Rome, 2026 European Vacation

Now in Rome, which is fun, cosmopolitan, energetic and the May weather was exquisite.  Walked four miles and electric biked another 15.  I think the total tallies for my move-about - 1000 miles on a motorcycle (on and off road), 25 miles on an electric bike and about 40 miles walking around.  All the above were done in a somewhat random fashion of having a destination but a bit variable on how to actually get there. The bicycling specifically was done without charting a course, which makes sense especially as it was electric-assisted, meaning you can make up time or ground whenever you decide.  Walking that’s not true at all and when you want to be done, you actually don’t want to be 3 miles from home.  Even motorbiking you can’t go hog wild without a direction since you can end up a 100 miles in the wrong direction before you know it.  Biking without electric assist also has its limits since once you are tired, you are tired, and a hill is a hill.

Section E of Terminal 1 of the Rome Airport sends you through a curved gauntlet of a terminal, first leading you without escape through several Vegas-like brightly lit duty free shopping areas hawking everything but a postcard or Roma tourist stuff.

Rome was pretty, busy, entrepreneurial, hawkish.  A new item I hadn’t seen before being sold at street level were small battery phone chargers, which was pretty genius - though getting a real one I guess is a challenge (mine works fine) and randomly plugging a street item into your phone seems somewhat hazardous - 1, the damage it could do to your phone and 2, the ability to hack your phone with location and data stealing seems like it should be a real concern.  But not real enough not to be charged up.

I’ve stayed in a lot of hotels, and even a fair share of airport hotels, but this Marriott mid-way between FCO (Rome airport) was an experience.  The lobby was just gigantic, an open floor plan concept if there ever was one, with check-in, concierge, bar and big restaurant under the same giant frescoed roof.  It was also a bit in the middle of nowhere, while still being central to both the airport and the city.  Big chain hotel with a clear mission of keeping a large amount of guests well-spaced and comfortable. 

I hate my Beats head phones.  Either I have big ears, or I accidentally bought a kids set, or they are meant for someone different than me - but they hurt my ears.  They weren’t cheap but they sit on my ears instead of over them like my Bose or Sony’s do.  Makes no sense, which makes me think I’m missing something about them, since they are popular.

The Chatwal Lodge in Sullivan County in Chapin Estate is closing, with little notice or explanation.  First the Dream Hotel bought it from founder Steve Dubrovsky and his partners if he had any at that time, and they seemed to have flipped it to Hyatt, who seemed to realized the water levels on the lake have been depressed for a decade or more, meaning not only do the homeowners look onto a moonscape of water level hope and consternation but any guests primary takeaway would be ‘wtf, where’s the water?’

Remarkably, to me, who has outlasted most of these better-funded projects with my real local knowledge, was that someone, especially smart hospitality owners, would have fallen in for the idea that this project had a chance to be vibrant.  The salesmanship behind that would have been fun to see and probably involved a cowboy-owner wowing some Indians from the Sub-Continent (the Dream Hotel is from there I believe), taking advantage of their eager-beaver desire to be cool and American.  By the time it sold in 2017, a friend in the know told me he thought the original founder was bouncing checks things had gotten so tight.  And then wallah, a sale to a bunch a know-nothings - there’s always a sucker out there.  But who knows, maybe I have no idea what I’m talking about, wouldn’t be the first time.

While they aren’t in contract yet, we are moving very quickly into contract on $2.5m of homes I was just talking about in previous posts that are some of the primary goals of this years business activities, plus another $800k of previously signed, finishing up projects.  We had all year to get it done, and here it is in May - could be another one of those big big years that have become common-place, especially with the team I have in place right now, in the office and in the field.  It just occurred to me as well, if these deals happen, I’ve put nearly $5m in deals together in the last 90 days between my spec homes and our ‘your land our homes’ program.  Pretty serious accomplishment made possible by -wait for it - the team we have in the office and the field.

One thing for sure is bluetooth connection across all platforms is much improved - even hooking up my Beats to the business class entertainment system went off without much of a hitch, which is unheard of.  Hotel radios, radios in rental car, etc… are becoming less of act of guesswork and hope and pray, and more of a ‘your connected’ exercise.  That’s progress, even if Iphone voice text transcription is still a great example of the truism that monopolies stop improving as prices increase, be a railroad car in 1890, TV stations in the 70’s, Microsoft Windows, or the phone companies (Baby Bells) up until the early 80’s.  Protected politically, risk adverse, and little incentive to push into new expensive unpredictable markets or products. 

You hear all the time about the nature of food preservatives in the American food chain, and the lack of nutrition in our food and how much of our seemingly healthy food is really just a vacuous chemical-filled product with a distant relationship to real food.  I ate a lot on this 3 week vacation, so if I haven’t put 10 lbs on, I am a live test case of how pure food, regardless of quantity, doesn’t cause obesity like fake food.

I love my transatlantic business class flights, though it appears I wasn’t mistaken when thinking the plane on the way over was an older model with seats that lacked the requisite cushioning.  The A330-900 neo I’m on now, with 3 hour Avatar movie queued up on the entertainment screen.  I’ve turned down the wine, champagne and cookies, and am settling into a comfortable flight - though, not be obnoxious, but being in the first row leaves me exposed to a little too much food and cabin activity right in front of me.   Got my slippers ready, blankey nearby, and a host of Air Italy goodies in the goodie bag, including moisturizer, eye blinders, and some other items.

When I landed from Corsica to Rome, it was May 18th.  That was a day a nationwide strike was underway to protest Israel’s genocide in Palestine, and now it seems other countries.  Per the press release - 

“Workers in two dozen cities had announced strike demonstrations on May 18, with additional solidarity protests launched throughout the day in response to Israel’s acts, leading to day-long mobilizations in many regions. USB emphasized the actions were in continuity with markings of Nakba Day during the weekend of May 15-16 and with a national demonstration against war and rearmament announced for Saturday, May 23.”

‍AI describes it as “The strike was organized following a call from the USB union and other civil society groups under the slogan "We block everything." Participants opposed rising living costs, increased military spending, and what they described as government priorities favoring armament over healthcare and education”.

Whatever the reason, I wasn’t aware of it and flew into the teeth of it Monday the 18th, with a lack of transportation from the airport, and hundreds if not thousands of people looking for ways out of the airport, as gridlocked traffic and strikes impacted the ability to get anywhere.  Unaware of the strike and thinking waiting a few hours would be the trick (and not being in a hurry), I did just that, organizing some photos, etc…

When I went back outside, it was worse.  I only had 10 miles to my hotel, but there was not a lot of options except for downtown Rome and even that was tough since there was the type of traffic leading into the airport that had people walking with their luggage scenario on the highways trying to make their flights.

So, I took matters into my own hands, and walked around with two crisp Benjamin Franklin’s until I found a taker, 4x the normal fee of my destination.  I was in a car in about 3 minutes with a lot of wonderment on a lot of people.  What did Tom Cruise’s sidekick say in that sports agent movie? - “Show me the Money”. The thing about traveling these days for me is that I’m not looking for a struggle from getting here to there - if going from Point A to Point B is painful, the whole trip will have lagging and negative impacts from the travel itself.  

My 3 French golf partners.