Rome

Friday, May 25 – Tuesday, May 29

Our arrival in Rome meant going back to the fast pace of the big cosmopolitan city. If you add to it that there is soooo much history in Rome you can imagine how much sightseeing there is to do and how many monuments, buildings, churches, ruins, columns, etc, there are to visit. We went of course to most of the major "tourist" attractions:
-The Coliseum
-The Roman Forum

-Castello St. Angelo (this place will sound familiar to you if you read "Angels and Demons" from Dan Brown)

View of St. Peter´s Cathedral from the rooftop of Castello St. Angelo

-Piazza Novona with Bernini’s "Fountain of the 4 Rivers": The Nile, Rio de la Plata, the Danube and the Ganges. 1 river for each one of the 4 continents recognized at the time the fountain was built in 1651: Africa, America, Europe and Asia. Another place that will sound familiar if you read the Angels and Demons book. After visiting this fountain we went to the nearest bookstore we found looking for a copy of the book. We tried to find out when and how Robert Langdon ran into this fountain in the book but had no luck. So if any one of you remembers it, could you please let me know?
-Piazza del Popolo, Piazza Venezia, and many more Piazzas
-Vatican City: St. Peter’s Cathedral together with a small tour of the crypt where the popes are buried. We went to the Vatican Museum and of course the Sistine Chapel.

-Via del Corso (for the shopaholics in the group)
-The Spanish Steps
-La Fontana di Trevi (Trevi’s fountain)

-The Panthenon

Rome was a lot of fun. It is a hectic city but the Italian people make it a very colorful and even folkloric place. One thing for sure is that the Italians will never die of stress or of a heart attack. They don’t rush for anything (well, except driving). When you ask them about a time frame everything takes 10-20 minutes, if you asked them about distances everything is close. Nothing for them is a burden, nothing is complicated. And of course at the beginning your tendency (or at least ours) is to believe them. But once it’s been 45 minutes and you are still waiting or you still have not gotten to your destination you begin to wonder if it’s not just part of who they are.
Exhibit A: We want to walk to the coliseum, is it far? How long will it take?? -Si si il coliseo vicino vicino dieci minute diestra, sinistra, diestra, sinistra- (Yes yes, the coliseum close, 10 minutes, right, left, right left). Once you get to the coliseum 40 minutes later and after 3 other Italians you asked on your way tell you the same (vicino, vicino, 10 minute) you wonder why you paid attention to Italian #1 and didn’t just take the subway in the first place .

I guess this is just what they call "La dolce vita".