When in Rome…

The most confusing part of our Italy vacation was our trip from Florence to Rome, as the Florence train station is crazytown and culture shock in itself. There is no one to help you and no one to ask questions to… well except for the Italians, but considering we only learned how to say wine and tomatoes, we didn’t even attempt it. There is of course the huge train schedule board but it lists final destinations, not the stops between. Since the Napoli train had our train number, we went ahead and hopped on. And who would have thunk it… we ended up in Rome. 🙂

Similar to Florence, we planned tours almost every day. Since Rome is much bigger than Florence, we decided to do a bus tour vs. a walking tour to see the entire city. I also think it had something to do with JD not wanting to hear me complain anymore. I’m not fun to be around when my feet hurt, but who is… right?

We also did a few other group tours, including one of the Coliseum and Roman Formun. JD and I were super excited for this tour, so much that we even watched Gladiator the night before on the iPad. I know, I know, we’re total geeks. Appearance wise, the Coliseum was pretty much what I expected, but I can’t explain the sense of evil I felt while we were walking through it. As interesting as the history of the building is, it’s hard to get over the fact that innocent men and animals were killed for entertainment. I can’t even watch gory parts in movies and to think hundreds of thousands of people came here to watch it live is insane to me. Crazy Romans.

During the same tour, we also walked through the Roman Forum. Lots of old buildings, lots of dirt, lots of marble. Yep, that pretty much sums it up.

I tried to take a few night pictures of the Roman Forum, as it was a hop skip away from our hotel, but this was the only one that came out right.. and it’s not even of the Forum 🙂

The next tour was a 1/2 day trip to the Vatican and definitely my favorite tour in Rome. We started with the Sistine Chapel and words just can’t explain how beautiful it is. I was already floored by how talented Michelangelo was, but after seeing this, it’s hard to believe he was even human. I think what surprised me the most about the paintings were how vibrant the colors still are. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to take any pics as they have super strict rules against photography (even though I totally saw a guy sneak one with his phone!) I just didn’t want to risk it… especially in front of 20+ paintings of Jesus.

Next was a tour of St. Peter’s Basilica and there is no way I can even begin to describe how amazing it is. The walls, the art, the alter, the dome… every piece of the structure is breathtaking. As if that wasn’t enough, we then learned that this is the burial site of Peter.. yep, Peter as in one of Jesus’s twelve disciples. Maybe we should of known that before this visit, but we didn’t.. so just imagine how amazed we were!

If you’ve ever taken an art history class before, you’ve definitely read about Michelangelo’s Pietà. It was much bigger than I expected and so beautiful!

Although we didn’t do a tour of the Trevi Fountain, Spanish Steps or Pantheon, we did walk bys of each.

We of course dropped a little jingle in the fountain. JD even got my coin mid-flight!

The Spanish Steps have to be the hardest monument to find in Rome. I honestly took 3 pictures of buildings we thought were it. Below is the real deal and since these were uhhh… just steps, we maybe spent 20 seconds looking at them. I didn’t even pick up their significance as I was distracted by two lovely Italians… Missoni and Ferragamo. I walked in Ferragamo with shorts and crocs on and totally got mean-mugged. My bad, just wanted to touch a fancy shoe. They didn’t even have price tags and I didn’t think the clerk would appreciate my Italian vocab, so we quickly left.

Last stop was the Pantheon… where a bird pooped on my head. Please tell me that’s good luck and that I’m going to win the DIY Blog Cabin house in Matthews county. Please, please, please!!!

Speaking of pooped, after every tour that’s exactly what JD and I were… exhausted! And since this was our vacation, we tried to squeeze in some down time every day. We are both highly entertained by people-watching, so every afternoon, that’s exactly what we did, alongside two beers and something sweet.

Although I haven’t posted any food pictures from Rome.. trust me when I say it was amazing! JD and I even found a restaurant that we liked so much, we ate at twice! We were so hoping to find “our” spot.. you know, one that wasn’t recommended and one that we just stumbled upon. One that our kids can go back to and say, “mom and dad loved this spot!” Ok, Ok, I totally took that from a Kodak commercial. Anywho, here’s a picture of us at “our” spot, La Taverna dei Fori Imperiali.

In summary… Rome was amazing and Florence was even more amazing. By far, my best vacation ever!

Cheers! 🙂