Rome-Day 2 The Colosseum

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Mark and Kelly got in about 30 minute nap and we headed back out to the tour meeting location. This was listed as a walking tour so we thought we would be walking to get to these places...silly thought. We got on a large tour bus that drove us to the Colosseum and through the tour were able to skip the lines and go right in. The Colosseum surface has large gaping holes covering the entire facade. This, we found was where the marble had been attached before they took it for other buildings in the city. We were able to go upstairs to look over the first level and get a better view of the underground tunnels used to raise the gladiators and animals. Across the street is the site of the gladiator school. Our guide said they were trained much like wrestlers are these days...I really didn't see the similarity since wrestlers don't deal with lions and tigers. Someone asked the guide about the statues on a building and her response was, "they are Roman-type statues"...hhmmm. We started to miss Ian-even Bernie would have made a better companion than this lady.
Our stay there was brief and I could see by Mark's expression he was planning a strongly-worded email sometime in his future.
Back on the bus. We drove by the Ancient Ruins at a reckless speed, all heads looking over our shoulders at what we thought was to be our next stop. Guess not. Our guide took us through the city, pointed to a 5 foot section between a tobacco shop and a grafitti encrusted wall and said that was the spot where St. Peter and St. Paul last saw each other. Kelly and I got a brief glimpse of a small monument behind the buildings..bus still traveling at warp-speed..but Mark was on the other side of the bus and only saw the Tabacchi shop sign and grafitti. I was sorry I didn't have my camera out to catch the look on his face thinking of the saints in that location.
Our guide brought us to St. Paul The Apostle Church where the Pope will say mass on occasion. The Pope has his own alter that no one else may use and it is directly over the tomb of St. Paul the apostle.the church is huge with massive columns, paintings and marble everywhere. They keep it open without pews and that makes an impressive statement when you walk in. Painted high on one wall are pictures of every pope. They light only the present pope's picture. It was unexpected to come here and our guide gave us extra time to go down by the tomb of St. Paul. She came up a few notches on Mark's redemption meter.
Next we went to see the Roman Forum in the Ancient Ruins..up a few more notches..that was pretty cool too. They are still excavating and continue to find new areas and items all the time.
It was time to head back. The driver and guide asked people where their hotels were and made side trips to drop people off. Nice..except at one of the stops we heard our guide say, 'bye'. We thought this was directed to a tourist..nope. The bus pulled away and we saw the guide head into a shoe store. Huh.
We made it back and stopped at a grocery store on the way for salad and fruit to add to leftover pasta. We are relaxing in the room watching our first (and only!) American station since Paris...Fox news. It really is better than nothing😊
Vatican tour tomorrow..I expect a personal meeting with the Pope...while we are looking forward to seeing our last site, all three of us are happy we will be heading home to Bogie and our daily life. This has been a great trip!

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