J. Chaffey Blog 3

Today we leave Rome and head to Florence and as soon as we arrive we get straight to it and jump on a train to the Leaning Tower of Pisa and pose like every other tourist. We spent a long time Rome compared to the other cities we will see. However, Rome definitely deserved all the time we spent in it and there was never a dull moment from walking around the Colosseum to gazing upwards at the work of Michelangelo in St Peter’s Basilica. Thankfully Rome is in much better condition than Greece and there are fewer stray dogs and not as much rubbish or graffiti and the trains are so much better than anything like home. Yesterday we saw Pompeii and that was mind blowing because I had read and heard so much about it that it was fascinating to see it for once in real life, even if the plaster casts of the dead bodies were rather depressing. A similar place to Pompeii was Ostia which was an old town that was situated on the mouth of the Tiber and we ended up playing “accumulative” tiggy which made the ruins that much more fun to explore as you were frantically searching for a spot to hide or trying to evade our fellow players.  On Friday we walked to the Vatican and spent the day exploring the Sistine Chapel and St Peter’s Basilica, what made the day that much more interesting is that we were free to explore by ourselves by about 2 30 which meant we got to explore St Peter’s in our own time. Because  of this luxury a few of us decided to pay the 5 euros to walk to the top of the dome and look down upon the people within and then look out over the whole of Rome. The night was topped off by finding a cheap and tasty restaurant whose chef looked like he could have been from the mob and so we nick-named him Fat Tony, his pasta was simply to die for. Just like Greece I don’t think I could ever live here but I would like to return to see it all again but I certainty would not be able to do it at the pace we have, to do what we have done in a mere 6 days is nothing short of a miracle with a few close calls on timing. Just before I go I must admit being able to use a washing machine to do all my washing at once was so good and for only 2 euros to wash and dry (we split it between 4 of us) it made everything smell nice and meant I had more time to explore Rome and so was 2 euros well spent!