Day 20: On the road to Rome

Monday, July 29, 2013

Today's highlights

Super hot bus

New digs

Pantheon

Trevi fountain 

Biggest gelato in the world

*** Robbie here ***

Well today started with a little disappointment. Since we were unable to rent the scooters yesterday, we thought we would give it a shot today before we headed to Rome. We were told by our B&B lady that the rentals would cost €26 for the whole day. We were excited as we entered the rental agency only to find out that the rental costed much more than that. Unfortunately, we only had a couple hours before we had to leave for Rome, so we decided it wasn't worth the money just for a few hours.

For those of you who know Angie, you know she is a planner. She is adventurous and has had incredible experiences in her life because she plans them. However, nothing brings Angie down more than when she makes a plan and it falls through. She was so excited to do something romantic in the Tuscan countryside on our anniversary that it broke her heart to not be able to do it. Our walk to the train station felt like the sad walk with sad music on Charlie Brown (and more famously known on Arrested Development). At the train station she was expressing to me that she really wanted to have that experience with me. As I was listening to her, I just melted and felt an overwhelming feeling of compassion and love for Angie. I love her so much! She is always pushing us to have great experiences, step out of our bubble, and be romantic, and I love her for it. I just always go with the flow, taking things as they come and not actively seeking them. I feel like I did a poor job of handling her sadness over the Vespa rental debacle, so maybe in some way, writing this story is part of my penance. I am one lucky man to be married to such an incredible, beautiful, kind woman. 

 Anyway, moving on. 

We made it to Rome! What a cool, cool city. We made our way to our B&B in a neighborhood just a couple metro stops away from the Vatican. When we arrived outside the gate, we rang the bell to the apartment, but Giovanni (our host) didn't answer. We sat around for a while but he didn't come home. So Angie decided to hop the fence and see if she could knock on the apartment door. A neighbor spotted her and eyed her suspiciously. Angie had no luck with breaking in so the neighbor guy confronted us as she hopped back over the fence. We tried to explain what we were doing but it took some serious convincing for him to trust us. He was nice and let us use his cell phone. No answer. And even though there was no answer, it made us realize that cell phones are so great. We haven't been able to use our phones as real cell phones (just for photos, blogging, and reading) and we are reminded all the time how much easier traveling would be if our we could use our cell phones all the time. But maybe it's good--it forces us to ask natives how to get to places or where to eat. We get some good, honest opinions and funny experiences because of it. Giovanni eventually showed up, apologized profusely, we dumped our bags and hit the town!

The first thing we saw was the Pantheon. Whoa mama, it was amazing. This building was enormous, and it seemed even bigger by the fact that it was built in 27 BC, then rebuilt in 120 AD.  That's old. The columns were huge and we learned about how inspired the ancient Romans were when they successfully built the dome ceiling. A dome of that scale was unheard of in that time. We learned that Bruneleschi, a Renaissance artist and architect, cut a rectangular cross section out of the roof in order to understand how it was built. What he learned from the Pantheon he used in creating the dome atop the Duomo church in Florence; an amazing thing, due to the fact that the Pantheon was built 1500 years previous. The ancient Romans were extremely advanced in architecture and technology. Anyway, as we walked into the enormous doorway, we were struck by the big open space inside. There were thousands of tourists, but it wasn't too crowded because of the building's design. Beautiful. 

Another beautiful spot we visited was the Trevi fountain. We don't know too much about this fountain, just that it is awesome. 

Remember gelato? How it's delicious? Well be jealous because Angie and went to the most famous gelateria in Rome! Our gelatos were huge, but we saw one family split a gelato cone that was as big as a birthday party cone hat! It could've doubled as one of those vuvuzelas from the World Cup. Insane, and insanely delicious. But really, they are all good, every gelato we have had. 

Just because the fountain and the pantheon were so beautiful, we went to see them again at night. Take a gander.

Tomorrow we visit the old city!