after paris… continued

well, as wil said below, he did forget a huge chunk of site seeing that we did later in rome after dinner. we saw so much, how could he have missed it!

well, to pick up after saint peter’s, we opened our guide book and picked a recommended restaurant- a small family run business with yummy proscuitto, mozzarella, linguine, risotto and wine.

we also used our guidebook for a planned walk across rome at night. this was perfect for us because it hit all the additional places that we wanted to see but couldn’t, due to trying to catch the two biggies (colosseum and st peter’s) before they closed. although it’s basically impossible to catch a taxi in rome, we caught one after walking a bit to take us to our starting point.

we started in “campo de fiori” (field of flowers), a bustling square around a large statue, of cafes and restaurants, spilling into the middle. we enjoyed our first gelato as we watched the square crawl with hoards of people out enjoying the cool roman night.

passing by other interesting piazzas and buildings, we stopped at the pantheon… originally built as a temple to all gods, this (later changed to christian) church was so majestic at night. i only wish we could have had more time to see it during the day to go inside (one of the most interesting and best preserved domes of ancient churches), but the sight coming around the corner and seeing the massive columns and pediment was pretty astounding. (*note: the columns were made with one solid piece of marble each, and the structure holds the record of the largest unreinforced concrete dome!)

after a couple more less exciting stops, we made our way around a corner to be shocked by the trevi fountain. one, because of the impressive sight of stone, water and light; two, because of the impressive sight of people! the square was filled to the brim of hundreds of people trying to get close enough to toss their coin into the water. scammers with roses and silly toys were at every turn as well…but the sculptures coming out of the stone and projecting water were as cool as i had hoped they would be.

after throwing my coin, wil and i came near to the end of our night walk, ending at the spanish steps…i had heard they weren’t that exciting, were dirty, etc. but wil and i both agreed that it was a pretty fun spot (at least for an evening). this place too was filled with people sitting all along the massive steps (up towards the spanish embassy, thus the name), chatting, taking pictures, smooching and just enjoying being alive and in rome…so we thought we’d join in on the same mentality as we savored our last few moments in this bustling city that we unknowingly had to rush through.

back to the hotel we went, which brings me back to the end of wil’s post.

wil forgot to mention that the reason we had to rush through rome so fast was not only because of the train but of checkout…we figured the train would get there midday (not 4 though) and we’d have the afternoon and the next half day to split the main sites between. until we discovered that check out was at 9:30am!!! i was so sad to come all the way to rome and miss out on some things, especially the sistine chapel (i mean, come on!) but i guess we’ll just have to come back…