When in Rome

We had a fabulous 5 and a half days in Rome. It's amazing how non-stressful life can be when your only obligations for the day are eating gelato and going to cool museums and ancient ruins.  Here's a quick breakdown of our days:

1: arrived at our apartment* in the late afternoon. Took the metro into town and wandered around.  Saw the Mouth of Truth, but it was closed for the evening, so we didn't get pictures. Slept 10 hours.

2: Rob presented his conference paper to a group of international academics. I went to a cooking class and ate a sumptuous meal. Guess who had more fun?

3: Spanish Steps, Borghese Museum (amazing Bernini sculptures!), lunch in the park, Colloseum & Roman Forum, Gala dinner (for the conference) at a hilltop villa overlooking the city, very expensive taxi ride home at 1am--the driver misunderstood us and tried to drop us off in a really sketchy neighborhood. We finally made it home!

4: Trevi Fountain, Pantheon, Piazza Navona, Vatican Museum, St. Peter's Square & Basilica--climbed to the top of the dome--it was so incredibly beautiful, had a quiet dinner at home and rested our aching feet!

5: Open air market shopping for food and souvenirs, lunch in the Jewish ghetto, Campo Fiori (another market), wandered around and saw advertisements for an opera that night and decided to go. We dashed back to the apartment to eat and change and then went to see Verdi's 'La Traviata', performed in a church. It was incredibly beautiful and though we didn't get pictures, it's a wonderful memory of a unique experience we had.

6: Took a bus out to Tivoli (about an hour from Rome) to see Villa D'Este and the incredible gardens there. As the rain started, we realize we didn't have umbrellas or the memory card for Rob's camera. BUMMER! We braved the drizzle and used our tiny camera and ended up having a great day! Also stopped by San Giovanni, the official church of the Pope. On the way home, we spent our last $5 on some pastries and then I made dinner for Rob, trying to recreate some of the things I learned at my cooking class. We packed up that night and prepared for our early flight home the next day.


**Our apartment. This was our first time using Airbnb and we highly recommend it! All the reviews of this place were amazing and we agree that Pina is the best host ever! It was SO NICE to have a "home" and be outside the major tourist area, but still close to the Metro.




P.S. My mom was gracious and generous enough to come stay with the girls. They went to the movies, picked strawberries, made jam, went shopping, got pedicures, and tried new recipes together. They had a terrible time and really missed us a lot....