Rome

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More touristy fun....

Our arrival in Rome was livened up by our slightly lunatic hotelier, Andrea. His attention span was a few seconds long and he loved to sing...

We continued our very touristy travels here, visiting St. Peters (very impressive, even when it feels like you've visited a thousand churches already), the Vatican museums and a few old buildings. Everything was vaguely familiar from my art history lessons...

We enjoyed watching the flocks of birds flying over the city at dusk...they would create the most beautiful patterns as they swarmed, twisting and turning to catch the next insect.

Our travels since Barcelona were being increasingly disrupted by my (Andrew) eye condition. What started out as a puffy eyelid had turned into a red, dripping, swollen mess. It was not pretty. It was not exactly conducive to meeting new people or hanging around in crowds, and a little alarming on the health side too. Because it was only getting worse, we headed to a hospital in Rome to get it checked again. A couple of hours later, I had a new prescription for eye drops and not much to make me feel any better. I was wearing an eye patch on and off at this point and feeling pretty miserable about the whole thing.

When we finished our tour of Rome, we were all cultured out. We booked an overnight train to Switzerland to visit a friend and relax for a few days.

ps The cheese in Italy is to die for!

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Photos

Trevi Fountain
Jen's favourite Roman thing

This is Low Season!
Crowds gather around the Trevi fountain...we couldn't imagine what high season would be like

One to Return
First coin over the shoulder into the Trevi Fountain, to ensure my return to Rome

At the Coliseum
Thankful that we weren't fighting the lions

Illicit Shot
I took this shot of the ceiling of the sistine chapel before realizing that we weren't allowed to take pictures....hope God wasn't watching too closely

St. Peter's Basillica
Big....jesus mary mother of god is this place huge. This photo shows only a very small portion of the interior

St. Peter's from the Dome
Looking down on one of the small (!) crossings in St. Peters from the dome

In the St. Peter's Dome
The angle of the walls gets steeper as you climb up between the interior and exterior shells

Rome from the Dome
Light breaks through the clouds as we survey Rome from the dome of St. Peter's

St. Peter's Square
Looking down from the dome

Size 42?
Jen checks out the remains of a collosal statue

St. Peter's by Night
Impressive....