Rome

When In Rome…do as the tourists do…..

We said goodbye to Amalfi and hello to Rome in 2 hours’ time. When we arrived at our apartment in Rome, Calvin was happy to return the car and go back to public transit. Although driving into Rome was quite uneventful it still is a whole different experience driving in Italy (as you are well aware of since we have mentioned it in every entry about Italy). We are staying in another 2 bedroom apartment on the 4^th floor with no elevator. I’m not complaining -we are getting lots of exercise. The location is convenient to the public transit and a 20 minute walk to most of the Roman ruins. We look out to the street below and as soon as we arrived the boys spotted the local gelato place across the street. Sweet!  We really do enjoy these old ‘high’ street communities where everything can be had within a two block radius. We had the local butcher, fruit and veggie market, gelateria, bus stop and various cool clothing stores within 20 meters of our apartment.  Rome is scheduled to be a short six days but with more to see than most countries.  We’ll be rockin’ all week to get to all the main tourist traps. 

Colosseum (Colosseo) and Palatine Hill

We decided to start our Rome experience at the Colosseum. We walked there and saw so many other ruins just by the side of the road, unmarked but clearly extremely old.  It’s likely Rome’s most famous landmark and you see it in so many pictures but when we turned the corner and caught a first glimpse, it was breathtaking.  The size is surprising – it’s massive.  Originally capable of seating some 50,000 spectators for animal fights and gladiatorial combats, the amphitheatre took only 10 years to construct – impressive for any century let alone the 1^st century. 

 The boys were really excited to get in and see where the gladiators once stood and fought for their lives. We decided to opt for a group guide who helped us skip the line and ended up only costing an extra 5 euros to our tickets. It was well worth it as she was an archeologist herself and was obviously passionate about her job. She shared a lot of interesting information about the emperors and gladiators and the internal structures of the building. The floor has been removed in the Colosseum so that you can see the underground cells and tunnels where the people and wild animals waited to be lifted, poked or thrown in the ring to fight one another.

You will notice from the picture we have posted that all of the walls have holes on the outside. The outside of most of the Roman ruins were recycled after the fall of Rome for local construction or for new architectural wonders like St. Peters Basilica.  Most of the ruins have lost their marble or limestone including the Colosseum.

We left the Colosseum and walked up to Palatine Hill where Rome was founded by the twins Romulus and Remos (mythological? perhaps).  It’s just a short walk up the hill from the Colosseum and you almost instantly leave the crowds behind. Visitors flock to the Colosseum and the Roman Forum but seem to shy away from Palatine hill which is full of interesting ruins and quaint gardens. There is so much to see and all of it such a window into the world of Ancient Rome: the House of Livia, the House of Augustus, the Temple of Apollo, Palace of the Flavii, Domus Augusta and the amazing Circus of Domitian.  There is a small but very informative (free) museum and a fresh water spring to drink from. 

Interesting travel note about Rome…you can drink from the fountains all over the city.  The water is, for the most part, still aquaducted from the mountains and it is fresh and apparently endless.  Most emperors and prominent political figures made the hill their home and built their residences up there.  We explored the many paths and found a large open area that once was an amphitheatre, Augustus’s home and the huts that Romulus and Remos lived. The hill provides a fantastic view of Rome and the Roman Forum below but we were too tired to go further so decided to leave the Forum for another day.   We had a copy of Gladiator to watch that night and we all sat around the laptop and watched Russell Crowe kick some butt after a long day.  The movie is one of our favorites but it was extra special that night after our visit to the real Colosseum and our new appreciation for the atmosphere surrounding the Gladiator battles.   Russell Crowe, oh my…

Roman Forum and other really touristy spots

The next day we left early to visit the Roman Forum.   The Forum was the commercial, political and religious center of ancient Rome, which included the Arch of Septimus Severus, Temple of Saturn, Arch of Titus and the House of the Vestals.  The armies would march under the various Arches carrying the conquests of most of the known world at the time.  Exotic animals captured and kept in cages until fight day at the Colosseum were also paraded around for the locals to see.

Various carvings on the Arches depicted the conquests and wild beasts of the time.  I have to say that the boys were not really impressed with the Forum.  I’d suggest you visit the Forum first or hire a real good tour guide as there are mostly just columns laying on the ground and a few foundations of buildings.   A really good tour guide and an extra shot of imagination are required to picture what this must have looked like two thousand years ago.  We lacked both that day.  We did want to find the burning and original burying grounds of the great Julius Cesar but it wasn’t very impressive – not sure what we were expecting.   

We didn’t stay long.  I gave myself the name of Lilianna and used my best Italian accent to pretend I was a tour guide for the boys...you know, just to shake things up a little. Here is a picture of "Lilianna" helping out some American tourists. We found our way out of the Forum area and headed to the next site.

We climbed hundreds of stairs (as we do every day in Rome) to reach the street level for more exploring. Devin has declared stairs his #1 enemy and eggplant his #2. Noah convinced him to try grilled eggplant in Spain and he just about lost it. On the way to the Trevi Foundation which was quite a walk, we came across a Chinese restaurant in one of the tiny squares. We all looked at each other and said…YES! We were growing tired of pasta, pizza, pizza and pasta so why not trade one starch for another! The kids thought it was pretty funny sitting in Rome eating Chinese food but it was some of the best we have ever had. We had a great lunch and were ready to tackle the rest of the sightseeing.   

The Trevi Fountain was jammed full of tourists but we had to go to see this magnificent fountain and of course throw a coin over our shoulder.  The superstition is if you throw a coin you will return to Rome one day. I threw a coin in about 18 years ago and here I was back in Rome so everyone gave it a shot.  The fountain is the largest Baroque fountain in the city and one of the most famous fountains in the world. 

We then headed to another key tourist spot and just followed the crowd to the Spanish Steps. On the way we stopped at a café and shot back an espresso. We first stood across the street from the steps and watched all the people lounging and sunning themselves and while doing so a street vendor came over and offered me a couple of roses. I said no thank you and he told me they were free because I was so lovely.  Wow, that is so nice…..I thought, so I said thank you very much! He then told Calvin how fortunate he was to be married to me…who could argue…except Calvin pretended he didn’t know me and he was instead married to the woman standing in front of him. Ha ha…The guy must have seen us coming because he knew Calvin was kidding.

Then after complimenting me so nicely he asked Calvin for some money for the roses!! I haven’t fallen for many scams but he totally got me on that one. Here these are for free because you are so  lovely but how about giving me some money anyway? No thanks, keep your stinking roses!   After I picked my ego up off the pavement we climbed the many steps to the top and admired the view.  

The steps slope upward from the Piazza di Spagna at the base to the Piazza trinita dei Monti and a beautiful church at the top.  It’s the widest staircase in Europe….anybody care? …not really, except for the 000s of tourists who come to see the widest staircase in Europe. 

We were wiped so we jumped on the Metro and returned home.  We decided to try one of the local restaurants for dinner and fell for the ever common tourist 12 euro breadbasket.  Damn, each slice of bread for 2 euro (that’s $3cdn)….we were not happy with the bill but the food was great. 

The Great toy hunt

After introducing the concept that everyone gets to celebrate a birthday on this trip regardless of your real birthday, Aidan was quick to point out the necessary birthday gift giving tradition. 

We decided on one gift and of course, Aidan wanted something we could not find anywhere.  It has turned in to a fun thing for all of us as we have to locate the local toy store(s) in search of Captain America.  We have yet to find the Captain but we are having a blast walking through all the toy stores in Italy. 

Campo de Fiori and Pantheon

This was a little too far for us to walk so we caught the bus to Campo de Fiori. This is a rectangular square near Piazza Navona and in English means ‘field of flowers’.  The name was first given during the Middle Ages when the area was actually a meadow.  It used to be used for everything from public hangings to political meetings and now it is a flower market but every morning it has food, clothing and anything else you could imagine.

We walked a round and looked at every stall and bought some candy, nuts and truffle paste (great for pasta).

Calvin negotiated 4 large fruit salads and we just stood around watching the world bustle by. As we were leaving I saw some people eating some delicious looking cannoli and so I asked them where to find these little pieces of heaven. They didn’t offer us a bite but told us they were amazing and where to find them. They were right. They were amazing.

We walked to the Piazza Navrona , ate our cannoli and admired the three beautiful fountains. After wiping our faces and loosening our belts we set out to find the Pantheon.

The Pantheon is a temple to all the gods of Ancient Rome and was rebuilt by Emperor Hadrian around 125AD.  It is billed as the most perfect architectural splendor in the world.  I suppose that is a personal thing but this place is simply amazing.   The pillars in front are massive and the Roman doors at the entrance are breathtaking.  

There is a large, spectacular dome in the middle that is said to have inspired the dome revolution throughout Europe.  You can look up to the heavens and see the sky through the hole at top and when it rains the floors are sloped away from the middle so the water will not pool.  Almost two thousand years after it was built, the Pantheon’s dome is still the world’s largest unreinforced concrete dome.  The name 'Pantheon’ likely originated from the Greek adjective meaning “to every god”.  It has been in continuous use throughout its history and since the 7^th century, it has been used as a church and from our view, it’s the best preserved Roman building in Rome.  We took our time walking around inside and looked at all the monuments and paintings.

I had read in one of our tour books about a GIANT foot that was part of an ancient statue that marked an entrance to the city. I was determined to find this GIANT foot as some little quirky site that the boys would think was fun. We walked up and down the street it was supposed to be on a couple of times and couldn’t find it so we wandered into another church that was quite lovely. Aren’t they all though? This one was the Santa Minerva and it contained a statue of the risen Christ by Michelangelo.  We all seemed to need a rest so we did on the stairs of the church and then… back to that FOOT! I was determined to find this GIANT foot! Noah suggested I just ask someone to which I shot him a look of contempt. We went back down the street (3^rd time) and found it. The reason we had missed it was because it was no bigger than my foot!! Not GIANT at all. We had walked by it and not noticed it. We all had a laugh and the boys enjoyed teasing me about the GIANT foot for the rest of the day. We planned to take the bus back home but couldn’t find our bus number so we walked all the way home. It took about an hour which normally would not have been too difficult but after a day of sightseeing we were beat!

Vatican City

We couldn’t decide if heading to the Vatican in the early morning or the late afternoon would be better to avoid the crowds but after a late wake up time, our fate was sealed.  We packed our lunch and headed to the Metro. Eight stops later we arrived with a whole throng of tourists. Since we really just wanted to see the Sistine Chapel, we planned to cruise through the Vatican Museum as fast as possible.  Ya see, you have to enter the Sistine Chapel through the Vatican Museum and there is usually a two hour wait to get into the Museum. 

The walk from the entrance of the Museum to the entrance of the Chapel is a 45 minute walk on a good day.  Yup, inside a museum walking for 45 minutes – get a sense of the size of this place….freakin’ huge.   We ‘picked’ the better of the two arrival times as we walked straight in to the Museum but the amount of tourists was overwhelming and we were not able to build any pace to our walk to the Chapel. 

We really can’t complain too much about the walk as we were in awe from the moment we entered.  The Vatican Museum(s) are among the greatest museums in the world, since they display works from the immense collection built up by the Roman Catholic Church throughout the centuries, including some of the most renowned classical sculptures, furniture, jewellery, mosaics, stain glass and most important Renaissance art in the world.   The museum was founded in the 16^th century as the conquests piled up and they have done a great job displaying the millions of pieces.

Calvin whispered, under his breath, how powerful it would be if the artifacts displayed a brief description of ‘how’ the church came to own such a foreign treasure and the ‘cost’ of that treasure.  Anyway, it’s impressive and staggering to think of the amount of works on display and apparently a multiple more are archived in the basement. 

As there is no short-cut to the Sistine Chapel, we took our time and took in all the artifacts. The tapestries and mosaics were really beautiful and the boys were impressed by the ceilings.

Finally we reached the Sistine Chapel and it was crowded but we managed to carve out a little niche for our family to just stand and look at every panel. You are supposed to keep quiet as it is a chapel but of course the many tourists find this difficult to do so your experience is tainted a little by the guards shushing every few seconds. They do try to rush you through but we stayed and took our time. The Creation of Adam with God’s outstretched fingertips is beautiful but the entire ceiling is equally impressive.

I was explaining to the boys what each panel was and what it represented when we got to one that said it was God creating the Sun and Moon. The actual panel on the ceiling shows God creating the sun, moon and planets.  The sun at the end of his outstretched right hand and the moon over his left shoulder but more importantly to my crew, an angel flying across the piece with his robe askew revealing his bare bottom. 

The boys thought it was pretty funny and out of place up on the ceiling until they came to the conclusion that that is why we call it “mooning” someone. When God created the sun, moon and planets, he created ‘mooning’ as we know it…..not sure that was Michelangelo’s plan. These boys are learning so much! We spent half an hour looking at the ceiling and the paintings surrounding the interior of the Chapel.  The true mastery and genius of Michelangelo is fully realized when looking at that ceiling. 

We ate our lunch and made our way to St. Peters Square to visit St Peter’s Basilica. It amazes me that female tourists show up at the CHURCH of all churches in short shorts or tank tops only to be turned away with an utterly shocked look on their faces. Come on ladies, show some respect here.  For many (we’re talking billions) this is a place of pilgrimage. 

St Peter’s is the largest of any Christian church in the world.  It has markings in the floor of the sizes of a few of the other larger churches in the world.  Size does matter.  As we went in, it got very dark and started to rain a little so we took our time looking in every nook we could find.

We spent a lot of time admiring Michelangelo’s Pieta which is such a sad statue of Mary holding a slain Jesus.

When we left the church it was raining but it didn’t stop us from walking around the square and finding the spot that the Pope would bless us from if he were there, but he wasn’t. Instead of the Metro we took our first taxi ride through the city and it was great. We got to see a little bit more of the city on our last day in Rome.    

I apologize in advance for the length of this post but there was so much to see and do in Rome that we could have written a tour guide during our short stay.   Few cities have the ability to inspire like Rome.  We absolutely loved Rome and could have spent months if not a lifetime absorbing the energy, romance and history.  With Trevi Fountain tradition on our side, we will be back!