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A Gardener's Notebook: The latest incarnation of my column detailing the trails and tribulations of my garden. Join the list and ask your own questions about gardening Subscribe

Roma. There is little that can be said of the romance of Rome that hasn't already been said. My wife, Rosanne and I found the city to be the most welcoming of all of the cities we visited. Granted, it is a large city, something I am not terribly fond of, but it is a living city. You feel involved in the city not isolated from it.

Of paving, planters and Piazzas

Rome is not a city of parks and gardens like London, but there are special corners you can find that pull you off the cobblestone walkways and into cool, sections of trees and grass that make the busy streets seem miles away. The main public spaces are piazzas, large and small. The area surrounding the famous Trevi Fountain would be called a back alley in New York City, but in Rome it is filled with tourists and Romans alike at all hours of the day and night. While there are a few planters of flowers, the piazza is basically paved in cobble. The larger, Piazza del Poppolo, is also bare of floral adornments, but still feels alive with the life of the city and provides a public meeting place for the city dwellers before and after mass and as they go about their shopping.

Green on the map

If you look at a color map of Rome, you will see a large green area, 4 x4 miles, north of the city at the end of the Via Veneto. This is Villa Borghese. Fredrico Fellini used the shopping district of the Veneto as the location for his famous film, La Dolce Vita. If you follow the street to its northern end you enter the Villa Borghese. This large villa, now a public park, provides a host of garden delights. There are relatively untamed sections of trees, with statuary scattered haphazardly about, manicured areas alive with flowers and a small but lovely boating pond with faux great temple . Walking a few hundred yards in any direction leads you to another type of garden.

On our first day in Rome we strolled through the city to the top of the Spanish Steps. Continuing along this street brought us to another entrance to Villa Borghese. We strolled through, but since we needed to return to the hotel for dinner we didn't see a large part of the park. We made plans that day to return for a morning so that 2-year-old Joseph could have some "run around" time and meet some other kids.

The day we returned to the park it was very hot, but once we got off the sidewalks and into the garden paths it was quite enjoyable. We walked along gravel pathways until we came to the small lake. The surrounding vegetation was lush and Joseph helped a new found friend, Lorenzo, feed the ducks. Just around the corner sat a very nice playground that was awash in children. We sat and watched Joseph play for an hour or more and then headed off to a small café for lunch.

There are trees in Rome that painters have loved for centuries. I cannot remember the species, but most of you will have seen them in various ancient and Renaissance paintings. These trees are limbed up quite high and then divide into a canopy of branches and leaves at the top. This habit gives them the look of huge, living umbrellas. Having seen these trees in so many paintings it gave me a special feeling, actually sitting there under them.

Sicily

We left Rome after 4 days to meet some relatives of my wife's. Sicily, being nearly the same latitude of Southern California, looks strikingly similar. We saw Jacaranda trees, the local species of broom (genestra) that grows on the flanks of Etna and chaparral much like I look on every day from my office window.

Our hotel was in the resort town of Taormina, quite near the ruins of the ancient Greek city of Naxos. Just steps from our hotel was the Villa Communale, or City Garden. This was once a private estate that was donated to the city. Like everything in Taormina, the garden was a series of terraces stepping down a steep hillside. It provides excellent views of the ocean as well as a cool spot to get out of the scorching, Sicilian sun. This garden also held several large garden "follies" designed to look like ancient dwellings. While you couldn't enter these buildings due to their "tumble down" design they gave a unique air to the entire garden. Roses of every color abounded here in the heat of summer and their fragrance filled the gardens.

It is always amazing to visit new places and meet new people. Our trip to Europe effected me in more ways than I ever dreamed. I see everything in a slightly different light now that we have returned. I hope you enjoyed some of my memories and I highly recommend that you travel whenever you can, even if you only walk next door or down the street to see a neighbor's garden.