when in rome...

hello from rome. we have been staying at the italy farm stay (http://www.italyfarmstay.com/) for the past three days. we love it!!! it has been the most authentic italian experience. we went horseback riding yesterday...we went up and down steep hills, forded a river several times...it was the real thing, not one of those trail rides where your horse does it with its eyes closed. also we took a cooking class from our hostess. we learned to make pasta from scratch...then we ate it for dinner with homemade wine from the vineyard on the farm. it was so good! you are all invited to try it too, we plan to make it when we get home. today we decided to take a bus over to rome for the day (most tour books suggest 3 days for rome so you can imagine the walking we have done) this is by far the oldest city we have been in. we started with st. peters (in vatican city) and climbed to the top of the dome for a view of rome, moved on to the pantheon, saw the trevi fountain (so beautiful), then the forum and colosseum. we stopped for a late lunch of pasta and wine, of course, and the waiter treated us to some lemoncello (no idea how to spell that one) for dessert. now we are off to see the st. marie maggiore church which is supposed to be the oldest church in rome and beautiful (and free). love and miss you all. thank you for your notes it was such a nice surprise to finally get online and have mail. love you, steph and rach