Rome!

So, it has taken a while to get this post up - the day after we got back I woke up sick (and was for two weeks), and since then I have been playing catch up.

Today I finally decided I would sit down and do this. It was hard to pick what to put in- we took hundreds of pictures! - Obviosly nobody wants to suffer through that so. . . I made a slide show of some highlights and then if you want more details you can keep reading below. (It got lengthy-sorry! It's nice to have recorded though. Oh and sorry about typos and run ons- it's late and I'm going to bed!)

Make an on-line slideshow at www.OneTrueMedia.com

S.P.Q.R. (days 1 & 2-Ancient Rome and other Roman sites): After our plane trip there we decided to drop our luggage off at the hotel and hit some sites (no time to waste on our "relaxing" vacation! LOL!- although I did tell Reed that at least one day, I was going to wake up on my own-without an alarm. :))

Mentionables that we saw/did/learned:
* The Colosseum - it's huge! as soon as you walk out of the station it's right there in front of you.
* Took an English tour of the Colosseum and the Roman Forum. We are so glad we did this because we learned so much! And it helped us notice many things around the city that we wouldn't have even seen without learning a little Roman history.
* Although I was glad to see this site, it really was disturbing how gruesome Rome had become. It seemed they thrilled in finding new ways to kill people - they estimate around 700,000 died here and some made this their occupation - they would have a manager and everything- it really was a form of entertainment for them. It was set up by the Emperor to buy favor from his people - free entertainment, free food, and big prizes were handed out.
* If a gladiator survived for 7 years he earned his freedom - that rarely happened.
* Original Roman Numerals used IIII for four and not IV - Early Christians changed this to save space. We saw many examples of this around town.
* The meaning of SPQR- it stands for Senatus Popolusque Romanus which means the Senate and the People - the 'que' means 'and' but in particularly means 2 parts of a whole such as "husband and wife". To the Romans this signified that you could not have the one without the other. After we learned this, we realized that they had SPQR on everything- gutters, lamp posts, statues, hats of police men, etc. . . We made it a game to find different ones around town the second day.

 

After this we went to the Roman Forum and saw the Circus Maximus where they used to have chariot races. This place fit up to 300,000 people!

*By now we were starving but in Rome most restaurants don't open until 7:30 or 8 so we had a couple of hours to walk around- at one time we were so exhausted we sat down at a park and about fell asleep -we were ready to crash by the time we made it back to the hotel!

The next day we saw many of the major sites that you always hear of and some churches that my brother and his wife had suggested.
* The Crypts of the Capuchin Munks- I honestly found this one a little disturbing - It is the resting place of almost 4,000 Capuchin friars and their bones are nailed in different designs around the walls. You couldn't take pictures inside but if you are interested there are pics here.
* St. Peter in Chains Cathedral. This church homes what is thought to be the chains that bound Peter. You can also see Michelangelo's Moses here. In general the cathedrals were all very pretty and very big. We enjoyed going to see many of them. I am grateful to my brother for his recommendations!
* We walked through the Piazza del Campidoglio and the Capitoline Museum- this is considered to be the "center of Rome" and was designed by Michelangelo.
* Church of St. Clementi- this was a very interesting church. It was built in the
12th century. . . on top of a church that was built in the 4th century. . . which was built on top of Roman ruins that were built in the 1st century. It was neat to go down each level and see the excavations.
* Trevi Fountain and Spanish Steps were fun to see too - we went there at night and it was just beautiful.

Mama Mia! (day 3- Florence and Pisa) Today was probably one of the highlights of our trip- but it was one LONG, crazy day! When we got on the subway, we thought we were pushing it to squeeze into what space was left but we had a train to catch! Then for the next few stops more and more people got in. We just kept getting cozier and cozier. . . At one stop, someone got in and the door wouldn't shut so the conductor had to come in and shut the door for us- once we all sucked in! Then at the next stop a man with luggage started to get on and we all sucked in again and the man behind me exclaimed, "mama mia!". Little did I know how accurately that phrase would describe that day!

First of all we missed our train! We got there about 2 minutes too late. -No problem, we will just get on the next train to Florence. We waited and waited for the boards to list "Firenze" on the departure list- it never came so we started to get nervous by the time we were able to figure out what train we were supposed to be on we had to run to catch it and just barely made it! The problem was it was labeled "Naples" not "Florence" - why didn't we think of that? (isn't Naples south of Rome?- oh well!)
We didn't have a lot of time to spend in Florence so we just hit some of the big sites:
*Brunelleschi's Dome - This was a huge, beautiful church. It was really just gorgeous!
*Climbed to the top of Giotto's Bell Tower- 412 steps- my legs were shaking by the time we were done! The view was worth it though. It was simply breathtaking!
*Went to the Academia to see Michelangelo's David- pictures simply do not do it justice - it is huge! Michelangelo was brilliant- you can see the ripples in his shoulder blades and the veins in his forearms and the tendons in his knees.
*Ran, again, to the train stop to catch a train to Pisa. (I saw some Italians running to catch their train too so I didn't feel like such a tourist!)
*Climbed up the Leaning Tower of Pisa (another 300+ steps) - so fun! By the time you get half way up you already start to feel off balance. When you get to the top sections, there isn't much of a railing and as I have a little phobia of heights, I got a little nervous going up much farther. Reed kept saying I didn't have to go if I didn't want to- I replied, "Reed, I'm in Pisa, I'm going to the top!" There were a few of us up there that took a while to actually stand up straight. It really felt weird to have it lean so much and the railing was short and had big gaps - this so wouldn't fly in the US- too many lawsuits! Eventually I got used to it and walked all the way around the top- that was an accomplishment!
*Caught the train back to Florence and went to see the original "Gates of Paradise" in the Museo dell'Opera del Duomo - very beautiful.
*Walked to the Ponte Vecchio - just a pretty bridge with many jewelry stores on it
*Got a sandwich and crepe and ran (actually we just walked this time :)) back to the train station to go back to Rome - I only mention this seemingly mundane part of the day because when we were planning this trip I wasn't sure if we would be able to do so much in a day and Reed was determined to make it work (he knew how much I really wanted to go to Pisa). When he presented the game plan to me he said, "well, it looks like we will be able to make it all fit in. . . but there was no room to schedule meals"- lol! We had some snacks that we brought but we were really excited to eat and the chocolate crepe was sooo yummy!

Villa Borghese and the Vatican Museums (day 4)
*Walked through the Borghese Museum- many pieces by Raphael and Bernini here. So many of the statues are amazing! They look real almost! I really liked Bernini's David- it showed him more like the young determined shepherd that he was while Michelangelo's is more like the king he became - don't get me wrong the latter is amazing as well!
*Walked (and walked, and walked) through the Vatican Museums. This reminds me of a humanities class I took in college and our teacher talked about a friend who realized on the train ride out of Rome that she had forgotten to "look up"! - I thought how silly- who goes to the Sistine Chapel and forgets to look up?! Then one of my friends who is a pilot and goes to Rome explained that by the time you get through the museums you are so tired that you might actually forget- really??! Well, I appreciate that a whole lot more now!- Our legs ached so much that by the time we got to the Sistine Chapel all we wanted to do was sit! So we took a break before going through all the frescoes on the wall and all the panels on the ceiling. This was another highlight of the trip! It was really amazing!- almost surreal to see something I had only seen in books before!

Big Lemons and The Best Pizza in the World (Day 5- Pompeii)
*Saturday we went to Pompeii- it was interesting. Not much more to say then that. We were warned to skip the brothel so we did. We took the audio tour and were glad we did- we learned a lot from that. As we came out we saw the biggest lemons we have ever seen- and of course had some lemonade. :)
*That night we ate dinner at Buffeto's. Apparently it is the best pizza in Rome and as put by a child if it is the best pizza in Rome, and Rome is the capital of Italy and pizza was invented in Italy then that makes Buffeto's the best pizza in the world- that sounds reasonable. :) (we read that on a picture a child had made that was given to them and hanging on their door) It was pretty good pizza - we waited in line for a long time- long enough to get a gelato and have dessert first!

A Day of Rest- Finally! (day 6)
*We took it easy on Sunday. We went to church in the morning- it was about a 2.5 mile walk (in the rain) - that was interesting. We enjoyed ourselves though. Since Reed is pretty fluent in both Spanish and Portuguese he was able to understand about 80% of it. My eyes got a little dazed. . . until a nice American missionary came up and translated for me!- Then I enjoyed it a bit more!
*Went to the Pantheon
*Walked through St. Peter's Basilica - it was very beautiful! I really liked seeing Michelangelo's Pieta. There were also some nice mosaics outside that we really enjoyed - they were of scenes from the New Testament.

Ciao Bella Roma (day 7)
*Took a bus to the Appian Way- an old Roman road (obviously repaved) There we went to the Catacombs of St. Sebastian. Here we saw one of our favorite statues of Christ. We learned a lot too.

*Went to Buffeto's again

*Made sure I got one more crepe and gelato - I know! - I felt justified since we probably walked about 5-10 miles a day!

*Took a stroll along the Tiber at dusk and by St. Peter's at sunset- the perfect end to a wonderful trip!