Rome!

Okay, Rome is cool.  I wasn't sure it would be.  I really thought Florence would be the coolest.  Interestingly enough, Florence has been the least interesting place.  Rome though has been fascinating.  Today we did the Roman ruins.  Oh. My. Goodness.  Unbelieveably cool.

The trip started with Trajan's Baths.  I took several pictures, but as I am about to inundate you with more ruin photos than you can stand, I will refrain from posting these.  I'm sure Kate and I will show them all to you when we get home.  Start popping the popcorn now.

A bit further down the road was the Colosseum.  You cannot believe how enormously cool this building is.  We spent three hours tromping through the ruins.  We only left because we decided we would run out of time for everything else. 

This is the view as we came up to it initially.

On more than one occasion we offered to take pictures of couples.  One very nice couple returned the favor.  Now we have proof that we were together on this trip. 

 The inside.  The white-ish stuff low on the right is original marble seats.  These would have been for the upper class men.  The flat part is a temporary floor.  I don't know why it is in.  They sadly wouldn't let us walk over there.

The area under the floor where the animals and whatnot were stored.  They won't let you down there either.  It is very cool though.  The moss and grass down there were incredibly green.  There were workers all around scraping moss off rocks.  Nature is still fighting for control.

Another shot from ground level.

 We then moved to the Palatine and Roman forum.  This is the stadium at Domus Augustana.  They think that this was more of a garden and riding arena than it was a true stadium.

There is a point up high overlooking the forum.  In this shot the Temple of Vesta is down low at center (home of the Vestal Virgins).  The three columns to the left are from the Temple of Castor and Pollux.  Above those is the Arch of Septimius Severus.  The forum is the grassy area to the right of the three columns and below the arch.  There are some columns bits remaining and some of the original floor.

A column top from the Temple of Saturn.  It was erected in late Republican times.

Hey, look!  Anne is at the Roman Forum!

Kate is too!

Et tu, Brute?  This area is Julius Caesar's forum.  We think this is where he was killed.  Don't quote us on that though.  We probably should look that up.

 These flat rocks are the original floor of Julius caesar's forum.  We didn't check for bloodstains.

 One of the really cool things (or really disturbing things) is that there are all these fragments just laying about.  In America all of this would be hermetically sealed in a museum somewhere.  Here they are just laying around. 

This is a shot of the Forum  from the other direction.  The Temple of Saturn is on the right.  Palantine Hill is in the background.

More random bits just laying around...

We left the Forum and treked our way to the Teatro Marcellus (a Roman theatre).  The outside wall exists, but the rest has been integrated into another building. 

This is the Tiber River.

This is all that is left of the Circus Maximus.  The space is intact, but there are no ruins left.  It pretty much is a dog park now.  The stuff to the left is Palantine Hill and the Roman ruins.

 One last shot of the Colosseum as we headed back home.

 The Roman ruins apparently are crawling with feral cats.  We saw a couple.  They were remarkably philosophical about all the people in their way. 



After leaving the Circus Maximus we wandered our way back home.  We stopped in a tiny little trattoria for dinner.  The owner met us at the door and ushered us back.  His english was about as good as our italian.  We did a lot of pointing.  For the first time we had real garlic bread.  This may be the best garlic bread we have ever had.  The little man was quite proud of himself and gave me the secret recipe.  Bread, garlic, salt.  It was amazing!  Kate had the gnochi (potato dumplings) and I tried the spaghetti.  I'm doing a taste test of piizza, spaghetti and lasagne in all four cities to see which one is the best.  The Great Taste Test of Italy as it were.  This so far the best spaghetti.  A delightful girl from Arkansas joined us for a moment.  She just wanted to hear southern voices for a bit.  She is in the middle of a year's study abroad and was missing the south.  We finished our day with gelato and cannoli.  A sweet ending to a swell day.