Italy Tidbits

There are some things that I realize I forgot to include in my daily recaps, that we'll want to remember as part of our trip. So this is tidbits - vacation recap style.

1. Public transportation is so convenient and affordable. It was a life saver to have learned the buses, metros and trains. Although we still walked - a lot - we saved ourselves a ton of time by using Rome's public transportation.

2. Instead of pizza-by-the-slice, they have pizza-by-the-kg. It looks spendy at first (€18 for 100kg of margarita) but in reality it's dirt cheap! We got a plate full of different types of pizza for under €6. To put it in perspective, 100kg is equivalent to about 220lbs.. can you even imagine ordering that much pizza? It is fun to try all the different kinds and man it was delicious.

3. Breakfast in Italy is nothing like breakfast in the US. They have rolls and pastries, cold cuts, juice and, of course, caffe and cappuccino. At the hotels they have watery scrambled eggs, cold cereal, granola and yogurt, but I have a feeling these things are just to appease tourists. By the end of our time in Italy, Blake was dying for some bacon, sausage or decent eggs (of course this didn't get any better in Israel - no bacon there!). 

4. Traffic. is. crazy. The lines are just suggestions, if there even are lines. In Rome and Florence, the traffic lights were generally followed, but in Naples - forget about it. Naples traffic is a free for all, pedestrians beware. In Rome, you could fairly safely cross the street when the light was red or when the crosswalk sign was green, but you'd better keep an eye out still. Crosswalks are also just suggestions, and as long as you are bold enough, you can cross anywhere. Just be prepared to wait for cars and not the other way around, and don't be surprised when cars don't stop but simply go around you. 

5. Horns are a disease. Drivers lay on the horn for any and all reasons. You waited 0.0005 seconds before going at that green light? Honk x3. You tried to turn but couldn't and are now blocking part of the road behind you? Honk x10. You are slowing down for a red light too soon? Honk x2. You are in front of a hotel? Honk x5. We thought this was bad in Rome.. but it turns out its even worse in Israel. 

6. Decaf beverages are called deca, even though the word in Italian is decaffeinato, so you'd think that 'decaf cappuccino' would still get the message across. Nope. They look at you like you have two heads. Then when you say, cappuccino decaffeinato, they say, "oh, si, si, si. Cappuccino deca." 

7. It isn't just, "si" for yes, it's, "si, si, si". Not in every context of course, but most of the time you get several in a row. 

8. Exact change is not only preferred but requested at every transaction. If you don't give some form of change, they'll ask you for it, and accept nothing short of emptying out your pockets as proof when you say you don't have it. Try to use a large bill and you might get turned away as a customer. Even major businesses, like the Vatican Museum for example, wouldn't accept an €100 when the change would have been under €20. Weird and annoying. 

9. Airport runaround. When we flew from Rome to Israel we were laughing at their system the entire time. First of all, you do the usual take a train to get to your terminal, wait in line, security, wait in line etc. Once it's time to board, you go down some escalators and walk outside to get on a bus. Yes, a bus. Then that bus takes you all around the entire airport (or so it seems) and way the heck out onto the tarmac, practically on the runway, where the plane is. We just couldn't stop laughing about how silly it was to cart us out to the terminal, and then cart us around the airport to the plane.. when the plane could have easily come to the terminal, or the terminal could have easily been one building, since the planes don't even come up to it! Then we get all situated in the airplane, and wait for about an hour until we're cleared to taxi out onto the runway (not even the one we were sitting next to). The flight was typical and uneventful after that, until we landed. Then the majority of the passengers started clapping when we touched down.. we weren't sure why. It hadn't been a rocky flight or anything. Blake and I wonder if we missed the announcement that this was the pilot's first flight or something. It was all a little strange!

Roma: Day Seven

Ancient Rome!

We started our day by sleeping in (that means we got up at 7:00) and made it to breakfast in the hotel (we've left too early to catch it every other morning.. we weren't missing much). We caught the metro down to the Colosseum and got in line just as they were opening. When we went to see it before, the line was astronomical. We only waited about 20 minutes to get our tickets and book our behind-the-scenes tour for that afternoon.

We did a little walking around and then headed to the St. Peter in Chains church, just up the hill. This church is mostly known for Michelangelo's statue of Moses, part of the tomb of Pope Julius II (he is the pope who commissioned most of Michelangelo and Raphael''s work in the Vatican). The church also houses a set of chains that are 'said to be' the chains that Peter was freed from while in prison (Acts 12:5-17).

The tomb of Pope Julius II, Moses is in the middle.

After that, we headed to the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill. Awesome!

Isn't this garden gorgeous!

This is where the Emperor used to sit when visited by people!

This is the entrance and large hall where people would approach the emperor
(used to be closed in, ornate and over seven stories tall!)

The view of the city, no wonder this was prime real estate!

The Arch of Titus

This is a scene of the Romans carrying away the plunder from their sacking of the second Jewish Temple
in Jerusalem (see the menorah/seven branch candlestick). It is an important piece of historical documentation,
because there are some people (the current owners of the temple mount in Jerusalem) that would like to
change history and say that the Israelites never had a Jewish temple. However, this is considered
proof that it existed when the Romans took over Jerusalem. 

We were pretty excited for our behind-the-scenes tour of the Colosseum. This tour allows you on the platform, the ground level and on the third/top level. What a sight and what a view from the top!

This section is a reconstruction of what the entire amphitheater
would have looked like in terms of seating. It would also have
been entirely blazing white, like those white stones you see here.

Elevator number eight. This is one of the supports for one of the many elevators that lifted animals and fighters
onto the stage. Our tour guide pointed out that Romans numbered everything!

The view from the top looking down.

The fourth and fifth floors were up there, for common people.

The remains of a staircase to get to the upper level seating.

The emperor sat in this section, where the cross is now.

Arch of Constantine from above.

The forum from above.

After our Colosseum tour we went to a restaurant we'd heard about that had a second level terrace with a view of the Colosseum. We decided this would be the perfect end to our fantastic week in Rome. We had an absolutely fantastic dinner here with killer dessert and our last Italian cappuccino. It was perfect. You just can't get a view like this at home!

We headed back to the hotel to ditch some things and then we went out to do some shopping! We literally shopped until we dropped and closed down the town. We barely got our last few items before everything was closed down and our feet refused to go another step. \

The next day we would get up early and catch a train to Tel Aviv, Israel and spend the day traveling.

What an unbelievable week we had in Roma. I can't even contain all of the sights and history we soaked up. We absolutely loved every minute of it (okay, okay, except that two hours walking around Naples). Arrivederci Rome!

Roma: Day Six

Pompeii and Naples - Happy All Saints Day (which is actually a celebrated holiday in Italy)!

Today we got up early (yes, again) and caught a train to Naples. From Naples we caught another train to Pompeii and we spent the majority of the day wandering through the city of Pompeii. It was really quite interesting and a little sad. Overall, it was pretty neat to see the more complete remains of first century Roman life. 

The remains of frescoes on the walls.

*warning*

They used to think that the citizens of Pompeii were killed by suffocation from the ash, which seems like a horrible way to die and makes you wonder why they couldn't escape it better. However, I was reading an article from National Geographic that suggests that a wave of heat (about 300°C/570°F or above) is really what killed these people. Also they suggest that the contortions of the bodies are from the extreme heat causing muscle contractions and not from suffering a slow death. That perspective somehow makes me feel better.

You can see the ruts from wheels in the paving stones!

This was a baker's house. See the oven in the back, and these stones are mill stones.

The amphitheater 

Inside the amphitheater, not quite as big as the Colosseum, but still very big. 

After Pompeii, we walked through the present day city of Pompeii (not much to see) to get back to the train station. We did get to enjoy some freshly squeezed orange juice and bought a couple of oranges to take back to Rome with us (they were delicious).

We got back to Naples and took a metro to the Archaeological Museum, so that we could see some artifacts from Pompeii. It was dark by this time and the three block walk from the metro station to the museum was a little sketchy. We toured the museum and had two options. We could either get back to the metro and take it to the train station and wait for two hours... or we could take the Rick Steves' walk from the museum back to the train station. We knew that our first three blocks were a little sketchy, but we also had two hours to kill until our train... so we walked.

Rick Steves says that Naples is "colorful". Let me put it this way, if Rome were New York; Naples would be New Jersey. We discovered that our three block temperature of Naples was correct.. the entire town is a little sketch. We couldn't get back to Rome fast enough! Sorry Naples, but we won't likely be back! It was a long day and a long train ride home (we had to take the slower crummy trains, so two hours instead of one). Needless to say, I didn't take any pictures.. I was too afraid to have my camera out and look more like a tourist. Well, at least we can say that we've been there!

Roma: Day Five

Today we got up early and caught a train to Florence. It was one of the new fast trains which were really clean and comfortable and only take one and a half hours to make it to Florence (as opposed to three hours on the old dumpy trains).

We had museum tours booked for the afternoon and started our morning with a self guided/Rick Steve's walking tour. We started walking from the train station to the Duomo, Florence's most visible and largest church. 

We walked our way through Florence with intermittent downpours to see the major sights in the city, although some places were closed because the next day was a holiday. We saw the outside of the Orsanmichele Church, Palazzo Vecchio, the Uffizi Courtyard and Ponte Vecchio. 

We saw the original David later, but this was his original home.

Ponte Vecchio in the background

The view of the bridge, Ponte Vecchio, from the 3rd floor of the Uffizi Gallery.

Ponte Vecchio, filled with shops, mostly jewelry shops.

The view down river. I don't know if the Arno River always this dirty
or if that was because of the torrential downpours.

After that we toured the Uffizi Gallery - which was a completely awesome art gallery that walks you through the renaissance as it developed. No pictures allowed though. After that we toured Accademia, which is famous for it's star statue: Michelangelo's David. Also no pictures allowed. 

Once we were finished with our museum tours we were exhausted and soaked through from the now steady rain. So we caught an earlier train back to Rome. We met some friends in the lobby of our hotel and went out to dinner. After dinner, a little shopping and then early to bed because we had an early train to catch the next morning. We liked Florence, it was clean and people were friendly. It was just unfortunate that it was so very rainy the day we were there. I guess we'll have to go back and explore it a little better!

(P.S. Even though it was a miserably wet day - are you catching on to that yet - it was still a great way to spend halloween.. i.e., a great way to avoid it!)

Roma: Day Four

We got up at a leisurely time (yay!) and transferred hotels because a group of people that we will be going to Israel with are coming to Rome for the rest of the week. We had plans for today, but one of the tours fell through so we rescheduled today for Friday and gave ourselves a free day.

Once we checked in at the hotel - which is, in theory, really nice. It has electronic key cards, bigger rooms, a breakfast room, elevators and an actual hotel looking entrance. However, both Blake and I agree, we already miss our other little hotel. The last hotel had awesome beds, a big(er) shower and free wifi 24/7 in your room. This hotel's bed is rock hard with stone pillows, the shower is smaller than any I've ever seen, and the wifi is pay-per-use only. Oh well! The benefit to this hotel (which I forgot to take pictures of) is that it is very, very close to the train station, which will come in quite handy in the next several days.

Our first stop was the Colosseum, just to check it out. We would be touring it on Friday, but I just didn't really feel like I was in Rome until I laid eyes on this monstrous monument. As you are about to see.. I thoroughly enjoyed taking pictures of it.

It's so tricky to get self portraits without putting your camera down to use a timer. We just don't trust
the passersby and this camera is heavy on the monopod! Blake generally does a pretty good job with it though :)

The Arch of Constantine

These guys would pose for a picture with you (for a price)

After I got enough pictures of the Colosseum, we headed back to the Metro (we're really loving the Metro at this point - so easy to use and saves us some time getting around) to take a self guided/Rick Steve's walking tour called The Heart of Rome, which we actually did in reverse order. It made following the directions a little tricky, but Blake is great at navigating through the busy streets at this point.

Our first stop was the Spanish Steps, which we'd seen before in the day time. We stopped at a tea room, thinking that tea sounded nice...until we looked at the menu and saw that a cup of tea was 9-12 Euros! Yikes! We moved on to the Trevi Fountain, which we hadn't seen in the daylight yet.

Water from an aqueduct fills the Trevi Fountain.
We tossed in some coins.. we'll see if it works ;) 

Next up was the Pantheon, which was a little busy, especially outside because there were some demonstrators stating "We're not ghosts, we're people too" but I'm not sure what they mean by that. They were also filming a movie on the street next to the Pantheon, which drew quite a crowd. It was cloudy and therefore dimly lit in the Pantheon and pictures were hard to get.

The Pantheon

The amazing dome.

Next stop, the Piazza Navona - where my camera battery went from one bar to dead (skipping that red flashing stage in which you can usually eek out several pictures). Darn! I did get some cell phone shots though.

And lastly, we went to Campo de' Fiori, which was just minutes from our last hotel (we were supposed to do this walk the first afternoon we arrived, but since our plane was late.. and we fell asleep early..it didn't happen). I didn't actually get any pictures there. It was pretty, and there had been a huge market there that day, but we were arriving just as they were taring down. We did buys some pasta from a pasta vendor and then sat down at a little wine bar to enjoy a glass and people watch (by their heater/lamp.. it was chilly!).

After we got back to the hotel we realized that it was the last day we could use our tickets to see the other locations of the National Museum of Rome (we'd gone to the wrong one the first day). So back on our feet we went to make sure we got our money's worth and saw what there was to see at the main location of the National Museum... here are some highlights. First off, we found all the heads to all those headless statues we've been seeing:

I liked this bronze sculpture of a boxer, the details in his hands and gloves were great..
not sure why I didn't take a picture of the whole thing though.

This sarcophagus was awesome. SO detailed and so old!
The man buried with it was a war hero, hence the battle scenes.

And then we went back to the hotel again to crash!