Day 2

Ciao Ciao!

Today was an awesome day. I woke up around 7:30 am to Andrea poking me in the side to wake me up. Nice wake up call.  We got ready and dressed in our appropriate attire, covered shoulders and covered knees, then headed out onto the streets ofa Roma. We walked to Termini Station to get a taxi to take us to the Vatican City! The cab ride was crazy, I saw my life flash before my eyes a few times and business men on Vespas in their full business attire. Pretty funny. Cab ride was only 10,90 euro! I tipped him too, but turns out I shouldn't tip anymore. I'm on a real tight budget. So he drops us off at the door and we walk right in along with the families with matching backpacks and the tour guides with gawdy "hey look at me I'm a freaking tourist" decorated sticks to keep the group together. We're really kinda trying to fit in.

Luckily, we reserved our Vatican tickets like two months ago so we just walked right in and their was NO LINE either. There were not a lot of people there at all. The first sign we see is <=== (that's supposed to be an arrow) Cappella Sistina, so of course we take off in that direction. We skipped ALL the museums and rushed to see the Sistine Chapel. What's funny is you have to go through all these art galleries to get to it so everytime we would turn a corner we would get excited and then it would just be another gallery "And this is the gallery of maps," a tour guide would say.

FINALLY, after a few crazy minutes of running through some galleries (good art though) we made it to the Cappella Sistina! Words nor pictures can explain how beautiful it was. The colors just popped off the walls and ceiling and the detail was incredible! It was really hard to soak it in. Andrea and I tried to sneak pictures but then realized the guards didn't really care as long as the flash was off.  The most amazing part though is that there was close to NO ONE in there. We were happy.

After the Cappella Sistina, we tried to make our way to some museums but realized that we started the whole thing backwards. Some guards got onto us, we would go through it backwards. We saw some other cool art, bought post cards, journals, and I bought a real rosary. I was so excited. Andrea saw a Caravaggio painting and cried, she's such a crazy art kid.  I saw a lot of naked statues.  Finally, we finished the museums (kinda). We mainly just got tired of the crazy touristy crowd.  So we decide to head to St. Peter's Basilica!

On our way, I see a cute little kiosk with awesome leather (or so I thought) purses. So we decide to take a gander (there's that southerness coming out). Turns out the men are total pervs and three italian men surround us and try to sell us purses and try to look down our shirts, now we see why they want to sell purses. We just walked out disgusted. 

When we made it to St. Peter's, there were TONS of people there. Well over 1,000, I'm not kidding. So we do our tourist thing and take pictures of it and in front of it and then go get gelato. Yummy.

Andrea almost got hit by a car three times today, JUST SAYING.

After St. Peter's, we were tired, hot, and irritated; so we took a cab back to the room.  

Andrea: "We need to get to 130 Emmanuel Filiberto."

Cab Driver: "oh-a Emmanuella Filiberto" (emphasis on the bert)

Me: "I think he said it better than you."

Cab Driver: (looking back in the rear view mirror) "Yes yes."

it was pretty funny.

So we get to the hostel (I love our hostel) and rest, do our internet thing, and rest some more. Then Andrea, the owner comes in, (he's a very attractive italian man) and says "I'm so sorry I woke you last night." Yes, I woke up to a loud noise and it was Andrea.. No worries though, a group came in late and they had to get a bed out of our room for their's. It was still funny though, another story for our italian adventure.

Once we get rested and dressed, we decide to head out to the Spanish Steps and to get food. We decide to take the Metro this time, which I advise anyone to take. It's fast and way cheaper than a taxi. We end up at the Spanish Steps and it is PACKED. Do our tourist thing and take pictures and meet some girls from Australia, it was nice to hear someone speak English. Then for some reason my camera lense completely locked up and wouldn't work, I was sad. But after I gave her a break she started working again.

We then decide to go down Condotti, which is apparently the most expensive street to shop on in Europe. I kinda believe that, Hermes, D&G, Dior, Chanel, Tiffany's, Bvlgaria, Guess, Cartier, JIMMY CHOO(love), Burberry, you name it.. it was there. After some window shopping, we decide to get some food.

Everything was freaking expensive, then we find this cute little pizza place and the cute old italian waiter swore that they had the best pizza in all of Europe.. He talked us into it, surprisingly.. we got spaghetti and a glass of coke that cost 4,00 euro. You better believe I enjoyed every last sip of that coke. After some eating and talking, I get out my large plasticized Roma map and Daytrips in Italy book and decide what to do. Some little Cafe catches my eye and turns out it is the cafe that Wagner, Liszt, Byron, Berlioz, and Goethe hung out in the 1760s! Which was awesome, I remember that from Music App class. So we decide to find it (turns out it was right down the street from us) but we go all the way back to Trevi Fountain for some reason. Which was a fabulous idea. We've loved this little book (kudos Aunt Jena) and our plasticized map (thanks dad). We definitely didn't look like tourist with our huge cameras and plasticized maps. Mission failed.  

Anyways, the book took us on this awesome tour through some of the old city and even listed places that tourist wouldn't know about, like Caffe Greco. We saw Piazza Colonna, which was dominated by the 2nd-century Column of Marcus Aurelius. Which was later replaced by one of Saint Paul. the Palazzo Chigi was right next to it which is the residence of Italy's prime minister. Cool.

So we continue our tour down Via del Corso and as we continue some italian girl all prideful with her gustyness decides to cross the street in the middle of traffic without looking. I mean it would have been one thing if she was American, but this is her city. A mini van honked at her and she looked around confused, she almost got plastered into the cement. Good thing you know the meaning of a red light italian girl.

Anyways, as we kept traveling down Corso, we ended up back on Condotti and find the smallest nation! It's behind two big wooden doors and it's called Soverign Military Order of Malta (S.M.O.M.) It has been accorded extraterritorial rights by the Italian government and issues its own passports, license plates, stamps, and even money! It has a population of about 80 and carries on humanitarian work around the world. So neat.

Next we find Caffe Greco which is closed :(  but we take pictures anyways. Funny thing is, some tourists saw us taking pictures of this little caffe and they start taking pictures. I mean really? They're probably clueless to what it is.

Next we see a John Keats museum (he's a poet). Cooooool. As we walk down to Piazza del Popolo, we see this huge event happening. It was a red carpet event for the opening of a new high end designer store, I saw a lot of recognizable fashion designers and ladies in fancy dresses. Next we head to the piazza, which was once the northern entrance to Roma. It was beautiful! There was this saxophone player and guys selling roses and barely anyone there.  We give the saxophone player money and take fun pictures of him.

Then some guys comes up and hands me three roses, I tell him I don't want them BUT HE INSISTS! So I take them. Next thing I know, he comes up asking for money "Just a leeetle bit," he would say. I tell him I don't have anything, which is true. So I give him the roses back and he shoves them back in my hand. I finally dig out ,20 euro cents but it's not enough for him. We bicker back and forth for a little while then he finally gives up. It was quite an experience.

We then check out some cool things around the piazza and some guy actually thought we were italian (SCORE).  We end up traveling down this kinda shady looking trail up a hill and end up on top of Pincio hill, I almost cried. It was a view of the WHOLE city at night. Breathtaking. 

We then take some more pictures and head back to the subway (metro). So quick and end up back at our hostel in no time.

We got new hostel roommates today! They're from London, Dominic and Portia. We ended up talking for an hour or so about where we are from. Very cool people and now we're friends on facebook. Alright for meeting new friends.

We've been asked to get "liquored up" twice by Americans, which is weird and shady.  Andrea and I came up that it's a way to get Americans drunk with free liquor and pizza and then they get "Taken." Makes sense, not.

Tomorrow we head for Montepulciano which I'm excited about, it will be a very nice calm town where we can just chill and enjoy italy a little more. I've learned that the time to tour is in the early mornings and evenings, not as many tourists. 

Next trip I want to go to London. I'm enjoying this traveling thing.

It's 2:30 am here and we have to get up in 5 hours. We're definitely still stuck on Mississipp time.

 Buon giorno to you or should I say buon notte,

Gabby