Day Two in Rome dawned HOT HOT HOT! We were still a bit exhausted from the slightly maniacal walking tour of the previous day. Sam was reading Four Seasons in Rome by Anthony Doerr and was looking forward to visiting the Trastevere quarter, where Doerr spent a year at the American Academy. Also, Ben and Rachel had shared their fond memories of a day and an evening there. So, we hopped on a bus and headed in that direction.
Trastevere is a charming medieval neighborhood. Very few tourists seemed to be there the day we spent wandering the streets. This was a lovely low key day. We did some wandering, we did some shopping, we ate lunch in a fabulous trattoria (Casa Mia in Trastevere) we sat under a tree by the Tiber and ate some gelato, we headed home! We did not go into a church or basilica, we missed the palazzo and skipped the frescoes! But it was a thoroughly enjoyable day without crowds or congestion.
The next day, we went back to being tourists. We scheduled a walking tour of the Vatican Museums and the Sistine Chapel. They call these tours “Skip the Line” tours, but you are still standing in a line a lot of the time. There are rigorous security checks and there are MANY “Skip the Line” tours, so you are always behind another group. The only way to truly skip the line is to go before they open and be the first one in the door!
The Map Gallery fascinated us! All of the maps in this gallery are by a friar and geographer Ignazio Danti. It took him only 3 years to complete the 40 maps. We noticed strong similarities between the hill shading by Danti and Sam’s father’s innovative hill shading technique. The map of Italy is from 1580.
Let’s just stipulate at the outset that there is an OVERWHELMING amount of art to be seen at the Vatican. Everywhere one looks – floors, ceilings, walls, indoors, outdoors – there is art. There are innumerable paintings, sculptures, mosaics and frescoes. Giotto, da Vinci, Raphael, Titian, Caravaggio, Veronese, and of course, Michaelangelo! It is clearly too much to absorb in a 3 hour tour. It would take a lifetime of study to understand the scope of what is there. That said, it was enormously pleasurable, even in the dreadful heat, to spend some time experiencing this vast treasure trove of amazing works by creative and abundantly talented human beings.
The Holy Door or ‘Porta Sancta’ by Vico Consorti built in 1950, only opened every 25 years by the Pope for the Jubilee.
Clockwise from top left: 1. The Holy Door or ‘Porta Sancta’ by Vico Consorti built in 1950. This door is only opened every 25 years by the Pope for the Jubilee. 2. The animal section of the sculpture gallery. This is a tiny fraction of the works in this area. 3. A landscape from the ceiling of the Gallery of Maps. 4. The Pièta by Michelangelo Buonarroti. He completed this magnificent sculpture at age 24! 5. Though this scene of six men, a bird and what appears to be (gasp!) a severed head, looks like a bas relief sculpture, it is actually a painting!
Day Four in Rome – You can imagine where we were headed! The Colosseum, the Forum and the Palatine Hill, of course! It was about 95˚F outside, but there is no way to skip these treasures! Again, a guided tour seemed the best way to really learn about what we were looking at. So, packing up several bottles of water, putting on our hats and walking shoes, off we went!
The amphitheater known as the Colosseum was commissioned around A.D. 70-72 by Emperor Vespasian as a gift to the Roman people. The Colosseum was built by thousands of Jewish slaves captured in Jerusalem by Titus, the son of Vespasian. It was constructed of limestone, brick, concrete and tufa, in only eight years. After his father’s death, Titus opened the Colosseum with 100 days of games, including gladiatorial combats and wild animal fights. Attending events at the Colosseum was free – if you were a male Roman citizen. Inside, the Colosseum had seating for more than 50,000 spectators, who were arranged according to social ranking. The only women allowed to attend were the Vestal Virgins. After four centuries of active use, the moral weight of a million human deaths and countless deaths of captive animals brought this magnificent creation to a halt, and up until the 18th century it was used as a source of building materials for numerous building projects, including the cathedrals of St. Peter and St. John Lateran, the Palazzo Venezia and defense fortifications along the Tiber River.
After two toasty hours of the Colosseum, our group headed up the Palatine Hill. Considered the birthplace of Rome, it was shady and a spectacular place to overlook the Forum. A rectangular plaza surrounded by the ruins of several important ancient government buildings at the center of the city of Rome, the Forum was the center of day-to-day life in Rome for centuries. There were triumphal processions, court trials, meetings of the Senate, and public speeches. This is the site of the Temple of the Vestal Virgins who tended the sacred fire, an eternal flame. There were also other temples and basilicas. Today, after intermittent archeological excavations, the Forum is a sprawling ruin of architectural fragments.
Our last evening in Rome, we did possibly the most touristy thing we’ve ever done – we took a night time driving tour of the sights of Rome, including dinner and gelato! It started around 7:30, when it is still light in Rome in late July. But St. Peter’s Square was lovely in the twilight and blessedly free of most people! The Pantheon, the Piazza Navona, the Trevi Fountain, the Colosseum and the Spanish Steps were other highlights of this quickie tour. Our guide was quite knowledgeable, but so were we, after four days of a Roman Intensive Course!
Our next target is Lucca in Tuscany. Of course there will be more ruins and cobblestones, but we’ve signed up for a pasta making class while we’re there!
Our love to you all,
Sam, Donna & LuLu
July 26, 2019
LuLu's Outta Town 
SO much fun to read! Glad to see you are still having a wonderful time. Sara
LikeLike