Roaming Rome

July 13

So I have successfully started the last leg of my journey. This morning we checked out of our hotel in Florence and climbed on our last bus ride to Roma. Thankfully, it wasn't too rough of a bus ride. 

For the most part on our travel days, I just sleep. I'm sure you all know how great at sleeping I am, so the traveling days aren't too bad for me. And since it's hard to be fully rested when you've been sleeping in hotels, buses, boats and trains for a month, I've been sleeping the whole rides. So yes, I did spend most of today asleep on a bus. We did get a pretty nice break in Siena for a few hours around lunch time, too. The view was beautiful. A few dedicated people even ran all the way down the hill to take pictures in sunflower fields. I didn't make that far, but it was nice to see the Duomo in Siena and just stretch my legs and refuel. 

After our lunch break, we climbed back on the bus and I went back to sleep to finish out the ride to Roma. 

Tonight we are having an unscheduled walking tour with Steve, which I'm quite looking forward too. And the next three days are quite busy, so I'll be here and there - and studiously researching and writing my term paper. But don't worry, I'll be up bright and early (if I sleep at all) on Sunday to catch my 6:20 flight home. Just found out we have to leave the hotel at 3:45. Yep, am. Giddyup! 

Anyways, I'll let you know how Roma is when I get the chance. Miss you all!
Lucy

July 14th
The walking tour last night was pretty fun. We walked around and saw some of the fountains, including the Quattro Fontane, with it the Carlino, and the Trevi Fountain. It was absolutely nuts how many people were crowding the fountain. It was really cool to see though. And in the heat of the day, it was really tempting to see - I definitely wanted to go swimming. The unfortunate scenario of a massive fine prevented me, though. 

After the Trevi, we continued to "Follow the Steve" as I like to call it. All the way up to a pub with a sign that said, "Skip the Trevi, have a bevy". It was happy hour, so Steve continued right on inside. 

After just hanging out for a while, a few of us decided to split off and find some dinner. I honestly don't know how Italians take so long to eat - I'm usually ravenous by the time we sit down, and then the lax atmosphere doesn't put my food in front of me right away and I get so antsy. Hopefully I'll manage to have a proper meal and not be antsy at least once before the end of the trip! 

Anyways, after a nice dinner, we wandered back to the hotel and my exhaustion brought me straight to bed. Unfortunately, I woke up with a head full of congestion. Not fun, especially on the one morning we had to wake up extra early for a trip to the Vatican. 

But don't worry, I'm a trooper. Popped my sudafed, stole a large amount of tissues from our hotel room, and began chugging water to hydrate. The benefits of my high tech medicinal techniques has yet to kick in, but I'm still trooping. And the Vatican was still awesome. It was quite huge, and our guide told us more than plenty about everything we saw. But it was worth it. Wearing my dress, tights and sweater to be fully covered (in the nice, sweltering summer weather) was worth it. The Sistine Chapel is so crazy. So are the guards who yell, like clockwork, "Shhhhh! Silence! No foto!". I might have enjoyed making fun of them. The ceiling was cool too :) At Steve's recommendation, I'm considering getting a book on it, because you definitely can't study it in a brief twenty minute visit with a million of your not close friends. And your neck starts to hurt after awhile. But still way cool. 

Even better than the Sistine Chapel was St. Peter's Basillica. For at least the first ten minutes, I just stood there in awe, looking up. Ok, let's get real - that's how I spent the whole visit. It's phenomenal. And massive! I definitely felt like a small child or even just a tiny doll in a massive doll house. A more than massive play house. It was nuts. But so cool. The ceilings, the floors, the sculptures, the mosaics, and just it all. I'll stop listing every aspect, but it was wonderful. One of my friend's took some nice pictures (for her and me) so I'll post them later. Get pumped! 

Sidenote about pictures. I'll probably just post pictures in order of my trip when I get home. So I'll relive the trip, city by city, as I can once I'm back in the states. So stay tuned, things won't end Sunday! 

Anyways. After the Vatican, the sudafed was wearing off so I drugged back up and took an epic nap for the afternoon. I was still feeling rough afterwards, but I did manage to start my paper... And I'm now in a theater, typing this on my phone, waiting to see Harry Potter 7.2 - needless to say, I'm excited and need to go! 

Let you know what I'm up to later, after my date with Harry :) 
Lucy