Travels With Snacks: Roma!

Our driver extraordinaire!

Whew this was a long day. It is also a long write up. Rome is about a 60-90 min drive from the port (Civitavecchia). We hired a private driver and guide for the day so that we could see as much as possible. The heat wave continued today, with the high according to my watch being 99 degrees at around 3pm. There were no clouds in the sky. It. Was. HOT.

Our driver picked us up at the port and drove us to the Collosseum where we met up with our guide, Maria Teresa Ferrari. Is that an Italian name or what?? Our goal for the day was to do a panoramic tour of Ancient Rome since both girls have studied it in school and then to see the Vatican Museum, Sistene Chapel, and St. Peter's Basilica. We were aiming to finish this with enough time left to get gelato before a 4pm pickup for our drive back to the ship.

We started by looking at the Victory Arch, which is Constantine's Arch. Constantine was the Emperor who allowed Christianity to be legal, and in fact converted to Christianity himself. This arch commemorates his victory over Maxentius. There are multiple victory arches sprinkled throughout Rome but this one is next to the Collosseum. And is arguably the most important one when looking at both the history of Rome and the history of Christianity.

Victory Arch - our first stop, at the Collosseum.

From the arch we walked to see the most preserved section of the Collosseum's exterior. We opted not to go inside the Collosseum because it would take up too much of our day. This ended up being the first of our fortuitous choices because as we were walking by the entrance to the line, our tour guide talked to another guide who explained that no one was getting into the Collosseum anytime soon because it was already at capacity so groups had to leave before more could go in.

listening to Maria Teresa tell us about the Collosseum.

All hatted up.

It was already blazing hot at 10:30am. We only brought two hats to Europe: Doug's running hat and my "France" hat that I bought on our trip 7 yrs ago in France when we had blazing sun and no hat. For those keeping track at home, that's 2 hats for 4 people which is not enough hats. So we decided in addition to a France hat, we needed 2 Italy hats. Conveniently there are no shortage of guys peddaling hats. They wanted 10 Euros per hat, per crappy almost paper glued together hat, but our tour guide told him that was ridiculous and we would need 2 hats for 10 Euros. He much too quickly agreed, but we didn't feel like haggling any more so now we have one running hat, one (nice) France hat, and two (not so nice) Italy hats. Since we'll be in blinding sun at Pompeii tomorrow, this was a good investment.

family photo at the Collosseum

Circus Maximus with the old Roman
Palace in the background. The white
pebbles are the old track.

Our driver picked us up at the Collosseum and drove us to Circus Maximus, which used to seat an unbelievably 250,000 people. You can still see the chariot race track, although the seating is gone. It sits right in front of the old Roman palace which still looks quite palatial. The old Roman palace sits on top of the hill that Romulus chose for the city, and across from the hill that Remus chose. Romulus of course won their battle and the palace was built upon that hill.

From Circus Maximus we drove to an area where we could walk to the Roman Forum. Maria Teresa took us to a spot where we could see the difference in height between the current roads and the ancient Roman roads. New roads and buildings were just built right on top of old ones, so the difference in height looks like its about 1.5 meters (although we were looking down so it was hard to gauge). We then walked up into a square, via steps built by Michelangelo, into a square that housed both current and ancient Roman government buildings. The exteriors of 2 had been renovated by Michelangelo providing an interesting juxtaposition of the ancient next to the merely really old. This juxtaposition can be found throughout much of Rome. I found it interesting to see normal life going on right beside these treasures.

Photo looking down at the original Roman road.
You can see the new road height is far above the old road.

The very very old contrasted with the merely old, all throughout Rome.

Temple of Saturn in the Forum.

On the other side of the square, past the government buildings, you get to a place where you can look down on the Forum. The Forum is where Roman life took place. It house government buildings, including the courts, places to hold public debate, places where criminals were tried, gladiator battles, etc. It also has several temples, the largest of which (at least in my pictures) is the Temple of Saturn.

A view of the Forum.

Trevi Fountain (see family photo below!)

From the Forum we drove to the Trevi fountain where we successfully saw a beautiful and horrifically over crowded fountain without getting our pockets picked. We then drove through the commercial area of Rome to see the Spanish steps - less crowded, but still bustling. The Spanish Steps are very near the posh shopping area of Rome full of all the glamorous designers whose clothes I will likely never wear. These women are committed to getting their clothes shopping in though, teetering on very tall spiky heels while walking on cobblestone. Not for the feint of heart.

Spanish Steps.

After the Spanish Steps, we went to the Pantheon. Elisabeth was really excited to see the Pantheon. I was hungry. But I am SO glad we went. I haven't been to many places I liked more than the Pantheon. It used to be a Roman temple, finished around 126 AD after being started sometime around 27 BC. The original structure was smaller and built by Agrippa, the current structure was finished by Hadrian. After Constantine legalized Christianity, it was converted to a Christian church in 609 by Pope Boniface. The Roman Gods and Goddesses were replaced with statutes of Jesus and saints. Over the course of the next 1400 years, it has been modified, restored, etc but remains largely the same. The top of the dome is open to the elements and it acts as a form of sundial. If you stand in the center and look out the door, you can tell what time it is. The sun streams in so beautifully from the top of the arch. Kings and other famous people are buried there. We saw the burial site of Raphael, for example. It is a fascinating building and I wish we could have spent more time there, but like I said.... I was hungry.

Exterior of the Pantheon

We had a quick lunch at a pizza place. Maria Teresa told me we had only 20 minutes to get food and be out of there. She apparently told the staff there also because the guy made us order extremely quickly - almost like the Soup Nazi from Seinfeld. The pizza was different than the girls are used to, and different from Napoli pizza so the girls didn't really like it but we ate enough to stave off hunger and then got back into our van for the drive to the Vatican.

Dome of the Pantheon with open top

Interior of the Pantheon.

Family selfie with the dome -
everyone was doing it!

The drive took quite awhile because the streets of Rome are insane. As we approached the Vatican, Maria Teresa pointed out the line of people waiting to get into the Vatican Museum. It went well more than the length of a soccer field. If you get skip the line tickets and have an official tour guide, though, you don't have to wait at all! Huge bonus as when we went into the museum another tour guide told ours that they had reached capacity and those people weren't going to get in. Waiting for hours in 99 degree sun to not get in would be terrible.

To visit the Sistene Chapel, first you have to wind your way through the Vatican Museum. The Vatican Museum has very little if anything to do with the Vatican or Catholicism. It is a collection of art that was collected by the various Popes. They have fascinating pieces in there, but we were on a schedule and didn't have time to see everything (which would take at least a day). We did see many famous sculptures, tapestries, and Estruscan artifacts. She said they make you wind through the Museum as a form of crowd control for the Sistene Chapel. It was HOT inside the museum (except the hall with tapestries, which was air conditioned). It was also jam packed with people. Maria Teresa was pretty expert at zipping through the crowd, but it was hard to keep up with her at times and make sure we didn't lose the kids. She always waited for us and got us a good spot to discuss some of the things we were seeing.

Of course, aside from St. Peter's Basilica, the main thing to see is Michelangelo's Sistene Chapel. Once you're through the museums you wind your way Space Mountain style through hallways and stairwells until you get to the entrance to the Chapel. It is supposed to be silent inside, but in this case the saying "the silence is deafening" is literally true. Every so often they get on the loud speaker and say SILENCIO! It is almost wall to wall with people. There is a bench around the entire exterior that if you hover long enough you will get a spot so that you can sit down and appreciate the masterpiece that surrounds you.

You're not able to take photographs inside because they have recently finished restoring it back to its original color. Breathtaking doesn't quite describe the chapel. Fascinating, unbelievable, captivating, remarkable - those are words I think you could justifiably use. The thought of someone painting all of that ceiling (5000 sq ft!) in one lifetime much less in 4 years is crazy. And then - he painted The Last Judgment which is a gigantic wall on one side of the Chapel. I think my favorite story about the Sistene Chapel that Maria Teresa told us was that one of the Cardinals found some of the scenes in The Last Judgment to be inappropriate (nudity, etc) and lobbied the Pope to have them removed. The Pope apparently liked them. Michelangelo exacted his revenge on the Cardinal by painting him into the fresco as the devil himself in the lower right hand corner.

We sat and stared at the Chapel for about 15 mins before we moved on to St. Peter's. Another brilliant thing about having a Vatican approved tour guide is that instead of exiting then standing in line to see St. Peter's, she was able to take us through the side door which puts you out into the exterior courtyard of St. Peter's. The courtyard had a fountain that puts out potable water so we refilled water bottles and splashed water on our faces before going into St. Peter's.

Michelangelo's Pieta

There is a big holiday in Rome on Saturday the 29th. Its St. Peter and St. Paul day. They were in the process of readying St. Peter's Basilica for a huge audience and so much of the large interior of the nave was blocked off which made it feel much more crowded than necessary. We worked our way around the exterior, first stopping to see Michelangelo's Pieta - which is as gorgeous as I remember it. It is behind glass because a mentally ill person took a hammer to one of the hands and knocked the fingers off back in the 70s. Maria Teresa also pointed out that many of the very large "paintings" high up on the walls are actually mosaics made from tiny pieces of glass. Its incredibly difficult to believe because they look exactly like paintings, but when we got to the very last one just before exiting, you can actually see the individual pieces glinting in the light.

The Dome in St. Peter's over the altar

The most beautiful part of St. Peter's is the altar and the dome above it. When we were there light was streaming in from the windows. The dome was also designed and started by Michelangelo when he was in his 60s. He wanted the dome to be larger than the Pantheon, but it is not. On the interior of the base of the dome is an inscription from the book of Matthew where Jesus speaks to Peter that in English reads "You are 'Rock' and on this rock I will build my Church, to you I will give the keys of the kingdom of heaven." Peter is buried (supposedly, although this is controversial) within St. Peter's Basilica which is of course the heart of the Catholic Church. In fact the Basilica was built where it is because Peter was buried there, so in essence the heart of the Catholic Church was in fact built upon the rock of Peter.

After we exited the Basilica, we walked through St. Peter's square and pointed out to the girls the various places that they might see things on TV (where the Pope speaks on Christmas, Easter, New Year's, etc) and where the chimney is that announces a new Pope after a conclave. Fun fact: the chimney is not always there. There is an antenna marking where it goes and when there is a Papal Conclave, they install an oven in the Sistene Chapel with a chimney going up onto the roof where the antenna is.

Family photo in St. Peter's Square

Now it was time for gelato (obviously) and then the hour long van ride back to our cruise ship. We. Were. Exhausted. It was so tiring. The heat was draining and we saw so many things that our brains were overloaded. We got back to the ship, had dinner (the Maryland crabcakes were EXCELLENT even if my family made fun of me for getting them all the way in Italy), and then watched a show called Come Fly With Me, which features gymnasts, dancers, aerialists, and singers. It was really loud, but they are all very, very talented.

and, finally, gelato!

Charlotte didn't join us for the show because she has made a group of friends through the kids club, so now she wants to go there every night. She loves it and I am really happy that Royal Caribbean provides fun activities for them. Then it was time for 3rd dessert (those people ordered 2 desserts with dinner!) and bed so that we could be ready for our LAST touring day - Napoli! We will visit Pompeii and then get lunch (pizza) and gelato.

Dinner dessert (x2 for Doug, E and C!)

For those who read this far, you deserve a medal! If you ever want to book a trip to Italy, I highly recommend the travel agent we used to book our tours in Cinque Terre and Rome. I also recommend the people we used in Naples. Both were names giving to us by friends and I am happy to pass them along!!