Rome if you want to....

Wednesday, December 17, 2008
We went to the Miami International Airport around 1:00 p.m. We’ve been to other “international” airports, like Las Vegas or Fort Lauderdale, but man, Miami really IS an international airport. We felt like we walked into another country as soon as we got to the airport! We were the only ones speaking English. We had a scare because our flight confirmation said that we were flying Delta, so we tried to check in with Delta. However, apparently Delta is owned by Alitalia and we were actually flying on Alitalia. So then we went to Alitalia’s check in and everything was in order. The guy that checked us in was nice and gave me a window seat and Elliott an isle seat and then blocked out the middle, so we had a whole row.
The flight was 9 ½ hours long, and we were fed dinner and breakfast. The dinner was pretty bad, in my opinion. Plus, they were very chincy with the drinks, so I was dying of thirst. Next time, I’ll take my own drinks. Elliott slept most of the flight. I finished a book and then tried to sleep, but I can’t sleep on flights very well. I was able to sleep for a couple hours once I had Elliott sit at the window and then I leaned on him and spread out on the row.  Once we landed, it was already 8:00 a.m. on Thursday.
Thursday, December 18, 2008
Once we landed, we got our luggage (thank you for direct flights!) Then we went to get a taxi. We had read in books and on signs in the airport that we need to a get a taxi with a meter. So this guy comes up and in broken English tells us that he has a meter and that he’ll take us. He was in a suit and looked nice enough so we decided to follow him. Once we got in the car, though, there was no meter. So Elliott opens the car door while he’s backing out and yells “No! We’re getting out!” The dude flat out lied about the meter, so we got out. Then others tried to hustle us to their taxi’s but we found the official airport taxi line and that’s where we found a legitimate taxi. He didn’t speak much English at all, but we were able to tell him where our hotel was b/c Elliott had printed off directions beforehand. Wow, what a taxi ride! Traffic in Rome is HORRIBLE! It’s scary, people just drive all over and there are streets coming and going in all directions. We were so glad we weren’t driving. Plus, it was fun to look around. There are cool things to see all around.
Once we got to our hotel, we tried to check in, but they wouldn’t let us do so for like 5 more hours. Luckily, they had a luggage closet, so we dropped off our bags and started touring. We were so stinking tired, and really just wanted to sleep, but it was nice to get us going and try to switch our clocks. We decided to walk to Villa Borghese, which is basically like this massive park that has a few museums, a zoo, and equestrian center. We went to the Galleria Museum and saw a lot of art and statues that included works of Michelangelo, Bernini, and Caravaggio. Our favorite was a statute of Apollo and Daphne, where Daphne turns into a tree. It was beautiful and we wished we could take pictures, but we had to turn in our bags and cameras before entering. I also found a huge foot that had a flip-flop on it. I can’t even imagine how big the whole statue would have been, b/c only the foot was there and it was really big. I loved that it had a flip flop on it and again, wished I had my camera. After the museum, we walked around the park and found a nice romantic lake to sig by for a bit. By this time, we were so tired, we were dizzy. We still had time before check in, so we found a restaurant called Il Pomordorino, which I think means “little tomato.” I had margherita pizza and Elliott had a brushetta that had mozzarella, tomatoes, and green stuff. Both were delicious and we were happy that our waiter spoke pretty good English. We then, of course, had to try some gelato, so we ordered something that we really didn’t know what it meant, other than “crema” and another word I recognized to mean strawberry. It was strawberry gelato, cream gelato, fresh strawberries, whipped cream, strawberry sauce, and some sweet cracker things. It did not disappoint!
After lunch, we went to the hotel and finally checked in. Elliott said I could take a nap, but only for a little while because we needed to get used to Italy time. So we slept for four hours (much needed), and when we woke up, I still wanted to sleep! So we stayed in the hotel, and ate the leftovers from lunch. We planned out our next day and got online to post on the blog and do my fantasy football (since I’m in the championship game!!). The internet only works in the lobby and there are no plugs in the lobby, so I couldn’t post much on the blog b/c our laptop was dying. After that, it was about midnight and we went to sleep.
Friday, December 19, 2008
Elliott set the alarm for 7:30, but he turned it off and we slept until about 8:30. Our hotel is under renovations (we are in a brand new room that reminds me of a room made from Ikea stuff; very posh and minimalist), so we couldn’t have slept even if we wanted to. It took me a while to fall asleep, so I was still really tired. I don’t do well with time changes. We get breakfast for free (rather, included) at our hotel, so we ate a big meal since we were starving and food is kind of hard to come by since all the restaurants close at weird times. After breakfast, I finished my hair, and then we were off to the Colosseum! We decided to try out the metro subway system since it is quite a ways from our hotel. The auto ticket machine charged us double for some reason, but it dropped us off literally at the Colosseum. Best 4 euro ever spent (except for gelato). Once we got off the Metro, a young guy approached us, and I ignored him but Elliott actually listened. Good thing, because he was selling us a great tour of both the Colosseum and the Roman Forum. You pay them, and they take you right past all the lines and give you an English tour/history of the Colosseum. Then we had like 1hr 15 minutes of free time inside the Colosseum, which was awesome. They had an exhibit with some cool statues too. The Colosseum is impressive and hard to describe. I liked all the arches.
After our free time, we met up with a different guide from the same company and she took us through Palentine Hill/Roman Forum. She was from Australia and really knew her history, plus she was really funny. The Palentine Hill is where the emperors built their palaces. They are in ruins now, but you can see how massive of a structure it was. The Roman Forum had the house of the Vestal Virgins, the Senate house, churches, and Via Sacra which is where the soldiers would march in with their spoils of war and where big arches were built to celebrate their victory. These two tours and our free time spent exploring the area took about the whole day. After we were kicked out since it closes, we went to Via Cavour and ate at a cute little café. The waiter saw us looking around, and in broken English says “please, please, come in.” I couldn’t resist.  We ate some dinner (well, actually lunch, but at dinner time). I had a caprese sandwhich and Elliott had some penne pasta. The food was just okay, but it was cheap and the service was good. We’re always happy when people speak English. After dinner, we had to have another gelato, so we got cherry gelato on a cone and shared it. It was super sweet and quite tasty. Then we continued down Via Cavour and found a grocery store. We bought some Diet Coke (or CocaCola Light, as they call it), real chocolate, Pringles, soap, and tissue. The grocery store was funny…not at all like America’s. It is not very big and it STINKS, and everything is in Italian.  Go figure. Haha. Afterwards, it was getting quite cold and dark, so we decided to head home. We took the Metro again and walked back to our hotel. Now we are resting, planning our day tomorrow, and are probably going to turn in early since we are still tired from our first 48 hour stint of no sleeping! Tomorrow we are going to hit the Vatican with the same tour company (pretty cheap and really informative).