Dear Family and Friends
It took us a while to get our Rome photos sorted out as there were more than 1,800 photos to go through and believe it or not most of them are lovely, so the process of selecting only a few for our website was really a tough one! We hope you will love them as much as we do - so here’s the link to our Rome photos - enjoy!
http://albums.laurenstravels.com/rome
Rome was wonderful and has totally met our expectations - we are tempted to say that we enjoyed Rome more than Paris!
For starters the Romans are friendly, warm-hearted people who are more able and willing to speak English than the Parisians, though we had some difficulties trying to communicate to some of them. Even though it was still winter when we visited Rome, the weather was much warmer than in London this time of year, although the people in Rome dress according to the season not according to the weather - if you catch my drift - coats, gloves and scarves the lot!
We also found Rome to be a cheaper holiday destination than Paris (and London for that matter!) In Paris we had a ‘pub’ lunch - hotdog, toasted cheese & ham sandwich, chips, a coke and a cup of coffee for €40 - in Rome a meal consisting of a ham carbonara pasta, a large pizza, a large bottle of water + a cup of coffee set us back only €17!!
The streets are not as dirty as people always say they are - London’s streets are far worse, where you have to dodge people’s ‘gop’ and spit all the time and also cleaner than the streets of Paris, where we had to dodge dog poo!
We left London on Thursday morning, 2nd February 2006, very early with Ryan Air from Stansted Airport and arrived in Rome at about lunch time. The flight was very an interesting sightseeing experience - as we flew over the Alps and Austria - the endless mountains were covered with snow - whetting our appetites for a lovely holiday in the Alps (in June?!?).
After arriving at our hotel we went for a lovely Italian lunch at the restaurant around the corner from our hotel - we had fun explaining to the waiter that the pasta I ordered has the same name as his ‘bowtie’ - so we taught him a new English word! We then bought 3 day Metro / bus tickets for €11 per person and went with the Metro to Spagna tube station to visit Piazza (square) di Spagna, which boasts one of the city’s major monumental attractions, the ‘’Scalinata'’ - or the Spanish Steps as they are known as. Unfortunately, they were busy with some maintenance work there, so we will have to go back to Rome at some other stage to go and take some more photos of the famous Spanish Steps with the (fake) Egyptian Obelisk at the top of the stairs. At the foot of the Spanish Steps is the Fontana della Barcaccia - built almost a century before the staircase.
From the Spanish Steps we walked to the Trevi Fountain - which in Roman terms is almost new - as it was built only about 240 years ago The water that flows over and through it was brought to Rome by the Aqueduct originally built in 19BC to supply water to the baths near the Pantheon. At the Trevi Fountain we bumped into loads of foreign sellers, selling roses and other gadgets - these people make it very unpleasant at the tourist attractions as they just don’t take no for an answer. The rose seller will give you a couple of roses with a big smile and say - for you! - then he will chase the man (Shaun) and insist on getting money for it - if you don’t want to pay for it they get very angry and grab the roses back! Just to get rid of one of these obnoxious guys, we ended up paying €8 for 5 squeezy balls, for which another lady paid only €1 each!! One very positive thing about the Trevi Fountain is the fact that the legend is that when you toss a coin over your shoulder, you can make a wish and assure that you will return to Rome - which we both did!
We had a very exciting day lined up - visiting the Colosseum, the Roman Forum (ruins), as well as the Pantheon.
Firstly, the Colosseum - built in AD80 represents Rome at its grandest. The Colosseum was an arena for gladiator contests and public spectacles. The Colosseum seated 100,000 thumbs (thumbs up - let him live; thumbs down - let him die). The stadium was inaugurated with a 100-day festival in which 2,000 men and 9,000 animals were killed. Can you imagine all that blood!
Outside the Colosseum we had a bad experience when one of these foreign sellers tried to sell us jewellery - at first I was bit interested but then we said no thank you - then he insisted - eventually I said ok - I will buy one of the ‘real Indian silver’ chains from him - it was €25 - we only had €20 notes on us and gave the guy 2 of them and asked for change, which he refused to give - eventually after threatening him that I will call the police as they are everywhere - he gave us 2 X €5 notes and after some more threatening all of a sudden out of nowhere a big man appeared and ripped the whole roll full of bangles and chains from the seller’s hand and the seller ran off and the man (who was apparently a casually dressed police man) took the roll and walked off angrily in the opposite direction, leaving us stunned! I was shaking - but that just made us hard to these sellers, so the rest of our weekend in Rome we just avoided them at all cost.
Another thing that Shaun put on our website as tips for Rome, is all the American students outside the Colosseum trying to sell you a guided tour at €8 - whereas you can get the same tour inside the Colosseum for €3.50 - we had a wonderful guide book with the actual tour in it - so we did not bother with a guided tour. As a matter of fact, we walked past a couple of these and the tour guide was reading all the stuff out of a book - in very bad English - so we saved ourselves some money!
After visiting the Colosseum we started our Forum tour - which are the ruins of the old Roman senate. Such a pity that it was not preserved at an earlier stage! We bought a book which showed you pictures of what it looked like originally.
From here we went to the Pantheon - as Rick Steves says in his book - ‘’For the greatest look at the splendour of Rome, antiquity’s best-preserved interior is a must. Built two millennia ago, this influential domed temple served as the model for Michelangelo’s dome of St. Peter’s and many others.'’ The walls at the base are 23 feet thick and made from heavy travertine concrete, while near the top they’re less than five feet thick and made with a lighter volcanic rock (pumice) mixed in. At the top in the inside, the oculus, or eye-in-the-sky, is the building’s only light source and is almost 30 feet across. The 1,800-year-old floor has holes in it and slants toward the edges to let the rainwater drain. There is a beautiful marble floor in the place, which they say is still largely original.
On Saturday morning we got up really early as we were informed that the queue is very long to enter the Vatican City (an independent country of little more than 100 acres, contained entirely within Rome with its own postal system, armed guards, helipad, mini-train station and radio station). We spent about 3 hours walking through the Vatican Museum (seeing only half of it as there is so much to see) and then we walked through the Sistine Chapel, where we were not allowed to take photos - knowing Shaun and myself you will know that we tried! Oh boy, we were almost caught - the security guard came to us and told us in a very firm voice ‘’NOW YOU PUT THAT AWAY!!'’ - fortunately the lens was pointed downwards otherwise he would have confiscated our camera - as he did with another tourist’s!
Displaying the glories of the ancient world, the lavish papal palace (Vatican Museum) is decorated by the likes of Michelangelo and Raphael. ‘’The four miles of displays in this immense museum - from ancient statues to Christian frescoes to modern paintings - culminate in the Raphael Rooms and Michelangelo’s glorious Sistine Chapel.'’ Fortunately there weren’t that many people around, so we had a wonderful experience! You can go and check lots more of the magnificence of the inside of the Vatican Museum on our website: http://albums.laurenstravels.com/vatican-city
Almost all the statues’ male organs have been removed or are covered with fig leaves - as in the years 1550 to 1800 when the Church decided that certain parts of the human anatomy were obscene, were removed or covered. According to Rick Steves’ book - ‘’Perhaps Church leaders associated these full-frontal statues with the outbreak of Renaissance humanism that reduced their power in Europe.'’
After a very interesting, beautiful and fascinating walk through the Vatican Museum and Sistine Chapel we were starved and started walking down the busy road to try and find a MacDonalds that everybody told us was very close - well - approximately 3 km later we found it! We walked through a huge food market on the pavements of the road - selling fresh food, fish, vegetables, fruit, flowers etc.
On Sunday morning we visited St Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican City. ‘’St Peter’s is the greatest church in Christendom. It represents the power and splendour of Rome’s 2,000-year domination of the Western World. Built on the memory and grave of the first pope, St. Peter, this is where the grandeur of ancient Rome became the grandeur of Christianity.'’ - quoted from our guide book by Rick Steves. In his book he warns you against pickpockets on the number 64 bus to the Vatican City - and you guess it - a pickpocket (whom we noticed when we got on the crowded bus!) was standing behind Shaun and it did not take the pickpocket long to see what he can steal from me - I noticed his hand underneath my blouse - where my money wallet was tied up around my waist and stuck into the front of my pants!! I loudly said - ‘’Excuse me!! Could you please take your hand out of my clothes!!'’ We were rattled!
At the St. Peter’s Basilica, standing on St Peter’s Square, we were fortunate to see the Pope (Benedict XVI) delivering his weekly Sunday 12noon blessing session! There were hundreds of people on St Peter’s Square listening to the Pope’s blessings in Italian, German and English!
Next we went inside the majestic St Peter’s Basilica - no words can describe the feeling you have when you stand inside the Cathedral looking around you - you feel so small. The photos don’t do the place justice - but you will get the idea how amazing it is inside!
By Sunday afternoon we were both exhausted and my feet were in pain from all the walking - so we went back to Trevi Fountain to enjoy the lovely ice cream from a little street cafe! We then walked back to the Pantheon where we stopped for a pizza before heading back to the airport for our flight back to London!
When we got to Stansted Airport we were stuck in an incredibly long queue at the passport control as one of the other airports in London was closed due to a fire, so we missed the last train back to London and had to call a taxi (which cost us an additional £50 to the non-refundable £25 that we have already paid for our Standsted Express train tickets back to London!) We got home only after 3am the Monday morning!
But it was all worth it as we had a very lovely weekend, walking through one of the oldest European cities!
Lots of love to you all and please write to us soon!
Anel & Shaun + the poopers!
2006 far above the rest of them - we had ours with us constantly and it was always of use.
