Day 21 - Venice to Rome

---

Bags to coach was at 8:50am as we had a long drive ahead of us today to get to Rome. We drove for about 3 hours before our first stop off for lunch; I got lasagne (when in Italy) and a fruit salad. We stopped here for about 45minutes before we set off again for about another 2.5hour drive before stopping again, this time only for 15minutes before continuing for about another 30-40minutes before we arrived in Rome.
In all honesty I wasn't hugely excited about Rome as I was here back in 2006 for 5 days but it was still nice to see all the buildings like St Peters when we drove in.
Derek dropped us off just near the court house so Leona could take us on a walking tour. Firstly we started at the Piazza Navona. We were here for about 15minutes to take some photos and get an icecream if we wanted before we then moved on to the Pantheon. The Panthenon really is quite impressive especially considering it is over 2000 years old and still looks fabulous. We had about 20minutes here where I quickly ran in and took a couple of photos before taking off round the corner to the pharmacy to get some cough medicine as I'vve been hit with the dreaded Contiki Cough bad. I got cold and flu tablets yesterday and today cough medicine. Fingers crossed they clear it up.
After the Pantheon we moved on to the Trevi Fountain. This was still just as gobsmacking as I remebered. Last time i was here i threw in one coin. Apparently that is if you want to return to Rome. Well, here i am so this time i threw in the full 3 that you are supposed to. The second is for true love and the third is supposedly for a wish; we'll see about those two. We were at here for about 20minutes before moving on to the Spanish Steps.
The Spanish Steps were much prettier than last time i came here because this time the Trinita dei Monti (the church at the top of the steps) wasn't covered by scaffolding.
After 10minutes at the steps we made our way down Via Dei Condotti; the most expensive shopping strip in Rome. It is home to Prada, Gucci, Versace, D&G, Bvlgari etc, lovely to walk past. We headed back to the bus then to get taken to our included dinner. Tonight on the menu was brucetta and Pizza. We also got a bottle of wine to share between us to go along with it.
After dinner we drove past a few more sites like the colosseum before heading out to the hotel. It's pretty far out of Rome central which was a bit crap but it is a nice hotel. After a shower we all headed out for some light drinks onto the patio area they have out the front. It was nice, we got to have a good chat with everyone without music pumping over the top or everyone being asleep on the coach. I hit the hay at about 12:30am along with a few other sickies as we wanted to try and get better before our next few big days.

---