We're in Italy!

Ciao!

So much has happened since the last entry! We're technically in Florence now, but I thought since there was so much to say, I'd make a separate entry for Rome.

Let's see...well, we arrived in Rome on June 7th, after a long night of travelling with little sleep, thanks to a toddler on the plane that shrieked the entire 7 hours. We took a train from the airport to the train station, and from there, walked to our hostel, which was conveniently nearby (although dragging luggage through the streets of Rome is difficult no matter what the distance is!)

Our hostel, Casa Olmata, was very nice, and had lots of character...it was in a very old building near the church Santa Maria Maggiore ( the pope was there when we were!). The staff was friendly and on our last day, they packed us each a bag of snacks and drinks!

The first evening in Rome, we were very tired, so we just took a stroll through the streets in the area near our hostel. We ended up in a Park, the Oppio park, that was sprinkled with roman ruins and had flowers and palm trees all over! It was beautiful! At one end of the park, we (by surprise) happened upon the colloseum!

That night for dinner, we ate at a little restaurant where we got to speak italian to the waiter! It was intimidating, but he was very friendly and grateful for our efforts. We were so exhausted, after dinner we went straight to the hostel (getting back took a while though, because the streets have no logical naming system, and the names change every block!) and went to sleep...for 12 hours!

The next day, after grabbing a pizza to go, we went to the Palatine Hill and bought tickets that included a colloseum visit. Palatine Hill is a beautiful green area with lots of ruins - it is said to be the hill upon which rome was founded.

After the Palatine, we worked our way to the Colloseum, which was neat except for a brief downpour of rain! After things cleared up, we continued exploring the collosseum, and then checked out the roman forum,

From there, we headed to the Trevi fountain, where I got scammed into taking roses from some sleazy street vendor guy ( I KNEW it was a scam, but he caught me off guard and those roses somehow ended up in my hand) and then we had to pay 3 euros for them...well, Drew did. So to pay back, I treated us to a delicious gelato!

After Trevi fountain, we checked out the Spanish steps, and from there, caught a metro back to the hostel. We then went to the store, grabbed a bottle of wine and pizza, and hung out at the hostel with our roommates.

The next day, we saw the Pantheon (which was so neat!) and the Piazza Navona (which has a famous fountain by Bernini...except that it was covered up!). That afternoon, we took a train to Florence just before the protests against Bush started, which was very good timing on our parts!

And that is Rome! Ciao!