Rome, Italy Day 6

2/22/08
Today we did the Vatican. It was much, much larger than I thought it would be. I could not believe it’s enormity. And built in the 1500’s… it’s just amazing. It took 120 years just to build the basilica that is the main gather place. Designed by numerous people including Rafael, Michelangelo and Bernini. Bernini did most of the sculptures. Bernini is my favorite sculpter so far. His work is great and so amazingly detailed. I’ve really enjoyed seeing all of the Caravagio paintings as well. They both have made me excited again about art. Anyways, our docent Tim, gave us a very nice tour of the Vatican. He gave us just enough history to not be overwhelming but very informative. 5 hours blew by quickly. I learned how important Julius II was. We saw the sisteen chapel which blew me away. Taking nearly 12 years to complete, Michelangelo has such amazing abilities to tell a story through one huge image. I was flattered by the enormity and the richness of the colors of that ceiling. What an honor to get to see that. Definitely amazing in it’s vastness.
After the Vatican, we had lunch with Tim and we all had pizza. Pam, Jan and I walked from there to do a bit of shopping. We picked up some brown boots for Jan and some candies and gifts for others. We headed back to the Visconti Palace Hotel and dropped off our things and were on to piazza del pompello. This is a large square that has multiple fountains and lots of people. We wanted to make sure we got to see 2 additional Carravaggio paintings before we left Rome. We’ve seen so many of them and I would love to get to see ALL of them. The two we saw at St. Maria’s Basilica were the one of Peter being crucified upside down and the one of Saul, falling from his horse and God’s light shining down on him. Now we’re headed to dinner with Diane and Dave.

Rome, Italy Day 5

2/21/08
Villa Borghese was a great place to see some Bernini sculptures. This was the only real tour we did without a guide. We did rent audio guides that we listened to throughout the walk. It was nice to see some of Caravaggio's paintings. This is probably one of their largest representations of his paintings as they had an entire room of them. We were not allowed to take photos, but I got a few anyways in secret.

Rome, Italy Day 4 - Pompeii

2/20/08
Today was our big day in Napoli (Naples) and Pompeii. This has been the piece of our trip I’ve been looking forward to the most. Not only did we get to walk in Pompeii, but we got to see Napoli and some of the amazing artifacts from the great explosion. We had first class tickets on the train from Rome to Naples. It was about a 2 hour ride through the countryside. When we got to Naples we were shocked to see how dirty the city was. Lots of garbage and not a lot had been cleaned very well. We met our docents and headed toward Pompeii. The short van ride gave us a good overview of a lot of the city. Quite modern in parts and very close to the water.

After getting onto the grounds, we got our tickets and were on our way. We really enjoyed the walk around the grounds. We got to see their amphitheatre, the homes, business’s and brothel houses of Pompeii. It was interesting. The mosaics and craftsmanship were outstanding. Not only did they have a system of catching rain water right in their courtyard, but they had ways of draining waste, walkable sidewalks, cobblestone streets and marble floors. Pompeii was huge. Too vast to just walk in one day. We saw only parts of this huge place. Our docent wanted to make sure that we got to see all of the highlights and we sure did. We saw where a palace was and the casts of the bodies they found. They even found a dog that could not get away from the blast because he was tied up by a chain.

After leaving this great historical place, we headed to the downtown part of Naples. We had pizza with our docent at her favorite pizza place. It was really nice to have a traditional napolian meal. Great buffalo mozzerella cheese that Pam and I both loved.
From here we wandered around the dirty city of Naples and ended up at the Museum dedicated to Pompeii. It was great to see some of the artifacts and mosaics that we saw represented in Pompeii. They were so advanced 2000 years ago. Even dentist tools that still look the same as they do today. After this, we said our goodbye’s… promised to come back some day and see everything else, and headed back on our 2 hour train ride.

Rome, Italy Day 3

2/19/08
We got up early this morning to go on a food tour of Italy. We met up with our Docent after a little trouble with our Taxi going the wrong way. We walked into a typical market in which had everything like an American market and much more. We viewed things we'd never seen before including peeling an artichoke with a knife, horse meat people could buy and zuccini flowers. It was a fun experience because she did all of the buying and we got to have lunch after our tour. We had cheese, salad, meats and drink.

I wish I could type more, but I don't have the time. Off to the Vatican this morning.

Rome, Italy Day 2

We decided to do a few tours this week with a company called Context. Our first tour included an overview of ancient Rome and the original palace's and temples the Roman's had built around the 2nd century AD. These ruins we dug out over a period of 150 years and have become some of the most visited spots by tourists in the world. We walked through the coloseum and got a real indepth description of the different workings of that massive structure. We were told that the coloseum actually had battles with ships inside. They had such an elaborate system of acqueducts that they could actually flood the ground floor in bring in ships to battle to the death.

After our 5 hour journey around anceint Rome, we headed toward their newest gallery to get a view of the city from the top. 5 hours was surely not enough time to see everything, but is enough time to see a lot. The Gallery we headed to next was called, Mon. A Vitt. Emanuele II and Romans call it the White Cake, and they hate it. It's a beautiful building, with great columns and amazing bronze chariots on top. The only problem with it is that it is bright white. There is not another bright white building in view which makes it stand out quite a bit.

The view from the top of this building was amazing. Not only could you see forever up there, but you got a great idea of the vastness of the city. Rome is about 5 million people and they had 26 million visitors last year...needless to say, it's a big city.

Paris, France Day 3

2/17/08
We got up really early this morning and headed for the airport. With a 36Euro cab ride, we reflected on how to make this trip a little more cost efficient next time. If the US dollar were better, we probably could have made out a little better. But everything is 1.6X more expensive. YIKES!

The airport ride was fine... we had a little to eat before the ride and it held us over until we got off of the easy jet airplane and headed for our hotel. Rome was a great city to fly into. Italy is extremely beautiful with lots of mountains and the great ocean along the side of the plane. We met up with the group, including Pam's mom, and headed out on the town. We walked over to the Spanish steps and battled the crowds for a minute and got an ice cream. We then walked to dinner at a famous Roman Pizzaria. It was fabulous. We waited for about 30 mins. outside and 45 mins. for our food, but it was worth it.

Paris, France Day 2

2/16/08
Today we visited the Eiffel tower for most of the day. It was an amazing experience. The tower is really amazing in person. Its incredibly large and really intricate. It means so much to us to have seen it. Once the sun goes down it glows like “a ballroom gown” as they say here. We began our day in the Jardin de Luxemburg again today because it is a sunny day and when we were there yesterday, we didn’t take time to explore it. We walked further into the garden and were pleasantly surprised to see not only fountains, but huge grass landscapes and chairs to sit and relax everywhere. We noticed how fit the French are. We’ve seen very, very few fat people. It seems that everyone is out jogging or exercising. We were surprised to see so many groups of people doing martial arts in the park. We took a few photos and moved on. We went straight for Saint Sulpice. The meridian line goes right through the middle of the church and it was made famous by the Da Vinci Code. It was a great church with a lot of great architecture. It was a little more run down than the others were, but it was still beautiful. We then went to the modern art museum and the George Pompedeau centre. We had lunch from a vendor on the street. I had a hot dog in a great piece of bread covered with cheese and Pam had a sandwhich with goats cheese. We sat next to the fountain and enjoyed our meal… then headed to the day’s destination, the Tour de Eifel.