Whew. So, I returned from Rome the night of the 14th, dead tired and sick. Fortunately enough, I woke up feeling much better.
Well. Where to begin?
We woke up at 6:00 to get to our 10:38 flight, and security went smoothly. From there we took a 3.5 hour flight to Philadelphia, and had a 3 hour layover. Then, we began our 7 hour trek across the Atlantic to Rome. Our flight was extremely empty, so my dad and I shared a row of 4 seats and I was able to lay down, stretch out, and enjoy 4 hours of solid sleep. We arrived in Rome around 8:00am their time, and grabbed our luggage and then a taxi to Hotel du Torre. Once there, we took showers and began to walk. And walk. And walk. Rarely would our dad let us sit down, because we needed to stay awake until at least 7:00, which is 3:00am our time. Believe me, it's very hard. We strolled around, saw the Pantheon(1), the Spanish steps, Basilica of St. Peter's (the Vatican), and enjoyed our first bites of gelatto. We sat down in Piazza Navona for dinner and I enjoyed a margherita pizza (2) and tiramisu. It was fabulous. We walked around a little longer and then finally retired to our beds. I slept a solid 12 hours, and was finally adjusted to the new time zone.
I don't know if I mentioned this, but we planned on visiting Florence as well. So, at 11:30am, we hopped on a train for 1.5 hours and went north. Our hotel, Hotel Accademia, was but a few blocks from the station and we immediately went there and then had gelatto for lunch. Our hotel had made 3:00 reservations for the Museo Accademia, which houses Michelangelo's famous David. Pictures were unfortunately not allowed, but take my word for it, it was very cool, and much larger than what I had envisioned. After walking around there for about an hour and a half or so, we climbed up a tower at a famous church (sorry, I don't remember the name) and looked down over the city. (3) It was beautiful. Then, we went into another art museum that was very architecturally pleasing. One of Michelangelo's Pietas is stored there. (4) By then it was dinner time--well, for us anyway. Italians often go out for dinner around 9pm, but because of the time difference, we were ready to eat around 7. We were walking back to our hotel to clean up before supper, and passed a place called the Il Porcospino. (FYI, most restaurants there have outdoor patios, and waiters are often standing at the entrance as you walk by trying to get you to sit down.) The waiter called out, "Good evening!" and we just smiled, continuing to walk. Then he yelled out, "You can say hello. We're not French!" This made us laugh, and we decided in the end to go there for dinner. We ate outside and I had lasagna (5). It was absolutely amazing--way better than what you'd get at say...Johnny Carino's. (: After dinner we walked around, went to the ATM, got some gelatto, called my mom, and say a gorgeous Lamborghini driving by. (My dad returned home and searched Ebay for a Lambo. They're kind of pricey.) Then we went to bed, and for the second night in a row, I slept over 12 hours.
On our second and last day in Florence, we woke up too late to have breakfast at the hotel, so instead went to a bar and had cappuccinos and croissants. This cafe was located in a piazza where a repica of Michelangelo's David stood. We also had reservations to go to the Uffizi, which is a HUGE museum full of famous paintings and sculptures. I would guess that it was about, oh, 2 miles long or so. It was cool, but, I have to be honest, got a little old after about the first 5,280 feet. After that we went to the Science Museum, which was very interesting. It started with the very ancient tools used to plot stars in the sky and such, and worked up to modern day things. Very nice. My dad was "coveting" almost everything there; he's such a nerd. (: Then we went to sit down at a nice outdoor cafe and had lunch. My dad got a Caesar salad, my brother a sandwich, and me, a pizza. (6) Very yummy. After that we just kind of sauntered around, walking in and out of countless cathedrals and churches and touring little art museums along the way. Oh, and Lucas, if you're reading this, I thought of you when I saw in one of the churches clothes worn by St. Francis of Assisi. (7/8) We kept our eye out for a good restaurant the whole day, but nothing appealed to us quite as much as the Il Porcospino had the night before. So, we decided to go back. That might seem kind of boring, because, after all, we were there to try new foods and all that jazz, but if you had been there, you would have gone back, too. The service that we received was better than anything you could ever get in the States. Our waiter, Franco (the guy who made the French comment), sat down and talked to us, engaged the whole room of guests in conversation, and we couldn't resist returning. I had ravioli with truffle sauce (9). Oh. My. Land. It was so good. We stayed there, at the restaurant, for probably another 2 hours or so after we finished eating, because in Italy, you have the table for the whole night. We took pictures and had dessert and coffee, and it was very relaxing. A very funny thing about Franco was that he loved Texas. He had a Texas keychain and wore a Longhorns arm bracelet, even though he's never visited America. And, even more than he loved Texas, he loved George W. Bush, or "G.Dub" as he called him. The wallpaper on his cellphone was of the President and the First Lady (10) (sorry that picture's so blurry!), and he had postcards of him hung up in the restaurant. He's was very entertaining. The whole staff was just as good as Franco, and we loved spending the night with them. (11 - Franco's the one to the far right) Since we had to catch a train the next morning, the alarm was set for 8:00, so we got in about 8 hours of sleep.
We caught a train back to Rome around noon, and nothing too exciting happened during the day. Again, we just wandered into multiples churches, chapels, and museums. At 7, however, we embarked on a tour with a former practicing architect from the States, who brought us through a winding tour of Rome's ancient architecture and history. We learned about the Pantheon, the Trevi Fountain, along with other buildings and sculptures throughout the city. It was very interesting. We went back to Hotel du Torre (12), and slept well until 8 the next morning.
The next day was probably the one where we saw the most famous places in one day. It began with the Vatican Museum, where we waited in line for almost 2 hours to get in. The whole museum is 4 miles long, but we weren't able to see all of it because of the insane amount of people that crowded the halls. At the end of the museum is the Sistine Chapel, and that was absolutely breathtaking. Pictures, again, weren't allowed there, but it was so cool to see all this work by Michelangelo, especially Adam's Finger. After seeing all of that, we went and again walked around the Basilica of St. Peter's, which was a lot nicer, considering the fact that we were basically walking around in a daze the first time we saw it. There we saw Michelangelo's most famous Pieta. (13) After all of that we caught a cab to the Colosseum (14), which was phenomenal. It was really cool to see where thousands of people sat to watch races and fights. Right next to the Colosseum is the Forum (15), which was also very interesting. We stopped to eat paninis from a stand on the street and then went into a prison where Peter was kept. It was tiny, but very cool to see. We walked back to our hotel after that, and hung out for a while, taking naps and all that good stuff. We used bad judgment, unfortunately, in choosing dinner that night. We stopped at That's Amore, which was basically in the center of where most of the tourists like to hang out. The food wasn't very good, although, I'm glad to announce, the cappuccino was phenomenal. Again we slept well, resting up for our last day in Rome.
Our last day was very relaxing, with mostly just walking and enjoying Rome. We went into the southern part, and just walked around, even getting ourselves a little bit lost. (; We sat down at a tiny cafe and had paninis and Cokes, and then went back to our hotel before grabbing a taxi to the Borghese. We had reservations there, too, so we got in at exactly 5:00. The Borghese Gallery had some very cool pieces in it, including another interpretation of David. WE walked around there for about an hour, and then around outside. The Gallery is on I don't know how many acres, but there's a lot of beautiful land outside. We strolled along, taking silly pictures (16), and eventually made it back to the hotel to ask for a restaurant recommendation. The guy told us to go to a place that was very close to the hotel, and it was very good. The serving style was very unique and interesting, where they just brought out bowls of what each person ordered for everyone to share. It was all very nice. We tried clams and mussels, king prawn, seafood scampi, and lots of pasta. We went to bed as early as we could in preparation for our very long journey.
We woke up at 5:30am to catch our 10:00am flight. We waited and waited and waited in line until the little kiosk actually opened. Ugh. But, we got on the plane for the 9 hour flight, where I watched The Illusionist, The Gridiron Gang, School for Scoundrels, and a bunch of T.V. shows, all of which were very good. I especially recommend The Illusionist and The Gridiron Gang. (: We had a very short layover in Philadelphia, and I slept all the way to Denver. I got home, didn't feel good, but eventually got to sleep and, like I said, felt much better. I'm unfortunately still adjusting here--I went to bed at 7 two nights ago and 8:30 last night. Whatever. As long as I'm adjusted by the time school starts, I'm fine.
Italy was fantastic. I recommend it to anyone who's looking for a fun vacation. :D
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Well, I better get to work on my 40 essay questions from my English teacher. Ugh.
Thanks for reading!
