March 28, 2009

went to Rome for the day since I missed the trip while I was sick. I took a train from Florence at 6:30 in the morning. I got to Rome about 9 and took the metro to the Vatican. Vatican City confused me so much, because you enter into Piazza di San Pietro but then you can't really go anywhere else. There were fences everywhere and you could only enter and leave through the one arch leading back into Rome. I eventually figured out that the huge line wrapping around the piazza was to get into St. Peter's so I got on line since I couldn't figure out how to go anywhere else. I walked around St. Peter's for a while and went to confession (I can now say I've received a sacrament in the Vatican). Then I climbed the dome and visited the papal tombs. I got to see where Pope John Paul II is buried. A lot of the people visiting the tombs where crying when they walked away from his tomb. I also went to see a free exhibit on the history of the Vatican in honor of their 80th anniversary. They had a really cool model that was an exact replica of the city and took six months to build.

After spending half my day in the Vatican, I left to explore Rome. First I went by Castel Sant'Angelo and Ponte Sant'Angelo. Then I worked my way over to the Ara Pacis by Richard Meyer and saw some cool buildings on the way. Next I went to Piazza Navona, where I got some gelato. Piazzo Navona is pretty cool. It's full of painters selling their work while creating more paintings. I also checked out the Pantheon, Campidiglio or Capitoline Hill (not nearly as impressive as I was expecting), the Colosseum, aand the Arch of Constantine. On the way to the Colosseum and Arch, I had to walk by an extensive collection of Roman ruins. It was so neat to see. I wanted to go through and explore the whole thing, but I was afraid of running out of time. Then I headed up to the Trevi Fountain, which I really liked except for the huge crowds. Some of the fountain is carved in detail but a lot of it is rough rock, so it's really natural looking. I couldn't get too close though because of how many people were there. All of Rome was crawling with tourists, but at the Trevi Fountain, there was just a sea of people. My last site to see was San Carlo Quattro Fontane which was a little underwhelming. When we learn about these things in school, they always seem so much bigger. It's very different to see them in person and realize how small they really are and how little importance they seem to have in the city. At this point I still had close to two hours before my train, so I decided to see Piazza della Repubblica which is right by the station. I sat there for a long time sketching.

When I finally went to the station to catch my train, I was still a little early, so I got on the first train heading back to Florence. It only left about 15 minutes earlier than the one I had planned on taking but I figured I'd get back 15 minutes earlier that way. Boy was I wrong. I had completely forgotten that I bought a more expensive ticket for the later train because it only took two and half hours whereas the one I got on took four hours. So by waiting 15 minutes I could have saved myself an hour and a half of travel time, especially since I had already paid the 8 extra euro to get back earlier. Needless to say, by the time I got back to Florence, around 11:00, I was exhausted.