When in Rome...

Our last stop in our trip was Rome!

I forgot to take pictures of the hostel, but it pretty nice. It was little sketch, because our room had some loose electrical wiring, but otherwise it was perfectly fine. The best part about it was that it was literally a two minute walk away from the train station and the metro. 

DAY ONE:

First thing we did after checking in was head over to the Pantheon! Excitement!

The Pantheon was made in the 100s! Now that's old! I can't even fathom it. No one really knows its original purpose, but now it functions as a church. The dome is largest, unsupported concrete dome in the world.

After that, we headed over to another church, Santa Maria Sopra Minerva. Most notably, it has an elephant obelisk in front of it by Bernini, and it holds the bones of St. Catherine inside.

Then we headed over to Il Gesu. We got distracted by this fun cut-out on the way.

Then we finally made it to Il Gesu!

My favorite thing about Rome was that every time you turned a corner you saw something jaw-dropping. For example, we were strolling down the street and we turned a corner and there was Palazzo Venezia!

Then we made our way to the Trevi Fountain!

Apparently, if throw a coin into the fountain behind your back, you'll return to Rome. After I threw mine in, I shouted, "Next year in Jerusalem," which I think wasn't quite the right sentiment, but it was what I know.

Then to the Spanish Steps!

Up, up, up the stairs we go!

Jason and Rachel met us at the steps and Rachel took us to this really good restaurant where we got delicious pasta!

I got spaghetti bolegnese, my favorite.

After that we ran around the Circus Maximus, where they used to hold chariot races!

Then we stumbled upon the Temple of Hercules, which Amy and I had studied in art history, so we were super pumped about it.

Then we went to Trasevere, a cool place to go for the nightlife in Rome. Rachel took us to this amazing place where you could get chocolate shots! Chocolate-shell shot-glasses filled with liquor and syrups and topped with whipped cream!

DAY TWO:

We decided to spend the day in the Vatican for our second day in Rome.

We started off in St. Peter's Square  

The Swiss Guard!

It turns out that in order to get tickets to hear the pope speak, you have to get them from the Swiss guard! So I mustered up my courage and got the attention of one of them. He told me to follow him, and he led me behind the barricade into a booth where he gave us our tickets. It was so cool! I felt like a VIP.

Then we went inside St. Peter's Basilica, the world's largest church!

Inside is Michelangelo's Pieta, the famous sculpture of Mary and Jesus

After that, we headed over to the Vatican Museum! According to a guide, if you only spent one minute in front of each object in the museum, you would need 13 years to get through everything!
So we went on a guided tour so someone could tell us about what we were seeing and take us to the most important stuff--a highlights tour if you will.

The Apollo Belvedere!

The Torso Belvedere!
(Michelangelo's inspiration for many of the figures in the Sistine Chapel)

This red marble is so valuable that one square cm is worth  80,000 euros! 

 

This sculpture of Hercules was at one time struck by lightening. The people thought it was Hercules soul leaving his body, so they held a funeral and buried it in the ground. It was dug up and found only recently.

The Raphael Rooms 

The famous School of Athens

This is actually a portrait of Michelangelo 

And Raphael put his self-portrait in the image too. He's there in the black cap, looking out at the viewer. 

We also got to see the Cistene Chapel and Michelangelo's famous ceiling and Last Judgement! No pictures inside though....

After our tour we headed over to the Vatican Post office and sent post cards home from the Vatican! 

Just a side note: Rome only has two lines in its subway system. They keep trying to build a new line, but every time they dig they come across more ruins! Here's an example of ruins that they came across in an attempt to make a new line.

After leaving the Vatican we headed to the Piazza di Campidoglio, a square designed entirely by Michelangelo, including the architecture of its Senate buildings. Once again, something I had studied in art history

Finally, we met up with Rachel and Jason and Rachel took us to a pizzeria called Dar Poeta. The place is so good there are usually lines out the door to get in, but when we finally got in, it was absolutely worth the wait!

I got eggplant on my pizza, it was amazing!

Then we got nutella calzone for dessert. Actually a calzone with ricotta cheese, but with nutella and powdered sugar instead of tomato sauce. I know it sounds weird, but boy was it good.
Jason loved it!

Before

After!

DAY THREE:

On my last full day in Rome we headed back to the Vatican to hear the Pope speak! We got there about two hours early, so we got really amazing seats!

By the time 10:30 rolled around, the whole square was packed, standing room only. We were very pleased.

Can you spot Amy and Rachel in the crowd?

The pope's band. 

Some Cardinals waiting for the pope to arrive 

The pope arrives on his pope-mobile (actually what it's called I swear)

After hearing the Pope, we hopped on a train to see the ruined city of Pompeii!

We passed these amazing mountains on the train!

Then we arrived in the beautiful Pompeii!

The ruins where fascinating and very cool, but my favorite part was the absolutely stunning views.

It was especially cool (although a little gross) it see the perfectly preserved people who were coated in hot ash from the eruption. You can see them frozen in contorted positions as they basically boiled to death.

My what a perfectly preserved restaurant!

The bath house 

The amphitheater

After we left Pompeii, we grabbed a bite to eat at the station and then we took the long train ride home. 

DAY FOUR:
Today was my last day in Rome. I had a 8:20 flight home, so I decided that I would spend the morning and afternoon trying to fit in as much as I could before I had to leave. 
We had intended to start at the Collosuem, but due to a Union strike, it didn't open until 11:30, so we headed over to the nearby Basilica di San Pietro in Vincoli first. 
This church is most notable for two things. First, it holds the supposed chains of St. Peter. 

Second, it is home to the tomb of Pope Julius II. Julius had commissioned Michelangelo for the work. The massive design was never completed, and both the Pope and Michelangelo died before it was finished. Here is what was completed before the artist's death. 

Perhaps the most famous element of this tomb is the exquisite statue of Moses that Michelangelo sculpted for the work. The Moses is famous for having horns. This comes from a mis-translation of the Latin Bible. In it, Moses is described as having rays of light coming from his head, but this was misinterpreted as horns. For centuries, Moses was depicted as horned due to this mistake. Oddly enough, by Michelangelo's time, it was known that this was a mis-translation, yet Michelangelo depicted Moses with horns anyway.

(Sorry about the tangent, we studied this in art history too, so I know a lot about it)

Anyway, after that we headed back to the amazing Colosseum. 

Our fabulous tour-guide, Max

After spending an hour learning about the Colosseum, we headed over to the Roman Forum and its surrounding ruins. 

The Arch of Constantine. 

A depiction on the arch of the looting of the temple and the famous golden menorah that was stolen and never again found

Maximus Basilica (another one we studied in art history)

This is the Temple of Romulus. Apparently, these doors are the original doors and they still have locks that work. 

After spening about two hours around the ruins, I decided I needed to get gelato one last time. So we headed over to the well-reviewed San Crispino, recommended by Rachel. 

It was amazing, I got pistachio and caramel, my favorites! 

Finally, since it was on my way back to the hostel, we stopped by Santa Maria della Victoria, which  was actually a lovely little church, really exquisite, but the main reason it's visited is because it is home to the famous altarpiece of the Ecstasy of St. Theresa (you guessed it, I studied it in art history)

After that I raced back to the hostel, packed my things, and caught a bus to the airport. Of course, my flight was delayed by an hour due to weather, so I needn't have rushed, but the flight went smoothly and I was back home and in my room around 12:30AM. 

So that's the end of our whirlwind trip around Italy! It was an amazing, once in a lifetime experience that I'll never forget, but it's good to be back in London to relax and rest after all that running around!