Porcetta and an Afternoon Walk through Rome

I ended up waking really early and no one was awake to join me. I decided to run a few laps around the campus grounds and found myself taking pictures again of this lovely campus. I have shared many emotions and discoveries on this campus. I have discovered a love of heritage on this campus. I decided to take a leap from everything I knew and understood to examine my life in another country.

 We are in Castel Gandolfo in late May with Walsh University. When my last program ended for the Spring of 2009, none of the olive trees were blooming, none of the kiwi plants were sprouting and the campus barely had a heart beat of spring. My first program ended late April. What a difference one month can make on the growth of life on this campus this May of 2010. I walk around and reintroduce myself to the campus. I love this little private moment I had this morning.


I came back into the lounge area and loaded my pictures up online for my family to view of my experience so far. By this time it was 11 am. I was joined by Dr. Fountain and we chatted about the past few days and what was planned for the day. Since it was the weekend, the Brothers were not supplying any breakfast, lunch or dinner. I asked the others in my group if we could walk up into town and have a Porcetta sandwich for lunch and then go into Rome to walk around. Everyone was up for it.


For anyone that is unsure of what Porcetta is: Porcetta is baby suckling pig roasted to amazing perfection, sliced up and enjoyed on a hard roll bun. This with a bottle of orange Fanta makes for an excellent lunch in my opinion. For lunch the group marched up that god awfully steep hill from campus to the summit of Castel Gandolfo to enjoy lunch. By the time we made it to the square, we were covered in sweat. No need to work out today, we just had our cardio work out walking up that hill.

The group of us with Lago Albano in the background

We all headed into Rome and walked the traditional walk through Rome that everyone from Walsh University does. The walk starts at the Spanish Steps and ends in Vatican Square. Mike, Steve and I pointed out different things to the others about Rome that we loved. We even stopped at the pizza shop just off of Via Octaviano near Vatican Square called Alice to have a piece of potato pizza. I would recommend this to anyone. It was like Rome had never changed and for Mike, Steve and I it was like we never left. The summer group was coming back tonight from their weekend trip in Venice. Our group would finally meet Danilo and for Mike, Steve and I it would be like old times here in Castel Gandolfo.