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Published: April 9th 2021
Before meeting Fiona I had started to save up for my next big adventure. We have talked about buying a house together, taking on her two kids and potentially having a child together. Once all this happens, big travel adventures will be limited. I have travelled and seen quite a bit of Latin America and North America but Asia is somewhere I really wanted to go whilst the opportunity was still there. Whenever I talk to people about travel, most people travel to Asia so I always feel I don't have much to talk about on this continent as my focus has always been Latin America. I talk to Fiona and ask if she'll be ok if I travel to Asia alone because I feel if I don't do this trip I'll have regrets and would never want that to impact on our relationship. I'd love for Fiona to join me but the budget isn't there for both of us and she has commitments with studying and being a mother. Since going to Asia together isn't possible, I suggest before I go away that we go to Rome, since this is somewhere we both really want to visit. Fiona begs that
we go for at least 5 nights and asks that we try to do things at a steady pace as she found Krakow to be hard going with my fast pace. I agree and promise to be more mindful of the pace when exploring Rome. The problem for me is I am so used to travelling alone and having long legs tend to speed walk and do things at a fast pace so that I can see as much as possible; I need to get better and understand not everyone can do things the same way as myself or necessarily enjoy having an itinerary that is too packed.
Day 1 An early morning flight means we arrive in Rome in the morning still. We take a train from the airport and head towards a stop not too far away from our hotel which is just outside the Vatican City. In order to get to our hotel from the station stop we have to cut through the Vatican. The Vatican is heaving with many people and sections are closed off and security everywhere; it seems too chaotic and overwhelming, especially when we are dragging our luggage. We discover the
reason it is so busy and heavily guarded is because Turkish president Erdogan is visiting the pope.
Once we cut through the Vatican we are at our hotel. Remembering that our first day isn't a full day here and not wanting to overdo the itinerary I suggest we stroll down the road from our hotel to
Castel Sant'Angelo. Also known as Mausoleum of Hadrian it was originally commissioned by the Roman Emperor as a mausoleum for himself and his family. It was later used by Popes as a fortress and castle, and today is a museum and popular tourist attraction. The structure was once one the tallest in Rome and it still offers impressive views of the Vatican and Rome. When we first arrive at
Castel Sant'Angelo, we enjoy walking around the gardens which go around in a circle to the old fortress. I have my new Canon camera and it is the first time I am properly using it after a brief test run back home. It seems the parakeets enjoy the garden too as we hear their loud squawks as they fly above our heads and socialize together in the trees. Inside, we walk around admiring the
architecture, many sculptures and beautifully painted ceilings. Once at the top, the views of the city are amazing. You can tell that some of these buildings are very old just by their appearance.
Our stroll from
Castel Sant'Angelo takes us down to
Fontana di Nettuno, then to the
Pantheon. The
Pantheon is 2 thousand years old and built as a template and dedicated to the twelve gods. It is the only Roman building to stay practically intact through all the centuries. The building is circular and has a large round hole in the centre of the ceiling. Where it had rained earlier in the day you could see a wet circular area on the stone floor.
Nearby to the
Pantheon, we think we have discovered a restaurant recommended to us by friends. They couldn't recall the name but said the restaurant had a sun in their signage. The restaurant is called
Terra di Siena and it has a sun in their logo. We decide to have dinner here and I send a photo of the restaurant sign to them to see if it is the same restaurant and they confirm it is. It is always good to visit
places recommended by people you know to see if you then share the same experience. After a lovely three course Italian meal, we enjoy a pleasant stroll back to our hotel via the way we came in while admiring the night time views of
Fontana di Nettuno,
Castel Sant'Angelo and
St. Peter's Basilica.
Day 2
A continental breakfast is served to our hotel room and, once fuelled up, we are ready for a day of exploring. We take a similar walk as we did yesterday as we head over to
Museo Nazionale Romano, which translates to the National Roman Museum. The museum was created back in 1889 at a time when Rome had not long become the capital of Italy. This museum is a must see as it houses the finest collection of Roman artefacts from excavations within the city as well as gorgeous wall paintings, jewellery and ancient sculptures.
Near to the museum is
Villa Borghese Park, a large landscape garden that contains buildings, museums and attractions. The weather is feeling a little chilly, since the sun is behind the overcast clouds, but we are wearing hoodies and it is February; just glad we are in
Rome and not London. Although we are not freezing, we are wanting to get inside somewhere warm. My Eyewitness book is highly recommending the
Galleria Borghese. When we get to
Galleria Borghese, we discover to visit we require a timeslot and availability is limited so we decide to perhaps come back a different day if we have time.
Galleria Borghese houses and displays a collection of ancient sculptures, mosaics and paintings dating back to the 15th century.
We carry on walking around
Villa Borghese Park. There is quite a bit to see here from
Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna to the
Silvano Toti Globe Theatre, a replica of Shakespeare's globe theatre. The park has a zoo as well as many beautiful monuments, including the
Water Clock. We discover a little café called
La Clock Casina which felt like it was in the heart of the park. Here, we managed to get a cuppa tea along with limoncello cake; although the guy serving us found it strange we wanted milk with our tea, surely he knows Brits drink tea with milk?!?
Afterwards we head to
Villa Giulia as it is on the outskirts of the park. Built for Pope Julius
III between 1550 and 1555 which at the time was on the edge of the city, it is now publicly owned and houses the Museo Nazionale Etrusco, a collection of Etruscan art and artefacts. The museum’s works are spread over two floors and are arranged according to period and place of origin. The collections include pottery, funeral urns, jewellery, bronzes and sculptures. Among the museum’s most valuable objects are a sarcophagus from the year 520 BC, as well as several terracotta figures such as the Apollo of Veii and the image of Hercules and Apollo vying for the deer, both from 510 BC. We find our visit here to be interesting, although we feel that perhaps we've seen too many museums in recent days. The walk around the mansion and gardens is still a pleasant experience.
Today as involved some walking with around 17,000 steps. We decide to head back to our hotel via
Piazzo del Popolo, which has the oldest obelisk in Rome. Also, within the plaza, are the twin catholic churches known as
Chiesa Santa Maria dei Miracoli and
Basiilica Santa Maria in Monetesanto, they literally mirror each other with a street running through the middle; quite
unique from my perspective as I've not seen anything like this before.
Day 3 I had read somewhere that the Pope does an audience and that it is possible to get tickets. After looking into this in more details, I discover the audience is on Wednesday mornings and free but to obtain tickets you need to get up early and go to a certain location within the Vatican. Given we were in Rome on a Wednesday, it felt like an experience not to be missed. I set my alarm for 7am to get showered and dress to be at the security gates for around 7:30am. If you require less than 10 tickets, you can pick them up without reservation from the Swiss Guards at the "Bronze Doors" located just after security at
St. Peter's Basilica. The queue luckily is not too busy but still busy enough that it was worth getting there early for. Once I pick up the tickets, I head back to our hotel to have breakfast and wake Fiona up.
Once ready, we head to the Vatican and we have to go through security (a second time for me but on the other side
of where I collected the tickets) we go to a relatively large room for the audience. I understand in the summer time the audience is held in
St Peter's Square to accommodate very large crowds. Once we are through security, we enter the large room and find ourselves half way from the front, so the view not too bad. We can sense the excitement with the crowd as many people start shouting "Papa Francesco" and cheering. He then slowly makes his entrance by walking down the aisle from the back to the front stage, greeting and shaking people's hands as he makes his way down. The audience with the Pope consists of small teachings and readings mainly in Italian but also in English, French, German, Spanish, Polish and Portuguese. A truly remarkable experience whether you are Catholic or of a different faith or non-believer.
After our audience with the Pope, we visit
St. Peter's Basilica, one of the world's most holiest churches. This church gets its name from being built on top of the tomb of St Peter, who was one of the twelve apostles of Jesus Christ and one of the first leaders of the early church. This
church takes your breath away with its beauty and size. We climb to get to the top of the dome and the views are spectacular, in particular the view of
St Peter's Square looking down from high above and seeing the city views.
After a cheeky Mcdonalds for lunch (Italy now ticked off) we visit the
Vatican museums. The museums are a must see and we take advantage of having our Rick Steves audioguide from an app on our phones; this was recommended to me by a work colleague and I am very appreciative of the suggestion. The only problem with visiting the museums is they're absolutely packed with tourists and everyone follows one winding walk and so it is difficult to take your time with the pressure of many people being behind you. The final part to the museums is the
Sistine Chapel and, although impressive, it is slightly disappointing as you are crammed into a room with security guards yelling at people to move forward or not take photos; I did try to sneakily take a picture but it came out blurry.
Day 4 The previous day we had purchased these Roma Passes, which allow
access to a wide range of museums and monuments as well as transportation around the city within 48 or 72 hours. These passes come in very handy as we want to visit
Ostia Antica a place outside of Rome and the metro is the best transportation option.
Ostia Antica is a large archaeological site, close to the town of Ostia, and is known for being the harbour city of ancient Rome. I understand that
Ostia Antica is better than
Pompeii because it is more intact, however, the two are both very different as
Pompeii was inhabited by wealthy Romans. I haven't been to
Pompeii to be able to compare them myself. The Ostia archaeological site is just a short walk from the Ostia Antica metro station.
Ostia Antica was first built in 4th century BC as a simple fort, but as Rome expanded, so did the town and it became an important hub.
When we first arrive at the archaeological site we are amazed at how big this town once was and how well preserved it is. We find a friendly cat trying to bask in the sunlight which is struggling to break through the heavy cloud. As
we continue to walk around, we find so many interesting artefacts and mosaics spread out around this once lively port. The Rick Steves audio is very handy and informative as we walk around the ruins that were once a theatre, forum and baths. This place is just impressive and definitely the best preserved Roman archaeological site I have visited. The site also has a café and souvenir shop and at the end of our tour around the site we were glad for something to eat and drink as it took quite some time to walk around the ruins.
We head back into Rome and search for this little gem known as "
the Aventine keyhole". My work colleague recommended I visit but would not tell me too much as she said it would ruin the surprise and therefore I will not say too much in this blog as I don't want to spoil it for anyone else but this little gem involves looking at a random keyhole and seeing a beautiful spot.
We stop off for a coffee and feel concern to see this small little dog pacing up and down the same footpath; we don't know if we
should do something but worried the dog is lost or can't find its owner. We wouldn't even know what to do being in a foreign country and just hope the dog gets reunited back with its owner.
From the coffee shop, we head in the direction of the
Colosseum and enjoy taking some selfies outside it as it starts to get dark and the lights on the building coming on. As it gets darker, we continue to walk around and I take photos of the buildings lit up. Fiona says I sound like the paparazzi with my special night time setting on my camera. We find the
Trevi Fountain and it is heavily packed with so many people taking selfies; some guy offers to take a photo of us using a polaroid camera for a few Euros, Fiona gives the person a 10 Euro note and as I see her give the note I have this bad feeling but its too late the guy gives us the photo and then tries to run off; I argue with him that he needs to give us change and he wouldn't but then suddenly throws some coins in the air and darts
off; these coins were literally cents and so we paid 10 Euros for this small photo print out that doesn't even show the
Trevi Fountain because it is too dark for the polaroid camera; luckily it is a good photo of us as a couple and so we will keep it. We finishing the night by having a nice meal out, we find the popular
Spanish steps aka Scalinata di Trinita dei Monti in Italian. These steps are literally some steep steps that slope between
Piazza di Spagna at the base and
Piazza Trinita di Monti, with the
Trinita dei Monti church at the top.
Day 5 Our last full day in Rome and we start the day with a visit to the
Colosseum. The
Colosseum, also named Flavian Amphitheatre, is an overall amphitheatre in the centre of Rome and is one of the seven wonders of the world; It was built around A.D. 70 to 72 under the emperor Vespasian. This massive structure measures around 620 to 513 feet. The amphitheatre was used for entertainment and could hold more than 50,000 spectators at any time. The main purpose of the amphitheatres was to place gladiators (strong worriers)
against wild animals to see who would win. Aside from the games, the Colosseum also hosted dramas, re-enactments and even public executions.
This
Colosseum is just spectacular and the photos we take are stunning with the blue sky and sun beaming down on us. This is now the third wonder I have seen and totally agree it should be one of the seven wonders of the world.
We spend our afternoon at the
Musei Capitolini, the capitoline museums are a single museum that houses a selection of art and archaeological artefacts it was established back in 1471 when the Pope at the time donated bronze statues of great symbolic value to the people of Rome. In the museum is a second copy of the 2nd-century AD bronze masterpiece Equestrian Statue of Marcus Aurelius and the bronze She-Wolf with the twin humans Romulus and Remus feeding on her milk. The museum has a café where we grab a coffee and tiramisu cake, very Italian indeed, and we enjoy the amazing views of the city.
Afterwards, we take a stroll back to the
Colosseum and find a restaurant opposite for a drink and light lunch. The prices are very
expensive but since we're having a drink and something small to eat it doesn't work out too expensive and it is nice to soak in the views for probably our last time on this trip. We then go and visit the
Trevi Fountain before it gets dark to see the fountain from a different daylight perspective.
Day 6 Our last day in Rome and we have quite a bit of time before our flight departure home and we had originally planned to visit the
Roman Forum in previous days but ran out of time so this was the perfect opportunity to see this location before we leave. These picturesque ruins were once the most important forum in ancient Rome. The
Roman Forum was the main scene for public meetings, law courts and gladiatorial combats in republican times and was lined with shops and market stalls. Today, the ruins are still quite intact given they're thousands of years old and amazingly there is an original door of a template that still locks. We are blessed with blue skies and sunny warm whether that just perfects the photos we take of these beautiful remaining ruins of what was once quite
an important part of Rome; some may argue it is still an important part of Rome 😉
It is sad that our adventure has come to an end but we've had an amazing time in Rome and it is definitely a city we'd like to revisit someday. Thank you Rome for being such a great host 😊
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alex waring
Alexander Waring
Rome
Wow! So much to see and do in this amazing city. Well done for being able to fit so much in, whilst also going at a more gentle pace. And well done also on being able to attend an audience with the Pope ?