Roma

Last Saturday, Jess and I ventured to Rome.

It started Friday night, we walked to the nearby train station around 9pm to catch a train to Paola and then a train to Rome. We got in Paola around 10pm and looked at the schedule to see what time the train would leave for rome... and it wasn't leaving until 1am! Wow. So we had some spare time on our hands to kill so we went to a nearby cafe to sit and wait. While we were sitting we saw across the street and tunnel with a bunch of people camping out under it. and we could hear music of some sort past the tunnel. It was the first of may and for italians it was the day of the workers (kinda like our labor day, but more of a celebration). So we walked through another tunnel next to the one with the campers, because we didn't think that one looked so safe, and there was a huge carnival on the other side. There were street vendors, a variety of carnival rides, and loud music. So we walked through some of it and sat down and watched to rides. That killed about 45 min. but then we got bored and cold so we walked back to the train station to wait 2 hours. It was boring to say the least! But finally 1am rolled around and we were on own way. The train was great! we had our own person seating room that we could close the door, curtains, turn off the lights, and pull the seats into beds! So it was great to be able to sleep comfortably and get plenty of rest for our big day. 

We arrived in Rome at 6am. The train station was crowded! There were some many people curled up against walls sleeping. We bought a map and an unhealthy doughnut breakfast and headed out to see all we could see. First stop was the colosseum. It was early in the morning so it was not open yet for tours, but it was nice to see it empty and quiet.

Near the colosseum was the Arch of Constantine

Then we hung out with Julius Ceasar for a few minutes

Then we walked a ways to the Trevi Fountain. Its a good thing Jess is good at directions because every time I'd look at the map I wouldn't know which way was up! She was a great tour guide! I was a little disappointed in the Trevi Fountain, I had always wanted to see it and had such beautiful images of it in my head, but when we saw it, it looked smaller than i thought it would. And they were cleaning and and it was off and it was kind of a let down.

Then we went to the Pantheon! Now this was not a let down. I've read about it in books and it was surreal to actually be there and see the oculus was really amazing

 and there were also people dressed up outside but we didn't get out pictures taken with them because you have to pay them for it, so i snuck a pic for free!

Then we came across the Castel Sant'Angelo. It was crowded and we didn't go in, but it was pretty to look at from the outside

Then we made our way to the Vatican. It was around 10:30 by then, the pope was supposed to be speaking at one. But we were trying to get in as many places as we could so we didn't hang around to hear him speak.  

After this we took a taxi (my first one! hehe) to the National Gallery of Modern Art! I was so excited, i read that they had some Van Gogh paintings and i really wanted to see them. I also saw a lot of other great paintings. There was an artists exhibit in parts of the building by an artist named Cy Twombly. But to me, most of his works were scribbles and looked like a five year old could have done better! 

^This is Cleopatra 

 Im in this art! it's a mirror with a boy on it and I am in the back ground

This is a row of wooden Silhouettes lined up. ^Here is one of Cy Twombly's works

This one was one of my favorites I saw! i loved the dot technique.    And here is a man thinking

I believe this on is Jackson Pollok but dont quote me on that.  And this is Van Gogh

We searched the whole museum for Van Gogh and the last room we go to here is this one painting by him. We read on one of the self guides that there had been a robbery several years ago and that most of Van Gogh's works were stolen and this was the only one left.  I was sad, but still very excited to at least see one of his works in person! 

After the Art museum we headed to Giardino Zoological where there was a place called valley of the Dogs. There were so many dogs runny around, it was great! we even saw this horse sized great dane having a drink at the fountain.

After this we went back to the colosseum to try and get inside, however so was every other tourist in rome. It was pack and we didn't have much time until we had to be back at the train station to go home. So we decided just to sit outside and enjoy the view. But the weather took a turn for the worse and rain starting pouring down before we could run for shelter. So me and jess huddled together under her tiny umbrella to wait out the rain. But it kept raining and harder so we made more shelter under our huge map. Which at the time was a good idea, but when we were walking back to the train station we realized that a dry, nontorn map would have been more useful. Luckily we made it back on time only getting a little lost but we got right back on track. It was a great adventure and we saw everything we wanted to and more!

Next stop Pisa! (in a few weeks!)