…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.
