Day 6: Rome

Oh boy this is going to be a long post. I realized as I was uploading pictures that we did SO much stuff this day. I mean it a TON of stuff. So get yourselves ready for lots of pictures. And I apologize for this post taking so long. For some reason blogspot wasn't letting me upload pictures and I couldn't just do a post with out all of the pictures. It just wouldn't have been right.

I totally forgot to mention a few things when I told you about our hostel in Rome. When we got there the people had our reservation completely screwed up. They told us that each person owed way more than what we had written down and we figured out it was because they only had it written down that our reservation was for 6 not 8. At first I was nervous that I didn't make the reservation for the right number of people, but I thought about it and I knew for a fact that I did it for eight people. So we had to go through and find the confirmation email and such and they realized they had written down the wrong number of people. Those workers were just a little stupid and kind of weird. As we were trying to figure everything out two of them were all over each other, right in front of us! It was very strange and slightly uncomfortable. (Although it isn't too shocking for Europe, no one cares about PDA). So anyways because they thought we only had 6 two of us had to be put into a different room and had to move around every night. Sarah and I ended up being the ones to move around. It wasn't bad, but it was slightly annoying when it was their fault not ours. The first night it was really random, there was another kid from ASU in the room with us. What are the chances of that?! It seriously surprises me sometimes how small the world can be. Then the next day we found out that one of the workers at the hostel went to ASU too! Shocking isn't it?! I guess it helps that ASU is such a big school, but still...

Our first full day in Rome was completely full of fun stuff. We got up early and had breakfast and got ready. The breakfast at the hostel was pretty nice. It costs 2 euro for cereal, toast, hard boiled eggs, coffee, juice, milk, and cookies. Pretty good amount of stuff for just 2 euro. The only thing that stunk was that we had to do our own dishes. Isn't that weird?

We wanted to get going early so that we could get to the Roman Forum so we could get tickets before there were huge lines and crowds of people. It was awesome that we did that cause the line literally took like 5 minutes and when we were leaving the line looked like it would have taken about an hour to get through. Also the nice thing about our tickets was that it was for the Roman Forum and the Colosseum! Two birds, one short line :) Another benefit to getting there really early was that there weren't that many people so you could actually walk not having to weave through people. By the time we left there were a lot of people. We also purchased the audio guide for the Roman Forum and it was pretty good. The guy on the audio guide wasn't all that interesting but I did learn some cool facts. I honestly just like looking around and taking pictures though.
The girls listening to the audio guide. Britta and Sarah didn't like it, they thought they guy's voice was boring.



Look at how lucky we got again with the blue skies!!! Seriously sold blue sky.


There were so many ruins it was so cool. Just to think that we were walking where people lived and worked hundreds of years ago!




We were running out of time before we had to meet up with Michelle so we headed over to the Palatino to get a little looksy. Haha along the way we passed by this sign and I told Britta to pose and she did this awesome pose.
When we made it up to the top of the hill we found the beautiful, open, green area. These trees were so cool...they stood there solitarily on the little green mounds against the solid blue sky. Gorgeous.


There were also trees with these brilliant pink flowers. Did I ever tell you guys that I love nature? Because I do, I love the beauty of nature. It is so complex and intricate yet it is just a part of everyday life.

After the Roman Forum we went to meet up with Michelle and then to meet up for a free tour that we planned on doing with some people from our hostel in Florence. Unfortunately we thought we were supposed to meet at the Colosseum when indeed the tour ended at the Colosseum, so we ended up not going since we were going to be late for it. Instead we headed over to the Trevi fountain to see it in the daylight and take some pictures.
The five of us in front of the Trevi Fountain!!!! It is so sad cause all four of our sunglasses are now broken :( Alex was the smart one and didn't bring her sunglasses with her on the trip because she didn't want them to break. If only I had that idea cause I was so sad when mine broke. They were my favorite pair of sunglasses!
The next ten pictures are of each of us normal in front of the fountain and then a picture of us throwing in a coin. It is kind of funny to look at how different all of our throwing pictures are. I honestly don't know how all the other girls looked cute doing it. I went last and was thinking okay throw it gracefully and cute, but heck no it was way too sunny. I could barely see I had to squint my eyes cause the sun was right in my eyes. Haha I don't know how they did it, but oh well mine is funny.

Aww, Michelle had sunglasses she cheated. I just realized that. So not fair.


Then after all that hard work working out or throwing arms we had to treat ourselves to some more gelato! Delicious. And it was a nice way to relax and rest our feet.


When we were at the gelato place Kat came and met up with us and then Mandy joined us too. Mandy just happened to be in Rome at the same time as us with her grandfather. It actually worked out nicely for her because her grandfather ended up getting sick so he couldn't really go out with her so she was able to join up with us and go around for a little bit.

After we met up with them at the gelato place we headed over to the Pantheon.


That ceiling looked so cool! I learned while I was there that the whole in the ceiling is supposed to be God's eye and it is open so it allows in sunlight and even rain.
Oh my goodness! Alex is holding God's eye!!! Haha I am such a loser. I was trying to do this with my hand but we decided that Alex has prettier hand than me so we used her fingers.
We took the time to relax here too cause we were all tired of walking. We had already done a lot of that this day so we deserved another rest period. We also thought we were waiting on Sarah to look around more, but we eventually realized that she probably just lost us. Shocker :)
I love this candid picture. Everyone doing their own thing. We eventually got up and started to look for Sarah and ended up finding her outside waiting for us to come out. It was so cute cause when we found her she was like I made sure not to move from this spot cause I could see the door and I didn't want to miss you guys coming out. Oh by the way she didn't have her cell phone with her either so if we ever lost her on this trip it would have been hard to find her.
After the Pantheon we decided to go to the Colosseum since Kat, Alex, Britta, Sarah, and I still had our tickets for it and along the way we stopped in front of this building to take a few family pictures :) I honestly have no idea what this building is. The whole time we were thinking it was the Spanish steps and we kept being like no it isn't, but what is it. I think it may be some political building. Either way we took pictures in front of it cause it seemed old and important.

This is our wonderful family. All trying to act our parts. HAHAHA. Oh my, my friends crack me up. Also since Kat joined us we had to figure out what part she played in our family, but first we had to see how she interacted with us and we really had to take the time to figure out a good spot for her. We finally decided she is the crazy aunt. Let me explain. We had to take into consideration that she was only with us for a short period of time so she couldn't be an immediate family member cause it wouldn't make sense for her to come and go. Then we took into consideration her personality and it just clicked that she is the crazy aunt on Alex's (the husband's) side. One because they are both tall and two cause they both had blonde curly-ish (Alex's is fake) hair :).

SUCH LOSERS!!!

With our brief picture pause we continued on to the Colosseum. Alex, Kat, and I got the audio tour again, but Britta and Sarah chose against it. I am happy I got it cause it kind of helped me picture more how it was supposed to look before all the looting and deconstruction of it.
It was crazy being in there. SO COOL and it is so old it is such a unique feeling to be in a place like this. I mean can you imagine being there when it was active with fights and gladiators!!!!





It is hard to picture what it used to look like. First you have to understand that the fighting ring is supposed to be fully covered on top of all the maze looking stuff on the ground. Then yo have to picture there being bleachers all the way around the place on top of the archways. It would have been amazing to see it then, but seeing it now it pretty awesome too.
As soon as we walked in there we lost Sarah, but it didn't really matter besides the fact that we didn't get any pictures with here. She had to leave a little early anyways to go and meet Michelle outside so the two of them could go over to the Vatican City to pick up our tickets for the Papel general audience.
When we were done with the Colosseum we went outside to find Michelle still sitting there and immediately 'uh oh' went through my head. She had thought that she was supposed to meet Sarah right outside of the exit, but she was really supposed to meet her at the arch next to the colosseum. So we really had no idea where Sarah was, we just hoped that she got to the Vatican city safely. The worst part was we had no way of knowing whether she was okay or not cause she didn't have her stinkin' phone!!!!

We again took some time to relax after we got out of the Colosseum. We sat on these steps for a while and I took the time to take some pictures on my iPhone and do some cool editing on them.
I really liked doing the whole sunglasses thing...I think it looks pretty darn cool.
After our little relaxation time we headed back to this unnamed building to walk up the steps but they were closed. Instead we walked around this to another set of random steps to walk up.

Haha half way up the stairs Michelle got tired and decided to lay down on the railing. Alex obviously found it quite hilarious.


As we were walking we found this cool little water fountain. That was a really cool thing about Rome, they had water spouts all around the city to drink from or refill our water bottles in.

The Colosseum at night! Beautifully lit up!
That night we went back to the hostel and met the boys then headed out to meet Alex's friend who is studying abroad in Rome. She took us to a really good Italian place for dinner. This whole time Sarah still hadn't come back and we were all really worried about her. We felt really bad that she was off by herself but really happy when we got back to the hostel and she there and safe!