Monday, September 26, 2011

Ostia Antica

Deceived by the discouraging weather forecasts, we decided not to leave Rome for the week-end. And when on Sunday morning we woke up with a bright autumn sun, we first cursed the weather reports, and then we started frenetically consulting our travel guides to see how to remedy the week-end and where we could go on a one-day-trip.

The choice finally fell on Ostia Antica, the former harbour of ancient Rome, described by the guide as ‘as charming as Pompei’.

Well, perhaps the comparison with Pompei was a bit pretentious, but we have to say we were not disappointed. On the contrary, we enjoyed it very much - according to Mathilde it was even better than the Roman Forum.

Ostia Antica is a large archaeological site, particularly suggestive as immersed in the littoral pinewood.

Because it has been covered by mud for centuries, most of the ruins remained perfectly preserved. And because of the large area covered by the site (and because probably less advertised than the Roman Forum or Pompei) there are very few tourists: in many places we felt as we were the only ones visiting.

Highly recommended to anyone who will come to visit us!

(On a marginal note: for the second time in three days we managed to eat outside with Leo. Perhaps parenthood is not as black as painted…)

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