Rome
Here I am back for the penultimate post for this travel series. I will do one more post after we return, and by then I hope to have sorted through the pictures and added them into the appropriate prior posts.
But for now, this is our summary of Rome. As I write this, we are resting with our feet up in the hotel room having done a whirlwind 2 1/2 day Rome tour. We have been blessed with absolutely gorgeous weather for most of our time here despite the predicted three days of rain. The only rain we had was about two hours on Sunday morning at the start of the marathon. Other than that, it has been blue sky, puffy white clouds just like in New Mexico, and temperatures of about 60-63 which has made it just perfect to stroll outside.
Saturday we had an 80-seat double decker bus with only 20 of us aboard. (It would return to the ship full of embarking passengers later in the afternoon). We dropped our luggage at our little hotel right in the center of Rome and then took off on a walking tour of some of the major sites. Our hotel is about a three minute walk from Campo de Fiori, which is a fruit and vegetable market in the mornings and filled with restaurants and diners in the evenings. We are also about a 10 minute walk from both piazza Navona and the Pantheon. So of course we went to try both of those on the same stroll. After a gelato break at Piazza Navona (Tartufo, of course!) we found the Pantheon to be packed, so we skipped it until later and headed to the Trevi Fountain. Everywhere was packed with tourists; the crowds have been heavier than during any of our prior visits, so we decided to head back towards our hotel and find some little place for dinner. We did, and sat outside and did a bit of people watching and ate lemon veal scaloppine and spaghetti with meat sauce, and a bottle of wine. That night we went over to the Colosseum for some night pictures, and walked back via the (also lit) Roman Forum and Palatine Hill before turning in. Turns out, the Colosseum was the start/finish line of the Rome Marathon to be run the next morning at 8am. The entire area was blocked off to traffic, but pedestrians were allowed in. Our feet and knees survived.
Sunday was the rainy morning start, but it was, shall we say odd, to see no traffic on any of the major streets of central Rome. Made it easy to walk, though. We meandered over to the Pantheon, watched it rain through the oculus, listened to the choir, looked at Rafael’s tomb, marveled at the construction and saw real domes, fake trompe l’oeil domes, a statue of Hercules, and then as the rain left and the sun came back out, went over to Trastevere to meet up with our great-nephew for lunch. Not sure where we ate, but had fried artichokes, burrata, and caccia e Pepe and ravioli. We were so stuffed that dinner later that night was only a little bread and cheese and that was it. Went back to the Trevi Fountain to toss in our three coins, and fight more crowds before our feet decided they were in need of a good rest before tackling the Vatican in the morning.
Monday was an easy get up, with breakfast at the hotel, which is marvelous, by the way. Juice, Cappuccino, espresso, eggs, meats, cheeses, pastries, cereals, fruit and bread from the famous bakery Roscioli which is literally six feet across the street from our front door. People come from all over Rome to get their bread and we have it delivered to our breakfast room.
We taxied over to the Vatican, where we fortunately had pre-purchased timed tickets, because the line for buying tickets was down the block and around the corner. I just measured it on google maps, and it says it was over 0.15 miles! Just to get a ticket. We walked right in, accompanied by dirty looks from those who did not prepurchase their tickets and who had to wait while tour groups and voucher holders walked by. I don’t know how many they let in at a time, but it was packed. Shuffle, shuffle, shuffle behind tour groups, dash to the side when the group paused, find a spot ahead, listen to the tour commentary on Rick Steves app, repeat at the next room.
Luckily for us, when we finally arrived at the Sistine chapel we found a space to sit down along the wall, and then were able to ‘join’ a tour group at the exit directly to St. Peter’s. This saved us walking 1.35 miles to return to the museum entrance, around the Vatican walls to the Piazza entrance and another long line waiting to enter the basilica plus another security check. They told us the basilica holds 60,000 people and it felt like all of them were there today. Even so, it felt less crowded there than inside the museum.
(Somewhere in the middle of writing this, Tom opened a bottle of wine, cut up some cheese and salami, and we went up to the rooftop to sit and relax. Our puffy white clouds are still around, as is the blue sky but it is starting to turn gray to the northwest)
And that about wraps it up for today. We’re finishing up the wine and cheese, we have checked in for our flight tomorrow on American, and we will be back in Albuquerque late on Tuesday. I hope you have enjoyed this blog as much as we have enjoyed writing it, and I will see you all back home.
