Spring Break Part 3

And now, we come to the last leg of the Italian adventure: Rome

Note: the internet is really bad here at the moment so there are only a couple of pictures with this post, but I will add more soon.

We were so excited to get out of Naples and get back to Rome, a place we had felt good and comfortable, that we headed to the train station early. Unfortunately, we couldn't get a train until around 12:30, getting us into the city at about 3. We hadn't known when we booked the trip, but we were going to be in Rome for the 150th anniversary of the unification of Italy. There were celebrations taking place all over the country, and when we arrived and started walking around, we saw tons of people walking around dressed in green, white, and red and carrying Italian flags.

After we checked in to our hostel, we went to the Colosseum to meet up with Patrick and Connor, two other Champlain Dubliners who had been traveling in Germany for the beginning of the week. It was so exciting to see some friendly faces, and to be next to the huge ruin of the Colosseum, and after telling each other about our trips so, Patrick and Connor told us that they were meeting up with Greg and Brittany, two other Champlain students who were studying in Rome and could show us around. We got some gelato while we waited, and saw some amazing things just on our walk to our meeting place.

When Greg and Brittany found us, we followed them through crowds of people in the shopping district, looking into tempting clothing and jewelry shops. It was really nice to be lead around, and not have to stop to check a map every few blocks. They brought us to the Spanish Steps which, surprise surprise, were pretty much just steps (still very cool though). We climbed to the top, and after walking only a little further, made it to a park that overlooked not only Piazza Navona, which is considered one of the most beautiful piazzas in Italy, but the whole city.

  After our walk, Greg and Brittany showed us one of their favorite restaurants, a small place near their apartment. They told us that any place that had a person outside beckoning customers inside was bound to be touristy and not very good. We went in for dinner, and it turned out to be my favorite meal of the whole trip. Connor, Patrick, Ian and I ordered a bottle of red wine for the table and took our time eating and talking. I had lasagna made with homemade pasta, and tiramisu for dessert. Feeling happy and full, we met up with Greg and Brittany again for a few drinks since, in addition to Italy's 150th anniversary, it was also St. Patrick's Day! We went into a pub and were surrounded by tipsy Italians wearing festive Guinness hats and guzzling from table taps. Little had we known when we first entered, but this was a karaoke bar, and soon the sounds of the Italian national anthem filled the room as everyone around us started to belt it out. Then the tone switched to Italian pop songs and we tried to sing along with the words on the screen. Ian and I went back to our hostel and felt truly relaxed for the first time on our trip.

The next day we met up with Patrick and Connor again for a pizza lunch and a trip to the Vatican. We ignored the many, many offers from people trying to get us to go on expensive tours and instead jumped in line for the museum. It was a beautiful, warm, sunny day so we didn't mind the wait. Once we got into the museum, we were overwhelmed by the beauty of everything we saw. Everything was so elaborate and there was so much to look at that we could hardly take it in. The Sistine Chapel was definitely a highlight, and even though the room was packed with people, we could barely stop craning our necks to gaze at it.


After the museum we got in line for St. Peter's Basilica. It was enormous inside, again with so much to see that it was hard to take it all in. We saw the giant archway the Pope stands under and found out that the remains of St. Peter were directly underneath. I'm not Catholic, but it was still a very spiritual place. There was a men's and boy's choir in the corner singing and adding a mystical quality to the whole place. We also went under the basilica to see the tombs of the former Popes.

Before dinner we headed to the Parthenon. Ian expected it to be a tribute to the Roman gods, but it was taken over by Christianity early in its history and was just another fancy building, so we went to have dinner. For our last dinner in Italy, the guys decided to do the traditional Italian dinner. There was bread, wine, a pasta course (which I stopped at), a meat course, and dessert. The restaurant was a little awkward because it was still early for dinner in Italy, but overall it was good.

The next day it was time for Ian and I to leave, but our flight wasn't until 8 at night so we still had a full day. We bought tickets to the Forum and the Colosseum, but didn't get to go inside the latter because the line was too long, and after Pompeii, the Forum wasn't as impressive. But it was still a good day. We had lunch (pizza for me again), headed to the hostel to pick up our bags, and went to the train station to catch our bus to the airport after one last gelato (mint for me, mango for Ian). The airport, it turns out, was a lot less sketchy than we originally thought once we passed through security.

We waited for a couple hours for our plane, and groaned as we saw that our flight was fully booked due to a class of about 50 teenage Irish girls all wearing pink and purple 'I <3 Roma' sweatshirts and caked in makeup. I was so tired and ready to go home that I kind of flipped out on some of them who were trying to get in front of us on the line to get on the plane (RyanAir doesn't assign seats).

But we finally made it home around midnight. The trip was fun, challenging, exhausting, and thrilling, and an experience I will remember forever. I'm ready to face the next weeks in Dublin and can't wait to see what else will happen!