountered it elsewhere, too.

After doing one loop on the bus we got off to go the restroom back at our hotel room. We planned on getting back on the bus so I could get more photos but gee whiz, I had plenty. We decided to get a better feel for things in the area around our hotel. We stopped in a couple shops by didn't buy anything.

Look at the fun pastas.

We should have investigated restaurants a bit more. Trying to limit the cobblestones and uneven ground left us with few options. While we thought tucking down a side alley would lead us to a tasty adventure, it didn't. Left food on our plate even.

Probably should have gone down this way instead.

After an afternoon nap we decided to check out the terminal again. When we came in yesterday it was pouring rain, the place was crammed with thousands of people, I was dragging luggage, and the hawkers and panhandlers were bothersome. It left us with a not-so-stellar impression. Today we found there was an entrance/exit on the same street as our hotel. Dang! It would have saved us some time and energy if we knew about it yesterday. Oh, well.

It's a big station with lots of people. 

And again lots of panhandlers/beggars. Usually you can wave them off or tell them no and they move on. Not here. Stand in line to pay for anything and they don't leave your side. 

Yep, gelato twice today. Might as well when in Rome, right?

We were surprised the terminal didn't have any seating anywhere. Couldn't even find a bench out and about around our hotel either. Hubby usually has to take break when we're walking and he didn't get the chance today. He was a trouper though and made it through. Two and a half miles for the day between cobblestones, uneven sidewalks, and solid ground. Good job to him.

Back at our hotel, I spied out the window something that just might be the Vatican?

Tomorrow we're off to meet up with the Crown Princess. Our hotel is one of the hotels Princess uses for cruise passengers so we considered booking the Princess bus to the port. But when we spoke to the rep today she suggested a private transfer. For about $10 more we could get a car for just the two of us that will drop us off in the port area. After the struggles hubby has had these last couple days getting on and off buses with the airport to Rome bus and the hop-on hop-off bus, he's glad he's not climbing up and down those bus steps again. Between our last go-round in Florida with his falls, the flight issues we had on our way here, and then the struggles getting around Rome, this has been an eye-opening last few months. And not in a good way. But we're still plugging along and thankful to be able to do what we can!

The Friday 15

Today's Friday 15 - those 15 items I get rid of each week - is mostly a list and not photos. Before we headed out of town I sent a bunch of things on their way without taking photos.

To my daughter went two pair of pants, one sweatshirt, two Christmas ornaments from upcoming tutorials, four stuffed fabric pumpkins and one candy corn trick or treat bag from the tutorials earlier this month, and one rope toy for her dog. That's 11.

To our neighbor went a fidget mat that I made. These mats help soothe the anxiousness that comes from patients with dementia and Alzheimer’s. They also are helpful for kids with autism.

A tutorial for this will be coming up on November 6.

That makes 12.

And three little sweeties had to go back to Simply Cats. I've been fostering another bunch of baby kitties for them. Goodbye to Pink, Christina, and Maya.

And that makes 15.

Want to know more about fostering cats? Check out the video I made for Simply Cats this summer.

First Day in Rome

First of all, let me just say...A 12 hour non-stop flight is just too dang long for us. Cerebral palsy boy and rheumatoid arthritis girl just can't do it. We flew Delta from Boise to LAX. Then Delta partnered with KLM who partnered with Air Alitalia. So it wound up being an Air Alitalia plane for the 12 hour LAX to Rome overnight flight. Those seats are tight and close with no legroom! Add in the two folks who sat in front of us reclining their seats all the way back the entire time and it was a miserable trip. The guy sitting in front of me must have had a seat that was a little off because when he reclined his it smashed into my knees. I could not move my legs at all. Ever. And in the reclining position the top of his seat came within just a few inches of my face. Seriously. Maybe six or seven inches away from my head. The whole flippin' flight. Along with hubby being squished by the person in front of him, his TV screen wouldn't turn off so he had a glow in his face all night.

Then there was the baby who was crying. And the restroom I wound up in with no toilet paper. Oh, yeah, and the flight attendant who was gruff and stern and downright rude to passengers (not to us, thank goodness), raising her voice, pointing her finger. Then there was the one who kept coughing in his hand as he was pouring beverages, including my water. I'm going on record right now - if I get sick it is because of him.

And shall we talk about the wheelchair assistance issues at both LAX and Rome? We won't, but we had problems both places.

All those things rolled into one day made us come to a decision.

Never again. Never again will we take an overnight flight. Never again will we take a long flight. Our bodies can't do it. The amount of physical pain the last 24 hours has caused? Unbearable. So we won't be attending that wedding in India. We won't be visiting Australia. And Norway just got taken off our must-see list.

But we're in Rome. Not sure it was worth what we endured, but maybe after the Tylenol PM kicks in and the morning comes we will have a bit more clarity. After taking the Terravision Bus (only 5.30 Euros when you buy the ticket ahead of time -  a great bargain) to the Termini Station we I dragged the suitcase across all those darn cobblestones to get to our hotel. In a drenching rain. In fact, it's been nothing but drenching downpours since we arrived.

A rainy bus ride

We're wet, our clothes are wet, inside the backpack is wet, and the suitcase is in pretty darn wet as well. Clothes are stripped and we have our pjs on - at 3:30 in the afternoon.

Rainy view out our hotel window

We did collect a stash of snacks from the plane (it was too uncomfortable to eat much) along with our two protein bars so we have a boring, mostly unhealthy dinner.

First night's dinner in Rome.

We are desperately in need of some rest. We'll regroup tomorrow and hope to make a better day of it.

And Away We Go...

If you remember, back last year we realized we didn't want to do a bucket list. We followed the lead of Scott Jones (you can see his inspirational Ted Talk here) and decided on a f*** it list. You can find our list here.  If you notice, the first thing on our list is no early mornings. But we had to make an exception today. 

While we were originally going to use this early morning flight to get us a long stopover in Amsterdam on our way to Rome, our flight was changed a couple months back and we were being rerouted through LAX. We could have used those hours in LA to take a tour or head to the beach, but with security the way it is, with traffic the way it is, and with the way hubby's mobility is, we thought it best to just stick close. So a relaxing breakfast, relaxing lunch, and lots of people watching was planned. We found ourselves a quiet corner and did just that.

And also watched construction.

Had some delicious wood-fired pizza.

Left an encouraging words money pocket in a restroom.

Now away we go!

Make a Fabric Owl Ornament - Tutorial Tuesday

It's Tutorial Tuesday and today we're making an owl ornament you could use year 'round. Not just for Christmas!

For this project you will need:

• 2 pieces of fabric for body
• 2 pieces of fabric 
• Sewable HeatnBond ®,
•  buttons 
• Small felt scraps
•  Ribbon
• Polyester fiberfill
• Owl Ornament template downloaded from here
• Marking  pencil

• Pins or Clover Wonder Clips
• Iron
• Sewing machine
• Matching thread
• Rotary cutter
• Cutting ruler
• Cutting mat

The pattern is now available in my Etsy shop as a digital download with the written directions, step-by-step photos, and printable template. Click to get your copy today!

Looking for more Christmas ideas? Check out some of my other projects?

Disclosure: Deb's Days is a participant in affiliate advertising programs designed to provide a means for me to earn fees by linking to affiliated sites. This means that, at no additional cost to you, I will earn a small commission if you click through and make a purchase. Your purchase helps support my work in bringing you new sewing and crafting content.

You can find the step-by-step how to video for the homemade fabric owl Christmas tree ornament sewing project here:

Yummy Monday - Pig'n Pancake, Seaside, Oregon

It's Yummy Monday! Today we're talking about the Pig'n Pancake restaurant in Seaside, Oregon.

We were driving outside Astoria, Oregon a few months back and saw a billboard for a place called Pig'n Pancake. My mind went right to pigs in a blanket. Which I can't stand. I may have even said gross out loud.

Then a couple days later we were in Seaside, Oregon and I was searching on my phone for a place for breakfast that had good reviews.

We needed to make a stop at the local bank and saw that the Pig'n Pancake place was about a block away. And it had great reviews.

It was so not a pigs in a blanket place. (Thank goodness.) We had probably one of the best Denver omelets we've ever had. Chock full of bacon and onions and peppers and tomatoes and cheddar cheese. Oh, yum.

We also had lingonberry Swedish Pancakes. A double yum.

Look at their cute plates!

I'm always surprised by the amazing - and delicious - things we run into by chance. 

Cruise Ship Saturday - A New Adventure and Extended Travel FAQs

It’s Cruise Ship Saturday and we have a new extended adventure coming up next week that'll take us a while to get through.

Fly Boise to LAX to Rome.

A couple days in Rome.

Board the Crown Princess for an Italy-France-Spain-Portugal-Ft. Lauderdale transatlantic voyage.

A Florida Keys road trip.

Board the Royal Princess for a Caribbean cruise.

A flight from Ft. Lauderdale to Atlanta to San Francisco.

Board the Grand Princess for a Mexican Riviera Cruise.

Stay onboard for another Mexican Riviera Cruise.

Fly home.

I'll be blogging live the whole trip so keep an eye out for new posts each day!

But before we head out next week for that lengthy adventure I’m covering some FAQs about traveling for an extended period of time. It's a long post, but pretty darn thorough. (I had a lot to say.)

You used to spend all your time Alaska; now you’re all over the place. Did you get bored?  What changed?

We definitely didn’t get bored with Alaska! Hard to believe that we’ve been 15 times and we still want to go back. But now we aren’t working and can move around any time of the year from ship to ship, place to place, in order to meet up with our crew member friends. That’s the reason we do so much ship-hopping – to get to as many of our crew buddies as we can.

How do we choose which itineraries to cruise / regions to visit?

We don't care where we go. There hasn't been a place we haven't liked! So for us, it starts with price. When something pops up with a great (and sometimes unbelievable) price, we then look at other cruises before and after it. We also look at the list of our National Parks we still need to visit to see if we can tie it into the trip. Then we go from there. We'll be able to get three new National Parks in during this upcoming trip.

What’s the best part of extended traveling?

Being able to be completely immersed in travel mode. It takes several days to finally relax once we’ve left home, and having an extended time away lets us really get into the relaxing mode. No worrying about meals and cleaning and sprinklers and grocery shopping. It’s like running away from home and living in a different world. Who wouldn’t want a trip like that to last as long as it could?

What’s the worst part of extended traveling?

The organization it takes. We really don’t like having to stick to a schedule, but when planning for an extended trip there are so many moving parts – flights, taxis and buses and shuttles, ships, hotels, rental cars, specific places we want to visit – so we need to have some sort of structure. I make a spreadsheet that shows where we are every single day (that part is set in stone) but thankfully the rest is flexible. We like being able to wake up in the morning before deciding what to do for the day. We can't predict how we'll be feeling on a specific day a month from now (heck, we don't even know about tomorrow) so we don’t book many tours ahead of time.

Here’s what part of our May-June spreadsheet looked like.

One of the other things hard about extended traveling is we don’t really get to relax when we’re home. When we're not traveling we're either hurrying to get things done around the house before we leave or trying to get the house back in order after we get back. And let’s not even talk about how furiously fast I have to work to pre-tape Tuesday Tutorials before we leave again! This year we traveled Washington and Alaska in May and June, the Caribbean in August and September, and now another trip in November and December. It has almost been a year of too much traveling spread out too much throughout the year. (If there was such a thing.)

Have I always had the travel bug?

Hi, my name is Deb and I'm a travel addict. I used to camp with my grandparents every summer so it started young. A couple months back my mom brought one of my old school papers dated February 10, 1976. In my fifth grade handwriting I had included this in a poem:

Looks like I had adventure on my mind even back then.

Once my husband and I became a two-career family we started traveling together with our daughter. Almost every Thanksgiving break, Christmas vacation, spring break, and summer vacation since then has been spent traveling. We even traveled all 50 states with her before she went off to college. Thanksgiving in Iceland? Christmas in Hawaii? Spring Break in London? Easter in Mexico? 4th of July in Alaska? Been there, done that. 

How much longer will we do this?

I’m not sure. Every time we take a trip I think it’s going to be the last one. Hubby’s cerebral palsy is continuing to make movement harder for him and it will only get worse. And the falls he's had aren't helping things. My rheumatoid arthritis isn’t improving, both knee replacements are wearing out, and having only one working lung continues to make things a bit of a struggle. I’m not certain how adventurous we can be anymore. In fact, I just canceled a month-long trip to South America. I think it’s time for us to stop planning ahead and instead live a day at a time. I say that, but yet we talk about living in Alaska for the summer. Go figure.

What do we pack when we cruise?

Still using the one shared suitcase and shared backpack.

Hubby struggles enough walking on his own so we make sure his hands and arms are always free. If we want to take something I know I’ll be the one responsible for carrying it through the airport or into the hotel so we keep extras to a minimum. Just call me the pack mule! We only take one set of nice clothes in case we wind up at the Most Traveled Guest party. Otherwise it’s casual all the way. Nothing exciting or unusual can be found in our suitcase. Other than being loaded with a bunch of snacks for crew members.

One trip required an extra suitcase just for crew snacks.

And my encouraging words money pockets that I'll be dropping off each day somewhere along the way. I have Euros for some of them, too.

Cut, glued, labeled, stuffed, and ready to go.

How do I prepare my blog posts, and how long do I spend writing them?

I usually type them up in a Word document, copy and paste, and then add the photos. When we were on the Caribbean Princess for the month they had the amazingly super-speedy unlimited internet so I could work right within the blog post. But alas, these next couple months will be spent on ships where super-slow internet is the norm. Most likely I won’t be able to post many pictures until we get to some speedy land-based internet. Probably a good thing as I work way too much on blog stuff when I’m traveling. (And I still wind up with mistakes.)

Do I blog while I’m home?

Unfortunately (or is it fortunately?) I do. For years I did a post a day based around a picture I took. 1000 straight days of pictures and stories. (That’s the Pic a Day Project tab at the top of this page.) Then I took a break. At the beginning of this year I decided it was time to get all my travel “stuff” off my computer and do something with it. This year my new content schedule has been crazy.

I’ve had to work hard to get information and photos posted several times a week. At the end of this year I’ll be re-evaluating things. I’m not sure what next year’s blogging will look like yet, but I need to cut back a bit on something.

What travel apps do I recommend?

For someone who used to teach technology classes to teachers, I’m a pretty boring app person. Just a few months ago I figured out (with my daughter’s help) that I could download Google Maps for offline use. I use Mobile Passport every time we go through Port Everglades to get us into the super-short Global Entry line. I do use WhatsApp a lot because that's how we communicate with our crew member pals. Looking at the home screen on my phone you can tell how boring I am.

What are some of my favorite travel websites and blogs?

There are two blogs I use as resources for every cruise we take. If we’re heading to a new port or are even going to a port where I’d like to do something different, I head to both sites to do my research. 

*Yellow Fish Cruises (Pescado Amarillo) has been writing about winters at sea for nine years now.  Look at all the cruises she's written about! And I can't even get all her port information into one photo. She just headed back out for a trip most of us could only dream about and boy, does she have plenty of ports coming up in the next few months. And thanks to her, I’ve borrowed stolen most of these FAQ questions from her blog. (Thanks, J!) If you want to see how a seasoned cruiser with over 1,000 days on a ship answers these questions, check out her FAQ post here. 

*Vickie and Bernie Travel is my other go-to. Vickie blogs all about Princess Cruises but also has a bunch of port information there. Just look at it all! Vickie is going to be the South America destination expert for the Royal Princess next year so I'm sure her resource list will continue to grow. I was able to meet Vickie on the Caribbean Princess in August and she'll be on our ship these next couple weeks. We have something in the works for both our blogs, so stay tuned.

Since they’ve both been blogging live from cruise ships for the last several years they have a ton of great information on ship life, too. They are also are fun to read when I’m stuck at home with nowhere to go. They both have great connections with crew, staff, and officers. We love it when others love and respect the same people we do. Be sure to check out both of their blogs. You'll see why I like reading them so much.

*I use Viator quite a bit for when I do need to book things ahead of time. We’ve used companies on Viator for both tours and transfers around the world. We're using them at least a couple times (so far) for this coming trip.

*If you haven’t signed up for the USPS Informed Delivery service, do it. You’ll get to see a scan of the mail being delivered each day. Even though we have our mail held while we’re gone, it still shows us what is coming. How did we travel without this?

Does extended travel like this still excite us?  Is taking one long cruise better than several shorter ones booked back to back? Are four cruises in a row four times as much fun as taking one cruise?

We much prefer the extended traveling over the one-cruise thing we had to do when we were working. We are comfortable on the ship and when we visit the same ports again and again, those begin to feel like home, too. But I think one of the biggest plusses for us in repeating the same itinerary is the flexibility. When we hit a port just once we feel like we have to cram in as much into a day as humanly possible. We want to see it all. Which leads to exhaustion. Makes the vacation feel like work. I surely don't want that so I like revisiting the same ports several times. But four cruises in a row aren't really four times more fun; they are just more relaxing. 

We’re not big on the longer cruises. Passengers on longer cruises are typically more well-traveled and can be a bit more "particular." Just like I shared in September:   

An older lady saw my black (Elite) card. Then she looked at me. Then she looked hard – really hard – at the number of cruises on my card. I could see her mind spinning, trying to figure out how someone looking like me (younger, chunkier, wearing shorts and a t-shirt) could even be in her “Elite” group. The judgement eyes were upon me. Big time.

Those instances happen more often to us on the longer cruises so we don’t do more than one every couple years.

Whew, that was a lot. Now, off to finishing up trip preparations. See you next week from Rome!

The Friday 15

15 more items are gone from my home.

• Old, holey tennis shoes I should have stopped wearing long ago.
• My favorite two piece swimsuit so faded and stretched that it should have been tossed out even longer ago.
• A pair of sweats, a dress, a top, and a lace cover up.
• Three magazines.
• A calculator.
• An attempt at a Christmas tree for a tutorial.
• Three Christmas tutorial projects. (Tutorials to be posted in the near future.)

15 on their way - some to the trash and some to Idaho Youth Ranch.

5 Things to Know: Labadee, Haiti

Today we're talking about the cruise port of Labadee, Haiti. Learn about five important things you need to know about the private Caribbean island.

1. You can't leave the port area. Seriously, you really can't. No going off on your own to see the real Haiti, no independent tours, no taxis. The property is fenced off from the surrounding area. It's leased by Royal Caribbean for use by Royal Caribbean, Celebrity, and Azamara cruise ships and they want to be sure to keep their passengers safe. 

2. Lunch is served - for free. But the tasty drinks will cost you. Try a Labadoozie, a frozen rum and juice combo. Comes with a reusable cup, even.

3. Lounge chairs are free, too. Move them where you want. 

4. For the least-busy beach, head to Columbus Cove. It'll be a (bit) quieter than the rest. 

 Want more activity? Check out the roller coaster, zip line, or aqua park.

5. You can get to and from the ship and around the compound by using a tram that runs continuously. But if you're up before noon and want to head from the ship to the area, catch the free ferry. It's docked right next to the ship. If you're not careful, you'll walk right by it. It's one way only - ship to shore - and doesn't operate all day.

This photo was taken while sitting on the ferry. It's that close!

Whatever you decide to do on Labadee, make it a great day.