Rome Day One

This was a great vacation. I really enjoyed this city. It was truly a dream come true for me. We all had a great time.
My favorite part of this trip was seeing and touring the Colloseum.

Lily's favorite part was "visiting the Colloseum and the Roman Forum."

Lia's favorite part was "Everything!


"
John's favorite part was walking around Rome and seeing lots of different sights.

Here is the daily agenda with some great photos:
We left for Rome early on Saturday February 14th. We had a good flight and made it to our hotel, the Domus Romana, by 10:30 a.m. Our hotel was fantastic. It was an apartment so it had plenty of room and the girls were thrilled.


After about a 15 minute break!!We headed out to see some sights. But first we had to get some Gellato, an Italian specialty.

It turned out our hotel was in a central location. We could easily walk to the Spanish Steps first. Along the way we saw several amazing buildings and sculptures. Two blocks away we came to the Piazza Barberini where the Fountain of Triton is. This fountain was redesigned by Bernini (a well known architect and sculptor of 17th century Rome.) The Triton is blowing water from a conch shell.



We next walked to the Spanish Steps. This is a popular sight to see in Rome. It was packed with people (it was Saturday). The steps came to be called Spanish Steps after the Spanish Square (which was called Spanish because the Spanish embassy was – and is - located there). This is also the longest and widest staircase in all Europe. Lily thought the obelisk was really neat. It is probably from Egypt.
At the top of the steps is the Church of Holy Trinity on Pincio Hill. It is the white, two towered building. The inside of the church was pretty. I shopped for watercolor paintings while the girls and John were checking out the church. I was bound and determined to buy some art on this trip so that is what I did! I had to carry the big blue sack around with me the rest of the day though...



This is the view from the steps of the Fontain della Barcaccia a boat and of the narrow Via Condotti, home to many of Rome's designer shops. It was packed with Saturday shoppers. Next we found a McDonalds so we could use the restroom and grab some food. It was sooooo packed full of people. It was even a super huge place but oh my, everyone was out today!

Next we walked to the Trevi Fountain. It is a Roman custom to build a beautiful fountain at the end of an aqueduct. This particular fountain was built at the site of an ancient aqueduct in the years 1732 to 1762. It was nice to look at and hear the running water but the area was packed full of people. It is a tradition to throw a coin over your shoulder into the fountain and this will ensure your return to Rome. (I would love to come back!)




Next, we walked in search of an ancient temple site and ended up at the Pantheon. This is an amazing structure. The Pantheon is a building in Rome which was originally built as a temple to all the gods of Ancient Rome, and rebuilt circa 126 AD during Hadrian's reign. It is the best preserved of all Roman buildings, and perhaps the best preserved building of its age in the world. It has a huge dome roof with an oculus open in the top. It was transformed from a pagan temple into a Christian church in 608 AD by one of the Popes.
This is the Pantheon dome ceiling and oculus.
This is the inside of the Pantheon.

From here we intended to go see the Piazza Novana. So we looked at our map, found the Pantheon, tried to figure out the street names and locations and started walking. It was very hard to follow the streets. They were very small almost like an alley. It was also hard to find streets names. They were sometimes posted on the side of a building on the corner, other times, there was no names anywhere. We then found a main street and noticed up ahead tons of police. They were re-routing all of the cars AND the pedestrians. So we couldn't even head down the only main street we could find. UGH! So we just kind of followed the stream of people, gave up on our intended destination. We were tired and thought we'd head to our hotel. Well, we ended up finding this HUGE white building. There were police all around the building. I asked one what was going on and soon there was going to be a "demonstration". Here is a picture of the Huge white building, the Victor Emanuel Monument.

So, we walked around to the side of the monument, due to the police barracade and this is what we saw!!!!!!

It was so exciting to see the collesium. We had a tour planned for tomorrow so we thought we'd wait to see it but oh my, what an exciting treat. We just kept walking toward it. We were so exhausted, but it didn't matter. I think I walked with my mouth hanging open. It was such a great experience to be at THE COLLESIUM. I will never forget it. The crowd was small around the actual area of the collesium. The inside was closed for touring. We walked all around the huge building. It was getting dark and we were getting very tired of all of the walking. aka Lia was complaining about her legs being tired and my foot was bothering me.

So we looked at the map, the location of the collesium, and tried to find the street that would take us home. Well, we ended up on the wrong side of the collesium. So we headed to the HUGE white building. Looked at the map, found the building on the map, and then tried to find the street leading to our hotel. So, we walked where we thought it should be and ended up a bit lost. We ended up walking around the HUGE white building one more time and still couldn't figure the streets out. Lily was in a near state of panic..."Our we lost, How are we going to find our way back...Why can't you figure out where to go...!" WE were getting really sick of the complaining, so, we found a taxi.

The taxi literally drove down 2 streets and we were at our hotel. It only cost 6 Euros. We were so close but the streets just wind around. AND we found out that the pictures on the map show the building facing you. They are not pictured the actual way the buildings are positioned on the street. So when we would try to find the "a" street on the left, back side of the Pantheon, well, it wasn't actually behind the building.

Overall, day one was excellent. We weren't really lost and with all that walking we definitely walked off all of the calories from the gellato! Oh, and we very much dislike the HUGE white building!!