Marathon Village

This morning we're heading down to the EUR neighborhood. EUR was designed for the 1942 World's fair which never took place. Fascist inspired buildings include the Palazzo della Civita del Lavoro and the Palazzo dei congressi. We'll meet François, Odile's cousin, at the Palazzo dei congressi and then visit the Marathon Village to pick up our race packets.

UPDATE: François' wife Brigitte, and their friends from Aix, Didier & Margueritte; joined us for the race packet pickup - including cool ASICS backpack and black 15th Rome Marathon t-shirt plus tons of promtional stuff (including a frisbee). Metro-ed back up to near the Coliseum for a constitutional walk prior to lunch at the Caffe Aventino (just down from the Circo Massimo).

UPDATE2: We returned "home" to drop off the 4 kilos (!) of promotional materials I picked up at the Marathin Village and then headed out again - just us two - to the Trastevere (which we'd zapped last night). Few tourists out due to fairly cold and windy weather - we stopped at a few places for warm-up bracers, such as: La Casetta di Trastevere, Bar Le Cinque. Even got pious and stopped in at the Basilica di Santa Maria in Trastevere (see photo below).

Early evening saw us rushing over to Termini train station to meet our friends: Gianni coming in from Milan and Francesca coming in from Florence. We all walked over to a nearby place for dinner: La Gallina Bianca (where I continued my carbo-loading with an excellent spaghetti alla carbonara). Tomorrow some walking about (but not too much - as to remain fresh for Sunday's big run).