One morning after photographing the Pantheon, our group piled into a couple of taxis and headed to an area south of the Vatican.  Here we embarked on a little "walkabout" on a little street called Lungaretta.  Our  objective was a small Piazza called St Apollonia.  By the way, street signs in Rome are affixed to the side of the "building on the corner" as a placard.

We came upon a corner that had a brick wall surrounding a plot of land.  The wall had been painted in both directions for about 50 feet.  It looked like it had been an informal community project.  Here's an image of  a Roman face ... Caesar?

And this face painted at the corner of the two walls to give it some dimensionality.

There were big fish and horses with riders, too.

But my favorite was of these two horses painted on the two halves of a metal gate.  I think it is pretty cool!

On our way, we passed an apartment entrance with this gate proudly announcing the birth of a little boy!  It is something you would never see in Los Angeles .... we don't walk anywhere, and neighborhoods as a collection of people who know or know of each other don't exist.

After a little lesson on how drinking fountains in Rome work (more about that in another blog), we arrived at the square:

At one end is an old building wrapped to provide a false front while the scaffolding behind is being used  to renovate it.  These wraps are all over Rome, and are something I don't recall from my previous visits.  One thing it does is provide an opportunity to use the false front as a giant billboard! Here we have Apple advertising the camera in the iPhone 6.  On the ground floor, under the awnings, is a small cafe we will soon visit.

In the center of the square is the usual fountain spouting water out of some demon's mouth.

On the other side of the fountain was an unknown photographer looking towards the church at the other end of the square ... Note to Self:  perhaps  on the next outing I should consider changing my photography outfit to something a bit more chic?   :)

At the other end of the Piazza, in the corner, is an old medium sized church... you can see it below in this artist's watercolor painting. After taking some pictures of the inside of the church, I retired to a very cold Coca Cola under the awnings of the restaurant.  Have I said that it was very, very hot in Rome?  

We had a very cute, perky waitress ... and given nice filtered light and camera,  .... well, you know pictures were required:

Later, I went inside to show her the images on the camera's LCD when this other person jumped into the frame ... her boyfriend, a co-worker?  

Somewhere during our morning meanderings, I took this picture of Peppa and her friend. It seemed a fitting end to this post:

Now it was time for lunch and maybe a little nap before the afternoon shoot.  

I hope you found it interesting.

Bye for now,

Adam

P.S.  Don't forget to click on the images to see a larger version!