Rome!

Well, today was what felt like the entirety of Rome (but in reality was only a relatively small section of what used to be the ancient city).  The weather was gorgeous – high 60s to low 70s, and sunny.

From the ship, we had a roughly 90-minute drive to the center of Rome, where we were given some vague directions and the crappiest map on the planet.  If I had access to a scanner, I would show everyone just how bad this map is.  Most of the streets are not labeled at all, and the map-makers extraordinaire have stuck clip art pictures of the major landmarks over the landmark destinations (presumably so that we know what things like the Coliseum look like), but they’ve made the images large enough to cover several blocks in any direction from the actual location of the landmark, so that you can’t easily tell where things are actually located on the unlabeled streets.  NOT helpful.

Despite having to overcome significant adversity, we were able to see a number of historic sites in our morning free time.  We started by looking for the Pantheon, but managed to find the (very impressive) Tomb of the Unknown Soldier/Italian military museum first.  After some backtracking, we were able to find the Pantheon, which is one of Rome’s more-than-400 churches.  We then headed west (ish) to the Trevi Fountain, where I threw money from my right hand, over my left shoulder into the fountain.  Apparently, this indicates that I will quickly return to Rome, which seems like money well spent to me.  Our final morning visit was to the Spanish steps, before returning to meet our group at St. Peter’s Basilica prior to the afternoon’s guided tour.

Our tour guide for the afternoon was awesome.  She was enthusiastic, knew a lot about what she was talking about, and repeated herself endlessly.  She walked us across the street and into the Vatican, where we hit some of the most sensitive metal detectors I have ever had the privilege to walk through – people had to take off their earrings.  Crazy country, that Vatican.

The tour of St. Peter’s Basilica was really interesting, and when you walk in (and until the tour guide starts telling you the heights of different parts of the ceiling… over and over again) it doesn’t really sink in, just how massive the building is.  For reference, in the tallest dome, you can stack two Statues of Liberty on top of each other, and still have room before you get to the top.  The letters in gold around the bottom of the dome are seven feet high.  Construction started on the Basilica in 1506, and didn’t conclude until 1626.  One of the other crazy things about the building is that there’s not a single painting or tapestry in the place – it’s all mosaics, with the rationale that mosaics can’t be destroyed in a fire.  So everything that you walk in and assume is cloth or paint or anything other than tiny tiny tiles, is actually an incredibly detailed mosaic.  Hence the fact that the Basilica took 120 years to complete.

After crossing the street back into Italy, we went to a small church that contained Michelangelo’s Moses sculpture, and a few relics, including the chains that held St. Peter.  This was a relatively quick stop, on the way to the Coliseum.  We didn’t actually go into the Coliseum, but rather walked around the perimeter.  Apparently, the Coliseum could be filled to capacity or emptied completely within five and a half minutes – quite the feat, considering that it could hold up to 20,000 people at a time.

I really enjoyed Rome, and as I said, it was great to have an enthusiastic guide.  Tomorrow, we opted to do the Tuscan vineyard excursion, which Ben is very enthusiastic about, rather than the tour of Florence or Pisa.  Those will just have to wait until I return to Italy (I hope I threw enough change in the fountain for American Airlines to have overbooked our flights home and for them to offer $800+ in compensation for volunteering to wait for a later flight…cross your fingers, everyone!)  Happy day before Thanksgiving everyone!