John Henderson's Travel Adventures in Rome and Beyond

March 17, 2020

In virus-torn Italy, misery loves company but our suffering is soothed with pride

Sergio Serra rents out holiday houses around Rome. He has a wife and a 3-year-old daughter. Underneath all the death, the overflowing hospitals, the empty streets and the fear as the coronavirus cuts its swath through Italy, Sergio is one of many stories that doesn’t get told. “My income,” he said, “is completely zero.” Unlike […]

March 11, 2020

Life in Coronavirus lockdown: Italy closes its borders

Tuesday I had to make the risky move of traveling across Rome to a clinic using public transportation. As Italy becomes the western world’s most paralyzed country courtesy of the Coronavirus, I felt like the guy sneaking out of his shelter in a scene from “Night of the Living Dead.” My girlfriend, a third-generation Roman […]

March 6, 2020

Coronavirus in Italy: inside Europe’s biggest petri dish

Hello from Quarantine Centrale. Here in Italy we have become Europe’s red-headed, deformed stepchild. We are shunned, ridiculed and home bound. The Coronavirus has turned all 60 million of us into passengers on one giant cruise ship. We’re sitting motionless with no port accepting our wretched, damned souls. I myself am quarantined. Yes, it happened […]

February 14, 2020

Valentine’s Day in Rome: QC Termeroma is the perfect SPAcial gift

FIUMICINO, Italy — I love the parlor game: Who would you like to be at any point in history? Mine’s easy. I would be part of the aristocracy during the Roman Empire. What would your life be like? Let’s see. You go to your private thermal bath and sit in an outdoor Jacuzzi set at […]

January 28, 2020

Derby Day in Rome: a vicious rivalry that can still bring opposites together

(Editor’s note: I was planning on posting this Monday but yesterday was meant for remembering Kobe Bryant and not a relatively meaningless soccer game in Rome.Riposa in pace, Kobe.) It was a terrific idea to celebrate a birthday. Alessandro Castellani, my best Italian friend in Rome and veteran sportswriter, had gathered seven of his male […]

January 23, 2020

“The New Pope” a holy new experience for this film extra as an American cardinal

Eighty cardinals stared at me as I walked alone down the Sistine Chapel. I tried not to think about Oscar-winning director Paolo Sorrentino watching my every step or the two cameras I was told not to look at or I’d be shot on sight. Instead, I walked slowly, deliberately, as if in a trance, hoping […]

January 17, 2020

Heceta Lighthouse B&B a true guiding light for romance on spectacular Oregon Coast

YACHATS, Ore. — As a native Oregonian, I always find myself drawn to Oregon lighthouses, kind of like an inland sailor. It isn’t a need for safe passage to land, as so many boat captains have sought on our rough seas for 120-plus years. It’s more of an assurance of where I’m at, where I’m […]

January 8, 2020

Why I love Rome: My 6th annual list why la dolce vita is as sweet as black cherry gelato

Six years ago this Saturday I retired to Rome saying I wanted to live the last third of my life in the most beautiful city in the world. Of course, I could’ve been leaping into a chasm of living hell. I had few friends, no girlfriend, a tiny cave of a flat and terrible Italian. […]

January 3, 2020

The good and the bad in the U.S. — a hardened expat home for holidays

SAN FRANCISCO — In eight days I’ll have been in Rome six years and a few signs indicate that I’ve gone native. I drink coffee on 95-degree days in July. I speak Italian before I speak English. I turn to ESPN.com’s soccer page before anything else. But as I concluded my recent nine-day holiday visit […]

December 24, 2019

Christmas in Rome: Lighter on the lights but heavy on the meaning

Christmas has special meaning in the center of Christendom, but even St. Peter's Square is understated.

I grew up in the capital of the commercial world and now live in the capital of the Catholic world. It is Christmas time, a time when capitalism and religion merge into a big, sparkling Christmas ball — a green Christmas ball. Comparing Christmas in Rome to Christmas anywhere in the U.S. is like staring […]

December 18, 2019

Christmas gifts to the world: Heads up, Washington … here comes Santa from Rome!

Did you know Santa Claus lives in Italy? It’s true. His real name is Santa Clausini. He anglicized it to be accepted in more of the world’s chimneys. He and his elves (actually a self-loathing freelance writer from Oregon) have a workshop in Rome’s Monteverde neighborhood where we think up the perfect Christmas gifts for […]

December 11, 2019

Top 10 Underrated Towns in Italy for 2020: Get off the well-trodden track

Conde Nast came out with its annual Readers Choice list for the world’s best countries and Italy came out ninth. Italy appearing in a top 10 list is like Alabama football, U.S. billionaires and Harvard. Conde Nast called Italy the “evergreen country.” It’s always there. It’s why I’m here. And I’m not leaving. Next month […]

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