Following the Dream

Christian September 24th, 2008

Like most of the trips in Italy so far, the trip to Rome was not long, but delayed.  Our train ended up being 35 minutes late, which we spent sitting on the floor of the train station with our bags since there are no benches.  After the last hostel being so far away, we didn’t have high hopes for the one in Rome.  We were plesantly surprised.  From the train station, it was only a few short metro stops to our stop.  From the metro stop, our hostel was only a few blocks away.  The owners of the hostel, an Italian-American couple, were more than hospitable.  We threw our packs on our beds in the 6 bed dorm room and plotted out what we wanted to see on our first day in Rome.  We were given a nice map of the city and figured that we would spend the day seeing the free sites of the city.  We started out at the Spanish Steps and made our way to most of the big sites, ending up at the colosseum.  The plaza del Popolo was interesting, centered by a huge egyptian column.  The next stop on our first day was to the Trevi Fountain.  It was loaded with people throwing coins into it.  Legend has it that if throw one coin over your right shoulder you will always return to Rome, and a second will make a wish come true.  Let’s hope my second coin works out.  The fountain itself is interesting, portaying the sea god Triton.  We walked to the Panthelon and went inside.  From there we walked to a huge momument where we were able to have a great lookout over the city.  The colosseum was amazing from the outside, but it was too close to closing time to go in, so we decided to save that for the next day.  Outside the colosseum we noticed that there were tons of people selling umbrellas, camera tripods, and even men dressed as Roman Soliders trying to get tourists to take their photo with them for money.  It was definitely a place filled with touts.  Luckily, none of them seem to bother Casey or I.  I am not sure if it was because we look poor, or don’t look like suckers.  The stones that you walk on out front of the colosseum are trecherous.  We must have seen 2 or three people do all out face plants from tripping on the rocks.  It was amusing to watch.  It was a nice evening, cooling off quite nicely.  It did not seem too far to the hostel so we decided to walk.  That ended up being a big mistake.  It was a hour and twenty minutes back to the hostel, versus five minutes on the subway.  We got back just in time to have a quick shower before our pizza party that our hostel planned for us.  Everyone from the dorm walked with the owners of the hostel to a local pizza place.  The owner of our hostel said that the pizza was going to be “milky” to make it crispy.  I didn’t notice the milky part, but it was still good.  He even bought us a second round of beer.  A couple of people from the hostel went off to the Irish Pub down the street, but we decided to go back to the hostel to go to bed early so that we could wake up early the next day.
     We were up and out the door at 8:30.  It was a short ride to Palantine Hill, where we bought our tickets for there and the colosseum.  We spent a considerable amount of time walking around the ruins at Palantine Hill.  In the days of the Republic, Palatine ws the most desirable address in Rome.  The word palace derived from it.  Within the ruins, you can visit the ancient forum, where all the politics were carried out.  We also visited the House of Livia, where the wife of Augustus was believed to live.  It was pretty impressive.  There were fresco paintings on the wall that were still in good shape.  Just to imagine that those were the same wall paintings that were seen by romans two thousand years ago.  After being chased by killer flys, we decided to call it quits at Palantine Hill and made our way across the street to the Colosseum. 

There was a long line at the colosseum, but we did not have to wait in it since we already bought our tickets at Palantine Hill.  We made our way to the top to look down into the ruins.  It was pretty simply awesome looking around the place, with a little imagination of course.  Gazing around the building, I saw thousands of Romans cheering at the elaborate set where the gladiators were on center stage battling exotic beasts.  To see this place in it’s hayday must have been out of the world.  The movie Gladiator portrays only a portion of what the building was used for.  They also used to flood the center and have fake sea battles.  After walking around the Colosseum for a while, taking it all in, we decided it was time to head back to the hostel for some lunch.  We spent the afternoon making hostel bookings for Switzerland and figuring out a route into Germany.  We went back back into the city center to see some of the sites at night.  We really wanted to eat at one of the many cafes that surround the famous monuments, but it was way overpriced for our budget.  Instead, we actually found a McDonalds right in front of the Panthelon that was descreetly disguised just like the other cafes.  Even if we had to eat McDs to enjoy a meal in front of the Panthelon, it was still amazing.  We then made our way back to the colosseum for some night shots.  It had great ambiance.  In many ways it was almost like the Eiffel tower, in that there were many people around that had brought snacks and drinks with them to enjoy in front of this amazing site.  We decided to join them tomorrow night, but for now it was back to the hostel for some vodka and sprites on the balcony before heading off to bed.

     The next morning we were up bright and early to get to the Vatican before the crowds were too thick.  The line looked long when we first got there, but it moved super fast.  When we bought our tickets, we both were happy to get the student discount and save a bunch of money.  We spent a ton of time looking through the galleries in the Vatican, getting lost more than once.  The collections at the Vatican are so varied and immense.  We stared up at many famous frescos painted by Raphael and MichaelAngelo themselves.  The highlight was entering the Sistine Chapel.  Even though it was filled with hundreds of sweaty tourists, it was amazing.  That reminds me, I was very surprised that there was no air conditioning in the Vatican museum, mostly to preserve the art, but also to eliminate the hoards of sweat soaked tourists.  In a building with tons of people with temperatures in the 90s is a bit stiffling.  Back to the Sistine Chapel… It was amazing and you can see why it took four years to complete.  There is so much detail in it.  As you enter the chapel, one of the first things you notice is the guards going after people that are attempting to take photographs and also yelling over the drone of 500 tourists chatting to be quiet.  The paintings extended from the walls to the ceiling, centered by the most famous painting, Creation of Adam.  While we were making our way out of the museum it started to pour rain outside.  By the time we left, it started to let up a little bit.  We walked to St. Peter’s and enjoyed looking around the plaza.  The line to actually enter the Basilica was all the way around the court, so we decided to forgo waiting in the rain for over an hour and headed to St. Angel’s Castle that was close by.  We only looked at it from the outside, since the entrance price was too much for us.  By then the rain had tappered off completely and we made our way back to the colosseum to catch the metro back to the hostel.  On the way back we took our time making a few stops.  We stopped at the Plaza Narvona for a long period of time.  There was a guitar player playing a ton of well known songs.  He was amazing, so we decided to sit and watch him for a while.  By the time we had left, he had a crowd watching that would clap after each song. 

We also stopped at a bookstore that sold english books.  I picked up Marley and Me and Into the Wild.  Marley and Me was such a great book, I had trouble putting it down.  If you are a dog lover, you have to read it.  We also stopped at the place where Cesar was assasinated.  After making the stops we made it back to the hostel in time to shower, eat some lunch, and buy a box of wine to take with us to the colosseum.  We were planning on going out for dinner, then drinking the wine at the colosseum, then getting some ice cream.  Unfortunately, we found out that places don’t open until 8PM for dinner, so we had to adjust our plans a bit.  We took the metro to the colosseum and sat in front of it on a ledge drinking our box of wine.  It was tasty for $1.50.  During our time there we saw one person fall really bad on the stone street and someone get ripped off by the tripod salesman.  Besides that it was nice and relaxing without much excitement.  We ate dinner at an Irish Pub, which only served italian pasta for dinner.  It was recommended to us by our hostel.  It turned out to have amazing pasta dishes for very cheap.  While at dinner it started pouring down rain.  Just our luck.  We had to run back to the hostel in the rain, stopping for ice cream enroute.  We arrived at the hostel very wet.  We changed out of the wet clothes and packed up our bags for our early train to Naples.  We had mixed feelings about Naples, since every person who we told we were going there to said “Be Careful”, “Get in and Get out”, “Watch your pockets”.  This coming from people in the US and Italians living in Rome.  We will have to see if it lives up to the hype.

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