Colosseo inside and outDay 2 of Rome started off with a wholesome buffet breakfast of bacon, cold cuts, cheese, toast, fruits and blood orange juice at the hotel...mm mm yum! 9:30am rolled along so after finishing breakfast, Tinlop and I headed over to see the Colosseum in its entirety, aka inside out and outside in! Good thing we purchased a Roma Pass that allowed us to bypass the lines at the gate. Whew! After spending a litle over an hour there and taking about a kazillion photos of every single angle and boulder of the place, we finally (but reluctantly) left.
Arco di Costantino in a jiffyJust outside the Colosseum is the Arch of Contantine. It reminded me of the Arc de Triomphe but as the day went by, I realized all the arcos di whatevers look pretty much the same. Spending our time very wisely, we soaked in the view and snapped a handful of photos and were on our way within 5 minutes.
Taking in Foro Romano, Palatino and Museo Palatino, while baking in the sunTrekking toward the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill, we knew our feet were going to complain just by looking at our map. The place is ginormous!! Not wanting to have our heads squashed by falling tree branches, we quickly scooted toward the entrance to the Palatino as city workers trimmed the branches off the tall trees. Hardly surprised, we were greeted with another long line-up. Out came our Roma passes and in we went! Our eyes were overwhelmed with ruins of a thousand years of Roman history, the entire time being baked in a 35C sun. Not a single cloud was in sight so after about an hour, I started feeling preliminary signs of a heat stroke despite drinking what seem like litres of water. Once again, my body's water supply underwent osmosis as it moved from a higher concentration to a lower concentration (aka sweating buckets again).
The Pantheon as a resting place more than a holy placeAfter leaving the Roman Forum, we decided to walk to our next destination of our tour of Rome: the Pantheon. Enroute, we took in quite a sight as it seems like every corner you turn leads to a new discovery. We passed by quite a number of picturesque spots before we finally came to the front of the Pantheon. Tired as hell and sweating like crap, we took a little rest inside the Pantheon after peeking at Raphael's tomb and ooh-ing and ahh-ing at the architecturals of the building.
Penny toss at the Fontana di TreviMore walking awaits us as we made our way to the Trevi Fountain which happens to be only a few blocks away so the walk wasn't too bad. Quite a nice looking fountain indeed! Taking another kazillion photos of every angle and projectile of water, we left to do more exciting things: walk some more!
Refused to move at the Scala di SpagnaFor some odd reason, the Roman sun seems to make you crave Coke a lot, so Tinlop and I stopped at a Burger King (yes, in Rome) and sipped some Coca Cola. Marked up so much that you can buy 5 cases in TO, we slurped up every last drop of it before walking over to the Spanish Steps. Once there, we took a look at how high the stairs ran and decided we were NOT going to climb them! So being touristy, we took photos of the steps and of the fountain in the Piazza di Spagne and strolled briefly along the street lined with prestigeous shops like Louis Vuitton, Dior, Armani, Ferregamo, Prada etc.
Nappy, Shower and Headache, oh my!After leaving the Spanish Steps, we took the Metro back to the hotel to take a nice shower and perhaps a nap before enjoying the evening activities of more walking. By the time we got back to the hotel (about 5:45pm) I developed this massive headche. It's probably my brain telling me osmosis shouldn't be working the way it is. So after a shower, I passed out with the help of a Gravol until 8:00pm, when we went out again.
Piazza Navona, Fontana di Trevi and Colloseo at nightWe enjoyed a bit of Roman night time goodness as we visited the Trevi Fountain, all lit up this time, and passed by the Pantheon again, enroute to the most beautiful square in Rome: Piazza Navona. There, we saw street performers singing, dancing and all sorts of vendors selling art and portraits. We even saw a MJ impersonator! We didn't spend much time there since we didn't want to "hea" too long before heading to see the Colosseum at night.
We had a few slices of pizza again, this time much cheaper at 6.15euro and it was REALLY good! I don't know how I'm going to have pizza again in TO. The Colosseum was almost deserted by the time we got there, shortly after 10:30pm. We didn't "hea" there for very long either so we went back to the hotel to conclude another day in the fabulous city of Rome. (Aug.25.09 3:10am)
This is my kitchen-to-be. I have a queen size mattress on the ceiling. How lovely.
This is my tiny master bedroom. Bulkheads have eaten into the ceiling to leave me with what feels like a cave. Note the off-center light.
Apparently this is the only place where I can put my TV. To be wall-mounted just to keep the thermostat warm. Nice.
Somehow the electrician decided my suite will be a showroom. Equipped me with a 7-switch panel to turn off all the lights in one shot. On my ONE AND ONLY wall. How convenient.
What really did me in was his striking resemblance to my dad. I've always wondered if they were long long long lost relatives. Being only 2 years younger, 陳鴻烈 looked like Daddy in his younger years as well. The freakiest was watching 刑事情報科 because he looked so much like Daddy I had to do a few double takes!!
Wanted to submit another page to a contest yet spent so much time trying to put one together! Finally finished it after 5 hours. -_-"" So much for sleeping early tonight.
Done in 1.5 hours and super eager to see how many channels I can get, I plugged it in only to find out that I only got ONE channel: a US infomerical one -_-" well, at least it's in HD. I fiddled around with it by moving it around and ended up with another HD channel from Buffalo. So....2 channels... poo. At least it worked...poo.
My Rome trip actually marked the first anniversary of my blog! Hoot! I can do this every year! LOL!
The flight to Montreal was full so no first class for us and boy did I miss it! I must say I got spoiled with the last 3 flights with Tinlop in Executive First. Little did I know they don't serve cranberry juice in economy!! The washroom was yucky with no toilet paper at one point and the guy sitting in front of me kept bouncing in his seat. He's not even a kid (he can actually be classified as a senior) and he can't sit still! Every time he bounced, the screen on the seat back would slip over my laptop and come down on my panel. Not nice. He almost banged my head a couple of times too! Not nice x2. Our first "meal" was a fish with overcooked sugar snap peas and rice. It was bleh. Not nice x3654. Can you tell I'm spoiled yet? Even the caramel ice cream I had was funny... it was super hard!! Not nice x287423498273246!! and I wanted my cranberry juice! LOL! Okay, it's not that bad.
I couldn't sleep so I watched all of the episodes of Off Pedder that I brought with me and just before we landed (5:12pm Rome time), we had a snack of butternut squash, sweet potato, spinach and ginger pie. Surprisingly enough, it actually tasted okay. Estimated arrival in Montreal 12:30pm EST.
Final Day of our Journey Begins at Piazza del Popolo
Struggling Through the Villa Borghese and Galleria Borghese
Final Night of People-Watching at Campo de Fiori
Tinlop and I grabbed a gelato each at a gelateria called Blue Ice and sat ourselves down to people-watch a bit before heading back to the hotel to pack up. Did I mention the gelato we had was awesome? I was greedy and had two flavours, pistachio and pineapple and Tinlop had tiramisu. OMG, it was sooooo good!!
Sucessfully Showered in the Dark
Reliving "Angels and Demons" at the Citta del Vaticano
As we lined up to purchase the ticket to the Cupola, we were faced with another one of life's choices (what did I tell you?) - elevator or stairs. Elevator is 7euro plus 320 steps and stairs is 5euro plus 491 steps. So for the ripoff price of 2 extra euros, we decided to take the elevator. Soon we realized that the best decision we made since we decided to see the Cupola was spending the extra 2 bucks. Damn Michaelangelo for designing this torturous stairclimb for the people of today to have to pay to endure. I guess it wouldn't be half as bad if it wasn't so stuffy in there! The disclaimer at the ticket booth warns the elderly, people with heart disease etc, but what they REALLY need is one saying "You shall be trapped in a staircase no wider than 50cm with no looking back for at least 20 minutes. You will not be able to smell anything but the sweat of the people in front of you and those who are claustrophobic should take the other path and visit the tombs." So Tinlop and I climbed up what is equal to about 1/5 of the stairs at the CN Tower, taking in very much carbon dioxide and l'eau de body odour and finally made it to the top to take in the astounding view of Rome and Vatican City. Although the view is quite breathtaking, I'd hate to be the guard working there. Good thing the trip down wasn't half as excruciating.
After a short rest we walked over to the Musei Vaticano to see what known as the museum that holds the most art in the world. There was absolutely no way we were going to walk through all 1,400 rooms so we decided to head straight for Michaelangelo's Capella Sistina. An hour later, we were still walking towards the Sistine Chapel and by the time we got there, both Tinlop and I were too tired to truly appreciate the artwork. I guess the 14euro admission is worth it if you have a spare pair of legs to tack on. We decided to leave after seeing the Sistine Chapel and 20 minutes later, after being sent up and down and up stairs again, we finally made it to the souvenir shop. Just when we thought we were at the exit, we were pleasantly surprised with this:
With my wonderful knowledge of the Italian language, I spotted a sign for the elevators so we hailed one to take us down to the exit. What a nice elevator it was! A porter slid open the gate, unlocked the door and led us in one of the nicest elevators I've ever been in. Equipped with seats along the perimeter of the elevator wall, the wooden interior is quite extravagant. It reminds me of the really old fashioned ones you see in the movies, but it's about the size of my bathroom!
Roman Version of Lan Kwai Fong at Trastevere and Isola Tiberina
Grabbing a hand-shaved lemon granita each (at only 2euro), we headed back the way we came towards the Metro station. Just our luck tonight that the trains have stopped running already so we walked all the way back to the hotel and once again, saw the great colosseum at night. We're going to get sick of that stadium very soon LOL!
Colosseo inside and out
Arco di Costantino in a jiffy
Taking in Foro Romano, Palatino and Museo Palatino, while baking in the sun
The Pantheon as a resting place more than a holy place
Penny toss at the Fontana di Trevi
Refused to move at the Scala di Spagna
Piazza Navona, Fontana di Trevi and Colloseo at night
We had a few slices of pizza again, this time much cheaper at 6.15euro and it was REALLY good! I don't know how I'm going to have pizza again in TO. The Colosseum was almost deserted by the time we got there, shortly after 10:30pm. We didn't "hea" there for very long either so we went back to the hotel to conclude another day in the fabulous city of Rome. (Aug.25.09 3:10am)
