Spontaneous Trip to Rome

Originally I was going to stay in Florence because this week is midterms and I was going to study. But then I realized that this was the only weekend I had time to go to Rome. And my midterms don't start until Wednesday. So on Friday Kristina and I booked a trip to Rome and left the next morning! It was insane to plan a weekend trip to Rome on such short notice but I am so glad we did it! We left at 6:30 in the morning. Now usually I would be upset by this, however, we paid for the cheapest train - the "slow train" which takes 4 hours. Well, we accidentally got onto the fast train... and yes it was actually an accident. First of all, when you walk down the train the aisle is on the right side and there are like corridors to the left that seat up to six people... can you say Hogwarts Express much??? Which made me SO excited! It looked just like the Harry Potter movies (but slightly less glamorous). So I was able to fall asleep on the train and we arrived in Rome in under 2 hours. No one ever checked our ticket, so we just got off and acted as if we were totally supposed to have been on that train... what they don't know won't hurt them.

Lady Luck was on our side all morning when the hostel allowed us to do an early check-in, charged us 10 euro less than they were supposed to, and gave us a room with our own bathroom. It was fantastic. The weather was also gorgeous, 65 and sunny, so I could tell it was going to be an amazing day.

Big ol' Wheel

First we found the metro and took it to Vatican City. We got lunch right outside the city wall and then entered the museum to see all of the relics and paintings. Even the gardens were gorgeous (probably because it was SO sunny out so everything looked greener than usual). My favorite parts of the museum were the chariots that the Popes used to ride in and the Sistine Chapel. The chariot wheels were huge!!!! Literally taller than me. And the chariot was covered in gold, it was a lot of bling but I loved it. After more wandering around the museum that seemed to never end we finally ended up in this hallway that had a ceiling a city block long just covered in art work. It blew my mind. I thought no ceiling could out do this one! I took picture after picture of this ceiling and then I turned the corner and walked into the Sistine Chapel. Suddenly that ceiling I was so captivated by seemed pathetic. Holy cow. Now I fully understand why this is such a famous icon. The Sistine Chapel put all of the gorgeous ceilings I have admired to shame. Of course there were no pictures allowed in the Sistine Chapel but I'm a little dare devil and took one anyone so I could admire the breath taking views for more than the half an hour I spent just starring in awe.

Sistine Chapel - my rebellious picture muahaha

Massive Pillars

St. Peter's Basilica, that middle balcony
is for the Pope.

Next Kristina and I headed out to St. Peter's Basilica, however we may or may not have accidentally turned the wrong way out of the Vatican Museum. The fact that the entire crowd was going the opposite direction should have been our warning sign. So we definitley ended up taking the longest way possible to  St. Peter's. After our lovely stroll through a 45 minute detour we finally found the square, it was hard to miss. It is a huge opening surrounded by ornate buildings with massive pillars. The saints sit on top of the buildings engulfing the entire circle. The middle building is where the Pope lives and makes an appearance on Sundays. We were there on Saturday so I didn't get to see him, but I imagine that would be amazing. And crowded. At this time it was around 4 PM and we wanted to make it to Villa Borghese Gardens by sunset so we took a few more tourist photos (of course) and left the gorgeous square to head back to the metro. 

Hahahahah I LOVE the Swiss Guard uniforms
Not one of Michelangelo's better desgins.

Villa Borghese is like Rome's version of Central Park (I assume, I've never actually been to New York). But the general idea is a gorgeous park in the middle of a city. When you're in the park it is very relaxed, people rent bikes to ride through it rather than drive cars, there are gelato stands all around too. Kristina and I bought some gelato and then watched the sun set over Rome at the top of Villa Borghese. After all the walking we did it was great to relax and we had an amazing view. When we were ready to start moving around again we decided we wanted to see the Trevi Fountain lit up at night so we headed down towards the Spanish Steps on the way to the Trevi fountain. 

On the way to the Spanish Steps we were stopped by a huge crowd of people holding up Free Hugs signs. It was very interesting to see. I didn't think it was weird until just writing this post actually. Since they were all Italians in the crowd, why were their signs written in English? Weird. Anyways, that was slightly amusing and only distracted us momentarily. We saw the Spanish Steps, which were cool but to be honest they were so crowded with people you couldn't really see much of the actual steps. So we moved on and headed towards the Trevi Fountain. Now THAT was awesome. We didn't make any wishes though because we wanted to go back and see the fountain in the day so we decided to wait until Sunday for wishes. After admiring the lights a little but longer we got some dinner and went back to the hostel. We passed out by 10:30 PM, it had been an exhausting day.

The next day we obviously had to see the best part of Rome for every tourist... The Colosseum!! It was amazing and huge! I mean I knew the Colosseum was obviously a large structure but I mean it is just massive. And it is literally just in the middle of the city. We were walking down a normal street with a lot of traffic, look to our left, and, oh hey, there's the Colosseum just chilling at the end of the city block. It was insane. We didn't actually get an official tour of it, but I listened in to some random tours and I actually  bothered to read the signs around the Colosseum so I learned some fun facts. Like the bottom layer (the layer now visible to us) was used to store the exotic animals that warriors would fight and prisoners would be fed to. And that most of the damage done to the Colosseum was from a horrible fire that is undetermined if the emperor started or if it was accidental. 

Just being in the Colosseum was unreal. It was something I had heard about for as long as I can remember and I was amazed that I was actually standing in this historical and obviously famous building. It was definitley one of the coolest moments of my life. 

Afterwards we went to the Forum, which I'm not going to like was just a lot of ruins. Although Caesar was murdered in one of them! So that was cool. Well, probably not that cool for Caesar... Then we stopped by the Piazza Venezia which has the Capitol building on it. You had to pay to get in and we didn't want to so Kristina and I just admired it from the outside before searching for some lunch. We found this adorable outdoor restaurant that had an Italian man playing guitar outside. We had wine with our pasta and pizza. It was delicious and adorable. Everyone around us was speaking rapid Italian, to me it felt less touristy than most of the places we go. Then we headed back to Trevi Fountain

The Trevi Fountain was even more amazing in the daylight. And I was so excited to make my wish!! I kinda got too excited at first and accidentally dropped my first coin in the fountain... but that one didn't count!! Whoops. So I got another coin, posed for some pictures (of course) and then made my wish. I wished for.... 

Yeah right. You never tell your wish :)

After heading back to the Spanish Steps for a Siesta in the Sun we headed back to Termini train station to catch the train back to Florence. This time we got on the correct train, so it took over 3 hours to get home. Other than the fact that my ears popped every time we went through a tunnel (and there were a ton of tunnels...) it was pretty relaxing.

This Wednesday and Thursday I have midterms. (Oh that's right it's called STUDY Abroad... whoops) But then after that it's Spring Break with Shannon!! I can't wait to show her around Florence. Then we're going to Paris, London, and Pisa!! These midterms need to go by fast (and hopefully they are easy, fingers crossed!)

OH! 

Side note: today I spoke in ALL Italian at the Post Office!! It wasn't a very lengthy conversation but I still felt cool. And I got my first letter in the mail today from Emily Nelms. It was fun! If anyone wants to write me a letter, it would make my day :)

"Breanna McGuire
c/o Istituto Lorenzo de Medici
Via del Melarancio 6/r
50123 Firenze, Italia"