Italy 10 - Rome

 Rome, day 1

[Much like the day we arrived in Venice, I was sleep deprived and determined to get my notes down in what little consciousness I had remaining to me. So again, as written with only minor edits]

We got up before 6am to get to the train, and powerwalked up the town to the trainstation. We coulda risked another half-hour of sleep, but if that train was cancello then we'd be outoflucko. Dragging luggage uphill on 5ish hours of sleep sucks. The train was actually on time, and the rest of the trip I had my eyes shut wishing I was still asleep. We arrived in La Spezia in time to watch the sun rise, and then  transferred to our highspeed train to Rome.

The "First Class" was only moderately first class, but they did give me a coke so I was actually awake, for better or worse, and spent most of it reading and looking out the window. The countryside was cool, most of the larger hills had castles, forts, or old churches on top - the type of thing that would be a national treasure in the US but is blasé here. Plus we saw the leaning tower of Pisa again. My mom had only glimpsed it so we moved around to get her a prime seat and somehow, on this track only a few meters from the old track, we actually got a great view of it. It definitely leans, but I don't think I ever need to get off the train for it.

The train station in Rome was miserable. Loud, crowded, and full of lost tourists standing in the center of all the hallways. We went to the food square that my uncle and aunt raved about, and it was similarly miserable. The food was fine, but it was crowded, full of people standing in the pathways looking lost, and too loud to have a conversation with more than one other person. But we couldn't check into our airbnb until one and nobody wanted to go to a park to wait, so I was trapped there.

The 25 minute hike to the apartment was equally unenjoyable, but in a now familiar way. Destination weddings should always involve taxis. And sleep. Then we struggled with phones and tried to contact our hostess. I just sat on the sidewalk, all f---s evaporated. The apartment was baller, but with no f---s... it didn't matter in the slightest, I just wanted our hostess to end the tour and stop talking.

Finally it was nap time. And nap time was glorious. Two hours later, we regrouped, doing much better, and set off to see the city. I was sick of feeling like a pack animal, so I didn't take anything aside from a phone. No camera, no backpack, nothing. It was nice. [Most of the pictures in this post are from the family album]

We walked down to the colosseum and saw the outside, and then saw looked down on the ruins of all the old forums largely from 100 AD or so.

The sun was brutally hot. I kept to shadows.

Tower of tggrfgsf [Trajan's Column] which is basically the bayou tapestry carved into stone

The big badass national monument, which tricks you into accidentally walking through a museum

It's built, just like all the monuments throughout Rome's history, overtop the previous monuments.
Gives you a good idea of how impressive the rest of this area would have been back in the day.

Parthenon. Super cool. Loved the oculus, even if (because?) rain sprinkled in through it. Disappointingly didn't have the old gods in there anymore, but being Christianized preserved it through history, so fair trade. Everyone told me the same facts, because they all listened to the same audioguide. Thank god we had nap time. Probably need more naps. Probably should never ever get up at 6am. Gorgeous though.

Got out at closing time and watched all the tourists run for the gate

Then we did trevi. It's a nice fountain, celebrates finally having aquaducts again, but basically a tourist trap. They shovel money out every night. Factcheck that. [They only shovel money out twice a week, literally raking in 1.5M/year].  Watched girls take like 500 instagram pics.

Got dinner. Meatballs, homemade pasta, and some baller bacon. It was good, but very similar to what we'd have at home. Like I said, good.

Did the spanish stairs. The hannah montana of stairs, famous for being famous, and named after something kinda nearby but really has nothing to do with it.

Then we walked the half-hour home. I think we hit 4 of the 7 hills of rome, and all on 5 1/2 hours of sleep. I'm gonna go sleep more, hopefully i can flesh out this blog later.  [Clearly, I didn't]