We are a funny breed of people. Tourists. With our camera on our necks and our ball caps of our home teams. Our maps in hand guiding our every step to see as many things as we can and walk where millions of people before us have walked. And I mean millions. In Rome, more specifically the Vatican city, there is an average of 3 million people per day that come to visit. That's a lot of tourists. We have been surrounded by Asian tour groups, European and families from Iowa.The vendors are from Bangladesh, India and Africa. There is a rainbow of culture here. But a lot of racism too, I'll write about that in a later post.
The second day in Rome after sleeping a mere 3 hours before the breakfast buffet we had tickets for the hop on hop off tour bus. Thanks to living social discounted trips!!
DISCLAIMER: Aside from what you may believe about Doug and I taking this trip to Italy. WE ARE POOR! We don't want to appear rich or loose with our money. We are taking this trip purely because we are celebrating 10 years of an amazing and difficult and rewarding marriage. We are spending time with each other that we haven't had in years and we are going to enjoy every minute of it. If it means spending $8 on a stupid picture at the Trevi fountain so be it. We deserve it and you do too. Debt is hard, but it shouldn't keep you from living and experiencing AMAZING things.
Okay, back to the double decker, red party tour bus. Just kidding. It wasn't a party bus, but the side of it did look like a party with it's squiggly yellow lettering and the bright red headphones they handed us to listen to the tour of the city made. They made me feel all bright and sunny. Although one of the Asian tours had neon green earphones, that would have made me equally happy. :) Man, I am having a rough time getting to the point today.
The bus drove us through ancient Rome revisiting the sights that we had photographed the night before in the dark. We drove past "The wedding cake" which is a huge museum all white WHITE marble that is atop a hill looking down the crooked street to the coliseum. This building and the 2 behind it were designed by Michealangelo and are stunning. We passed the coliseum and numerous round-a-bouts where the center was a fountain. The churches are old and beautiful. One looking as if it could topple. The first stop we got off at was a church, couldn't tell you the name though. Haha, I'm terrible. We went in and at the entrance there was a security guard that made me put on a paper shawl to cover my shoulders. It was again a hot day so I had on a tank top and I had to be covered. Some girls had to wear one on their waist to cover their legs. Out of respect for the church and for God we had to be covered or possibly be refused entry. At this church over 1,000 years ago it is said that there was a miracle and snow fell from the sky on August 5th. So we are just shy of 3 days away from this holiday that that celebrate by dropping millions of white flower pedals from the sky. Bummer. After walking through the church we made our way back on the bus and took it to the coliseum stop. It still looked as amazing as in the night however now was full of people. People everywhere! I'm happy I got pictures in the night when it was a ghost town. We walked through the ruins of what used to be the rich part of Rome and was now just ruins with some amazing churches that still stood the test of time. The houses and other small structures were now just blue prints of red brick in the ground. You can't help but wonder what it looked like in the day. Small brick houses covered in white concrete and as you'd come out of your front door in the morning you see the coliseum and tall pillared buildings all white and grand with size. Amazing. We didn't go through the coliseum, but we only had 2 days to sight-see and we didn't want to spend it in line. We hopped back on the bus and took the tour through the Vatican and then back around to "The Wedding Cake" and climbed the steps from the courtyard up to the roof of the building. We looked down and there was Rome. The ruins, the coliseum, the churches, Vatican hill. You could see the mountains dark and out of focus in the far distance and in the shade of the white marble we cooled down and just took in the city. The tour bus took us back through the city passed the chariot track where Ben Hir was filmed. A long oval track that is set alongside a hill in a ditch. There used to be stands surrounding it that held 4 x as many people as the coliseum. Tall trees line the park, their lower branches trimmed so there is just a tuft of branches with green at the top. They remind me of African safari trees only tall and skinny and they are all over the city.
We ended our tour with Gelato after getting off the bus at the station. As we sat at this outdoor mobile Gelato shop I couldn't help but wonder if the owners are secretly mafia... you have to worry about these things in Italy you know.
Friday, August 2, 2013
When in Rome
ROME.
We arrived to Rome soaring out over bluish green waters off the west coast of Italy. The sea sparkled along the bronze sandy shore. To the right we angled back towards shore and to the runway just barely inland, Rome staring at us just to our right and the water now to our left. It was 12pm for Italy but for MN still only 5am. Our bodies were stiff and tired. We wanted to sleep during the flight but the sights of the Swiss Alps towering so close out of my airplane window through the clouds below all snowy and jagged kept my eyes fixed in awe. I think I did drift off for 5 minutes or so towards the end of the two hour flight from Amsterdam. We landed at Leodardo Da Vinci airport and took our one carry on suitcase (insert proud pat on my back for packing so light between the two of us in one bag!) down the moving walkways to a train platform that would take us into the city for €8 per person ($12 US dollars). The blue and white train was short with only 2 or three cars. You could move between them with the push of a button on the wall through a sliding door. The door in our cabin wasn't functioning so the people just pulled it open. I don't know If it was the broken door, the head rest of Doug's seat falling out on him as he sat or the scratched graffiti in my window but something tells me this wasn't the newest train in Italy. It was a smooth 20 minute ride into the center of Rome from the airport, crossing through open fields of tall dry grass bowing in the breeze. The train rocked my heavy head right to sleep just 2 minutes before we got to our station for the hotel. Doug awoke me and I was so disoriented! I mustered up enough energy to drag myself off of the train and then buy tickets for us to ride the public transportation. We stood in the HOT sun awaiting our bus. It was so strong. The bus took us to our street where our hotel was. doug had said "I think the first hotel we are staying at is a little sketchy" but he was way off. It was a new hotel with beautiful rooms, a restaurant, a pool and a few adorable bars and lounges. We checked into our room by 3:00 pm and we were just going to take a 'little' nap (after being awake for 36 hrs). As soon as our heads hit the pillows we were out! We woke up almost five ours later OOPS! In the words of Doug, when got to Rome we only had three days so we were going to "push through the tired" and stay awake once we got there and see as much as we could that first day! Haha. So much for that.
We did however wake up refreshed and by 9pm we were ready to go. We found a river walk with markets and restaurants adorned with couches and candle light. With the Tiber river raging on the other side of the white picket fence we sat down to our first taste of Italian food. There was music playing blending with the chatter of the people walking the river walk. We had penne pasta and brick oven thin crust pizza with no cheese. It was delicious! We made our way up the gray stone steps after dinner out of the river walk and to the stone purple lit walking bridge above. It was night and looking down back to the market we just walked through you could see the white lights lining the white tents of vendors and restaurants along the river. The streets were small square cobble stones much like Coyoacán.
We followed our map holding it up like typical tourist as we walked through dim lit cobblestone narrow Alleyways. We passed groups of hipsters and small cafés. Waited to cross streets as mini cars and motor bikes passed. It was quiet and relaxing. So quiet actually. I remember saying to Doug, "For such a large city it is so quiet and you can still see the stars." Our cobblestone path lead us to the pantheon a large round tundra type building, once a church covered in white stone with pillars and white adornments ow showed its red brick skeleton. We rounded to the front where a column of white marble pillars stood facing a plaza with a fountain at the center and restaurants and candle lit tables lined the other four sides of the square. It was here that I felt like I was finally in Rome.
Our late evening stroll continued down the back alleys of the Pantheon and to the fountain Di Trevi. This place was full of people, even at 11 at night. We were quickly approached by a young man from Bangladesh who was eager to help take a picture of us in front of the fountain with my camera. I politely declined but he finally convinced me to give it to him and he ran away with... just kidding. He didn't run. But he did scam me into having him take our picture with his Polaroid and $8 US dollars later he ran away before the picture developed... I wish I had just stolen his camera and ran. Crappy lit dark picture. Oh well, live and let learn right? The fountain was built as a facade to a building, the architect thought he'd make it something large and memorable. So to the arch with a merman statue he added fountains and more fountains. And it is memorable! For centuries people have thrown pennies into the blue pool for luck of a safe return back to the fountain someday. We however looked at our bank account, the fact that we are currently homeless and without work and a Bangladesh man just took $8 from us for a picture, realized we should keep our penny. Lol.
We took another journey from the fountain to the coliseum. We turned a corner and woop there it is! So big! The tallest structure in Ancient Rome, so beautiful at night, the yellow lights adding contrast through the arches against the black night sky. We sat on a stone wall bahind a giant tree and talked as a few people passed, it was really quiet by this time. It was a half passed midnight when we decide we'd better head back to the bus station, only to find out that the bus line back to our hotel closed at midnight. Ruh ruh! But thanks to our 5 hour nap we had all the energy in the world. So at 1 am we made our way back to our hotel. 2 miles and 1 and a half hours later we got back to our hotel.
I watched the sun come up over the city at 5:45 and We finally got to sleep by 6am and got to the breakfast buffet before it closed. I'd say it was a successful day. After all the day in MN was just ending as we get another sunny day in Rome.
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