Rome

Lots of pictures in this one.  Rome rivaled London as for the sights to see.

We really liked Rome.  We were super glad to get longer days, sunshine, and warmer weather.  Lots of history, and amazing sights to see.  And the people fit every stereotype I had ever heard of Italian people.  Everyone talks at a shouting level, hairy and greasy men, younger people look straight out of jersey shore, the list goes on.  Doing my part to fit in, naturally, I shaved a mustache. 

Also it was super crowded.  Luckily we bought our tickets in advance for the big attractions, but people were standing in line for hours.  I can't even imagine what Rome is like during peak times for tourism.

At times I felt like I was in Mexico.  Everyone wanted to sell me something.  When it rained, there were guys at every street corner selling umbrellas.  When the sun was out, they were selling sun glasses.  And EVERYONE was selling selfie sticks.  I couldn't walk fifty feet with out some guy getting in my way and saying "selfie?".  Pretty sure that was the only English word they know.

Some sights:

The Pantheon

St. Peter's/ The Vatican 

Roman Castle

The Colosseum 

Ancient Rome city center and ruins

And we also toured the Vatican museum and saw the Sistine chapel.  I didn't take pictures though because there were thousands of pieces of art and you aren't allowed to take pictures of the chapel.  The chapel was definitely the most impressive thing I saw.  Before I saw it, I thought the only painting in the chapel was the famous one of God touching fingertips with David.  Man was I wrong.  The chapel walls and ceiling are completely covered by paintings.  You could be in the chapel for hours and still see things you hadn't before.  Big time sensory overload.  It also blew my mind that michaelangelo painted the entire thing. For one, it must have taken a very long time.  Secondly, I'm fascinated that he was able to paint well on the ceiling which surely required him to paint at an awkward angle.

Food:

Okay I was disappointed with the pizza.  I'm a big fan of thin crust pizza where it's baked at super high temperatures for a short time, which is what they had. But the pizza just left something to be desired.  They were skimpy with the ingredients and hardly used any marinara sauce.  Also it was weird eating pizza with a fork and knife since they don't cut it into slices.

Beer was fine.  Nothing special, but I was happy to have a 660ml (24oz) peroni for 3 euro.

Wine was decent, and most importantly cheap.  Felt a little strange splitting a bottle of wine with another man though.

And Gelato.  Pretty much tasted like ice cream to me.  It was good, but nothing on blue bell or Ben and jerry.

Well, we've got on week left in our trip.  Were on a train to Florence right now and we'll be there for two days.  After that, Paris for three days, and then back to Dublin for our flight home.  

A moment to vent:  Since Brussels, weve been traveling by train.  We bought a pass that allows us to use the trains for a total of ten travel days.  So far, the pass has worked beautifully.  But it seems like Italy doesn't really care for our pass.  All the trains here require you to reserve seats and to pay extra.  Not a fan of that when I thought the pass we bought was a ticket to move freely about europe.  Anyway, whatever, we ended up having to buy a plane ticket to fly from Florence to Paris because it was somehow cheaper than reserving a spot on the train.  Whatever, that was really the first time we had to shell out a significant amount of money, which is good considering the trip is almost over.

Still having a great time, but definitely missing friends and family back home, and excited to start work!

-RO