Rome in 2 days with as many hills and as few tourists as possible

Rome in 2 days? Sounds like a rush … however, the news is it can be done. And you needn’t spend all day “gladiating” tourist hordes in the Colliseum.

Neighbourhoods with fewer tourists:

• Trastavere “west of the river” (Google Maps)
• Around Via Serpenti (south from Via Nazionale) and Via Baccina (east of the Forum). My favourite cafe, La Bottega del Caffe, is at the intersection (Google Maps)

Cafes/restaurants:

• La Bottega del Caffe, Piazza Madonna (where Via Baccina and Via Serpenti meet, the nytimes appear to like it too)
• Cafe Baretto on Via del Boschetto (parallel to Via Serpenti)
• Cul de Sac near the Pantheon
• Cafes at Piazza Santa Maria in Trastavere

Cafe scene

Hikes and hills

• The seven hills are very central, easy to saunter between, and hence fairly busy (just print out a map before you go since maps are rare on the ground, and incredibly they are not all marked on tourist maps).

• Also, we found 2 really pleasurable hikes up above the urbanity. Firstly, the ridge to the west of the central city - Monte Giancolo from Trastavere to the Vatican (the last bit is in an incredibly surreal subway, access via the underground car park. Secondly, the ridge to the east, just head north from the top of the Spanish Steps (the further you go, the quieter it gets).

View from Giancolo hill

Place to stay

• The Beehive, an absolute oasis close to Rome Terminus station.

The touristy but absolute must do’s (take a deep breath, and alternate with a hike)

• The Roman Forum and Palatine Hill (simply stunning). Make sure you get the view of the Circus Maximus (which is otherwise not worth going closer to since its a scrubby dog park). Buy a combo ticket for Forum + Colloseum.
• The Colloseum (combo ticket with the Forum, but buy from the Forum for a shorter line).
• Views from the Capitoline Hill
• The Pantheon
• The Vatican complete with bizarreness effigies of women in childbirth around the main altar (you’ve got to give it to the catholics, they really do bizarre well)
• For even more bizarre, go the crypt of Santa Maria della Concezione (I won’t say any more except that I absolutely guarantee you won’t be disappointed)

The quietest photo ever taken of the Vatican from St. Peters Square (seriously)

The travelators in the bowels of the Vatican (where the nuns go on the run?)

The quietest photo ever taken on the Spanish Steps (seriously)

Guide book and maps

• One thing to watch is the poor quality of maps and signage through Rome. I really recommend Lonely Planet’s Best of Rome (please buy from your local bookstore, not from Gigantazon). It actually manages to meet the claim on its front cover “the ultimate pocket guide and map” - it truly is portable unlike some of its thicker cousins, and has the best map I saw.

Mount Sutro saunter

I’d often wondered about the accessibility of Mount Sutro (207m), one of the 7 hills of San Francisco. Seen from afar, it looked enticing - thickly wooded slopes rising up in the middle of the city. However, on maps it always tended to be marked “UCSF” so I assumed it was private university land.

I was really happy when a friend told me there were paths up there, and sure enough, there are lots thanks to the folk at Nature in the City who have been clearing paths (volunteer details here). We hiked up there on a Sunday in June and didn’t meet a soul in the lush Eucalyptus woods.

The only downside is the lack of view from the top. Those Eucalyptus trees are just too tall. But its still well worth the trip.

• Trail Map (pdf)
  
• Google Maps (with contours)

Kanji on the hills above Kyoto

If you find yourself in Kyoto and want to escape the hubbub, I recommend a climb up Mount Daimon-ji, famous because of the large kanji symbol (literally meaning “big”) carved on the hillside. You can see it huge from the centre of town, look on the hillsides to the northeast.

For such a beautiful nearby hike its surpisingly hard to find. Here’s what you do

• Travel to Ginkankuji, “The Silver Temple”, in the northeastern outskirts of Kyoto. There are plenty of buses from Karawamachi station.
• Facing the temple entrance, head down the street to the left, and take the first right before you go through the stone gate. Note there’s no need to pay the 500yen entrance to the table.
• Start heading up the valley, past the car park. The path splits a couple of times, take the branch each time with the most “footpath-looking” signs!
• After 30 mins you arrive at a small shrine at the centre point of the kanji, and you will be rewarded - if its clear - with a beautiful sweeping view over Kyoto, all the way down to Osaka to the south and the hills of Kurama to the north.
• The kanji turns out to be made up of a system of concrete bonfires which are lit for festivals.
• You can climb up further to the summit of the mountain through lovely forest (another 20 minutes each way - 466m). The path continues east from the summit. Watch out for snakes! I walked 200 or so metres further and saw the biggest snake I’ve ever seen slithering into the buses. Admittedly I haven’t seen that many snakes, but I was glad I had my trusty walking stick!

Here are some more pics:

Patrick Purcell RIP

Patrick Purcell died in early February, 2007: just a few days before his 78th birthday. Here are some of my memories of this true character.

I got to know Patrick during my time working on my PhD in the Intelligent and Interactive Systems group at Imperial College, 1999-2004. During those long years of late nights on level 10, Patrick could always be counted on for a helping hand.

Indeed, Patrick was renowned for inhabiting the labs late in the evening long after most faculty had departed. Thus Patrick was always on hand for giving advice to PhD students in need. He had a knack as for seeing through weak argumentation, and I’ll personally never forget the day he (constructively) tore apart my first draft of my PhD abstract. Wow, he was cutting (literally) … and my thesis readers thank him for it.

Other things I remember Patrick for:

• Chatting up waitresses half a century years his junior, spark in his eye, whilst on group dinners in South Kensington. His junior colleagues greatly admired his gift of the gab.
• At the lowest point of my PhD, Patrick was one of those who encouraged me to submit a paper I wasn’t happy with, but which consequentially got in to a prestigious conference
• Having the most gloriously messy computer desktop and office. Messy desk, tidy mind.
• For occupying hours of my - and other student colleagues’ - time diagnosing issues on his PC. Patrick insisted on relying upon an old Windows 95 PC and an even older Sun Sparc for doing his email and web browsing . It was the least we could do.
• Along with about 10 other PhD students, I was based in lab 1005, the old EEE cad lab, which was right opposite Patrick’s office. Patrick regularly popped in to use the 1005 fridge and I swear he was the one responsible for leaving not quite empty milk cartons on the shelf next to the fridge. These quickly started to smell. I never caught him though, so the mystery remains.

Patrick - you’ll be sorely missed. Here he is on the left of this pic checking out the photographer, and not at all exicted by whats intriguing his colleagues on the computer screen.

You can read more memories of Patrick on Sunny’s blog post.

Shareslides with SlideShare (but not on hosted wordpress …)

Congrats to my pals Jon and Rashmi for the launch of their latest baby, SlideShare, which allows you to :

• Publish presentations online (be they produced in Powerpoint, Open Office, Keynote … ) by embedding in any website via a funky flash player (but see below - it does not work in hosted wordpress)
• Collaborate with readers via the ability to tag presentations and place comments on individual slides.

Its been great watching Jon and Rashmi work on this project over recent months, and for it to finally come to fruition. Its already catching a lot of attention and has been called the “Youtube of powerpoint”, “The bastard lovechild of Youtube and Powerpoint” and “Bore the world of presentations” …

Cheers guys! - and I love the Bollywood server names!

Appendix: come on wordpress.com - please support embeddable slideshare on your hosted blogs!
Slideshare allows you to embed a flash-based viewer to play your preso in any webpage with an embeddable object tag:

<object type=”application/x-shockwave-flash” …

However, this breaks in hosted wordpress in the same way that embedded youtube code breaks. WordPress published a fix for youtube. How about the same for slideshare, guys?

Movie idea: Snakes in a Post office

Snakes on a plane -> in a post office

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/5215506.stm

North Korea + Nukes = Noodles?

We’re all aware of the tension in South east Asia over the recent North Korean missile tests. Anyway, I was chatting with a Japanese friend the other day, and commented that things must be quite stressful over there. However, she put my fears to rest and made me smile.  Apparently, the longer range missile  - the Taepodong - sounds like a type of Japanese noodle so no one is taking it that seriously!

For further relief see ther “Rocket man” cover of the Economist a couple of weeks back, and imagine Elton John playing in the background …

Mark E Smith is alive (just …)

I was lucky enough to catch The Fall playing live last week at the Independent. They still rock, but Mark E Smith is looking seriously, seriously old. Quite honestly, he looks like my 70 year old uncles looked … complete with cloth cap and Sunday best suit.

photo credit: mor 

My advice - see them quick. Next year he might be in a wheelchair …

One blog ain’t enough - for CHI2006

If you’re swinging by CHI2006, in person - or virtually, check out the other chi blog , set up by a few conference attendees including myself. We aim to provide an alternative to the official word (which is of course super-useful, but will it convey all the fun? We aim to …). If you’re interested in becoming a co-conspirator - drop one of us a line.

Lost in Los Angeles

I just spent a wonderful weekend in LA with Jon and Rashmi. Unlike my previous 3 visits, this time I really felt like I found "the city in the suburb".
Whats the secret to enjoying LA?

1. Buy a decent street map and skip the freeways. Last time I spent hours on I405 and I10 … this time drives down Wilshire, Western and Sunset stunned me with just how colourful the city is.
2. Have a car (OK, OK, so this is obvious, but you'd be surprised as to how many friends I have who have gone to LA and been p*ssed off that they can't get around easily on public transport)
3. Hang out with locals who know fun places to go and where to park.
4. If you can't hang out with locals, at least do some research before you go.
5. Through a combination of 3. and 4., know where you are going before you start driving (reference "trying to find a cocktail at 4pm in downtown Culver City)

Talking of research, here are some tips on museums, cafes, bars, restaurants and neighbourhoods I would recommend: