Yes, we were wearing sweatshirts…it’s chilly here in Houston right now.  I’m praying that it’s a sign of a nice cool summer to come…yeah right.

Last year

This year

We started the day at the Borghese Gallery which is inside one of the largest parks in Italy, Villa Borghese. The gallery houses priceless statues and paintings commissioned for Cardinal Borghese. I’ve included a picture of the main path through the park. It’s a lot like the parks you seen in London or like Central Park in NYC, just not as busy.

We walked from the gallery to the Spanish Steps…ah…the romance. The steps themselves are actually a quite grungy stone, but the ambiance is unbeatable. It’s a place you can go with your date and if she dumps you, you can get a new one within a few minutes. It’s romantic for people of all ages. While sitting on the steps we took in our first taste of gelato, this was the first of many stops to gellati shops in our days here in Rome.

After lunch and gelato we headed toward the National Museum. This museum is one of the cleanest, most organized and unique museums that I’ve visited. Thanks to our trusty friend, Rick Steves (guidebook author) we learned a LOT about Roman history. If you don’t have a good guide book then get one or borrow mine before going to this museum otherwise you will be bored by room after room of marble busts. The architecture of this museum is unique. Each floor opens up by full length windows to a central courtyard which allows natural light to fill the galleries. The grandeur of the staircases caught my eye. The staircases are not showpieces in the center of the museum; they are almost like emergency exits on the corners of the building much like what we have in buildings the U.S.. The exception is that instead of steel and tread plate the entire thing, from the treads and the risers to the rails and newel posts is all made of marble. It’s gorgeous.

After the Museum we headed back toward Via Veneto (high end shopping and location of the US Embassy) to grab some dinner and then headed back to our hotel for the night.

Rome Day 2

We started the day in Piazza Venezia with the Victor Emmanuel II Monument and moved toward Ancient Rome visiting Trajan’s Column and Market, the Palatine Hill, the Arch of Constantine and the Coliseum. The Victor Emmanuel II Monument is huge and gaudy and most Italians don’t like it. They refer to it as the ‘typewriter’ or the ‘wedding cake,’ and I can’t say that I disagree with them. Trajan’s Column is a tribute to Trajan’s role in Roman history and his market was the first mall in Rome where the Romans would go to trade or sell their goods.

We moved on from Trajan’s area toward the Palatine Hill where Roman leaders lived in a lavish Palace that is now in ruins. This area is high above the city and is surrounded by the Forum, the Coliseum, the Pantheon and Circus Maximus.

After wandering through the Palatine Hill, we relaxed on a nearby hill to enjoy…you guessed it gelato and then we visited the Coliseum. We’ve included a few photos from our visit and we promise that the one of the two of us in front of the Coliseum is from the actual Coliseum in Rome and not a super imposed picture from a theme park where we’ve been hiding out all week. It really does look fake in that picture; it’s strange. Again, we headed back toward our hotel and stopped into the Hard Rock Cafe for a nice American dinner.

Day 3

We did nothing all day, literally. We decided that we would nix our day trips to Florence and Naples and just spread out our days in Rome a bit more. We weren’t up for the hassle of traveling to Naples/Pompei and we decided that Florence deserves a bit more than just day trip from us, so we are definitely coming back to Italy some day. We ate more gelato and enjoyed the vista at the Trevi Fountain.

Day 4

This is the day I’ve been waiting for since I conceived the idea of visiting Rome as a little girl; the day I visited the Vatican.

The Vatican Museum is huge; when I say huge I mean it. There is one room that is a ¼ of a mile long and it contains only the tapestries chronicling the life of Christ and the maps that outline the history of Rome. There is one particular tapestry that stays with me. It’s of Christ upon his resurrection. His eyes follow you as you walk from one side to the other, it’s surreal.  The Museum is fantastic and if you get a chance someday to visit, take the long way to the Sistine Chapel (go right instead of left), you’ll understand when you are there.

The Sistine Chapel is impressive, but over-crowded and less spiritual than I had envisioned. I am able to appreciate the Biblical origin of the subject matter and the impact of the art for art’s sake, but unfortunately both of those things are initially a bit lost in the drones of tour groups. We were able to find a seat along the wall and again with Rick Steves’ help we were able to understand and enjoy it as Michelangelo intended. By the time we left, the crowds had died down a bit and we were able to take it all in, but we didn’t take pictures as they are not allowed.

After the Sistine Chapel we headed toward St. Peter’s Basilica next door. I’ve visited the National Shrine in Washington D.C. and St. Paul’s in London, but nothing could have prepared me for the enormity of St. Peter’s Basilica. When you first walk in you have no sense of scale and it’s not until you read your guide book or you start walking around that you truly get a sense of it. The proportions are perfect throughout the church, from the architecture to the statuary, to the mosaics on the ceiling down to the marble on the floor, it’s all perfect and that’s why you can’t tell how immense it really is.

You start to get a sense of scale as you walk through the nave and on the ground as you get 1/3 of the way toward the altar you see an indication on the ground that St. Paul’s Cathedral in London would end at that point if it was laid within the Basilica. This truly makes you feel so small in a Church so big, with such an enormous spiritual presence around you. We spent a while wandering through St. Peter’s and then realized that we had an hour left to climb to the top of the dome to be back down for 5:00 Mass. We rode an elevator to the roof of St. Peter’s and then made the climb up the 320 stairs to the top of Michelangelo’s dome. We made it to the top, but we didn’t make it back down in time for Mass to start so we’ve decided to go back and finish our Vatican tour and attend Mass before we leave. We ended our day with dinner at our new favorite restaurant, San Marco and topped it off with gelato.

Day 5

We spent the day finishing up the Ancient Roman sites; the Forum, Capitol Hill and the Pantheon. We’ve included a bunch of pictures from these sites. We plan to spend our last day here in Rome finishing up our Vatican tour/attending Mass and soaking in the rest of the romantic hotspots like Piazza Navona, Campo de’ Fiori, etc. in the evening while walking across Rome.

aWe’ve had a wonderful and relaxing time here in Rome and we will definitely plan more Italian holidays in the future.
 

We were picked up by our driver, Ahmed that we hired for the 4 days we are here in Cairo.  The airport is on the far northeast side of Cairo and Giza is on the southwest side so he gave us a mini Cairo tour on the way to our hotel.  We are being picked up tomorrow morning at 9:00 for a day of museums, mosques, bazaars, etc. per Ahmed’s recommendations.  We will visit Giza, Saqqara and Dahshur (Red & Bent Pyramids) on Monday. 

Cairo is amazing and almost impossible to describe.  Flying into Cairo you first see Alexandria on the Mediterranean Coast, lush and green; the fields look like patterned carpets in every shade of green.  Then you see a line on the horizon, it’s the transition from the Nile Delta to the barren and tan desert which dominates the Egyptian landscape.  It’s a truly beautiful and amazing site to see. 

Driving into Giza and first seeing the pyramids is something I’ll never forget.  I did get a little emotional, but don’t tell Dustin because he will think I am a giant dork.  I am in a daze, still amazed and so grateful that we are here.  This trip is everything I’ve ever wanted in travel; Egypt and Rome are my two dream destinations.  I hope that you are all able to visit your dream cities in your lifetime because it is a truly fulfilling experience.