Day 74: Stage 61: Roma: 17 km, Sun, 27°

Walking The Via Appia Antica - Finally!

Before leaving home to walk the VF I made the decision to walk a piece of road out of Rome that I’ve wanted to walk for years. I suggested the possibility to Rob during a training walk and he agreed to join me. 

We picked up a train at Termini Station and,

eventually found bin 20B in an obscure place in the massive station.  

Masked up we jumped on board. 

We passed by some remnants of old aqueducts that fed water into the ancient city which had a population of over 1 million people 2000 years ago. 



Arriving at our stop we I filmed some race horses for Saiorse and then we began walking down a highway. 

After a couple of kilometres we arrived at our destination. If you’ve been following my blog you might remember a post that I wrote back in the fall of 2013 when walking the Via Romana in northern Spain while crossing the Camino Frances to Santiago. I wrote a letter to my old grade 5 elementary school teacher Mr. Allen about the experience given he had inspired me to learn more about antiquity. The walk today has been long in the making! But finally it happened. 

The Avis Appia was the first Roman built Road that went Southeast right across the peninsula to Brindisi. This made it easier for Rome to expand its empire by sending troops across Italy where they picked up ships that took them deep into the eastern Mediterranean area. Including Greece, Persia and Egypt. In 1975 my sister Kathy and I saw the end of this Roman way in Brindisi while waiting for a ship to carry us across the Adriatic to Greece. I feel a little like I’ve gone full circle coming back to the beginning of this ancient roadway. The VF Sud has quite recently been put together and is a continuation of the route that I have just completed. It passes through Brindisi and goes well beyond into southern Italy. The first guidebook for this route has just been released. 

Today Rob and I walked about 17 km of the first stage, and with the 3 km we previously walked from the Vatican we have now travelled about 20 km of the first stage which I believe is around 25 km long. 

Looking south along the Via Francigena Sud. 

Reset off back towards Rome. It was a hot day, but fortunately we didn’t have to carry our regular packs that have been our companions for many days.



Along this very straight road there are mausoleums, burial sites and the remains of the homes and villas owned by the wealthier among the Roman population.

It really is quite a marvellous walk!



Rob took a little yoga break because he hadn’t been getting enough exercise these past two weeks😂



Much of the via has been repaved with more modern stone which allows cars to travel along this way. Sunday mornings no vehicles are allowed until noon, the main reason I picked today for our walk. 





However, much of the original Roman pavers remain making it challenging for walkers, bikes and motor vehicles to pass in some areas. 



Some of the surviving villas. 





Burial sites. 



















The catacombs run for kilometres under this area. Rob was an interested in visiting them, and because Annemarie and I climb down in certain way back in the day we continue to walk along.



As I said, the VF SUD is all sign posted and ready to be walked😂

We then passed through one of the many huge gates in the Roman wall that still surrounds much of the city. It’s amazing just how big the old city must’ve been! We walked quite a way to get back into the ancient centre of the city.





We happened onto a Sunday old car rally and had a fun look around. Some real gems!



The Via runs right past the massive Roman bath complex of Caracalla. We went on to visit the site and this completing my list of places that I’ve wanted to see, but haven’t been able to during my prior three trips to Rome. I feel complete!

The site is absolutely immense! It’s amazing the engineering and technology that the Romans had figured out or imported from other cultures.



There were baths, Olympic size swimming pools, cold pools, hot pools and the list goes on.







The mosaics alone are quite exquisite!



This is the circus maximus where the legendary Ben Hur ran his chariot races. Palestine Hill on the right.

And then we passed close by the forum and the Colosseum, but we didn’t stop as we have purchased tickets for Tuesday morning.

Of course we took a few photos on our way past. Hard to resist!







I mentioned something about gelato earlier in the day, and I guess it resonated with Rob because he insisted on gelato as we got close to our hotel. So very good! I think we earned them today🤣



As you know, I’ve been sending Saoirse multiple videos of all sorts of animals these past 11 weeks. Her favourites involve horses, and she had her dream realized in Ireland today when her parents took her to meet a real live horse. I believe she was actually able to feed the horse an apple. What a brilliant experience for her! 

Tomorrow we go back to the Vatican to pick up our testimoniums. We are then going to visit a whole bunch of the inexpensive or free sites as we wander our way back across Rome. I plan to post again tomorrow in case anyone is interested.