Rome, Italy
/(May 10th - May 13th, 2015)
Rome is incredible. There is so much to see in this city and we didn’t have nearly enough time (only 2.5 days), but we covered a lot of ground in the short amount of time we had. We arrived in Rome, hopped on the metro and got off just steps from the Colosseum. We were welcomed with 86 degree heat, still had all of our luggage in tow and started walking towards our next Airbnb apartment. Once settled in we left to find some food and gelato in the nearby area. While searching for food we stumbled across Piazza Navona. It’s a wonderful place for people watching, eating at one of the many cafés that look into the piazza, and enjoying street artists, musicians, and magicians. We walked around for a bit before grabbing dinner at a busy restaurant just outside the piazza. The food was okay, but we were entertained by watching cars struggle to make it through the extremely narrow streets while the large crowds of pedestrians were unfazed as they walked past. We decided that our first night in Rome could not end with just an okay dining experience, so we had gelato at Gelateria Fridgidarium, which is ranked #12 on TripAdvisor (out of 7,100 restaurants). I got the most amazing raspberry sorbetto and Allen got the house special and chocolate fiorentina.
The next morning we set out to find breakfast and found Esco Sazio, an organic juicery (I was in heaven). It was a nice break from our usual coffee and croissant breakfast. We both had acai bowls with bananas, honey, and oatmeal on top, I had a pineapple, ginger, and cucumber juice and Allen had a chocolate muffin. It was amazing! We then set out on Rick Steves' walking tour of Rome. First we stopped by the Campo Fiori market which was just a few blocks from our apartment. There was everything from fresh flowers, pasta, oils, spices, fruits, vegetables, cheeses, and spreads being sold. We continued onto Piazza Navona again, but it didn’t have the same buzz as it did the previous evening. We passed by the Parliament & Senate buildings on our way to the Pantheon. We were completely in awe when we walked inside the Pantheon. We didn’t realize how big it actually is and that it is just in the middle of the city. Throughout our walking tour we were impressed at how modern life had been constructed around these amazing ruins from so many years ago. We were quickly impressed at how such significant structures were built without modern machinery and technology.
We continued on to the Trevi Fountain but were disappointed to see that it was still being renovated. We researched it online and restoration efforts were supposed to end in March, but it looked nowhere close to being done. We took a few photos and then tracked down Gelateria Valentino (a favorite spot of two of our friends). Allen got dark chocolate and their house special and I got Tiramisu. Everything was delicious and it was a refreshing snack as the day was starting to heat up. We continued onto the Spanish Steps, which were decorated with nice flowers and lots of people. We climbed to the top to get a view of the steps and the surrounding high end shopping options, but had to keep moving in order to get through our long list of sites. We walked to the Tiber River and ended up in Piazza del Popolo. The main fountain was under construction, but we were still able to take some photos of the Piazza. We then popped into the Leonardo Di Vinci museum which was located nearby. The museum had several mock ups of his sketches in addition to information about his life, military/political involvement, artwork, etc. After the museum we set out to find lunch. We ended up going to Que te Pongo, a seafood sandwich shop, which we were a little weary of upon first walking up to. It ended up being delicious! They had several kinds of smoked fish to put on salads or sandwiches and they even had some smoked salmon from Alaska on their menu! We finished lunch with some more gelato from Il Gelato Di San Crispino (recommended to us by a good friend/gelato connoisseur). Allen got salted caramel and stracciatella and I got lemon and pink grapefruit sorbetto. All flavors were fantastic!
After lunch we headed to the Colosseum, first stopping at the capital building and nearby ruins. Thanks to a recommendation from a friend, we had purchased a Roma Pass and bypassed the line completely to get into the Colosseum. We purchased the audio tour and spent over an hour walking through the Colosseum and learning about its history, various functions its held over the years, and again were completely amazed by how such an impressive structure was constructed thousands of years ago without modern day machinery or technology. Afterwards, we did another Rick Steves walking tour through the Roman Forum. Neither of us knew too much about Roman history prior to this trip so we’ve enjoyed learning together and seeing all the ruins in person. We decided to end our sightseeing with the forum so afterwards we headed back to our apartment too cool off and take a quick nap.
For dinner we went to Cantina Lucifero. It seemed to be a family run restaurant just around the corner from our apartment and the food was absolutely delicious. We started with a complimentary glass of prosecco and then we had a caprese salad. I had green gnocchi with a red sauce. Allen had a mushroom risotto (with fresh grated white truffle on top!). We split a chicken dish in a lemon cream sauce and to top it off we finished with a tiramisu. We were extremely happy with our choices and Allen reconfirmed his love for truffle :)
Our second full day in Rome was reserved for the Vatican and the Borghese Museum. We started out by going to Saint Peter’s Basilica (not realizing our Vatican Museum reservation would end in Saint Peter’s). At 9am, there was a relatively short line, it wasn't too hot yet, and it was extremely peaceful inside as the crowds were still pretty small. The minute we entered the basilica, we both got goosebumps. It’s the most beautiful church we have ever seen and we just stood there for a minute in awe. We walked around the entire basilica admiring the intricate details of the grand structure itself and tried to capture its beauty the best we could, but quickly realized no photo could do this place justice. It is no surprise that the basilica took over 150 years to build. We stood and admired the dome that was designed by Michelangelo himself as well as the large mosaics, some of which are works of art by Bernini and Michelangelo. After a short walk around the church we realized that we needed to get to the Vatican museum for our scheduled entrance time. Buying tickets online was definitely the way to go. We bypassed hundreds of people waiting in line to buy tickets and entered the museum. We didn’t end up spending much time in the museum because it was extremely crowded and everything seemed underwhelming compared to St. Peters. We did enjoy seeing the Sistine Chapel, although everyone was ushered through the room very quickly and told very loudly to be quiet. We wish we could have spent more time inside appreciating the series of frescos painted by Michelangelo, Botticelli, Perugino, Pinturicchio, Ghirlandaio, and Roselli that were decorating the walls and the ceiling of the chapel. We exited the museum through Saint Peter’s and decided to climb the duomo to get an amazing view of the city. The staircase at times was extremely claustrophobic, small, sideways, and stuffy, but the view at the top was definitely worth it.
After lunch we walked through the Borghese Gardens to the Borghese Galleria. We read up on the various paintings and sculptures throughout the gallery, but spent the most time admiring the Apollo and Daphne sculpture by Bernini. The life sized marble sculpture took four years to complete and the level of detail in the leaves, roots, and Daphne’s wind swept hair completely astounded us. Even though we aren’t true art enthusiasts, we could appreciate that the entire sculpture was carved from a single piece of marble with certain sections consisting of more air than marble. We regretted not getting the audio tour at the Borghese which would have helped us appreciate the other art in the museum so we vowed to splurge on audio tours for all our future museum visits on our trip. We finished the afternoon with some more gelato from Il Gelatone (a favorite spot of two other friends), some more acai bowls and juices from the organic juicery we visited the day before, and stopped by the University of Washington Rome Center on the way back to our apartment for a few photos (go Dawgs!).
For our last dinner in Rome we went to Est Artigiani del Gusto. We ordered a caprese salad, Allen got cheese and pepper pasta, and I got homemade pasta with zucchini and tomatoes. Both were delicious, but we decided to opt out of dessert at the restaurant and headed back to Gelato Frigidarium for a final gelato visit in Rome.
We had a great time in Rome and while it was a short visit, we saw more than we ever hoped to see. We know we’ll be back at some point, but were excited for our next stop in Naples for some authentic pizza and a day trip to Pompeii.
