Rome

A lovely mild day in Rome, I walked beside the Tiber which is a pretty jade green not the muddy brown of January. I saw a man catch a large fish before I dived into a church then a museum and then the endless laneways of little shops to get Johnny's birthday present. There are more tourists here than I usual, it is a positive town of babel but always fun, well mostly. I am really enjoying the freedom of doing exactly what I want after the inevitable restrictions of being in a tour. One of the others from the group is still here and we meet for dinner but go our own way in the day, best of both worlds.
I have very specific things I want to see but if they are shut, on tour, swathed in scaffolding or just plain disappeared its not a tragedy. There are always other things to see. Today it was Caravaggio, one of his sullen, sexy, touselled and very tactile John the Baptist representations. Not terribly religious but very appealing. Unfortunately no photographs in the museum

So many things

One minute its a deserted synagogue the next an enormous arch in the middle of nowhere or an entire city perched on the edge of a cliff or the sea. Some of the cities are purely Roman but others developed out of Punic or Numidian roots; its interesting to see the differences and similarities:

Tunisia

I have so many photos its quite haed to find the ones I want; I am sitting in an internet cafe desperately trying to give a coherent view before 4 when the bus is coming back this way; I think it is a hopeless task.

Tunis

There is such a lot here to see; The amazing mosaics of the Bardo Museum; the cheesy Kasbah; the beauty of the wealthy suburbs painted all blue and white by law which were relentlessly cute. Then we went out to the cities around; each one with something unique to offer<;

Sabratha

Hottest day so far and site with the least cover. However best theatre ever. Tomorrow we leave at 4.30am for Tunis. The hotel has managed to lose my blue shirt in the wash but I will miss the computer in the room and the massage chair, even if the instuctions are in Japanese. No opportunities to really go shopping which is a shame

More Leptis

Leptis Magna

What can you say about Leptis Magna, it takes the cake. Only rivalled by something like Pompeii everything else dwindles by comparison. Gradually deserted as urbanisation failed it was preserved by being buried in the dunes. Much is still unexcavated.

Ptolemais and Apollonia

Ptoemais is very dry and was well supplied with cisterns in ancient times. The enormous govenors house supplied the museum with some interesting finds but much of what is there is from the Byzantine period.
Apollonia is, especially since Africa dropped two meters, by the sea. A Greek city it was the port for Cyrenia

Cyrenia

This town, a few miles inland on the top of the escarpment, has some incredible views and a divided heritage, also now a lot of gum trees. The hellenistic baths are still there beside the far more elaborate Roman ones. You can see us sitting in the separate hip type baths of the helenistic period.The temple of Zeus was rebuilt by the Romans but is still pretty impressive. They have a strange funerary cult with blank faced statues of Persephone

Tripoli

Fun today in Tripoli, we started by going to the museum which is in the Red Fort at the edge of the old town. with so many Roman cities they had a good collection. Gadaffi's car from the revolutionary days was there with Drusus and Germanicus, neither of whom I can remember seeing giant heads of before. There were excellent mosaics and then we went into the medina. Scattered around amidst more modern buildings were pieces of ancient roman architecture. We finished up at a very pretty mosque.