So I was blogging earlier about how I’d lived in LA for more than 30 years before I got around to touring the iconic La Brea Tar Pits. Well, it’s been the same deal with another historic SoCal attraction – the Getty Villa!

I don’t mean the Getty Center complex running along the top of the Santa Monica Mountains by the 405 Freeway. It’s another of oil giant J. Paul Getty’s properties on the nearby Malibu coast that I’d known about but never seen. And it would have remained a mystery to me, except that dear (and vastly more proactive) friend Sherry did the arranging for us to visit the Villa and enjoy a fancy tea!

I finally discovered that Getty’s villa is not just “a” villa! It’s a re-creation of the Roman Villa dei Papiri that once graced Italy’s Neapolitan coast until it was buried by the 79 CE eruption of Mt. Vesuvius. 

And I had no idea the tour would so amazingly feed an obsession of mine that began over 40 years before! 

Okay, so to fulfill one of Mr. Getty’s whims (paraphrasing Mel Brooks, “It’s good to be da billionaire!”), architects worked from what was known of the original villa as far as it had been excavated at the time, then used details from other ancient houses around the doomed cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum to fill in any blanks. The result, finished in 1974, was an awe-inspiring villa complex complete with column-lined walkways, gardens and a gorgeous reflecting pool!

Oh, and the Villa serves as a fitting backdrop for Getty’s stunning trove of Greek and Roman art treasures! 

Also, can we talk location?! This stretch of Malibu coastline could make a person feel like they’re gazing out at the Mediterranean Sea!

And I’ve been lucky to view my share of ancient villa ruins in that very part of the world – including on the island of Cyprus at Paphos Archaeological Park! Here, you can stroll this UNESCO Heritage Site that was once a Greek and Roman neighborhood with its stone remnants of structures like city walls, a theater, and four villas with their ornate mosaics. Clearly, one heck of a gated community in its day!

On another part of Cyprus lie surviving hints of the ancient city of Kourion – including the House of Eustolios! Kourion was a flourishing city-kingdom until it was hit by a devastating earthquake in 365 CE. This villa was then repurposed as a bath house and is still home to an incredible collection of mosaics – as well as an intoxicating view out to the sea!

A couple years ago, I got to tour the layout of a Roman villa that once had a beautiful view of the River Thames in London! The second century Billingsgate House and Baths is preserved beneath an office high-rise in what the Romans would have known as Londinium – now the City of London, or The Square Mile. I’d have loved to chill with a glass of wine in one of its pools! Or maybe get warmed up. Or just be tepid if I couldn’t make up my mind.

Only a few glorious weeks ago, I was back in England where I made a priority of doing what I’m sure most visitors do – hunting down more villas! (I know, I know – last month it was courthouses…) This time, I took a short train ride north-ish from London to the city of St. Albans (thanks for the tip, KathyMo!) for a look at the site of the Roman town of Verulamium!

Before Roman times, the area was settled by the Caturellauni tribe (this piece is stretching my proofing abilities…). Then the Romans moved in (i.e., invaded) and ran a thriving town until the properly vengeful Iceni Queen Boudica had it sacked and burned. 

But the determined Romans rebuilt – and a few tantalizing bits from those days have been left unearthed and on display in Verulamium Park, presided over by St. Albans Cathedral (which was constructed using a fair amount of stone from the old Roman town).

A protective building shelters this mosaic which reveals a bit of the hypocaust system underneath that would have heated the floors of the villa that once stood right there:

Right there too is the marvelous Verulamium Museum with fascinating artifacts and area history on display, plus more exquisite mosaics that were moved there for safe keeping. 

So! My passion for things Ancient Roman that started four decades ago continues right along! It wouldn’t be a bad guess that this passion goes back to the moment in my youthful backpacking tour of Europe in 1985 when I found myself in the part of Italy from which Getty lifted his villa plans – among the haunting ruins of Pompeii:

I understand much more excavation has been done since my time there. But the starkness of what I did see – that eerie alchemy of desolation and preservation – was gripping…

Even so, the spark for what I then termed “the old stuff” had actually been ignited a few weeks earlier on that trip – back in England. Only days into that first overseas adventure, I set out on my own from London to find imposing Dover Castle, which has presided since the 11th century over the shortest sea hop between England and the Continent:

I fell in love with the sturdiness of this fortress that had survived every kind of onslaught, from arrows all the way to World War II “doodlebug” bombs. And though I’d studied history a bit in college, so many points along my measurement of time had nothing in my experience to associate them with.

Well, the 1985 trip changed all that. And in those first days of my exploring, one structure at Dover Castle extended my tangible measure of time even further – it was the Roman Lighthouse! This first- or second-century tower (a pharos) was one of two that would have had fires burning as beacons to guide ships through the river mouth below:

My charmed life of travel that followed would put me in the path of far older edifices than those above the white cliffs of Dover. But I think because it was this lighthouse that first lured me toward a lifetime of seeking out historic wonders of the world, it may still be the most special of wonders for me!

And how fantastic to find that this spark could be rekindled so very close to home! At the Getty Villa, it was such a delight to see and touch and wander through the kind of palace that the ruins I’d seen in so many lands had hinted at – ancient echoes brought to vivid life!

I just never know where the spark that ignites a passion of mine will come from. I can only say again how fortunate I am to have found this one rekindled time and again, beginning with those sturdy stones atop a distant promontory, to mosaics dotting windswept Mediterranean earth – to the local pet project of one extremely wealthy dude! Each place mesmerizing in its own way…

Best wishes to you for kindling those kinds of sparks, whatever – and wherever – they may be!

And cheers!