Posts Tagged by Rome
CNN iReport selected my photos!
| April 10, 2009 | Posted by Angela under My Travel Adventures |
I was reading the CNN Travel section and noticed that they were doing a special on Vatican City. They were asking for people to submit their photos of Vatican City and tell their stories. Being that we just returned from Vatican City, I thought I’d submit a few photos. A few days later, I received an email from a CNN reporter letting me know that they were considering my photos for their final selection. They sent me a few interview questions and I replied with my answers. I also told my story of how I was by myself when I took these photos because it was the day Jason had to go to Florence to retrieve our passports. At least he knew I was really there !
The final 9 were chosen and posted on the main CNN Travel Section. 2 of them were mine! You can check it out here.
http://www.cnn.com/2009/TRAVEL/getaways/04/10/travel.snaps.vatican/index.html
It is the one in middle right and bottom left. Posted below are the photos with my quotes:
It cost Ramirez-Bartels 7 euros (and many calories!) to climb to the top of the St. Peter’s Basilica dome, but it was worth it. “I was able to oversee Vatican City. It was truly beautiful.”
Angela Ramirez-Bartels found the interior of St. Peter’s Basilica the best part of Vatican City. “The interior of St. Peter’s really and truly took my breath away. The massiveness, the sparkling floors, the shiny statues, and the paintings — all of this was so hard to appreciate in just one sitting.”
Italy / Paris Trip Recap
| April 6, 2009 | Posted by Angela under My Travel Adventures |
I wanted to provide a recap on our Italy / Paris trip.
Many people might wonder, why the heck don’t you just book through a travel agency or travel with a group? Here are a couple of reasons:
1) I want to know exactly where our money is going. I don’t like to see one lump sum. I want to be able to cut costs where possible.
2) Groups mean that we have to do what the group is doing. What if we want to wander on our own for a while? I want to be in more control of our time.
3) It’s more adventurous doing it on your own.
4) I actually love planning trips.
As mentioned before, I studied in Spain when I was in college. After returning back to the US, 2 years later I planned a 2 week vacation to travel through Spain with my mom and sister. After planning the Spain trip, I realized how much fun I had putting it together. So when we decided to go to Italy and Paris, I got a rush of excitement to start the planning! Here are some tips just in case you are interested.
Flights.
Vayama.com is the best. They are like Kayak.com but specialize in international flights with origin in the US. They search all airlines finding the best price possible.
We paid $750/pp roundtrip from SAT to Rome. Right now, the prices are actually dropping the closer you get to the date due to the lack of traveling being done in this economy. However, it’s difficult for anyone to plan a trip to Europe a couple of weeks before – you usually want to plan 6 months ahead. So I thought $750 was actually pretty good.
Doing your Research.
As soon as I booked the flight, I started searching for a good book about traveling through Italy. I picked up Pauline Frommer’s Italy – Spend Less, See More. Highly recommended. She actually writes for various countries, not just Italy. Why I liked this book:
1) Best Times. In the US, we expect everything to be open 24/7 or at least from 9am-9pm. Europe is a bit different on their hours – closing at odd hours or closed on random days. She will let you know about this up front. She will also let you know when the worst time is to go due to the lines.
2) Invdividual vs. Group. While in Rome, we opted to do group tours which Paulin recommended. This was the best decision we made, saving us so much time and provided us an education at the same time. For example, we booked a tour for Vatican City. When we went to enter in the Vatican museum, there were 2 lines – tour groups and individual. The individual line looked about 3 hours long whereas our group walked right in – no wait. I can’t even imagine the summer!
3) Traditional vs. Non Traditional Hotel. Hotels in high tourist cities are expensive, period. Especially when you book in the city center. Pauline recommends other forms of accommodations for example: apartments and even monasteries and in neighborhoods outside the city center.
4) Restaurants. She recommends restaurants at all price levels and in various locations of the city.
5) Information, Information! She provides websites, phone numbers, addresses.
6) Education. Let’s say you decide to go see a gallery, museum, cathedral, or any historic site on your own- she will provide you an education on that site as if you were in grade school all over again learning about the history of Italy. I really enjoyed this because it’s more than just seeing, you are actually understanding and appreciating what you are seeing.
Accommodations.
I recommend doing your research on TripAdvisor.com and doing your bookings through Venere.com.
TripAdivsor has an extensive amount of reviews done by consumers. You can read through people’s comments to understand if certain hotels are ideal for you whether you are a family with children, young couple or elderly. Further, you can weigh out location vs. cost. European cities actually aren’t large in space as most US cities are, well Texan cities for sure. Even if you stay in a neighborhood outside the city center, a walk to the city center is no more than 30 minutes. Or you can always take public tranportation such as the bus, metro, taxi – all very safe, easy to use and accessible.
This trip was the first time I had ever used Venere.com. Comparing to Expedia, Travelocity, Orbitz, Hotels.com – Venere had the best prices. Not only that, you don’t have to pay upfront whereas you have to with lots of hotel resllers such as Hotels.com. This was so convenient because as we got closer to our trip dates, I realized that hotel prices had dropped. I went and cancelled all our bookings and rebooked. It was so easy to do through Venere.com.
I will mention the hotels we stayed out again:
Rome, Italy – WRH Trastevere Hotel (134 Euros/night). Apartment style, no elevator. Great room – Clean, modern. Free laptop in room with free internet. 20 minute walk to city center. Rome is a bigger city than most normal European cities so the tourist attractions are spread out all over.
Paris, France – Hotel Valadon (only 130 Euros/night). 10 min walk to the Eiffel Tower. Superb rooms- clean, modern. Free Internet.
Milan, Italy -NH Grand Hotel Verdi (157 Euros/night). Milan is an expensive city because it attracts businesses. Our hotel was a chain in Europe attracting business people. Nice, clean and close to the central station. About a 20 min walk to the city center. No free internet.
Venice, Italy – Hotel Ca’Pisani (159 Euros/night). Loved this hotel! Awesome service. Clean rooms, very cozy. Only 15 min walk to the city center.
Florence, Italy – Una Hotel Vittoria (141 Euros/night). About 30 min walk to city center. Very retro, modern hotel. Downfall was that Internet cost 3 Euros per 1/2 hour, what a rip off!
Attractions – Why we were there.
Make reservations for everything! I know you might not want to be bound to a scheduled itinerary but it’s so worth it, even if you don’t make a couple of your scheduled attractions. Seriously, if you are going to a city and you don’t want to leave without seeing a certain thing – for example, the Colesseum in Rome – then I recommend making reservations. Lots of attractions will sell out months in advance like the Last Supper in Milan.
I also recommend booking tours in Rome as mentioned before. The tour group we booked with was EnjoyRome – a recommendation from Pauline Frommer’s book. They were highly educated individuals and gave very thorough tours. Benefit was that groups get priority entrance also!
Getting around.
Europe has one of the best public transportation systems. Traveling from city to city is super easy and affordable. When we decided to go to Rome, we knew that we wanted to see other cities, taking advantage of our time there. To travel through Italy, we utilized TrenItalia: Milan to Venice 2.5 hours. Venice to Florence 2.5 hours. Florence to Rome 1.5 hours. Going from Florence to Rome was 33 Euros one way for example. Also, you can schedule and pay ahead via their website or you can book when you get there. I’d say book at least a week in advance maybe sooner in the summer just so you can esnure you get a seat. The benefit though is that trains leave and come very frequently to all the major cities so you should find something.
We did go to Paris while there but although we could have utlizied the train, we opted to fly. Mainly because it would have taken us all day to travel to Paris or we could have done a night train. Really, the flight was so cheap and the fact that it took only 2 hours to fly from Rome to Paris just made more sense to us. There are 2 popular low cost airlines in Europe: Ryanair and EasyJet. We went with EasyJet mainly because I have heard of so many horror stories on Ryanair. EasyJet had great service. Just remember that this is not Southwest Airlines. Yes, it’s a low cost carrier but Southwest Airlines is an exceptional airline. EasyJet will ding you for excess buggage items and weight or charge you to get on a new flight if you missed your flight.
When to go.
We chose March because the timing fit our schedules best. As you know, prices go way up for the summer. You will get the best prices from Fall through Spring. Also, do not go in August. Besides the fact that is it so hot, everything is closed ( meaning shops and such). Europeans leave the cities for the beaches during August. The weather is similar to the weather here in the US. We got some crazy cold days while in Rome and Paris. It was nice 60′s one day and then dropped down to the 40′s another day – sounds like Texas, huh. That’s just the randonmess of Spring weather I suppose. If you do go in the summer, it will be hot and and you are at historic sites so many times, the AC will not be like AC here in the US. Prepare to sweat!
Overall
I am a pretty organized traveler. I print all documents beforehand and organize it in a binder. I still managed to get one airport location wrong though. And we managed to forget our passports in one city. Next time we will have a checklist to follow just for an extra double check.
When we were checking in for our final flight back home, we conversed with this retired couple in front of us. They had spent 6 days in Rome and had years of travel experience. They asked us about our trip and what we learned. I told her about our mishaps. She laughed and said, no matter what, each trip you learn something new.
She was right. I thought about my last Spain trip and I specifically told my mom and sister that we don’t need to pack a lot since we will shop there. Well, we managed to pack a lot and buy a lot and our suitcase was just too large and unmanageable to take on trains. We ended up shipping it back via ship! It took 2 months to get back to us.
So this trip, I did a way better job of packing and thought twice before I purchased anything.
But as that woman said, you learn something everytime. This time, I will learn to follow a checklist and make sure I read in between the lines.
Overall it was such a wondeful trip and we absolutely, no question, want to return to Rome. That city leaves you wanting more.
Back to Rome and then back home – We made it!
| April 2, 2009 | Posted by Angela under My Travel Adventures |
We caught a train from Florence back to Rome early Monday morning. We were scheduled to fly out of Rome back to the US on Tuesday morning. I booked us at the Hilton Airport Hotel that way we didn’t have to rush in a taxi through traffic Tuesday morning; we could just walk directly from the hotel to our terminal. Our plan was to wander around Rome some more and go back to the sites we wanted to see again: St. Peter’s Basilica, Spanish Steps and the Colosseum.
We arrived at the hotel around noon. As a foreigner, every hotel will ask you for your passport. So I pulled out our travel book that has all our credit cards, money, receipts and identification. Hmm, our passports were not there. Jason and I looked at each other and he said: “Did you get them out of the safe?” What?? No! I didn’t put them in the safe and so I didn’t think to take them out. We had the front desk call our hotel in Florence immediately to check. Yes, they were sitting there nicely in the safe of our Florence hotel. Nice.
They made copies of our passports and faxed them over so at least we could check in the hotel. There was no way we were leaving Italy without our passports though – we needed them for our flight. I called DHL to ask for same day shipment and it was doable…for 400 Euros! It cost 70 Euros roundtrip on train from Rome to Florence. So we had to make a decision fast. Jason went back to Florence to retrieve them while I stayed in Rome. Not an ideal situation but that was really our only option.
So there I was wandering Rome by myself. First to do item was to go back to St. Peter’s Basilica and climb the dome. It costs 7 Euros to go up. I thought I was climbing to see the interior of the dome. Well, that was just one part. You can see the interior of the dome so basically you are standing at the highest point within the Basilica. You don’t get a great view because there is a chain fence that hinders your view. The purpose of the fence was apparently to prevent suicides which was a problem that occurred in the 80′s.
After seeing the inside of the dome, there is more to see which means more to climb. You begin going up a spiral staircase. The hall is extremely narrow and the right side wall is slanted inward not leaving you lots of space. I am pretty healthy and in shape but damn, this staircase made me sweat and breathe hard as if this was the first phsyical activity I was doing in a year! I was sweating and I had to stop a couple of times to take off layers. There was a couple in front of me struggling. I couldn’t believe how narrow the staircase was. It was a bit nerve wrecking because it seemed never-ending and you couldn’t foresee the end of it. There were little windows ever so often to let air circulate in. It was the late afternoon and it was March so there weren’t many people climbing this. I was thinking about the summer when the heat was overwhelming and lines were at a stand still, there has to have been people that had heat strokes, clausterphobic or anxiety attacks. I wondered how paramedics would get in or even know if there was an emergency. Anyways, this was all going through my head, I guess also because I was by myself.
I finally made it to the top and wow, it was so worth it! It was such a big breath of fresh air. I was able to oversee Vatican city – it was truly beautiful. I got some good snapshots. I wondered around on top a bit but there is hardly room to manuever through. I was really wishing Jason was there 
After this, I went back down which naturally, was a lot easier than going up! I wondered through the Basilica again. There was a service going on also. I was feeling a bit hungry so I stopped by a cafe near the Vatican and woah, I spent 20 Euros on pizza, a soda, and gelato. The soda alone was 6.50 Euros! What a rip off – I suppose because it was tourist town.
I got on the metro and headed towards the Spanish steps. Tons of people crowded this area. I took some photos from the bottom and then you’d think I was tired of stairs but I went ahead and climbed the top. I think I did more of a work out in one day that I have done in an entire month! Viewing from the top was also beautiful. Since it wasn’t the summer, lots of the flowers weren’t blooming yet but that was ok. I still got some good photos.
I then wandered around a bit. I decided to head back to Trevi Fountain. That fountain just amazes me. It is so beautiful. I feel like it needs more space. Such a massive fountain in such a small plaza. It’s hard to sit there and appreciate it. It’s jam packed with people too.
Jason and I had a plan. We were to meet at the train station infront of a store between 8:30 and 9pm. If neither one of us were there, we were to head back to the hotel which was a 30 minute train ride. I got on the metro and headed back to the train station. I went to the place we said we would meet. There he was! It was so cheesy but it felt romantic 
It was dark now so we wanted to go to the Coloseum and get some shots of it at night. That was lots of fun. We stopped and had some dessert and coffee and decided to head back to the hotel.
Our trip had come to an end.
We woke up early the next day and arrived 2.5 hours early for our flight. Come to find out that our Alitalia flight had been canceled. At this point everything was just amusing. Please, throw something else at us, please. So I had to go to speak to an Alitalia representative and she told me to go speak to a Continental rep in another terminal. We got on a shuttle to the next terminal. No Continental rep. Apparently they have random hours and only show up 3 hours before the next flight. Continental was the only airline that had a flight to Newark which is where we had our connecting flight scheduled from. We really needed to get on that flight!
I called Continental and they wanted to charge us a ridiculous amount. Finally, the Continental rep showed up at the airport. Long story short, we got on the flight – at no cost… and we caught our connecting flight to San Antonio. 5 hour lay overs are really worth it sometimes, you never know what will happen!!!
We arrived at 12 midnight and managed to be at work at 9am in the next morning. We are already back into the swing of American culture, WORK. Ugh!
I will write a post soon regarding travel tips just in case anyone is interested for future reference.
Ciao!
When in Rome…
| March 22, 2009 | Posted by Angela under My Travel Adventures |
…Eat pizza, have some gelato, drink lots of wine and enjoy your surroundings.
Our Hotel – WH Trastevere Hotel
We arrived in Rome safely and with all our luggage. We caught the metro from the airport to our neighborhood, WH Trastevere Hotel. Trastevere is the neighborhood on the “other” side of the Tiber river. You go east to cross the river into the city center of Rome. Our apartment/hotel was on a side street down an alley. It’s literally an apartment and we were on the 2nd floor. We walked in to find a greeting area where we met Alex and Maria. There was a community kitchen where can make some coffee and have a pastry. There were about 4 rooms and ours was the first on the right. They provided us with a laptop and free wireless internet. The weather was nice so we had the window open. We were so exhausted so we dropped our luggage and crashed.
Galleria Borghese
I had reservations for us to see the Galleria Borghese museum that evening. We woke up in just in time. The Galleria Borghese is famous for some the of the world’s most extensive art collections including paintings and sculptures by Raphael, Rubens, Titian, Caravaggio, Bernini, Antonello da Messina and Canova. It is located on the far north east side of Rome in a beautiful park.
Although we weren’t allowed to take photos inside the Galleria, I did get one photo of Bernini’s Pluto and Proserpina sculpture. This piece was done in 1621 and the details are so amazing that you can sense the intensity. You can see where Pluto’s hand grabs into the flesh of Proerpina’s leg.
We had dinner at a cozy restaurant on our way back to our hotel. Jason had the biggest calzone I had ever seen. Forgot to get a photo.
Vatican City
The next morning we had a tour scheduled for Vatican City. A cold front blew in that night so it was about 20 degrees colder than the day before. So it isn’t just Texas that gets crazy weather! Booking a tour is the best way to go because you get priority admittance. If you go on our own, you will wait in a line for an hour or longer. The lines were crazy and this was only March, I can only imagine the summer. Cristina, our tour guide, was a native Italian but spoke English and she was an archeologist. She was great! We had head phones so we could hear her more clearly. I cannot tell you how crowded Vatican city is. So many tourists packed into rooms like sardines. It’s hard to hear your tour guide and hard to appreciate the artwork because you are constantly moving. We saw the Sistine Chapel and St. Peter’s Basilica. Photos cannot capture the beauty and the massiveness of everything we saw but we tried.
Jewish Ghetto and Trastevere Neighborhood
That afternoon, we had a separate walking tour scheduled for the Jewish Ghetto and Trastevere, our neighborhood! There were only 4 of us on this tour and it is essentially wandering the streets but learning about your surroundings. The Jewish Ghetto is a neighborhood near the Tiber river. Historically, it is where the Jews were forced to live. It was chosen near the river because it often flooded and it wasn’t an ideal place to live. Today, the Jewish Ghetto is a desirable place to live because of the history and it’s characteristics. We did see a synagogue and it was the location where a bombing occurred in 1982 killing a little boy.
We also saw an old amphitheater shaped like the Colosseum. People often mistake this theater to be the Colosseum if they hadn’t seen the Colosseum before. It was built before the Colosseum and it was where Romans would go to watch plays – mostly comedies. It was the main attraction until the Colosseum began having their Gladiator games. The amphitheater lost the popularity. They tried to compete by doing real enactments of murders where they would take live prisoners and kill them on stage. It still couldn’t compete with the Colosseum so it eventually closed down.
Here is the fountain of turtles. I took this photo for my brother since he likes turtles. The original fountain was built without the turtles and added hundreds of years later. This is the most simple fountain in Rome and I think is more appreciated for that reason.
We went on to tour the Trastevere neighborhood. We saw many churches and plazas. One of the churches we saw was the church of St. Cecilia founded in the 5th century. St. Cecilia suffered martyrdom between 176 and 180. I was so fascinated by the fact that when they opened her tomb in 1595, they found that her body wasn’t fully corrupted and you could still see blood from where her neck was cut. A statue was made based on this finding.
Our tour guide for the Jewish Ghetto and Trastevere was originally from Detroit. She studied in Florence while in college and went back to visit 2 years later. She never left and has been living in Rome for the past 9 years. She isn’t sure if or when she will go back. She had some great stories and was very educated on Roman history. We walked through a plaza in Trastevere and she said that there are Roman ruins of the baths under the parking area but the locals today don’t want to dig up because then they would have to give up their parking and parking was already limited. It made me laugh because I am sure the locals are so tired of ruins being found left and right because it takes up their space. Here is me standing on the oldest bridge in Rome, Ponte Frabricio, built in 62 B.C. Made me a little nervous to stand on it!
Restaurant in Trastevere- Spirito Di Vino
That night we ate at Spirito Di Vino. I had read about this restaurant in a book and it was actually located right down the street from our hotel. The cuisine was said to be outstanding and famous for the pork shoulder and extensive wine selection with a wine cellar in the basement. A roman statue was found under the restaurant and now sits in the Vatican museum which makes this place even more special. Since there were no nachos, Jason decided to try the pork shoulder. It is an ancient recipe said to be a favorite of Julius Cesar. The pork is marinated for 24 hours – Jason felt like a king after eating it
And to top it off, taramisu. The best both Jason and I ever had!
The Catacombs and Appian Way outside the Roman walls
The next morning we had a tour booked to see the Catacombs and ancient Roman countryside. We left the official Roman city walls to a more peaceful setting. The Catacombs are the ancient underground cemeteries of Christians dating back to the 1st century. It was very fascinating – a bit creepy too. I mean you are down deep underground in very narrow walkways with the dead… well where dead were buried. Some popes and saints were buried in these Catacombs. It was a very holy place. We weren’t allowed to take photos but we got a few.
We went down the countryside to Appian Way which is one of the most important Roman roads that connected Rome to other cities. Original parts of the road were still there. The stones were much larger. We also saw the Aqueducts which were large structures that allowed water to flow into Rome for the population of 1 million people to use. They went into the public baths and of course to the private baths of the wealthy. They were huge!
Ancient Rome
That afternoon we went to tour the rest of Ancient Rome within the city including the Colosseum, the Roman Forum, the Capitoline Hill, Trevi Fountain, the Pantheon, and Piazza Navona. The Rome marathon was being set up for the next day so the streets were crowded. Around the Colosseum was where the marathon was ending so there were gates set up everywhere making it difficult to get good photos. Those marathoners!
The Colosseum was everything we expected. I really enjoyed the Roman Forum and learning the history. It’s amazing to learn about a civilization that existed for 1200 years which is half of what the US has existed for. And to see the architecture built on top of each other through the centuries was really interesting. The Trevi Fountain was gorgeous and crowded! As was the Pantheon.
We wandered the streets for a while before coming back to our neighborhood. We ate at a local restaurant where I had meatballs and Jason had olive pizza.
In 3 days, I think we covered more than a local Roman will ever see. We still need time to take in everything. We will be coming back next Monday to wander the streets some more and spend time to take it all in.
I’d also like to comment that I booked all 4 of our tours through Enjoy Rome. As I mentioned before, it is ideal to book a tour especially for the Vatican and Ancient Rome (Colosseum and Roman Forum) because groups get priority admittance. Further, I enjoyed Enjoy Rome because the tour guides were highly educated with masters or PhD’s in archeology and history. They weren’t flamboyant and gave you factual historical information and were able to answer your questions. It was very educational. I do recommend that you take time to wander on your own to see the monuments yourself after the tour.
Time to rest up and get ready for our flight to Paris the next morning. More to come.
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