Rome was, in a word, bravissimo. Perhaps a better word: stupefacente. One more would be favoloso. And the list could go on. What an absolutely wonderful trip. Without doubt, what helped to make it so was truly unbelievable weather. We arrived on a Wednesday evening, and it had rained earlier that day apparently. But for the entirety of our stay, we had brilliant blue skies with high temps in the 60's; we were reminded of how fortunate we'd been on our trip to Spain last spring. Even the Romans were saying that the weather was atypical for late November. We were told that only the week or so before there'd been torrential rains in Rome, forcing the city to close down the Colosseum and other tourist attractions due to flooding. Boy, did we dodge a bullet.
Rome is a place like no other we've seen. A constantly evolving archaeological dig! There are ruins of some kind just about everywhere you look. The subway system is not one of the best due to the fact that every time they try to dig a new tunnel, some ancient artifact is found, stopping the bulldozers in their tracks. (It still got us where we needed to go, however.) Our hotel was just off a little cobblestone square, one block from the Temple of Hadrian - built in 145 AD!! (It was incorporated into a papal palace in the 17th century, which is the facade you see from the square.) Anyhoo... Rome is old! I mean, like - really old! On the taxi ride from the airport in the dark, we could still marvel at impressive sites, such as the Terme di Caracalla (we never made it there but just loved to keep saying it all weekend with our best Italian accent, mimicking our taxi driver) and the amazing Monumento Nazionale a Vittorio Emanuele II (the National Monument) that we couldn't help but to view multiple times every day - it's enorme. And the warmth and friendliness of the people in general was really gratifying.
The Albergo Cesari Hotel in Rome was charming & old and had everything we needed, including huge rooms. It was in a great location on Via di Pietra, a narrow pedestrian-only street in the Pigna neighborhood and it was literally half way in between the Pantheon and the Trevi Fountain - less than a 10 minute walk to each. The first night we stayed close by and ate dinner at the Taverna Antonina, where I tried our first pasta carbonaro (a very traditionally Roman dish) and it was amazing. I can honestly say that we had only one meal our entire visit that would not fall into the "amazing" category - and even that one was still very enjoyable. After a fantastic meal and our first (of many) Limoncello digestifs, we strolled around our neighborhood. As we walked we did start to notice the sound of rushing water, but it wasn't until we turned a corner that we realized that we'd come upon the iconic Trevi Fountain, and I was knocked breathless for the first time. It's truly difficult to describe the feeling of seeing these unbelievable sites for the first time up close; places you've seen photos of your entire life or in movies or books and imagined what they must be like. The Trevi Fountain is such a place - but very different that what I imagined as it's basically the facade of the Poli Palace which stands behind it, so it appears to simply be one of the walls of a square (the Piazza di Trevi). Images we've all seen give the impression that it's in a much more open area. But this does not in any way detract from its beauty. We sat and admired for awhile (with thousands of our closest tourist chums) then made our way back to the hotel for a good night's rest - we had so much more to see.
The fact that the next day was Thanksgiving in America was all but forgotten, aside from the fact that we felt very thankful for our surroundings. We started the day with breakfast on the rooftop veranda and some of the strongest coffee I've ever had, but we were going to need it. We had a 1:30 appointment to meet a guide that we'd hired at the Vatican and wanted to make the most of the morning. We decided to check out one of the "hop-on, hop-off" bus tours that seem to have become all of the rage and that we've had good luck with in other cities; in Rome really not so much. The traffic is so gridlocked that it makes for a tortuously slow ride; I for one just kept feeling like I should be making better use of my time in such a city. We did get views of some amazing sites, but then once you appreciated what you saw you'd continue to sit there and look at it from the same view for the next 5 minutes until the bus moved again. We stayed on board as long as we could before we knew that if we didn't get out and find an alternate route we'd never make it to our appointment on time, so we disembarked at the Termini station and hopped on the metro for the really easy ride back across town. A short walk and we were at the Vatican Museums where we were to meet our wonderful Italian guide, Cinzia for our tour, which included the museums, the Sistine Chapel, and St. Peter's Basilica (as a group, otherwise known as the Vatican.) Mio Dio, what a place. The museums were all once the residences of popes; apparently as a new pope came along, he would build a new palace for himself and the old one would be used to display the art collections. The result is a huge art collection the likes of which I've never imagined. The frescoes by Raphael in the museums stood up to the works in the Sistine Chapel in my mind. Not to say that the works of Michelangelo, Botticelli & others in the Sistine Chapel were anything to sneeze at. I'll never again be able to look at the former's "Adam and Eve" in the same way. Savvy Cinzia used her iPad in the Chapel to bring up close for us the images on the ceilings and walls that seemed miles away from where we were standing. And the Chapel was the one place that you could not take photos; I didn't have a problem with that until Cinzia told us that it had more to do with copyright infringement than the preservation of the work. Sheesh! But I still couldn't bring myself to try to sneak one. Leaving the Chapel, you enter St. Peter's Basilica, and we were completely stunned by its magnificence. If that seems dramatic, I promise you it's not. I had chills. I had goosebumps. I considered going to mass again. It had quite an impact! Seeing Michelangelo's "Pietà" brought tears to my eyes. St. Peter's Basilica is the largest church in the world, and it will surely leave its mark on anyone who comes to visit, no matter what their religious affiliation. Then it was out to St. Peter's Square (Piazza San Pietro) for some more "oohing" and "ahhing" and the end of our time with Cinzia. Hiring her was a splurge as it was a private tour just for the 3 of us, but we felt it was some of the best tourist money ever spent. Actually, before Cinzia left us she kindly walked us to a local trattoria and spoke with the owner on our behalf to make sure that we could get a meal at that time of day - it was late afternoon by this point. The Birra Moretti and simple food were just what we needed before making our way back to the hotel. That evening was a special birthday meal for me as I turned 29, just as I had the year before in Prague. How lucky can a girl get? We celebrated with a wonderful dinner at Ristorante Clemente Alla Maddalena (complete with fireworks in the desert!) then a walk back home past the Pantheon.
Friday dawned, bringing with it more strong coffee and the goal of the Colosseum, which was about a 20 minute walk from the hotel. There was much to marvel at on the way there, then we marveled in excess at the Colloseo itself. We were perhaps a half mile away when we caught our first glimpse and the old lump developed in the old throat. The pinnacle of sporting venues, the structure was built in 80 AD, mostly on the back of Jewish slaves and celebrated with 100 days of games involving the massacre of at least 5,000 wild animals, in the most brutal of ways. Yikes. It's basically a huge ruin with a whole lot of history. The visit to the Colosseum was followed by a short walk to the nearby Forum (a huge grassy plaza once the center of Roman public life containing various government buildings from roughly the first to the 5th centuries) and Palentine Hill, once an ancient city. It was hard for me to grasp the history of this area as it goes so far back, but we did get some nice pictures there. And thus began our search for the one place - besides the obvious ones - that I was not leaving Rome without finding: the church of Santa Maria in Cosmedin which contains the Bocca della Verità, or the Mouth of Truth. Ringing any bells? The Bocca della Verità is an ancient cistern cover which legend says will snap shut upon the hand of a liar and bite it off. Am I getting close? Need any more clues? Princess pretending to be a commoner? Gorgeous AP reporter pretending to be a knight in shining armour? You got it - it's the famous scene from "Roman Holiday" where Audrey just isn't quite sure about what Greg is telling her, then he scares her to pieces. If you haven't seen this movie, I have just one thing to say: vergogna su di voi. You figure it out. All that acting made us hungry (see the photo album to understand) so on the way back to the hotel, we looked for a little trattoria that the guidebook recommended, the Enotica Corsi. The streets were wind-y and we were getting tired so we finally came upon a welcoming looking place and Chris said "Let's just eat here." And it just happened to be the very place I was trying to find. And it was also one of our favorite meals. We were almost the only customers besides the obvious family-owners who sat at their own table in the back. The service was warm & friendly and the food was delizioso. So cool when at the end of our meal they simply brought over a bottle of Limoncello for us to have as much or as little of as we wanted - on the house. Now that's Italian! After our little siesta back at the hotel (a daily necessity) dinner was perhaps our least favorite food, but our favorite waiter. When we asked what he recommended, in his broken English he asked "Whadda you like? I make it for you!" So even tho' it wasn't the most delicious of meals, the atmosphere felt very pleasant and authentic.
Mio Dio! It's only Saturday! This day we sort of took a chance and decided to visit a place that I'd not before heard of but was highly recommended by the guidebooks and the locals: the Galleria Borghese. Talking about it the night before Kyle wasn't so sure about it, but even he was duly impressed by its awesomeness. Once a 17th-century villa, the gallery now houses one of the richest of private art collections, amassed by Cardinal Scipione Borghese in the 1600's. No photos were allowed inside, but the works we were most impressed by were the amazing, intricate sculptures by Gian Lorenzo Bernini. Simply jaw-dropping. And outdoors was quite a treat as well. The gallery is part of the Villa Borghese Gardens, some of the most beautiful gardens we've ever visited. The camera got a work out as you'll see in the album. On the way to the Borghese sites, we passed through the lovely Piazza del Popolo; on our way back, our destination was the Piazza di Spagna and the iconic Spanish Steps. We found them without too much trouble, but timed our visit badly: it was a Saturday afternoon on a gorgeous weekend in autumn and not just every tourist within 50 miles but surely every Roman was out enjoying the scenery. What a crowd. And again, not at all like I imagined in the pictures. The steps themselves are part of a square and not nearly as out in the open as you'd think. But an excellent spot to enjoy a gelato or an espresso and soak up the sun. We did have a look inside the Trinità dei Monti church which stands at the top of the steps before seeking out some food. This time the guide book led us to a restaurant that had since been closed, so we settled for a nearby pizzaria and were not disappointed. Our last dinner of the trip took us across the Tiber River (il Fiume Tevere) to the neighborhood of Trastevere and the wonderful Ristorante Sabatini where we were well taken care of (and where Federico Fellini apparently used to hang out.) The waiter gave us quite a show with the decanting of the wine. We walked back dodging some very loud bats in the trees above us (and keeping our heads covered - it was all a bit creepy) then Chris and I strolled to a square nearby the hotel after dropping a tired Kyle off and enjoyed a - you guessed it - Limoncello in an outdoor cafe. When in Rome, and all that.
Our final day went quickly, and we wanted to get some shopping in (including finding the tie shop near the Trevi Fountain where Chris's brother had bought some ties on a previous trip. We did find it - Segatori - and bought some more ties!) We made an (almost) final stop by the Fountain to look in the shops, then made our way to the Piazza Navona - a Roman landmark but not terribly impressive that day, possibly because of the market stalls covering the square. We hadn't yet seen the inside of the Pantheon, despite its close proximity to our hotel, and walking back to it we caught the tail end of an open-air concert by the police band. The Pantheon was commissioned in the 2nd century as a temple to the gods of ancient Rome, but since the 7th century has been used as a Roman Catholic church. It's a beautifully preserved rotunda, and Raphael is among the well known figured entombed there. The inside is really beautiful. We then made an (almost) final stop at the Trevi fountain on our way to lunch - this lunch was one of the best as we simply came upon it while we were looking for a pizzeria that one of the shopkeepers had recommended; it was an unadorned store front with the door partially closed and frankly I'm not sure what made us go in, but we were glad we did, as it was some of the most enjoyable food & service of our entire stay - and the hands-down best cappuccino. Following lunch was our (final) final stop at the truly beautiful Trevi Fountain (I had to throw those 3 coins) then back to the hotel to pick up our luggage and catch our taxi. Unfortunately, our experience at Rome's Fiumicino Airport was not a good one - really long, hot security lines and not the most pleasant of waiting areas. But that could in no way put a damper on a trip to remember for the rest of our lives. I certainly do hope to get back to Rome one day; in the meantime, I have much to remember it by. Ahhhh... fantastico!
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