Wed 6th -Thurs 7th May
Accommodation: Villa Maria Teresa Boutique Hotel
Wed 6th May
We departed home at 7 am on Tuesday 6th May and finally arrived at our accommodation, just outside of Rome, at 4 pm Wednesday 6th May. This particular journey took forever, we’d been in transit for over 36 hours, and was a little more frustrating than others which started as soon as we walked out our gate.
Our Uber driver, Sam, arrived on time but Mark and I spent the next 45 minutes hearing how he blamed ‘Albo’ for all our government debt. Apparently it was minimal before Labor came to office which my quick googling as he spoke showed completely to be false. He claimed our PM was a traitor to the country unlike Trump who works so hard for his people. At this point I did want to ask him how long he spent watching SKY or listening to 2GB! He bemoaned how the US had things better than Australia which for me begged so many questions but, primarily, given he was Egyptian and only here for the last 15 years then why didn’t he head off to the USA!
Our flight from Sydney to Singapore involved a detour via KL, due to storm activity closing Singapore airport around the time of our arrival. We had been wondering what to do during our lengthy 6 hr layover in Singapore but, with the KL detour, it turned out that we barely had time to grab a bite to eat. Our primary concern with our journey had always been whether we’d make the final flight out Copenhagen, given we only had an 80 minutes buffer and the new European security measures at passport control were known to be causing some delay. However this flight ended up delayed too so that worked in our favour and we actually got through passport control in record time.
The uncertainty of whether we’d make our last flight meant I hadn’t booked any accommodation for our first night but, once we realised all of or bags, especially Dagwood (IYKYK) had made it to Rome, we then sought out a hotel and settled for one located down the coast at Formia. This was a grand old building which had once been a stately home but was now a boutique hotel run by the local nuns. The Villa Maria Teresa Boutique hotel fronted a glorious section of beach and offered great views out towards Mount Vesuvius. It was a grand building with lovely rooms, several outdoor terraced areas, a lovely pool surrounded by an outdoor dining area, and its own private beach club nestled amongst the many along this section of the coast. There was a conference on at the hotel during our visit but I anticipate they would probably be booked up year round for weddings! The whole venue was absolutely beautiful.
Our hotel room was also quite grand being a double room with water front balcony views from each room however we didn’t dwell too long inside and headed out fairly quickly to stroll along the lungomare. The water temperature was only 17 degrees otherwise we may have been tempted to head for a beach swim as it was a most glorious setting. There were lots of others out strolling but the many beach clubs were all closed. It’s worth noting that all of the many beach clubs we passed were modern, clean and exceptionally well maintained so I imaging they’d be quite pricey. We were just out of season now so the area was relatively quiet but heaven wonders what the place would be like in a few weeks time when peak summer hit! We ended up going back to our hotel to kill some time before the restaurants all opened as there was nothing open until 7 pm. This gave us an opportunity to enjoy a cocktail and the lovely terrace though so it all worked in our favour. We chose the closest restaurant to our hotel as were too exhausted to walk far but found, even at 7 pm, we were the only diners. This didn’t matter though as the food was good and that was all we needed before heading back to the hotel to tumble into bed after our very lengthy journey.
This is a rather beautiful part of the Italian coastline and well worth exploring. We were very grateful for our safe travel and arrival, our smaller than expected car and for having the opportunity to be in this beautiful part of the world.
