Rome

Rome Photos (until I can figure out how to integrate them into the blog entry, just follow the link)
 https://get.google.com/albumarchive/112548351655084046186/album/AF1QipNkAB6eLlEFAzh4x3u1_rgC9PwE4cs4J6wJEruR?authKey=COmL2sG3kKGFAg

Welcome to our travel diary!  I decided to call it a diary instead of a blog just for funsies.  We are currently on the road, heading to the coast of Tuscany, and I have a couple of free hours.  Let me regale you with the story of the first few days of this trip.  We left Seattle at the crack of dawn last Saturday, and made it to Rome by Sunday morning (with a 5-hour layover in scenic Detroit).  Typically, our arrival in a foreign country where neither of us speak the language is stressful, to say the least.  However, we got ourselves out of the airport, onto an express train, the metro, and to our apartment rental in under 90 minutes!  Our apartment was up the street from the Colosseum in the Rione Monti.  Perfect location, with loads of restaurants and bars, easy access to buses, and walking distance to the Roman Forum, Colosseum, and Altare della Patria.  We dropped off our luggage and made a beeline to the closest bakery for some coffee and a snack.  By this point, it's about 11am and we haven't really slept in 24 hours.  The thought of staying awake until 10pm is killing us, but we made it!  It's amazing what a shower and some caffeine can do for you. 

Our first afternoon in Rome, we walked around the outside of the Colosseum and Forum up to the Altare della Patria.  It's an ostentatious display of national pride that gleams white and bright, showing up its ancient neighbors at the Forum.  The crowds in August in Rome aren't bad, and we had no trouble wandering through the monument, taking in the view of the city from the rooftop.  The amount of people with selfie sticks has dramatically increased since our last trip to Italy.  Now instead of keychains, street vendors are selling these monstrosities to the tackiest of tourists.  Seriously, selfie sticks fill us with so much rage and we realize that it's just us turning into cranky old people. But every person using one doesn't not look like an idiot.  <rant over>

Next, we visited the Capitoline Museums, which houses some of Rome's most famous statues and art.  The centerpiece is a gigantic bronze statue of Marcus Aurelius on horseback, Capitoline She-Wolf, and Commodus as Hercules.  Now's a good time to mention that we have oodles of pictures of all of our museum stops, so feel free to peruse. 

We hopped on a tram from Capitoline Hill over to Trastevere, a cool area across the river known for being the ‘gritty’ part of the city, which means that it’s now overwhelmed with hipsters.  We settled in for our first (and definitely not our last) Aperol Spritzes and snacks at a tiny bar in an even tinier piazza, and people watched for a couple of hours. When we decided to finally eat dinner, we went back to our neighborhood and had a totally mediocre meal at a restaurant that had a roach climbing on the wall next to us…inside.  Gross!  On that bummer note, we called it quits for the night and finally got a night’s sleep.

Day 2 in Rome was crazy busy.  We had been to Rome before, so this walking tour was a repeat for us, which was good because our last photos from 2009 sucked hard.  After breakfast at a nearby bakery, we went to the Colosseum.  Luckily we purchased a Roma Pass on our way into the city, so we had zero wait in line (think Disney Fast Pass, but for reallllly old stuff).  It was hot as blazes, so we made a quick tour around and were out of the Colosseum in an hour.  Crazy to imagine that Russell Crowe used to live there!  (j/k).  We moved on to the Roman Forum and walked the Via Sacra to see the incredible ruins and complete buildings left from the Roman Empire.  We listened to our Rick Steves podcast Roman Forum walking tour and let his sweet, sweet voice take us through time.  We highly recommend his podcasts for walking tours through some of the most overwhelming sights-he and another guide have only mildly annoying banter, there is nice historical context provided, and you get tips and tricks to help you avoid waiting in ridiculous lines at some of the major places.  Yes, I realize how old this makes me sound.  We made our way from the Forum to the world’s hottest, most crowded bus to Vatican City.  So many sweaty nuns! 

We had reserved tickets for the Vatican Museum at 2pm, so we wandered around outside the ‘city’ for a bit, had some sorbetti, and made our way to the museum.  The line for this place wraps all the way around Vatican City for people who didn’t make reservations, so we just merrily skipped past all of them, laughing all the way to the ticket office.  There are so many places that are made ridiculously less stressful and more enjoyable by making reservations ahead of time, the Vatican Museum, Borghese Gallery, and Campo dei Miracoli in Pisa among them.  We are definitely not fly by the seat of our pants travelers, and I hate waiting in line if I don’t have to.  I digress.  Back to the Vatican Museum.  This place is packed with antiquities and artwork that the Catholic Church has squirreled away.  The place was packed, as it was a Monday and many other museums are closed.  We joined the throng of people through every glorious room.  There are statues from the Etruscan period, Mesopotamia and ancient Egypt, and a room of the most gorgeous maps.  The highlights of the museum are the Raphael rooms, covered from floor to ceiling in masterpieces from this handsome young artist, and the Sistine Chapel, Michelangelo’s masterpiece.  The Vatican Museum is the place to give you a neck ache because you’re constantly looking up at the stunning ceilings, not wanting to miss a thing.  We spent a good couple of hours basking in the beauty (and heat—no A/C here).  After our 15 minutes in the Sistine Chapel (where they constantly shush you and announce “NO PHOTO”), we were able to sneak into the Crypts with a group tour (so naughty!) and did a quick spin through St. Peter’s Basilica.  Feeling full enough of the holy spirit, we boarded another hot and sticky bus (this time with yelling old people) back to the apartment.  We spent the rest of the evening have cocktails atop the Forum Hotel with a great view of the entire Forum at sunset and having a fun multi-course dinner at Trattoria der Pallaro near the Pantheon and a stroll through the Piazza Navona. 

Our last complete day in Rome was just as busy as the previous ones.  We packed in the National Museum of Rome, Baths of Diocletian, Santa Maria della Vittoria and Borghese Gallery.  The National Museum was fabulous-beautifully laid out exhibits of frescoes, mosaics, and statuary from ancient Rome.  Much of the exhibit is excavated from a Roman villa that must have been the Downton Abbey of its time.  We had the place practically to ourselves, which was a delight.  Across the street were the Baths of Diocletian, which contained well-worn statues and ancient Roman baths from 300 A.D.  We made a long walk to Santa Maria della Vittoria, which is home to my favorite sculpture, Bernini’s St. Teresa in Ecstasy.  We visited this chapel on our first trip, and my photos then were horrendous.  I more than made up for it this time in our short visit (chiusi for lunch at 12pm).  Nearby, we found a sweet little osteria built into an old oratory (say that 10 times fast) and had way too much pasta and bread for lunch.  With full bellies, we grabbed a bus to the Borghese Gardens, Rome’s dustier, dirtier version of Central Park.  We had plenty of time to stroll around before our Borghese Gallery appointment at 3pm.  The Gallery was tightly controlled-no reservations, no admittance.  Also, no bags allowed, which only is funny for the bratty American teenager who didn’t want to check her tiny purse because “it’s like, a rahlee ahx-pehn-sive bahhhg’).  I laughed my ass off later when I saw her toting around the tiny plastic sack they give you to hold your crap.  But back to the art!  The Gallery has works by many of the greats-Bernini, Caravaggio, Raphael, and Rubens.  Anything by Bernini is a treasure.  His sculptures are so lifelike they look as if they could breathe or turn and talk to you at any moment.  With sore feet and tired eyes and necks, we made the extraordinarily long trek back to our apartment (turns out the bus to the Borghese only goes one way).  We had dinner at a nearby trattoria and unfortunately got to witness the first of many British families have a complete vacation meltdown at dinner.  Yelling, swearing, and arm-grabbing completed our meal.  We cleansed our palates by drinking beer on the rooftop of our apartment, enjoying the nighttime panorama of Rione Monti and soaking up the last of our Roman holiday.  Next stop: Monte Argentario on the coast of Tuscany!