Our next stop on our Tourist trail took us to a lovely campsite – Camping Tiber Roma. Great site with good facilities and a nice pool to cool down in after a busy day roaming Rome.
We pitched up between two trees (a terrible idea seeing as we had a huge storm that night!) and explored our options for the next day’s adventure to Rome.
The campsite runs a shuttle service to and from the local train station, so the next day we got up early and caught the train into Rome. We just about made the train – I got wedged in the closing doors and had to be pulled through them by Guy. Slightly embarrassing!
The twenty minute journey took us to our first stop of the day – Vatican City. We joined the long queue to enter St. Peter’s Basilica – not the worst place in the world to queue and take in the majestic surroundings.
Finally reaching the end of the queue, we went through airport style security and a check to ensure we were dressed modestly enough, luckily I knew this in advanced and made sure I had my legs and shoulders/arms covered.
Walking into St.Basilica you are immediately hit by the scale of the place, you really do feel the importance of building to the Catholic faith and if you were ever unsure you were somewhere special, you are instantly reminded by the elbows and shoulders of people barging you out the way to get their perfect shot. We spent a while just strolling around the basilica, taking in all it’s intricate detail and marvellous decoration.
When we’d finally had enough of being elbowed by photographers, we made our way over to the Pantheon. It is hard to believe that it is almost 2000 years old! The engineering of the dome is incredible – again, hard to believe given it’s age.
Next, we accidentally stumbled upon the Trevi Fountain. Hidden at the junction of two small streets, we wondered what the crowd of people were watching. It wasn’t until we rounded the corner of the building that we realised where we were.
The fountain is exquisitely beautiful and predictably busy. We had to wait patiently to squeeze our way to the waters edge to look at some of the estimated 3000 euros that are thrown into the fountain daily. Of course, we contributed our own 2 Euro donation over our left shoulder for luck.
The colosseum loomed next on our agenda and by a happy coincidence a cultural celebration that week meant we entered for free.
Walking around the colosseum, the icon of the Roman empire, you could almost be in ancient Rome.
Again, this structure is almost 2000 years old and so impressive. The scale of everything is so great that even by today’s standards, this is an incredible piece of architecture.
From the colosseum you can walk to the ancient Palatine Hill – the most central area of what was ancient Rome.
Walking amongst the ruins, you get a real feel for the ancient streets and buildings that made up the ancient city.
Looking down at the ancient centre from the higher view points, you can take in some of the more complete buildings and piece together the ruins to imagine a bustling ancient city.
We spent the rest of our day wondering around the city, stumbling upon landmarks and picture postcard streets.
We spent some time walking around a peaceful park area where people were filling up water bottles from a water pump – when in Rome, do as the Roman’s do! This proved to be a mistake as we spent the rest of our trip being pretty sick! We came, we saw and Rome conquered!
Rome is a beautiful city, full of life and bursting with history, it is definitely one to add to your bucket list! Next on our list; Venice!
Live, Learn, Love
Laura