Home Run

I did something today that I have wanted to do for a long time. Using the maps on my cell phone, I walked about 1 mile to the Ara Pacis, the temple of Augustan peace. This beautiful structure was carved in the time of Augustus to commemorate the Pax Romana, a period of about 200 years when Rome so dominated the world that no other nation dared resist. This marble monument has always been housed indoors, so it is pristine, lovely and unweathered. I particularly wanted to see it because the cover of my New Testament introduction book in seminary was a photograph of this monument. The part of the monument displayed in the picture on my book is called “The Procession.“ My luck ran a little short however because the museum itself was closed. Today is May 1, and the museum is closed only two days a year, today and Christmas day. Even so, I was able to photograph it through the building’s glass side.

The other monument that I wanted to see is the mausoleum of the family of Augustus Caesar. This building was only discovered fairly recently and is still undergoing excavation and reconstruction. Scaffold and barriers were placed all around it to hide the ugly construction site, however, from the portico of the museum I was barely able to see over the barriers and grabbed a photograph of the structure. It was supposed to be open by now, but our guide tells me that it is still unfinished and will not be open for another couple of years.

So I still expect good things to come. There may be a time when I return to Rome and I can see both of these monuments restored and in their full glory. Nevertheless, I found them by myself, and walked to them by myself—to the two main monuments in Rome that I wanted to see. I’m sure these two places are not on the hit parade of most other tourists here. And I know that in the guided tours we will take for the next two days we will see many of the more popular attractions of Rome such as the Pantheon, the Colosseum, and the Vatican—all beautiful and worthy sites. No guide would ever take his tour group to see these two obscure monuments. But they are the ones that I wanted to see on this trip, and today I bagged them both. I called that a definite home run.Leer más