Thursday 23rd. May
Today we were off to Rome for the day, mainly to see Beatrice compete in the International Horse show in the Borghese Gardens.
After a quick up of coffee and some fruit we dressed and were ready for Stefania by 7.30 a.m. We drive into Pescara and parked her car, then Bruno drove us to the train station where we just made the Prontobus to Rome in time.
The bus took off and stopped in Chieti Scalo, Torre de Passo and Avezzano on its way into the Tiburtina bus station in Rome. The bus was comfortable and cookies and even espresso was served by the conductor. As the mountains of Abruzzo gave way to the flatter plains of Lazio the weather was fine and sunny.
After we arrived in Rome we took the Metro from Tiburtina to Termini and then changed to the A line to go to Piazza Spagna. The piazza and the adjacent ‘Spanish’ steps were crowded as usual with tourists. Walking onward, we came to the Fontana DI Trevino which was so crowded that one could hardly see the fountain at all!! Despite the fact that it was early in the season, there were huge numbers of tourists surrounding the monument. We took a couple fo photos and then walked a short distance to a panini shop where we bought panini sandwiches and walked a bit further until we found some church steps to sit and enjoy them.
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| Piazza Spagna |
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| The'Spanish Steps, (looks like Stefania has a comment to make!!) |
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| 'The City College of True Urban Propaganda - is this where 'fake news' is learned?? |
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| At a packed Fontana di Trevi |
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| A very smart carabinieri outside the Quirinale |
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| The huge and impressive Quirinale |
Then, Stefania wanted to find the Via Veneto which leads up to the Borghese Gardens. The GPS indicated it was a short walk but after walking up past the Quirinale, we decided that it was not so short and took a cab which dropped us by the gates to the Gardens. We had a little difficulty finding the Hippodrome where the horse show was being held but eventually found a large arena and sat down in some seats which were reserved for riding students and teachers to await the start of the competition. Then, Stefania asked someone to make sure that we were in the right place and it turned out we were not, so we walked over to the smaller arena where the younger people’s events were taking place and soon met up with Sergio, Beatrice’s father and the young lady herself. Beatrice was obviously nervous and was worried about remembering the course and which obstacles to jump in which order more so than actually jumping them which she was more confident about. She walked the course with her trainer and the measured the distance between jumps so that she could guide the horse when to take a stride and when not.
Soon the competition started and the young riders, riding what looked like alarmingly large horses for the size of their riders took on the course, There were some refusals and even falls but no one was hurt and the, mostly girl riders, performed very well. Then it was time for Beatrice Caputi to take the course. She jumped very fluently until she cam to the penultimate obstacle when the horse took and extra stride, landed awkwardly and Beatrice was not able to stay in the saddle and fell to the ground. Neither she note the horse were hurt but I am sure that some pride took a small knock. She seems to be a very competent rider and this sort of thing can happen to anyone. She has another competition tomorrow and maybe a third on Saturday so I am sure that today’s experience will have been very worthwhile.
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| Beatrice discusses the jumping course with her trainer before the start of the competition |
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| Sergio, Beatrice and her trainer refresh before the competition. |
The video should open here:
Afterwards, we met Beatrice, her father and trainer and they debriefed on what had gone wrong and I felt that the trainer (although I did not understand exactly what he was saying) was positive and felt that Beatrice had performed well up until the unfortunate mis-step. I have a video of her round which shows her very confident start.
We decided to go back and see a little of the senior competition in the large arena and watched five or six of the competitors make their first rounds in a two part competition. Just before this competition started, the previously one’s prize presentation was being made and the third place was Jessica Springsteen, daughter of ‘The Boss’ Bruce Springsteen!! She was also taking part in the next competition but was quite a long way down the starting list so we could not wait for her as we had to get back to the bus station for the 6.30 p.m. bus back to Pescara. We managed to get a cab and drove the quite long way back to the Tiburtina bus station where, being a few minutes early, we were able to grab a sandwich before boarding the bus which left right on time. After the weather had been so beautiful all day, it began to rain just as the bus left and en route there was low cloud and fog, so we had definitely had the best weather of the day.
The bus made good time as far as Avezzano after which the autostrada was closed and we had to travel on small roads which slowed things down quite a bit as we were following big trucks. We stopped at Torre de Passo and Chieti Scali and made it back to Pescara by just before 10 p.m. Bruno was waiting for us and after dropping him off at the apartment, we drove home to LFMD.
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