I know it’s been over a month but I’ve been really busy catching up with school and work! Hopefully my memory will help me along with all we did! Enjoy~
The day we left Siena was the day it decided to rain there (it couldn’t rain any of the other days?!) We missed our bus to Rome so had to wait 2 more hours before the next one came.. we arrived to our bed and breakfast around 8pm and pretty much dropped our stuff off before heading back out to meet with our friend Akshita before she left Rome the next day. First thing on our list.. FOOD! We round this cozy restaurant and had entrees and shared a secondi. It was so good!
My Dish - Bucantini All'amatriciana (with bacon and spicy tomato sauce - it wasn't really spicy)
Akshita's Dish - Spaghetti alla Carbonara (spaghetti with egg and bacon sauce)
Daisy's Dish - Melanzana Alla Parmigiana (baked layers of eggplant, tomatos and cheese)
Akshita with Daisy
Our Secondi - Coscia di Pollo con Patate Arrosto (roasted chicken with roasted potatoes)
After that, Akshita showed us around the area a bit. We had some gelatos (personally I don’t think any beats the one from San Gimignano). We also went to see the Pantheon, though it was too late to go in.
Head back to the B&B since it was past midnight and we wanted an early start the next day. It was such a cute place, cool set of keys and we had a dog too! Definitely would recommend the place!
Started the day off at the Coliseum. It was a huge place and just amazing how it was built so long ago. View was amazing but the food around the area is not recommended at all! (bring snacks if you plan to go) After we went to the Roman Forums and that took hours on it’s own. So much walking done but it was an amazing site.
Coliseum
Coliseum
Coliseum - Image of what people did there
Coliseum - Layers of the floors
Coliseum - Seating levels depending on social status and gender
Coliseum - Illustration of the how the coliseum was bult
Coliseum - ground view
Roman Forum - Daisy having a bit of fun 🙂
Roman Forum - broken pillar (?)
Roman Forums
Roman Forums
Roman Forums - house of Vestali
Roman Forums
Roman Forums - Beginning of Daisy's dream house
Roman Forums - more of it
Roman Forums - dream garden
Roman Forums
After the forums we went to this cute cafe and had some coffee and snack before meeting up with some friend from Siena for dinner.
Daisy - so deep in thought!
The next day we went to Castel Sant’Angelo before meeting up with our friends again to see the Spanish Steps and a garden in the area.
Castel Sant'Angelo
Castel Sant'Angelo - Sitting in the cafe area to enjoy the view
Castel Sant'Angelo - View from the top!
Castel Sant'Angelo
Spanish Steps!
view from the garden
in the garden - there's a greek temple (?) here!
chicken swan! (probably one of the most entertaining thing we saw there.. then it pooped and we walked away)
beautiful fountain on our way out
twin chapels - too bad one is under construction
It started raining soon after so we took the rest of the night off to relax/catch up on sleep/blog for the next morning at the Vatican! Early morning start to go into Vatican city (on a bus – couldn’t walk around).
Inside Vatican City
one of the coolest fountains in there
Was about a 30 min tour and moving bus = not too many pics, next up Vatican Museum!
View from the open space there when we first enter
really neat looking globe! (no idea of the significance of it though)
art on the walls
art on the ceiling
The School of Athens by Raphael
Crocifissione by Gerardo Dottiori
Le Sacrifice by Leon Zack
Ceiling of the Sistine Chapel
Close up
Sistine Chapel
Golden model of St. Peter's Basilica
Stairs heading down and out of the museum
view from the bottom
It was a long visit to the museum (around 4 hrs) and still we didn’t see all of it. Afterwards (finally) went into St. Peter’s Basilica and then we took a tour bus and walked around to see the areas of Rome we haven’t visited yet. It was pretty relaxing and got a nice shot of Daisy passed out (was lucky there was no pics of me) but she’d kill me if I posted it 🙁
St. Peter's Basilica
It's a pyramid! real pyramid, cemetery built around it (from what our friend told us)
this was right behind some government building that we wanted to see but it was a killer to get up those stairs!
Government building, wanted to get closer but it was closed already when we got there 🙁
Trevi fountain, we wanted to see it at night so we hung around the area for about 40 mins to see it
night view!
After that we went browsing around the stores on the way to dinner. Final dinner in Italy so we took it easy and went back to a place we knew was good food 🙂
Bruschetta with a small salad
Spaghetti alla Carbonara (had an obsession with it after I tried Akshita's)
Chocolate Mousse that was recommended by the waitress (good recommendation)
After that we walked home and took some night shots. We had wanted to take a close up of the Basilica at night as it’s beautiful lighting but they had closed it off when we got around to it 🙁
crossing a bridge on the way back
Castel Sant'Angelo (night view)
St. Peter's Basilica at night, too bad we couldn't get up closer
We had our flight in the evening the next day so we did some last min browsing/shopping and had lunch before we checked out. Our B&B owner was going to help us to the station but it was raining so had to take a cab to the station instead. We made it with time to spare (after some inconvenience with the elevator system they had there) and got to Madrid around midnight. Was a long layover but it was fine since I got some research in for my class the next day.
It’s been a surreal experience and such a different pace from my usual in New York. I enjoyed every moment of it and wish I could be back there now! But I will be back, and hopefully I’ll be able to enjoy it just as much!
Til next time~
J
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