Saint Maria Maggiore church:
Barbarini Palace:
Quirinale (home of the Italian President):
Trevi Fountain (location of the ancient aqueducts. If you don't know what it is, see the film Roman Holiday):
Pantheon (temple to the Roman gods)
Piazza Venezia:
Marco Aurelius colulmn (probably completed around 190 AD, the column depicts the wars led by Marcus Aurelius):
Piazzia Spagnia (Spanish Steps):
Campidoglio (ancient bridge):
Circo Massimo (place of ancient chariot races...see Ben Hur):
Here's what I wrote in my journal at the end of the day:
"Sooooo much walking! Was a really fun day though. I am so blessed by God to have been given a husband like Seth, a family that supports and loves me, and a healthy body which allows me to go out and do all the things I want to do. Today I was free to just enjoy myself. Rome is much slower-paced than other cities I've been to. It really has its own style - food, feel, architecture, and I like it!"
Okay, so not very insightful now that I look back at it, but I was exhausted.
Day 2:
On day 2 of Rome, we went into the Vatican city to see the Vatican Museums (which includes the Sistine Chapel), and St. Peter's Basilica.
The Vatican Museums are different from any other museum I've ever been to. You do not choose which way you are going. It's like a monopoly board, and the Sistine Chapel is your 200 dollars you get once you've been all the way around. You are herded through with all the other tourists, forced to look at the beautiful Christian artwork collected there.
Sadly, no one is allowed to take pictures of the Sistine Chapel, so I can only tell you about it in words. It is massive, and everyone is looking up. There are Italian guards yelling "NO PHOTO! NO PHOTO!" over and over and shushing everyone. You cram yourself in with all the others, trying to find a good spot to stand so that you can look up. And when you finally find a spot, and turn your neck so you can see the ceiling, it's like all the noise and yelling and smelly people surrounding you disappear. It was one of the only things I've seen in my life that lived up to the expectations. You look into it, and it's like it's looking back into you. The illustrations jump out from the wall, like a 3D effect. It's as if the angels are reaching towards you to pull you in. The ceiling floats away, but pulls you with it all at once. You begin to understand just how close, and yet how far away, we all are from God. Totally worth the herding.
After that we headed to St. Peter's Basilica, which I do have pictures of and which was absolutely MASSIVE! Why is it so big? What do they do in all those separate areas? Seriously, I want to know. It was gorgeous though:
Journal entry from day 3:
"This day started with us buying a combination ticket to Palatine Hill, the Roman Forum and hte Colosseum. It's actually cheaper than a ticket to just the Colosseum, and the line was WAY shorter. First was the Forum..."
The Forum was where basically everything happened in ancient Rome - markets, processions, political rallies and speeches, and nearby to the Temple of Jupiter.
So here are some pics of the ruins, where archaeological digs are still going on!
The Senate met there in this building, which survives from before Christ!:
The Forum also holds the home of the vestal virgins, who committed themselves to a life of chastity and adoration of the gods in exchange for a prominent position in society and a wealthy lifestyle:
After the Forum - where it was extremely hot and dusty (reminded us of GA big time!) we headed to the more lush Palatine Hill
It was really beautiful there - Italian trees are really awesome:
And walking the hill, we had great views:
After this, we were pretty beat from all the walking; however, we were both excited to see the Colosseum:
It was really cool and felt about the size of Sanford Stadium (actually a bit smaller!) It was somehow all at once inspiring as such an ancient architectural achievement and eerie as a place of so much bloodshed. Also, did I mention all the tourists??
After the Colosseum we had one last hit of delicious gelato and then walked back to Trevi Fountain for some classic people watching. It was fun watching people throw coins 8in the fountain and then start to smile after. We walked away from the crowds down some little alleys because we had decided to splurge on a sit-down Italian dinner. The waiters are pretty aggressive, asking you to sit and eat at their restaurant. We were trying to decide which place to pick, but in the end we were swayed by a large Italian man who spokes ome English. The food was really good and we were definitely pleaed with this special treat of Tortellini for Seth and Rigatoni for me!
After eating, we had planned to walk to the Tiburtina train station, which was kind of far out of the city. But we figured it was cool in the evenings and we would enjoy one last stroll through Rome. However, we had pulled up a map on Seth's laptop to find our way and his computer decided it wanted to restart and lose all the data we had left up on it. So we knew we would have to take the underground subway instead. So we bought our tickets for that and were on our way. Arriving at Tiburtina, it was...dodgy. There were no other tourists and the station was so tiny we weren't completely sure it was a train station. There were no trains to Venice in sight, and we wandered around confused. Our train tickets clearly said Tiburtina station...what was going on? Suddenly, an amazingly friendly Italian guy appeared near us (unlike everyone else in the station, all of which did not look....er...friendly). He spoke perfect English and asked us if we needed help. We showed him our ticket and he was just as bewildered as us at first. Then he shook his head and said we needed to head back into town and leave from Termini. He said our ticket just had to be wrong. Guardian angel much? I think so...
So we headed to Termini and he was right - we were supposed to depart from there. But not at the correct time or place that our ticket said. So Italian trains...do not trust your ticket. In fact, I have no idea what you should do...just hope a guardian angel shows up for you, too, I guess...
Anyway so we were supposed to take this overnight train to Venice. We got on, and it was little cars with six seats, three facing one another. We boarded early, and it was just us and another girl in our car. Then a woman came in and at the last moment, an older man. It was awkward, as we all knew we'd be on there for about 7 hours and needed to sleep at least some. The old man had clearly done this gig before, and decided we all needed to be for real. Basically, we all contorted ourselves so that everyone had some leg room to spread out. It was one of the strangest experiences of my life, since I basically cuddle with four other people. But hey, it worked, and we all got a little sleep and a lot closer. The older man and the woman got off at Bologna at about 3 in the morning, so after that, we really had some room! Needless to say, it was not the best night of sleep I've ever had.
We arrived in Venice with the sun. I snapped this pic right before we left on a bus to Jesolo, a beach town near Venice:
The story of our time in Jesolo is kind of a boring one. Basically, we sat on the beach. We bought a paddle ball set and played with that until we busted the ball open. We swam in the ocean. We ate gelato. We sat in the sun after a year without it. It was really great and relaxing, but kind of boring to talk about. Here's a few pics of the beach and our place:
We also took two day trips to Venice during our week at the beach. Here's my journal from the first day:
"Today we went to Venice, which was really really fun! Basically what you do in Venice is walk around and look at the awesomeness. It is very crowded by toursits, so I guess it could be annoying to live there. But it is absolutely beautiful - everything building. So we wondered around, just walking over bridges and taking pictures. We got a gelato which was yummy as always. Seth had nutella and ricotta with honey. I had dark chocolate and coffee. We wondered around looking in all the shops, walking over bridges, taking pictures, holding hands. We went into San Marco Basilica, where St. Mark's remains are kept. It was gorgeous inside, with gold all over. Domed ceilings sparkling with gold and all these violent depictions of the crucifixtion everywhere. Really powerful, a little scary."
Here's some pics of Venice:
That was about it for our Italian adventures - after our last day in Venice, pretty exhausted, we headed back to England for a few days before our final trip home to the US!
