Rome & Florence

The past few days have been jam packed with sightseeing all over Rome. Our hotel was a few streets over from the Trevi Fountain and we were pretty centrally located. It was a small room but it didn't really matter sine all we did was sleep there.  The shower was super small and gave me fits of claustrophobia, but the people were really nice and it was really clean, so I can't complain.

Our first night out we just grabbed some dinner and had drinks. We ended up at some bar for dinner that was totally empty and apparently is open really late...apparently we showed up about 5 hours before the party starts, but we didn't care, we were starving. Afterwards we went around the corner to a place that was right near the hotel. This place had a massive drink list and they had June Bugs on the menu (Williamsport happy hour at TGIF anyone?). So we ordered drinks and made friends with our waiter, Diego. We had a long day ahead of us, so we called it a night and went to bed early. On our way back, we were stopped by a guy at another bar who asked us to come inside for a drink, we told him that we,d be by the next day and that we were going to bed.

We did a 5 hour tour of the Vatican the next morning. No one needs to do a 5 hour tour unless you're studying art history. It was long, but our guide Emma was really knowledgabe and informative and it was really enjoyable once we got inside the Vatican. The Vatican itself was pretty ridiculous and I was totally blown away with all the mosaics. To imagine the amount of labor that went into the place is pretty incredible. After the Vatican we jumped off the metro at Spagna and visited the Spanish Steps and the Trevi Fountain which were total mob scenes with all the people. We were standing on the 3rd tier of the fountain (which runs into the sidewalk) and I watched some lady attempt to throw a coin into the fountain, completely miss and hit some guy...add that to the Trevi Fountain highlight reel.

We headed back out for dinner and decided to go to the bar that we met Diego at to do an easy dinner before we went out. We ended up running into the other guy from the night before and told him we'd be down to have drinks at his place after dinner. So we headed down to the wine bar where he worked and ended up making friends with everyone there (of course!). We ended up waiting for all of them to get done work and we all headed out together. They took us around to a few bars and we ended up hanging out with a bunch of other people traveling. So fast forward to 4am...we're dead tired and everyone is going their separate ways and somehow I manage to get separated from Brenda. I'm walking around looking for some kind of landmark hoping that I recognize something from earlier that day...I'm mapless, phoneless and Brenda-less. I recognize absolutely nothing and I've been walking around like an idiot, so I stop and ask a guy who is loading pastries and bread into his truck from a bakery...Senor, Fountain de Trevi...Via Tritone? (I motion that I'm lost) so he pulls out his delivery papers and gives me a paper that has a street near where the hotel is. Si! Si! I say! So he runs inside of the bakery and brings out a pastry for me, and we jump into his truck and we start making his bread deliveries for the morning. Yes, you read correctly, I delivered bread with the Italian breadman. I read the papers on where we needed to go and Carmel drove and delivered the bread into the stores. I spoke Spanish to him because I can't speak Italian.

So right about now, my mother is having a heart attack..."What were you thinking getting into a car with a man that you don't know! What were you thinking?!" Here's what I was thinking...it's 5am, I'm exhausted and lost and I have no freakin clue where the hell I am. Clearly this is this man's job and he needs to make all the deliveries before the cafes start to open and he has no time to waste. Plus, a free pastry and a ride to my hotel...sign me up.

So we make a few deliveries then all of a sudden, we are driving past the Trevi Fountain...and there is NO ONE there!!  It was insane, I make him stop the truck and I jump out and run around for a minute, then I jump back in and 2 streets later I make him drop me off at the corner.  I get inside the hotel and Brenda is like, OMG where the hell have you been..."Umm I just got done delivering bread..."

I sleep for an hour, get up then we go hit up the Coloseum for our tour. The African heat arrived that day and it was hot as hell. The Coloseum was everything I have ever imagined and absolutely amazing. I was in absolute awe all day. I think I took a million pictures. After our 48-hour day bender we ended up headed back to the hotel to pack and get a good night sleep.

We arrived in Florence today and have been walking around....the rain came today for the first time since I've been in Italy and it was a total downpour for about 45 minutes. We headed to the Academia to see David and I honestly have no words...what an unbelievable sight. You can study something all you want, but it's not until you actually see it in person to fully understand the time or workmanship that goes into a piece of art. David was absolutely brilliant.

Not sure what's in store for us tonight, and tomorrow is Monday so the museums will be closed.  Unless we go now, I don't think we'll get into the Uffizi, but I'm ok with it...Botticelli's Venus is the only thing I really wanted to see. Another time I guess...a reason to come back....