Foreigners

It has been quite an exciting few days.  When I'm not being intimidated by the communication gap, I getting us lost around the city.  But other than that, I'm having the time of my life.  We arrived early Tuesday - 7am (midnight back in Little Rock).  By the time we arrived at our apartment and settled in enough to sleep (since the only one that slept on the way over was Layne, and that was only for three hours), it was 9am.  We ended up sleeping until about 3pm.  When we got up, we walked around a lot and explored our little area of Rome.  We are staying in Campo de Fiori (daily farmer's market and flea market) which is only a few blocks away from Piazza Navano (street performers, restaurants, and artists), the Pantheon (just plain Roman history), and the Spanish Steps (more Roman history).  All of these places and pretty much everywhere you look, there is a fountain - a stone sculpted fountain with exquisite detail, each telling a story of ancient Rome.  And feeding these fountains are the aqueducts that have water so clean, the residents of the city fill their own water bottles and visitors get a kick out of drinking the fresh water.

Jess read a book written by Rick S.teves and I think she thought we had to do everything in the book because we have been going nonstop for three days straight.  On Wednesday, we woke up, dressed, and ate breakfast at a little cafe in the square near our apartment.  The farmer's market was great, there was so many awesome things.  We walked around beginning around 10:30am - we tried to do the walk that Jess read about in her book, but we got lost many times.  There are not a lot of street signs so it was hard to confirm where we were actually located.  Even using the GPS on the phone didn't alway work, because sometimes it got confused and said we were somewhere we weren't.  We managed to make it to the Spanish Steps in time to meet our tour guide, Marzia.  We walked around with her for three hours while she showed us "Classic Rome."  It was a fantastic tour and Marzia was great - telling us interesting, educational, and sometimes funny stories (she called them "curiosities" :D) about people, places, and things around Rome.  Some of the things we saw (in addition to Piazza Navano (with Marzia's narration about history) and the Pantheon again (this time going inside):  Trevi Fountain, Basilica di Maria sopra Minerva, Giolitti for the best gelato in Rome, and a cute little wood shop that Marzia loves.  After the tour, we managed to keep walking around - we were out from about 10:30am to 10pm.  My feet hurt!!

Thursday, we were up early, and met another tour guide at the Borghese Gallery.  To be honest, I was not all that interested in this tour.  Art history has never been one of my favorite things.  But our tour guide, Alicia (pronounced Ah-LEES-eeah) made it so interesting.  We walked around the gallery for three hours and I was sad when it was over.  It was incredible - she even made it interesting to Sydney. Layne wasn't much into it, but she did great, never once asking when it was going to be over.  After that, we rented a bike/motorized cart and drove around the Borghese grounds.  That was where Jess lost my phone.  She took it out to snap a few pictures to post on FB.  And somehow - either she left it on the park bench, she left it unsecured on the bike and it fell off, or it fell out of her pocket - it was gone.  I was pissed, but tried not to be.  We returned to where we saw it last and of course, it wasn't there.  So we returned to the apartment to call the phone company and get it all worked out.  It wasn't long after that when Jess' phone started to ring with an country code of +39.  Now I, I had no idea it was the country code for Italy, but I figured as much.  I answered thinking it was the thief.  I know, I know, but I couldn't help myself.  Turns out it was the Carabineri - the Italian police!  In the officer's broken english, he told me that someone had turned in my phone.  He tried to give me the address as to which precinct he was located, but I was only able to get a few pieces of info.  We hailed a cab and when we tried to tell him where, he got frustrated because we didn't speak Italian.  Believe me, I was frustrated too!  But we ended up calling the number that had called us earlier and had the cab driver talk to the officer.  Twenty minutes later, we were pulling up to the Carabineri.  I went in, they filed the report, and I walked out with my iPhone!  How amazing!  Our spirits lifted, we went to dinner and finished the walk that Jess read about in her book.

Today, we met up with Alicia again.  This time at the Colosseum.  What an awesome tour.  So much history and so much amazing things to see.  After seeing that we toured the Palatine Hill - use to be the "palaces" of the times.  Lots of ruins and incredible stories.  We ended the last of our three-hour tours at the Roman Forum (or what's left of it).  Another wonderful education walk around Rome.  We had lunch and returned to the room to rest for a couple hours.  Then we went to the Vatican - how can you go to Rome and not see the Vatican - catholic or not, right?  Well, really we just wanted to see the Sistine Chapel and we walked for an hour before we finally reached it.  We basically ran through the museum, but it was mostly because we were all so stinking tired from the other tours we'd had over the last few days.  We had dinner and Layne and I came back to the room.  Sydney and Jess decided to head on over the Piazza Navano to browse among the artists again.

Tomorrow, we will be heading to Praiano on the Almalfi Coast.  It is a three hour drive (we hired a driver to take us), but we will be stopping about half way to take a tour in Pompeii.  As a child, my family took a trip to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston (it was what we call today, a staycation - my parents took a week off from work and we stayed in our hometown and did a bunch of sightseeing at all the local museums).  The exhibit at the time was Pompeii and I remember it quite vividly (I was about 10-11 years old).  So when I heard that it was just a day trip, I told Jess I really wanted to go.  So she arranged it (she's awesome).  I realize it may not be as exciting as the other tours we had since in Italy (and certainly not as long), but having seen the exhibit, it will be so cool to visit the location. And I thought that Sydney would someday be able to make the same kind of connection that I'm able to make (just in reverse), so it is definitely a must do.  However, if I said I was dreading a couple hours in the car, I'd be lying.  I'm actually looking forward to just sitting.  LOL!  We've been walking for pretty much 12 hours for three days straight.  Can't wait to get to Praiano and just relax!

There will be no internet connection in Praiano - not unless I pay a few euros for a few minutes.  So I'll have to write all about that part of the trip when we return.  Until then, arrivederci!