When in Rome...make sure to do touristy things!
Trip Start
Aug 04, 2008
1
5
6
Trip End
Aug 19, 2008
Rome,
Italy
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
luckily with my ongoing jetlag and joe's ability to wake up early, we were out of the hotel at a fairly early hour, stopping for a quick breakfast of espresso and a cannolo (my first real one in Italy!) Yum!) near the trevi fountain and then off to find the "open-top" bus to get some audio-tourguide action and an education ride to the vatican...easier than taking public transportation and one price works for a 2-day pass!
st. peter's basilica was pretty darn impressive...luckily since it wasn't sunday the lines weren't too awful and we were able to get in without any problems (to get into the basilica women & men can't be showing too much leg or bare shoulders...luckily i left my leather mini-skirt and matching midrift tanktop at home...haha...)...
saw the famous Pieta and walked around the rest of the basilica...i think my favorite part of the basilica were the domes...according to joe (and wikipedia!) "Around the inside of the dome is written, in letters 2 metres (6.5 ft) high: TV ES PETRVS ET SVPER HANC PETRAM AEDIFICABO ECCLESIAM MEAM. TIBI DABO CLAVES REGNI CAELORVM ("...you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church. ... I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven....")"...which basically means each letter at the top of the dome are taller than joe...
after the basilica we decided to head over to the vatican museum so that i could see the sistine chapel and know what the room smelled like...but before doing so, we decided to get some ice cream...which is another story and since it involves joe and i having a little mini-tiff, i'll leave it at that and continue on with the day...to sum it up, joe got ice cream on his pants, i got mad at joe for getting mad, and then i get smacked in the face by a postcard blowing in a gust of wind and all is well...(ASAT#3)
the vatican musum is HUGE...and it's basically a VERY long maze of ancient things such as carpets, tapestries, marble sculptures, paintings, engravings, etc leading up to the sistine chapel (seriously, like an hour+ walk...almost kinda like waiting in line for a disneyland ride but with more culture and authentic old stuff)...
while i was hoping that it was going to be this spiritual surreal experience it was really more just crowded and kinda loud, with securitiy telling everyone to "SHHHHH" every 5 seconds and people trying to sneak in pics of the ceiling...despite all that, it was pretty awesome to see the sistine chapel and to really think about how incredible a feat it was!
for dinner we had...wait for it, wait for it...JAPANESE FOOD...i know, i know, you're in italy, what are you doing eating JAPANESE food? but seriously, it was a good idea at the time and a great idea in retrospect (to be understood in a later entry) and it was actually really good too!
following dinner i really wanted to see the spanish steps and the pantheon, and joe wanted to see villa medici so we started our walking night-tour to check out the above-stated locations...
started at the spanish steps -- crowded with people just chilling, drinking wine -- went up the steps, found the villa medici (only to find it's owned by the french...) and then headed back down the steps...not even sure why the steps are famous...but i know it's one of those things "you're supposed to see in rome"!
we window-shopped at all the high-end stores (since they were closed) such as -- gucci, jimmy choo (ASAT#4), dolce & gabana -- they were all located on the street directly in front of the spanish steps and made our way over to the pantheon...
got some slushes and just sat on the steps of the fountain in the rome night while some guy played old american song covers and some very drunk, slightly large woman danced by herself...the kind of dance where you hope she's drunk and happy 'cause otherwise it was almost a little sad...
so the first REAL night in rome ends where it started...right back at the trevi fountain...and i think it looks way more fabulous at night!.
A cannolo & an espresso
