Rome/Roma

The majority of our Italy trip was spent in Rome. When we were planning our trip, Rome had the most sites/attractions that we wanted to visit.

Day 1

From Florence we took a high-speed train from Santa Maria Novella train station to Roma Tiburtina station. It was about a one and a half our trip. The station was pretty modern, not like Milano Centrale. Once we stepped outside of the station, it was a different story. There are ancient Roman ruins mixed in with modern buildings. It was a site to see!

We took a five-minute taxi ride to our hotel. Our hotel, Domus Alberti, was more like an apartment that was split into a handful of rooms with a bathroom in each room and everyone sharing the kitchen/dining area. After we were given the short tour by our host, we grabbed a bag of our laundry from the past few days and headed for the laudromat. We dropped off our clothes to be washed and folded (including my jacket covered in chocolate gelato). Since we were a bit more south, the weather was warmer, so I did not need my jacket anymore.

We had arrived in Rome in the late afternoon, earlier than we arrived in the past two cities. In Rome, we discovered that there were not many restaurants open between the usual lunch and dinner service. We found an open bar that served some small plates and grabbed some plates and drinks. This was my least favorite place that we ate at in Rome. This just goes down to a lack of planning and not wanting to walk very far.

After the early dinner, we went out to explore the ancient city! I loved seeing the ancient ruins right next to the modern buildings. It’s so cool how well preserved these things were. We called it an early night so that we could have an early start the next morning.

Day 2

AHAHAHA!! Little did we know, we were dead tired from all the traveling. We did not get up until noon! That was the best sleep we got all trip since we did not have to travel or check out in the morning. We grabbed some coffee, bread, and pastries from the shared kitchen before we headed out.

That day, we only planned on visiting the Colosseum, which was about a 15 min walk from our hotel. For starting the day late, we did not have to stand in a long line to get our tickets and to enter the Colosseum. We wandered around for about two hours, gazing at the enormity of the Colosseum. After that, we walked around the Palantine Hill. There was more freedom to move around here, as opposed to the one way flow of traffic at the Colosseum. Deanna was able to stretch her legs and run around the ruins.

By the late afternoon, it was time to pick up our freshly washed and folded laundry. We dropped the laundry off at our hotel and looked for an open restaurant, Da Trani. We were immediately pegged as Americans for being the only ones eating at that time. Whatever, we were hungry!

Deanna and Cutie Pie split the pasta bolognese, Ben got steak with pepper sauce, and I got a seafood ravioli with mixed seafood. Our dishes were amazing!!

During our casual late lunch/early dinner, we booked an escape room in Campo de’ Fiori. This area seemed a bit sketchy to me at night. The escape room we booked, Escape Room Campo dei Fiori, was down an alley, it had no sign, and was hard to find. Finally, we looked at every single door until we spotted something that looked like it might be an escape room. We rang the bell several times and called the phone number listed. A few minutes later a guy came up to us on a moped and introduced himself as the owner. He apologized profusely for not being open when we were booked. He let us in and poured us some wine while he setup the room. As we started the room, we discovered that he did not speak English (but speaks a little Spanish) and we did not understand Italian, so the hints were going to be sparse. Despite the language barrier, we were able to escape!! The room was very elaborate for being in a tiny storefront. We relaxed in the lounge area with some wine and decided to do a different room. By this time, there were other groups there for the other rooms, and the owner had another staff member come in to help. This staff member spoke helpful English, so we got her for our second escape room. Our second time around was not as successful as our first escape room here. We escaped a few minutes passed the hour. I tripped on a cord and I hit my head (these were two separate incidents, not sequential things). Par for the course.

Day 3

Another late start to the day. This time, we missed breakfast in the shared kitchen. We found a Chinese restaurant, Mr. Chow, around the corner from us that was open. It was a quiet lunch with only a few other groups of people eating there. We had hot & sour soup, dumplings, fried rice with Italian ham, tofu clay pot, and a whole sea bass. Everything was delicious. It was interesting to see the slight Italian spin to Chinese dishes.

After lunch, we headed to the Vatican for our scheduled tour. Our tour guide, Chiara was amazing! We breezed through long lines and security area. Our first stop was a tour of the Vatican Museums. Ben and I were walking around in awe at all the luxury and art that were on display. Deanna happily walked along with Chiara at the front of the group while we slowly took in everything around us. Our tour also included the Sistene Chapel and St. Peter’s Basilica. We spent about 10-15 silent, breath-taking minutes in the Sistine Chapel. All the artwork on the ceiling was phenomenal! On our way to the Basilica, we stopped at a fountain and drank some Vatican water! The tour of the Basilica was the icing on the cake. It is hard to capture the enormity of the Basilica and everything inside it. I felt like an ant in the giant building. After experiencing the holiness of the Basilica, we were led down to the crypt–Ben’s favorite part of the tour. It was cool and creepy. I would highly recommend taking a guided tour of the Vatican! Our tour guide provided a ton of history, information, and humor. If we went through the Vatican ourselves, we probably would not be able to appreciate it as much as we did.

That four-hour long tour wore us out. We grabbed a nap before we went to dinner at Crispi 19. This dinner was a welcomed change to the pizza and pasta we had been sampling since we got to Italy. We always like to have at least one fancy dinner during our vacations. It is nice to get dressed in some fancy clothes and treat yo self once in a while! This dinner was a very memorable one. It was the dinner that turned Deanna onto salmon and duck. We were served salmon for an amuse-bouche. She never liked salmon before, but that night she devoured pretty much every bite of salmon. Ben got duck four ways. She loved the smoked duck.

After our feast of seafood, steak, and pasta, we had to walk off that meal. We went to the Trevi fountain and made some wishes. While walking around the fountain area, we spotted a McDonald’s. Even though we were stuffed from dinner, we felt compelled to try an international McDonald’s. This McDonald’s had screens for self ordering, which at the time was pretty new for us. The restaurant also had a full glass display of delicious looking pastries. Ben and Deanna got Signature classic burgers, I got a McVeggie sandwich, and we each got McFlurries. Everything tasted way better than McDonald’s back home!

Itinerary (click the itinerary links below to view posts):

• JFK
• CDG
• LIN
• Venice
• Florence
• Rome
• Amalfi Coast
• Lake Como