So we had impeccable timing catching the airport shuttle from the piazza catalunya square at 4:10am, and we were off to the airport. We were flying with Vueling airlines this time, and susprisingly everything was smooth. Once again it would have helped to speak Spanish, but no problems getting through. Now the task was breakfast. All of our wallets were a little on the light side, and not much was open at just after 5am…you guessed it. Mcds. Writing this blog has honestly demonstrated how much we ate there, but seriously, when you are strapped for cash, and that sucker is cheap, you really can’t help it. Anyways, we had seen signs and we followed them. Mcds was closed. Devastating. But wait…there are 2! Hmm. Well this next part was the lowest point in life I had reached. I asked a man who worked there what time Mcds opened at. Honest this guy handles questions about flights, problems, so many important things. He couldn’t help but smile at my ridiculously mortifying question. “It’s already opened” he said. Liar. The gates are closed. Nope…turns out he was right and we just hadn’t walked far enough down to the second one. Right. Cue head looking to the ground and walk away. Quickly.
We enjoyed our breaky quite quickly and headed to our gate. The flight was smooth as anything, and we arrived just on time. Fabulous. Now the trick was getting to the hostel. We had our directions and they said to take the train to termini. Easy enough. We follow the signs and we get in line for tickets. One train was leave at 9:06am, the next at 9:36. Considering it was 9:04 I figured by the time it was our turn in line we would miss the first train. Boy was I wrong. Got our tickets and we started running for the train. The whistle is blowing and Jewels is finishing buying her ticket. Run, run, run! We all jump aboard and breathe a sigh of relief. We made it; we actually freaking made the 9:06 train. Go us! Now finding a seat. I found a sector of 4 people, except two men had taken diagonal seats from one another. Akward, but I was going to squish through to the window. Perfect fit. Yay us. An hour later we arrive and the hunt is on for the hostel. We first however had to walk what seemed like years down the track. No I’m serious…we must have walked for like 15 minutes down the length of the train to get inside the terminal. We were laughing already. A pretty consistent trend in our trip. Who on earth would build such a large platform? Clearly someone who runs marathons. Thanks for the heads up Rome. Welcome. We were pretty good with directions at this point, so it really wasn’t that bad.
And then we entered Alessandro’s Palace. Welcome home. No really, it soon would be our home, but at the time it was just a place to sleep for 5 nights. Super cool. Check in wasn’t until 3pm, so we had a lot of time to kill. We stored our luggage downstairs and planned. Petey was to get in a couple hours later, so we hit up the Piazza de Republica in the meantime. Saw a fabulously ancient church and we found some pizza. Now, funny thing is we ordered the pizza thinking we saw chicken on top…when it turned out to be potato. Weird? And yet totally legit because we were in Rome. Go figure. We finished the pizza just in time to meet up with Petey! Finally rejoined.
Together we decided to hit up the major spots: first up was the Coliseum. Wow. Like, wow. We really were speechless. So much history in one place, it was overwhelming. Of course, like anywhere else in the world, we had a good laugh attack. Two asian girls were taking what appeared to be a myspace photoshoot. Now, normally this would not be as amusing, however, they had flowers, they were leaning against walls, looking at the camera, not looking at the camera. Naturally we had our own photoshoot with the wall afterwards too. See picture below! After the coliseum we decided to take a walk through the roman forum. The view from the top was gorgeous; filled with lots of sitting areas and an orange orchard you really did feel surrounded by awe.
Next up was the Trevi fountain: the infamous picture. We had heard it is the largest tourist spot it the world for pick pocketing. Note to self: keep the purse close. It was time for the pictures. The infamous picture where you toss a coin into the fountain and make a wish. We each took our turn: Jess, Petey then me. I ended up having to toss twice since I was so distracted by the first picture I didn’t make a wish. But then the best picture was still to come: miss Jewels. Now all of our pictures were blurry: I mean they are action shots, tossing a coin in, hips thrusted forward: not pretty but it’s the must have photo. So jewels steps up, we count 1-2-3-TOSS! Oh she tossed alright. She instantly went into a hand on hip, and hand perfectly positioned sideways. I’m pretty sure our mouths dropped in and instant laughter came. I mean, don’t get me wrong, it’s a fabulous picture, but I swear to god only jewels could have managed that shot. Perfectly poised, hand out, no blur, like a genie in the bottle. Fabulous. This quickly became THE joke.
We then headed off to what we affectionately called: the wedding cake of rome also known as Monument to Vittorio Emanuele II. You can see this from practically anywhere in the city with its huge glowing white boxy building, but its gorgeous. After snapping our pics we moved on to the Pantheon! Half of the exterior is under construction, but we managed to grab some gelato before sitting down to admire. Our first gelato in Roma, was, well, spectacular. How do you describe something that makes you so happy, and make you feel worldly, and just so in the moment. That was gelato. Every bite you can’t help thinking that you are in Rome, with friends, surrounded by beautiful people, and just loving every second. This was why I was in Europe in the first place. All those feelings, and gelato made you re-live all of those.
We wrapped the day off with a fabulous metro ride back to the hostel. It really was fantastic how cheap the metro was: 1 euro. That’s it. So sweet and simple, and no stupid extra coins. Just one euro. Fabulous Rome; points for you. Another fabulous side note about our hostel was the fact that it served dinner…every night. One guess as to what they served: pizza. I mean, granted its like a million pieces shoved over top of one another in a huge box and first come first serve. But really – it was easy, and already in the price we paid for. Excellent. Eat away ladies. We wrapped up our first day with some computer time and we were off to bed. Damn did we ever sleep well. Jewels, Petey and I split a 3 person room that was pretty much like a hotel: our own bathroom, towels, sheets, covers, a TV. Yeah…it was more a hotel than a hostel. We we’re all over that.
Day 2 we ventured to the Piazza del Popollo and walked up the hill for the view from the top. Gorgeous. This was our first view of the Vatican actually, and we could not have been more excited. How incredibly cool. On the way of course we ventured, and found our very own little private park and saw some gorgeous old architecture. Also, we happened to watch the changing of the guards which was really cool in front of what I would assume was a government building of sorts.
We ventured to the Santa Maria della Vittoria church. I’m not going to lie, it was probably the most exquisite, gloriously beautiful church I had ever seen. So much detail and elegance on the walls, and knowing the history as well. You had to be impressed. One of the coolest pieces inside was the Ecstasy of St. Teresa by Scipione’s favored Sculptor Bernini. It was fascinating to see that in person. We figured that today was going to be a venture day: tons of walking around since everything is so close to one another. Honestly, we talked a lot about this, can you imagine growing up around so much history? Walking to a friend’s house and your landmarks are the Pantheon, Coliseum, Trevi fountain, etc. “Oh where do you live?”; “Left of the Trevi fountain”. Ha. I like across from a Tim Hortons. Beat that. Ridiculous. Zero competition. It was amazing.
We now wanted to venture to the Spanish steps! Wow! Gorgeous, we started at the top and walked down. Honestly, the perfect weather so naturally the steps are covered in groups of people, travelers, locals, you name it. The things you see are fabulous, and I’m talking about prime people watching as well. (1) An older couple and the man honestly had pizza sauce ALL over his face, as if he had accidentally face planted in his pizza. He didn’t care, but boy his wife was eyeing him. Eventually she got out the napkins. But wow; a prize winner right there. (2) A group of asian men begged to take their picture with us: we were locals? Absolutely not. We gave a smile anyways. Pretty sure that picture made their day. (3) The Rose man. Now you realize that everyone sells roses, and if they say they give one to you, you grab it, you then have to pay for it. So its sort of a hands off thing. This one man selling roses would not give up, he thought I was great, and wanted me to take a picture with him. Absolutely we will. Ridiculous. One of those moments were eyes say everything: “Petey, take the damn, Petey TAKE THE DAMN PICTURE!”. Right, moving forward.
We had booked what was called a “ghetto tour”. No really, that was the name. It did things like the mouth of truth and other sites that we would never have necessarily ventured to see. It was fabulous though: we walked for about 3 or 4 hours and saw where the chariots raced, the mouth of truth (totally felt like Audrey Hepburn), and so much more. We saw the Jewish ghetto, and the island that separated it all. One thing I saw that I had never seen before were the locks that people put on the bridge. They wrote the initials of them and their love and locked it to the bridge symbolizing their love would last forever. How incredibly romantic. Can you imagine your name on a lock? How fabulous.
Day 2 we ventured to the Piazza del Popollo and walked up the hill for the view from the top. Gorgeous. This was our first view of the Vatican actually, and we could not have been more excited. How incredibly cool. On the way of course we ventured, and found our very own little private park and saw some gorgeous old architecture. Also, we happened to watch the changing of the guards which was really cool in front of what I would assume was a government building of sorts.
We ventured to the Santa Maria della Vittoria church. I’m not going to lie, it was probably the most exquisite, gloriously beautiful church I had ever seen. So much detail and elegance on the walls, and knowing the history as well. You had to be impressed. One of the coolest pieces inside was the Ecstasy of St. Teresa by Scipione’s favored Sculptor Bernini. It was fascinating to see that in person. We figured that today was going to be a venture day: tons of walking around since everything is so close to one another. Honestly, we talked a lot about this, can you imagine growing up around so much history? Walking to a friend’s house and your landmarks are the Pantheon, Coliseum, Trevi fountain, etc. “Oh where do you live?”; “Left of the Trevi fountain”. Ha. I like across from a Tim Hortons. Beat that. Ridiculous. Zero competition. It was amazing.
We now wanted to venture to the Spanish steps! Wow! Gorgeous, we started at the top and walked down. Honestly, the perfect weather so naturally the steps are covered in groups of people, travelers, locals, you name it. The things you see are fabulous, and I’m talking about prime people watching as well. (1) An older couple and the man honestly had pizza sauce ALL over his face, as if he had accidentally face planted in his pizza. He didn’t care, but boy his wife was eyeing him. Eventually she got out the napkins. But wow; a prize winner right there. (2) A group of asian men begged to take their picture with us: we were locals? Absolutely not. We gave a smile anyways. Pretty sure that picture made their day. (3) The Rose man. Now you realize that everyone sells roses, and if they say they give one to you, you grab it, you then have to pay for it. So its sort of a hands off thing. This one man selling roses would not give up, he thought I was great, and wanted me to take a picture with him. Absolutely we will. Ridiculous. One of those moments were eyes say everything: “Petey, take the damn, Petey TAKE THE DAMN PICTURE!”. Right, moving forward.
We had booked what was called a “ghetto tour”. No really, that was the name. It did things like the mouth of truth and other sites that we would never have necessarily ventured to see. It was fabulous though: we walked for about 3 or 4 hours and saw where the chariots raced, the mouth of truth (totally felt like Audrey Hepburn), and so much more. We saw the Jewish ghetto, and the island that separated it all. One thing I saw that I had never seen before were the locks that people put on the bridge. They wrote the initials of them and their love and locked it to the bridge symbolizing their love would last forever. How incredibly romantic. Can you imagine your name on a lock? How fabulous.
We wrapped up the tour by having some aperativos and a large glass of wine along a really cool side street. This is where we learned of Baffettos. Amen for Baffettos but more about that later. We chatted and had wine with the tour guide after everything was all said and done. We had lucked out and the tour was almost a private one, it was made on special request so it was Jess, Jewels, Petey, myself and one other Canadian named Sam. Very cool. It was nice having a small group for the tour, more bonding with the guide and you could actually hear everything. Even better. Our best bonding moment: bonding with the two tour guides over Jewels Trevi photo. Posed or not? Absolutely. We loved her.
Day 3 was going to be the most epic yet: THE VATICAN! Oooo baby. This was it. You walk in and you are automatically hit with the realities of what surrounds you. The smallest state in the world, a place with their very own postage, so much history, the POPE for crying out loud. Just wow. We got in line, which was quite long actually and waited. Amazingly, what we had heard was hours in line only took us 30 minutes! Fabulous; the day was off to a good start. Once inside we opted for the audio guide for St. Peters Basilica. I wanted to absorb as much as possible, and I clearly wasn’t going to be reading anything once inside, so audio guide it was. Fabulous. How cool to be inside, we had a map and at each setting you could listen to the historical background and what religious significance it presented. Not going to lie, our audio guides had a very heavy religious bias to them, duh, but more so then expected. Walking around, it was gigantic: so many people, and of course photographs being taken left, right and centre. Then the craziest thing I have ever seen: a man had a heart attack. He had been praying and I think he was so overwhelmed with being inside the Basilica, or, so many people…he had a freaking heart attack. All of a sudden we are watching a paramedic bust through the main blocked off area and to this man. Unbelievable. I’m sure this happens more regularly than you would think though. I mean; it is St. Peters Basilica after all.
After leaving the Basilica, we then got in line to climb the Dome. Now the pre-story bit: Jess had worn a dress to the Vatican, and it was a bit short to enter, and a nice security guy had informed us: if she can make it a bit longer, no problem. Fabulous. Done. So when we got into line to climb the dome, we are standing there when the same security guard came. He told us to go further up the line. What? There is a line…but he wanted us to change from a line, to a huge chunk of people, and fill in the gap. Well, unfortunately we were the only ones we had seen him and we stepped forward. Horrible idea: people thought we were cutting in line and one British woman had zero issues informing us how horrible we were. WE ARE AT THE VATICAN for frig sake. Right, so we are trying to explain the security guard (who is no longer in visible sight, bastard) and she was not buying it. She thought we had made it up. So now, I’m awkward giggling, wishing I was anywhere else in the world, but that line. No eye contact with others, no eye contact with others, because we saw him again and he said to stay.
After leaving the Basilica, we then got in line to climb the Dome. Now the pre-story bit: Jess had worn a dress to the Vatican, and it was a bit short to enter, and a nice security guy had informed us: if she can make it a bit longer, no problem. Fabulous. Done. So when we got into line to climb the dome, we are standing there when the same security guard came. He told us to go further up the line. What? There is a line…but he wanted us to change from a line, to a huge chunk of people, and fill in the gap. Well, unfortunately we were the only ones we had seen him and we stepped forward. Horrible idea: people thought we were cutting in line and one British woman had zero issues informing us how horrible we were. WE ARE AT THE VATICAN for frig sake. Right, so we are trying to explain the security guard (who is no longer in visible sight, bastard) and she was not buying it. She thought we had made it up. So now, I’m awkward giggling, wishing I was anywhere else in the world, but that line. No eye contact with others, no eye contact with others, because we saw him again and he said to stay.
Then the line starts to move, but we are no longer in line, so where do we squish in? Nowhere. A fabulous British couple thankfully let us go in front of them since they could tell we were a) akward b) had been standing there the whole time. The walk up was so damn intense: 551 steps. Oh yes. We did em all. We started at the bottom and made it up to the top without too many problems. Really narrow though at times. God was the view from the top ever worth it. A 360 degree view and you could live up there. Just to die for. The walk down was just as hellish as the walk up, but we somehow managed. To celebrate: we sent some postcards! Yay! How cool; the smallest state, so we had to. Classic photo for sure.
Then it was time for the grande finale: the Vatican Museum. We headed outside the Vatican and grabbed some pizza on the way. Not a long line at all and a breeze to get the ticket. Fantastically enough: we were able to use our ISIC card. I’m pretty sure this is the first time someone in Europe has recognized this card, but we were able to get the discount. Amen. We were going to see the Sistine chapel! How cool? Michelangelo would be thrilled with us. After what felt like an eternity walking, and when I say an eternity, I mean we honestly walked for almost 2 hours through the most gorgeous, thrillingly beautiful hallways I had EVER seen. Each room felt to me like the Sistine Chapel. We even played a game: flat or 3D, because I swear to god each and every ceiling looked 3D in the design, however, it was kindly pointed out that they were flat. Yeah, like I said, a game began. And it was hard too. Tricky paintings.
We finally get to the Sistine chapel doors: take a deep breath and enter. Holy jesus. It was the most magical moment you could dream of. Michelangelo had painted what I was looking at. The detail, the amount of time and sweat and I’m sure tears that went into this masterpiece. Its one of those rooms you could stand in for hours and never look at the same thing twice: just incredible. I can only imagine working there, and sneaking in after it was closed and just lying on the floor staring at the ceiling. That was my favorite part. The things you talked about in art class, that you read in books: this was it. This was freaking IT. Unreal. Words really can’t describe.
We finally left and decided to cross back on a gorgeous bridge. Statues lined both sides and you really felt like you were in a fairytale. You felt prettier walking across a bridge like that. Now there was a reporter of sorts that was filming on the bridge. We tried our best not to dodge in front of the camera to be on TV, but I swear, we were walking by and I got my foot caught on a cobblestone and LAUNCHED forward. Oh boy. The camera man must have given me THE dirtiest look of all time, but I was just thankful I semi-landed on my feet. I really wasn’t trying to get on TV, but I don’t think he would have agreed.
To make the day even better we dined at Baffettos for the first time. We had been told this place was not only sensational, but that we had to get there before it opened. It was open from 630pm-1am, and you had to be early if you wanted to eat. Hmm, okay then. So we got there at 6 and stood in line: first I may add: first in line. This place is family owned and feels like they were put on earth to make pizza. We get a seat outside on the patio and we each order the basic margherita pizza for 5 euros. No idea what to expect but after hearing all about it, we did have high enough expectations. Well, turns out the pizza surpassed ALL of our expectations. The pizza was a) a Canadian large, b) the most heavenly thing you have ever seen and c) the crust was so thin you don’t know how the whole thing didn’t burn in their oven. IT WAS SENSATIONAL. You should have heard us eating it: sound effects were ridiculously hilarious. I’m sure you can only imagine the “ooo”’s and “aaa”’s that the whole restaurant were saying. It was like flipping to the wrong channel. We just couldn’t get over the price though: 5 Euros for such a huge pizza. Of course we finished the whole thing, because it was heaven. We knew we would be coming back for sure. Baffettos was the best damn pizza in all of Italy and we were sure of it.
We finally get to the Sistine chapel doors: take a deep breath and enter. Holy jesus. It was the most magical moment you could dream of. Michelangelo had painted what I was looking at. The detail, the amount of time and sweat and I’m sure tears that went into this masterpiece. Its one of those rooms you could stand in for hours and never look at the same thing twice: just incredible. I can only imagine working there, and sneaking in after it was closed and just lying on the floor staring at the ceiling. That was my favorite part. The things you talked about in art class, that you read in books: this was it. This was freaking IT. Unreal. Words really can’t describe.
We finally left and decided to cross back on a gorgeous bridge. Statues lined both sides and you really felt like you were in a fairytale. You felt prettier walking across a bridge like that. Now there was a reporter of sorts that was filming on the bridge. We tried our best not to dodge in front of the camera to be on TV, but I swear, we were walking by and I got my foot caught on a cobblestone and LAUNCHED forward. Oh boy. The camera man must have given me THE dirtiest look of all time, but I was just thankful I semi-landed on my feet. I really wasn’t trying to get on TV, but I don’t think he would have agreed.
To make the day even better we dined at Baffettos for the first time. We had been told this place was not only sensational, but that we had to get there before it opened. It was open from 630pm-1am, and you had to be early if you wanted to eat. Hmm, okay then. So we got there at 6 and stood in line: first I may add: first in line. This place is family owned and feels like they were put on earth to make pizza. We get a seat outside on the patio and we each order the basic margherita pizza for 5 euros. No idea what to expect but after hearing all about it, we did have high enough expectations. Well, turns out the pizza surpassed ALL of our expectations. The pizza was a) a Canadian large, b) the most heavenly thing you have ever seen and c) the crust was so thin you don’t know how the whole thing didn’t burn in their oven. IT WAS SENSATIONAL. You should have heard us eating it: sound effects were ridiculously hilarious. I’m sure you can only imagine the “ooo”’s and “aaa”’s that the whole restaurant were saying. It was like flipping to the wrong channel. We just couldn’t get over the price though: 5 Euros for such a huge pizza. Of course we finished the whole thing, because it was heaven. We knew we would be coming back for sure. Baffettos was the best damn pizza in all of Italy and we were sure of it.
This is also when we discovered the heavenly gelato joint right next door. Smart business people right there, placing yourself next to the most fantastic pizzeria of all time; they do dinner, you do dessert. Jewels and I agreed that we would try and do different flavours every time we ate gelato. That time I had Bailey’s and banana. Oh boy, words cannot express how damn good it was. On our way home we walked past the Piazza Navona where they were still selling art, the Pantheon and the Trevi. Like I said, you can’t go around the corner without bumping into something historical. The final venture for the night was Trevi. The place is possibly even more gorgeous at night then the day. All lit up, still tons of people, but just awe dropping. We even took a “Jewels re-enactment” picture of the three of us tossing our ‘coins’. Legendary. So we are each taking a night time shot in front of the fountain when a rose seller approaches Petey. Now I think it’s the being half Italian thing, but damn this girl got hit on hard in Italy. Fabulously funny: this time was no exception and probably topped the charts. So he is chatting up Petey and she is giving me the save me eyes. Okay, I took the picture first then went to save her.
Note: A bit of background info. When I broke all my bones I had to venture on a pretty regular basis to the hospital for check-ups. Okay then, so this one time I couldn’t find where I had to go, and this one guy named Said helped me. Fabulous, he was a doctor and super nice: wearing the white coat and all. Right, well turns out he practically had my number on speed dial he called so often (even though I never answered; sorry) and on the way out of the hospital that fine day….turns out he is a custodian. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but the white jacket was not legit and the girls have never let that one go. Damn.
So back to the story: We get talking and the rose man says to Petey “What’s your name?”, she takes one look at me and says “Sarah”. Fabulous, thanks Petey. She then politely asks back, what’s your name?...I am not kidding you, he said “Said”. I doubled over laughing. As freaking if. Not only is his name Said, but Petey presented herself as Sarah. I was dying with laughter, literal tears. Said probably didn’t find this so funny, but he had to go sell more roses anyways. Oh boy, Rome was sure conducive for laugh attacks. We caught the metro home, but the thing about Termini station is that we could never quite grasp which exit to take. I mean this in the smartest way possible: all of us are exceptional with the metro, but we always seemed to take the exit that was on the opposite side of the station that we needed. It then became a game to find the right one. This game would last longer than we expected.
The next day was sensational and we planned to take a little breather and go to the beach! We ended up taking the metro, the above ground tram and finally a bus; all for the combined price of 1 Euro. Pardon? Absolutely. We asked where to buy tickets, but the one metro ticket we had bought was good enough for them all. I love this country. Brilliant. We travelled for about an hour, but the final bus was the best part: pretty sure it was half off-roading, bumping everywhere. We had no idea where we were going, but we figured when we saw a beach we could just jump off. Absolutely, we saw a beach and practically screamed for him to stop the bus. He slammed the breaks and we jumped off. Brilliant: hello beach. First stop: the bar. We each bought ourselves a beer, which funny enough happened to be Danish, but whatever, we were on a damn beach! Gorgeous weather and hot. Could not beat that if we tried. Also: not a single other person was on the beach. Private? It was ours. Sensational. We made fort, and each got comfy. We decided to hold off for a bit on the sunscreen since we had received zero colour the past few days: this was soon to be a HUGE regret. However, we decided to roast evenly like marshmallows. Seriously, we said we were marshmallows. To be golden brown on the outside. Ha. Ridiculous when I say it out loud now. We spent the day heavenly on the beach and then finally decided to head back before we missed the last bus: which we didn’t exactly know would be coming. Turns out we had to wait for about an hour: however we had exceptional entertainment. Five girls: Jess, Julie, Petey, Colleen (Jewels friend) and myself. We had to stand on the side of the road and well, we got a lot of honks. Honestly though, it sounded like a musical. We thought it was some sort of reality series joke. It quickly became another game: who has the best pick up attempt. The contestants included blowing kisses on motorcycles, whistling tunes, honking tunes by car, yells, and really slow drivers on bicycles. Ridiculously funny.
Note: A bit of background info. When I broke all my bones I had to venture on a pretty regular basis to the hospital for check-ups. Okay then, so this one time I couldn’t find where I had to go, and this one guy named Said helped me. Fabulous, he was a doctor and super nice: wearing the white coat and all. Right, well turns out he practically had my number on speed dial he called so often (even though I never answered; sorry) and on the way out of the hospital that fine day….turns out he is a custodian. Not that there is anything wrong with that, but the white jacket was not legit and the girls have never let that one go. Damn.
So back to the story: We get talking and the rose man says to Petey “What’s your name?”, she takes one look at me and says “Sarah”. Fabulous, thanks Petey. She then politely asks back, what’s your name?...I am not kidding you, he said “Said”. I doubled over laughing. As freaking if. Not only is his name Said, but Petey presented herself as Sarah. I was dying with laughter, literal tears. Said probably didn’t find this so funny, but he had to go sell more roses anyways. Oh boy, Rome was sure conducive for laugh attacks. We caught the metro home, but the thing about Termini station is that we could never quite grasp which exit to take. I mean this in the smartest way possible: all of us are exceptional with the metro, but we always seemed to take the exit that was on the opposite side of the station that we needed. It then became a game to find the right one. This game would last longer than we expected.
The next day was sensational and we planned to take a little breather and go to the beach! We ended up taking the metro, the above ground tram and finally a bus; all for the combined price of 1 Euro. Pardon? Absolutely. We asked where to buy tickets, but the one metro ticket we had bought was good enough for them all. I love this country. Brilliant. We travelled for about an hour, but the final bus was the best part: pretty sure it was half off-roading, bumping everywhere. We had no idea where we were going, but we figured when we saw a beach we could just jump off. Absolutely, we saw a beach and practically screamed for him to stop the bus. He slammed the breaks and we jumped off. Brilliant: hello beach. First stop: the bar. We each bought ourselves a beer, which funny enough happened to be Danish, but whatever, we were on a damn beach! Gorgeous weather and hot. Could not beat that if we tried. Also: not a single other person was on the beach. Private? It was ours. Sensational. We made fort, and each got comfy. We decided to hold off for a bit on the sunscreen since we had received zero colour the past few days: this was soon to be a HUGE regret. However, we decided to roast evenly like marshmallows. Seriously, we said we were marshmallows. To be golden brown on the outside. Ha. Ridiculous when I say it out loud now. We spent the day heavenly on the beach and then finally decided to head back before we missed the last bus: which we didn’t exactly know would be coming. Turns out we had to wait for about an hour: however we had exceptional entertainment. Five girls: Jess, Julie, Petey, Colleen (Jewels friend) and myself. We had to stand on the side of the road and well, we got a lot of honks. Honestly though, it sounded like a musical. We thought it was some sort of reality series joke. It quickly became another game: who has the best pick up attempt. The contestants included blowing kisses on motorcycles, whistling tunes, honking tunes by car, yells, and really slow drivers on bicycles. Ridiculously funny.
The bus FINALLY comes and we jump on. And we are riding when all of a sudden Petey says “What is touching my leg?”…Jess answers:”It’s a dog”. You should have seen her face. Literally a little dog was wrapped around Petey’s leg, but she was expecting us to say it was our feet, or a pole…nope a dog. Fabulous. Moving on. It’s time for the tram back before the metro. We were perfectly on time and the metro was about to go. The man is pointing through the trains to ours: we were train number 4 in the distance. So we all start running through the trains. Julie is first, I’m second, Colleen is third, Petey is fourth and Jess is last. Oh my god if you could have seen us running, we thought we had some time when all of a sudden Jewels, Colleen and I are on the tram and the alarm starts going. Jess is still about 3 trains away and Petey is super close. THE DOORS CLOSE. I shoved my hands in and Petey got there just in time! We are pushing the doors back, but clearly they were having none of that. I’m pushing the button to get the door to open and FINALLY IT DOES. Petey jumps on! We are yelling at Jess “RUN JESS RUN!” Oh she was booking it alright but holy crap the same thing happened, we had to keep the doors open. It was like a movie. A movie! Running through the trains, the doors are closing behind her as the exists each train running towards us. We are sticking our arms out reaching for her when she finally arrives! It was insane. We were dying laughing: AS IF THAT JUST HAPPENED. Of course it did: it’s US we are talking about.
This super sweet older woman sat beside me on the tram and to make it clear I do not speak Italian she did not speak English: however, we had her book. She was pointing to picture of Sardinia and I believe she lived there, showing me the sculptures and pictures. My show and tell was our towels: beach, burnt, sand. It was good, we managed quite well. She just kind of smiled/giggled at me, and I smiled and kept saying “bella” at her book pictures. It was great. Of course to top off a great night we celebrated at Baffettos with some gelato afterwards. Unfortunately, I tried dipping it in chocolate. I really don’t know why, but I feel like I need to keep trying and that all of a sudden I will love it. Absolutely not, this day has not come yet. I broke the chocolate off and semi-ate it slash pushed it overboard my bowl. Oops. However, the gelato itself was magical just the same. We decided to venture and take the bus back to Termini this time. Well, I was in tears the entire way, because somehow I had been positioned standing up between two men sitting down. We quickly became a ping pong table as my legs bounced back and forth between one man’s knee, the other man’s knee. I honestly was holding the bar of the bus so tightly as to not move, but the bus was packed and let’s face it Rome’s streets are not smooth. Oh boy, good ol ping pong. You should have seen my face as I just kept laughing and saying sorry simultaneously.
When we finally got back to the hostel I realized just how much colour I had received during the day at the beach. I had had some colour after getting out of the shower before dinner, but now, holy crap batman. My back was turning into like a quickly spreading rash of red, my calves were neon red and bits on my chest. Oh super hot. My legs were so painful I cannot even express, damn damn damn you sunshine. My thighs were perfect, but I had clearly missed the calves. Well lesson learned…again. Petey wrapped me up in wet towels to sleep with and I swear I had heated them dry by morning. Unbelievable.
Now I’m not sure if you have heard of that volcano Eyjafjallajoekull…but that baby affected us hardcore. More about that to come, however, Friday night was when we first really heard about its effects on flights. We knew we were in for a lovely treat by Volcano X. Well…to celebrate we decided to venture to Florence for our ‘last day’ in Italy. Ha. Yeah, well in our minds it was our last day. So half of us stayed to research on the Internet about the volcano, and the other half went to purchase the tickets. Fabulous teamwork.
Our train was at 6:30am so naturally we were up pretty early, to be there early. We got on our train and it was totally Harry Potter cabin style. Yay! Very cool, I had never been on a train like that. Jess and I were sitting together and the other girls were spread in other cabins. It was a mix of chatting and sleeping seeing as we were going to be a 3 hour train ride arriving at 9:30am. First stop for me: aloe. I had been on the hunt the night before, but of course NOTHING was open. Okay, well I bought my aloe cream asap and god damn that felt good. Wow; aloe really is a saving grace. I was now ready to go! We ventured first and got something to eat which was usually a croissant and a coffee. Delicious. We planned what we wanted to do and first up was the David. THE David. Oh wow, that picture that you grow up seeing in art books but never actually think you will see in person. The same sculpture that appears on almost every postcard in the area. All I can say is wow: David is HUGE. I mean, tall, honestly like 20 feet tall. I had no idea. But man oh man the detail that went into him is incredible. Not to mention he had a nice bum, but hey, David is incredibly famous. You had to do the 360 view. We ventured to the gift shop and made a couple purchases which included a pocket mirror for the purse with David on it: not going to lie, David makes me smile on a regular basis.
We then ventured to the incredibly beautiful Florence Cathedral. The outside was so detailed and ornate it was remarkable. Honestly though, the amount of detail that went into that was sensational, not to mention the red roof that you always see. Gorgeous. Now I had worn shorts that day, and since that is not welcome in the church we had to quickly come up with something so that I was allowed in. What did we do? The sweater skirt. I took off the sweatshirt I was wearing and tied it in the front then used Jess’ sweater and tied it around the back. My knees were now covered and I was allowed in! Yay! Granted I took the tiniest bitty steps since the sweater skirt was not stable, however, I was allowed in just the same. Not going to lie, the outside is much more impressive, but still very cool to be able to go inside. The sweater skirt saved me.
Finally it was time to explore the leather market: not going to lie, this was the main attraction to go to Florence, and none of us were against buying a little leather. I had a leather coat already, so for me the goal was a purse; a big ol, oversized leather purse. Dreamy right? We must have walked through that market for hours, talking and negotiating with people, seeing what they had to offer. There was so many gorgeous pieces, it was insane. Everything leather you could dream of. I ended up making the purchase of a large tanned leather bag and a smaller green clutch. Oh I was thrilled. We each bought something, some souvenirs and were pretty damn high on life. Jess made the biggest purchase of the day: a leather jacket. But not just any jacket; this one was going to be tailored. I had gone in with her to give her the okay, and I said it fit her exceptionally, except for the shoulders. The man said he could tailor it for no extra cost and the deal was sealed. While we waited for that to be done, we grabbed a drink and sat anxiously. Finally the time came and wow was it ever worth it. This jacket was made for her. To die for really. We were all thrilled for her, but most importantly, Jess was ecstatic.
This super sweet older woman sat beside me on the tram and to make it clear I do not speak Italian she did not speak English: however, we had her book. She was pointing to picture of Sardinia and I believe she lived there, showing me the sculptures and pictures. My show and tell was our towels: beach, burnt, sand. It was good, we managed quite well. She just kind of smiled/giggled at me, and I smiled and kept saying “bella” at her book pictures. It was great. Of course to top off a great night we celebrated at Baffettos with some gelato afterwards. Unfortunately, I tried dipping it in chocolate. I really don’t know why, but I feel like I need to keep trying and that all of a sudden I will love it. Absolutely not, this day has not come yet. I broke the chocolate off and semi-ate it slash pushed it overboard my bowl. Oops. However, the gelato itself was magical just the same. We decided to venture and take the bus back to Termini this time. Well, I was in tears the entire way, because somehow I had been positioned standing up between two men sitting down. We quickly became a ping pong table as my legs bounced back and forth between one man’s knee, the other man’s knee. I honestly was holding the bar of the bus so tightly as to not move, but the bus was packed and let’s face it Rome’s streets are not smooth. Oh boy, good ol ping pong. You should have seen my face as I just kept laughing and saying sorry simultaneously.
When we finally got back to the hostel I realized just how much colour I had received during the day at the beach. I had had some colour after getting out of the shower before dinner, but now, holy crap batman. My back was turning into like a quickly spreading rash of red, my calves were neon red and bits on my chest. Oh super hot. My legs were so painful I cannot even express, damn damn damn you sunshine. My thighs were perfect, but I had clearly missed the calves. Well lesson learned…again. Petey wrapped me up in wet towels to sleep with and I swear I had heated them dry by morning. Unbelievable.
Now I’m not sure if you have heard of that volcano Eyjafjallajoekull…but that baby affected us hardcore. More about that to come, however, Friday night was when we first really heard about its effects on flights. We knew we were in for a lovely treat by Volcano X. Well…to celebrate we decided to venture to Florence for our ‘last day’ in Italy. Ha. Yeah, well in our minds it was our last day. So half of us stayed to research on the Internet about the volcano, and the other half went to purchase the tickets. Fabulous teamwork.
Our train was at 6:30am so naturally we were up pretty early, to be there early. We got on our train and it was totally Harry Potter cabin style. Yay! Very cool, I had never been on a train like that. Jess and I were sitting together and the other girls were spread in other cabins. It was a mix of chatting and sleeping seeing as we were going to be a 3 hour train ride arriving at 9:30am. First stop for me: aloe. I had been on the hunt the night before, but of course NOTHING was open. Okay, well I bought my aloe cream asap and god damn that felt good. Wow; aloe really is a saving grace. I was now ready to go! We ventured first and got something to eat which was usually a croissant and a coffee. Delicious. We planned what we wanted to do and first up was the David. THE David. Oh wow, that picture that you grow up seeing in art books but never actually think you will see in person. The same sculpture that appears on almost every postcard in the area. All I can say is wow: David is HUGE. I mean, tall, honestly like 20 feet tall. I had no idea. But man oh man the detail that went into him is incredible. Not to mention he had a nice bum, but hey, David is incredibly famous. You had to do the 360 view. We ventured to the gift shop and made a couple purchases which included a pocket mirror for the purse with David on it: not going to lie, David makes me smile on a regular basis.
We then ventured to the incredibly beautiful Florence Cathedral. The outside was so detailed and ornate it was remarkable. Honestly though, the amount of detail that went into that was sensational, not to mention the red roof that you always see. Gorgeous. Now I had worn shorts that day, and since that is not welcome in the church we had to quickly come up with something so that I was allowed in. What did we do? The sweater skirt. I took off the sweatshirt I was wearing and tied it in the front then used Jess’ sweater and tied it around the back. My knees were now covered and I was allowed in! Yay! Granted I took the tiniest bitty steps since the sweater skirt was not stable, however, I was allowed in just the same. Not going to lie, the outside is much more impressive, but still very cool to be able to go inside. The sweater skirt saved me.
Finally it was time to explore the leather market: not going to lie, this was the main attraction to go to Florence, and none of us were against buying a little leather. I had a leather coat already, so for me the goal was a purse; a big ol, oversized leather purse. Dreamy right? We must have walked through that market for hours, talking and negotiating with people, seeing what they had to offer. There was so many gorgeous pieces, it was insane. Everything leather you could dream of. I ended up making the purchase of a large tanned leather bag and a smaller green clutch. Oh I was thrilled. We each bought something, some souvenirs and were pretty damn high on life. Jess made the biggest purchase of the day: a leather jacket. But not just any jacket; this one was going to be tailored. I had gone in with her to give her the okay, and I said it fit her exceptionally, except for the shoulders. The man said he could tailor it for no extra cost and the deal was sealed. While we waited for that to be done, we grabbed a drink and sat anxiously. Finally the time came and wow was it ever worth it. This jacket was made for her. To die for really. We were all thrilled for her, but most importantly, Jess was ecstatic.
The rest of our day trip was spent walking the gorgeous alleyways and streets. We were able to see the mini-David, and the area surrounding it which had tons of statues. So cool to see all the history you know? It doesn’t really hit you even. We had read in a book that one of the best gelato joints was in Florence: this quickly became our mission. On our trek we heard a group of people heading on their way, so naturally we kinda followed them and sure enough they took us right there. We paid for our cones and got in line. Oh. My. God. I got two scoops of mandarin and pineapple and words will never be able to express how delicious it was. It was like eating a mandarin, and the pineapple was so fresh. No wonder this was the best gelato joint: well deserved title. We walked along the river for a while, taking pictures and just taking it all in. Can you imagine living there? Seeing this everyday. I mean Ottawa is pretty, but we do not have ANYTHING like this. Our canal is amazing, but I guess I have seen it so many times. This was so different and unlike anything I had ever seen. We saw the locks again with couples initials; I am in love with that idea. How romantic eh? Love. Love is fabulous.
On our walk Petey got a phone call from her parents. We quickly hated when Petey’s cellphone rang because it never meant anything good: always bad news. Of course, this was a phone call to say that Paris airports were shutting down…we were flying back into Paris. Brilliant; the likelihood that we were going home was becoming slim. Hope and faith. We still hung on. We got some dinner and just laughed about the day slash this damn volcano and how Iceland was ruining it all. Iceland; like c’mon now. Everyone in Canada couldn’t give two craps about this, however, this volcano was becoming our reality quite quickly. One last venture before we caught the train we were able to see the Santa Maria Novella; gorgeous on the outside, however we didn’t venture in. We had a little bit of time before the train so we all grabbed a magazine and sat. We were in tears laughing about our lives, how this WOULD happen to us, slash, the mens bathroom was right across from our sitting area…and well…the door wasn’t closed. We were in tears. Ridiculous right?
Our ride home was good, we were all in different cabins, except Petey and I happened to be sitting beside each other. Oh boy, our poor cabin. I don’t know if it was partially the sun, or just being exhausted, but I had the giggles. Mad giggles. I was putting our purses above our seats and I grabbed Petey’s bag, just as she was saying “Be careful, my shot glass is in there” you heard the smashing sound of the glass against the railing above. I couldn’t breathe I was laughing so hard. Her too, sort of. But oh man, we were in tears. I was doubled over and the cabin probably thought we had some screws lose. But luckily, under some miracle, I did not break her shot glass: thank god. Can you imagine? Phew.
When we got back we checked our flights and BAM: all cancelled. Shocked? Absolutely not. We were going to be staying her for another couple nights. Luckily enough, Petey and I were able to book our next flight for Tuesday which was still sketchy since it was Saturday night, but still, we did it anyways. Jess and Jewels waited some more before booking but we were all screwed. This damn volcano Eyjafjallajoekull was being a pain in my ass. We joked about how 50 years from now this is the story we would tell the grandkids: “Now kids, this one time when your grandma was 21 she went to Italy, and this huge volcano EXPLODED leaving us TRAPPED for days...” Yeah I would slash will totally be telling that story.
Not only did this whole thing suck, but I was supposed to be meeting Pablo and his dad in Brussels. We were going to spend the week together for the first time in 5 years since I had stayed with them for 2 weeks in Spain and I couldn’t wait. Also, it was his dad’s birthday: how brilliant right. Well this volcano X was putting a severe hold on those plans. Of course it would: nothing is that easy.
So this was the first 5 days in Rome. Part 1. Wow right? Unbelievably filled with laughter, amazing food, long walks and gorgeous photos. Part 2: the aftermath of Volcano X soon to follow! Stay tuned!
On our walk Petey got a phone call from her parents. We quickly hated when Petey’s cellphone rang because it never meant anything good: always bad news. Of course, this was a phone call to say that Paris airports were shutting down…we were flying back into Paris. Brilliant; the likelihood that we were going home was becoming slim. Hope and faith. We still hung on. We got some dinner and just laughed about the day slash this damn volcano and how Iceland was ruining it all. Iceland; like c’mon now. Everyone in Canada couldn’t give two craps about this, however, this volcano was becoming our reality quite quickly. One last venture before we caught the train we were able to see the Santa Maria Novella; gorgeous on the outside, however we didn’t venture in. We had a little bit of time before the train so we all grabbed a magazine and sat. We were in tears laughing about our lives, how this WOULD happen to us, slash, the mens bathroom was right across from our sitting area…and well…the door wasn’t closed. We were in tears. Ridiculous right?
Our ride home was good, we were all in different cabins, except Petey and I happened to be sitting beside each other. Oh boy, our poor cabin. I don’t know if it was partially the sun, or just being exhausted, but I had the giggles. Mad giggles. I was putting our purses above our seats and I grabbed Petey’s bag, just as she was saying “Be careful, my shot glass is in there” you heard the smashing sound of the glass against the railing above. I couldn’t breathe I was laughing so hard. Her too, sort of. But oh man, we were in tears. I was doubled over and the cabin probably thought we had some screws lose. But luckily, under some miracle, I did not break her shot glass: thank god. Can you imagine? Phew.
When we got back we checked our flights and BAM: all cancelled. Shocked? Absolutely not. We were going to be staying her for another couple nights. Luckily enough, Petey and I were able to book our next flight for Tuesday which was still sketchy since it was Saturday night, but still, we did it anyways. Jess and Jewels waited some more before booking but we were all screwed. This damn volcano Eyjafjallajoekull was being a pain in my ass. We joked about how 50 years from now this is the story we would tell the grandkids: “Now kids, this one time when your grandma was 21 she went to Italy, and this huge volcano EXPLODED leaving us TRAPPED for days...” Yeah I would slash will totally be telling that story.
Not only did this whole thing suck, but I was supposed to be meeting Pablo and his dad in Brussels. We were going to spend the week together for the first time in 5 years since I had stayed with them for 2 weeks in Spain and I couldn’t wait. Also, it was his dad’s birthday: how brilliant right. Well this volcano X was putting a severe hold on those plans. Of course it would: nothing is that easy.
So this was the first 5 days in Rome. Part 1. Wow right? Unbelievably filled with laughter, amazing food, long walks and gorgeous photos. Part 2: the aftermath of Volcano X soon to follow! Stay tuned!
No comments:
Post a Comment