Roma

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Wer are now in Rome and have a great apartment for 4 nights very close to the colliseum. We then transfer to a hotel for three nights closer to the vatican. In Italy everyone travels around by scooter and it is very dangerous to cross the road...at all times. Coming after new years day, rome is in the midst of sales at all the shops and it is very busy. At some shops they even have a queue outside on the street to get in. We have been surprised throughout europe with people taking their dogs everywhere including shops , public transport etc etc.
We have had some great tips to avoid queues and went to the colliseum yesterday which was a definite highlight of the trip so far. We had been warned against gypsies, touters and pickpockets throughout europe and especially in Florence, but there obviously has been some change in the last few months. The police are very present everywhere and chase off and attempt arrest of anyone seen loitering, we have not seen gypsys and only a few beggars which is great as noone is hassling us at all.
We are really enjoying the pastries, pizza, pasta, coffee, hot chocolate, gelatti and chianni as you would expect. In italy noone starts early, so if you hit the street at 9AM vrtually nothing at all will be open, but late at night everything is open. In France you could find a few cafes open at 730AM and definitely breadshops but not so in Italy! We have been very lucky with the weather. In rome you do not need to use gloves, scarf, hat etc and it only has rained once on our trip which was when we travelled on the train from venice to florence so had no effect. today we went to the trevi fountain and made some wishes so looks like we are all in for a good year! Tomorrow is a big day as we head to pompeii via naples. We still get a bit of australian news via bbcnews channel and the internet of course. Rome has turned out to be cheaper than other cities we have visited which is a good thing, but is still expensive compared to home.
Pretty much you need to think of a euro as a dollar in terms of buying power (but of course it costs twice as much) however we have still bought quite a few clothes anyway and have expanded into the extra suitcase. ciao Dave, Viv, Lachy and Izzy

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