Four Points By Sheraton Roma West Hotel Rome

... looked like the could have been the works of the sisteen chapel. After a while of walking around we finally made it to the chapel...it was pretty cool. To think that one man did all of that incredible work on the ceiling yet was crazy! You weren't allowed to take pictures in the chapel...but luckily I am all about the secret pictures (thats how I got my picture of David in Florence). When we arrived at the museum there were no ...

... when he was 60 years old. The rest of the chapel including the walls and triangles around the ceiling were painted by artists including Boticelli. We learned that a Japanese TV channel (NHK?) had paid the $20M to restore the chapel, and drew proceeds from the sale of a particular book of photographs of the Chapel and other parts of Vatican City. This was one of the reasons why we could not take photographs of the Chapel. I bought the book.<br><br>As we walked through ...

... was an 11:35 flight Saturday morning to Venice for £71 more than my original flight. With running the risk of losing hotel bookings and a week worth of vacation I coughed up the £71 to make the trip still happen. I headed back to my flat and got a semi-decent night of sleep. I woke up at about 5AM to find out that my travel partner for this trip who was supposed to leave Saturday morning missed her bus to the airport because they ...

... didn't seem to be any signs anywhere telling me where I needed to enter or what these ridiculous lines were leading to, so I found the nearest tourist center and asked. I followed her directions, got in line with the rest of the crowd (it was a serious cluster you know what - there weren't even lines just sweaty bodies pushing along.) So it turns our this was just to get through the metal detectors. And the line was leading to the Basilica ...

... and then it took an hour cruising through the outer canal and Grand Canal to get to the port where we docked. After we docked, I took a shuttle to the city center and then walked a little ways to get to the train station so that I could go to Rome to visit SK, a friend from school. I got to the train station at 9:30 and wanted to leave on the 10:43 train (what SK and I had planned; I would arrive in Rome at 3) but that train and the train after it were booked, so I bought a ticket on ...

... far. Heading off to Naples tomorrow to see where pizza was invented and no doubt try lots! Dad (Robert), I havent had hot chips in days :) new record Vital stats: - Missed one bus stop, found ourself in suburbia Italy where they speak no English - Walked 100 000 kilometres - Managed to speak 5 Italian words so far, Bens favourite that he uses regularly "Mi Scusi". All for now, ciao xx

... day washing, lunch at a local bar, very nice, went to pick up the washing so we could get to the airport for 3pm pickup to the Tuscany tour, and guess what, Siesta, laundry closed until 3:30pm, Oh No, what to do, the lovely Headwater tour guides, Petra and Paul saved the day, and we met them at 3:45pm, and then off to Volterra. Volterra was beautiful, a medievil town surrounded by walls, very clean and beautiful shops, we stayed at Le Fonti a really nice hotel overlooking ...

Got up at 9:30 and had a lovely free breakfast at the hotel of croissants and chocolate spread, although the orange juice tasted suspect. After a round of showers, we got up and headed to the nearest supermarket to buy lunch, then headed to Roma Termini to catch the metro to the Colluseum. The Colluseum is extremely impressive from the outside (we couldn't be bothered queueing for an hour to ...

... speakers here, lemme hear you make some noise!, followed by Como estan, hombres!, Konichiwa, and Shalom, Salaam, and good night all my monotheists in the house!. Not gonna lie, I was pretty impressed with all the languages he could rap in even if he wasn't actually speaking like a Cal Mic Man. Jenny and I wandered the Vatican grounds, beautiful stuff, and cruised on over to the soccer stadium to meet up with her friends for Lazio vs ...

... story, and in pretty good condition, and many now have little stone breakwaters hooking out front into the lake. The women sit out front in little clusters, crocheting, with bits and pieces for sale, displayed on kitchen chairs. An elderly gent is repairing an ancient oar in the street (cordless power drill in hand). Tourist shops offering awful toys and souveniers cluster around the path from the jetty. The rest of the island is something else again. We ...