Rome, Florence, Venice-Italy

So we are pulling into Italia now! We hit three big parts of Italy, Rome, Florence, and Venice. But first to start in Rome....


ROME
Ah the eternal city.....we only had two days in Rome so we woke up super early the first day in order to fit everything in (we managed to hit twelve major sites all in one day, and checked everything but Vatican off our list on that first day) Some of these sites include: the Pantheon, Treve Fountain, Colosseum, Roman Forum, Ruins of old emperors, Arc de Constantine, and more. My favorite was probably the Colosseum-we got an awesome Scottish tour guide who gave us the low down on the whole gladiator thing (gruesome, eek!). It felt so surreal to be standing in something that old (which was the feeling throughout the whole trip in Rome). The weather was hot hot hot that day and everyone got sunburnt. We walked for about eight or nine hours straight that day (my legs felt like jello that night, but we only got through it by eating lots of gelato which is the best I have ever had in my life! They had it on every street corner practically!)

The next day we spent the whole day in the Vatican City. We got the same Scottish tour guide and he was super fun, telling us all about the old Popes and stuff. Saint Peter's Basillica was huge and so pretty, I was hoping to see Pope Benedict but alas he was M.I.A. We had to catch a train at five thirty the next morning so we ended up turning in pretty early that night but not without getting pizza and more gelato!


FLORENCE
Tuscany, land of grapes and wine and beautiful views! All of which we experienced in Florence. This trip was a little more relaxed than Rome because we didn't have quite as much to see. We went to the museum with the original David (which is the sculpture that best depicts a body or the 'ideal body' I guess), we went to a couple churchs and then decided to give our legs a rest and head back to the hostel and play some rummy (card game) out on the terrace of our hostel which looked over this huge vineyard.


The next day we went to the Bobli Gardens which are some royalty's palace gardens, they were beautiful and it was such a hot day out that it was nice to take a leisure stroll through all the greens and flowers. We then hiked up to the Piazza de Michelanglo which overlooked the whole city, it was breathtaking. Those moments are the times when I treasure the most because its so peaceful up there and it just makes you feel so relaxed and alive at the same time, its great!


VENICE
We only spent one day here but this city was soooo pretty! There were virtually no cars, only boats going through the canals, I thought that was pretty neat. We went to Saint Marks (I think thats the name of the church...oops) and just walked around the city looking at the little stalls, I bought a mask that was ornately decorated from a time period with old fashioned masquerade balls. The hotel we stayed in (we had planned to sleep in the airport but it closed down so we had to get a hotel for the night) looked out over the canal and we just sat there watching the boats go up and down. It was a great cap-off to Italy, relaxing and peaceful.


Our next stop, which was probably my favorite place, is London.


-abby

**check out the photo albums for Rome, Florence and Venice on the right hand side, click to enlarge the photos**