full day in Rome

Ahhh, first full day in Rome. We started off waking up at the buttcrack of dawn, surprisingly well rested from the night before. Had breakfast, which was an Italian version of a continental breakfast…had much better stuff, such as biscotti, Nutella, cheese and meat, etc. Met up with Denise, who we met on the way to the hotel from the airport yesterday. We planned to walk around and explore, and it turned out her roommate Rebecca was there, so the four of us set out to invade Rome…

Our first stop was a tabacchi shop to buy bus cards, phone cards, and refill my SIM card. The clerk was pretty cool, cuz he could tell we were Americans (er, except Rebecca, who’s Australian) who didn’t speak a lick of Italian, so it was nice of him to try and understand us. We got by fine on that one, no major snags. =) Afterwards, we tried to take the bus to a metro station so we could go to the Colosseum, but we ended up getting off at some random stop and just walking around. We ended up at the Pantheon, which was BEAUTIFUL. It was awesome standing inside a building that’s 2000 years old.

Rebecca, me, and Chris

Not too far away from the Pantheon was the Trevi Fountain, where a bajillion people, native Italians and tourists, were around. For some odd reason, there were these vendors walking around selling squishy doll things and Eminem posters. Random, yes I know. =P Of course, it’s always advisable to ignore these vendors, so we were trying not to make eye contact with them, but geebus they’re persistent! Oh, so right next to the Trevi was some gooooood gelato! Son of a monkey’s uncle that was good. I got Nutella and After Eight. =) Mmm…for some reason I think we’re gonna be eating a lot of gelato here.

After throwing coins into the fountain to ensure our return to Rome, we headed over to the Spanish Steps. Nothing too entertaining there, except the world’s “largest and most lavish” (according to Rick Steves) McDonald’s. I have this thing where I have to go to a McDonald’s in every country I visit, for comparison reasons. This one was pretty similar to the ones we have in the States, except their diet Coke tastes better (haha, yeah shuddup, I’m diabetic). After lunch, Denise and Rebecca went to do some shopping, so Chris and I walked around some more, taking pictures and whatnot. We ended up in Piazza del Popolo, checking out the architecture and waiting for this one church to open. For some reason, it never opened, and we were sad. =(

There was this guy (or girl, who knows) dressed up as an Egyptian pharaoh, and if you put a coin in the jar in front of him, he would bow. So we were sitting there by a fountain, observing this “pharaoh”…

Chris: That’s kinda funny, a pharaoh bowing…people should be bowing to him! *pauses* But then again, Romans stole his obelisk, so maybe he’s just trying to make money so he can get it back. Yeahhhh that’s it…he’s trying to buy back his obelisk!

HAHAHA what a nerd!

Because the church never opened, we decided to just head back to the hotel so we could write postcards and relax before we had to meet with the rest of our tour group at 6. This is when the adventure began. We took the metro to the station near the hotel, and there was supposed to be a 10-minute walk from the station to the hotel. That 10-minute walk took us over 2 HOURS. Omg…somewhere we took a wrong turn, and all the maps we had cut off at a point north of where we were wandering around, so we had no clue where to go. Street after street, turn after turn, tabacchi store after tabacchi store…no hotel. We kept telling ourselves that we would eventually find it, that it shouldn’t be too far from where we were, but nooo…we finally called the hotel, told them what intersection we were at, and got directions. Ahhh we made it! =P It was nice though, walking through the streets of Rome without totally looking like tourists. But after 2 hours of not knowing where the heck you are, it got a bit scary.

We chilled for about 45 minutes before it was time for us to meet our tour group for dinner. Our tour manager, Franco, seems pretty cool…always joking around and stuff. Dinner was gooood…their pasta here is different from what we’re used to in the States; here, it’s basically pasta with olive oil and a few spices, instead of smothered with sauce, and their salad had just the right amount of dressing. Mmmm yummy!

So yes…day one of Italy has been completed. We’re off to Florence tomorrow, and supposedly our hotel there has internet, so I’ll post this from there! Ciao!