Shane Life

Continued from earlier…

Rome is much bigger than I expected.

After finishing up at the Vatican and walking all around the basilica, we somehow got lost looking for food. We made our way back to Caffe Leonardo for the second night in a row.

The next day we walked around the rest of Rome that we planned to see. We started at Palantine Hill, a large group of ruins that sits above the Colosseum. We then took a guided tour of the Colosseum with an absolutely mad woman. Over the course of the tour, she managed to offend Americans, Chinese, Japanese, Romans, Fascists, Christians (sort of), and somehow animals. We walked through the Roman forums, up to the Trajan Market (the worlds first mall! - according to the map), over to Piazza Navona, and then to the Pantheon.

The Pantheon is beautiful. It’s hard to believe that it was originally used as pagan temple because when you step into the building, the presence of God is palpable. I felt extremely close to God during our time in the church. The most stunning feature of the church is obviously the oculus, which was in its full splendor when we arrived around 4 in the afternoon.

We got some gelato and then went over to Trevi Fountain where we found another American couple who we exchanged pictures with. It’s interesting - when you are in a foreign country, biases about cities you live in, etc. are thrown out the door because you are just so happy to hear English. The folks that we met at the fountain were from St. Louis, our cross-state rival, but we were pleased to speak with them for a while. We had a similar experience on our tour of the cupola where we met perhaps one of the friendliest New Yorkers we’d ever come into contact with.

After the fountain, we returned again to Caffe Leonardo for another half-liter of the house white and some dinner. It was a big day and we were pretty famished by that point. Our strategy for Rome had been to eat as much breakfast at the hotel as we could. The Rome Hilton has a “continental” breakfast that was included with our room because my dad is a gold card Hilton member and an all-around good guy. The only thing “continental” about the breakfast was that there was enough food to feed a small continent. Each morning we gorged ourselves on fresh fruit (at least I did), made-to-order omelets, 8 kinds of fresh-squeezed juice (the blood orange juice was the best), more pastries and breads than I could imagine, and the best brewed coffee I’ve tasted in my entire life. We figured with a breakfast like this, we could do 2 meals per day in Rome and dinner ended up being at Caffe Leonardo every night. Usually we ate an early breakfast, which wasn’t exactly regular, but since our favorite restaurant was open at that time, we figured it made sense to do it this way. It worked for us…people who are more “foodie” will probably choose a different way.

That evening after we returned to the hotel, we headed down to the lobby terrace that overlooked the pool for the evening. We caught up on our journaling for a few hours while we drank more of their wonderful Holland coffee (all I know about it is that it was FROM Holland, but I’ve yet to find it and figure out where I can buy it) and listened to the lounge singer who was entertaining the nighttime pool crowd (and by “crowd”, I mean the 10 or so people up on the terrace enjoying the beautiful Roman evening).

The lounge singer was great, covering everything from traditional Italian songs to “Roxanne” by The Police. Most of what she sang were lounged-up covers of American pop songs with an Italian accent. It was such an enjoyable evening sitting outside and speculating on what she would sing next. Time passed quickly and we ended up not turning in until after 1 a.m.

The next morning, on the recommendation of one of our waitresses at Caffe Leonardo, we visited the Gallery Borghese, an art museum that is a part of the large park in Rome, Villa Borghese. We had to make a reservation to get into the gallery, so we were excited about what we might see, even though we had not heard much about the collection. It turned out to be not very good at all.

The collection was very well put together and all came from one guy - some Cardinal from a long time ago who was related to some Pope (whatever happened to that vow of poverty?) - but this place was knotted up like Fort Knox. You couldn’t take ANY bags in and it cost more to enter than it did to get into the Vatican. Based on the collection that we saw, I couldn’t figure out what the big deal was all about - it was mostly sculpture and stuff that I didn’t really recognize (nor did Alli, who took Art History). Not really our cup of tea.

After our alotted two hours in the museum (we didn’t need both hours), we walked around the park a bit, stopping for a while near a fountain, where we both got out our journals and drew. Yes, I attempted to draw. While Alli took on the Colosseum, I tried my best to sketch the fountain in front of us. It was a pretty cool experience and Alli seemed proud of me, which was enough for me.

We walked to Piazza Popola at the Northern entrance to Rome and then back to…you guessed it…Caffe Leonardo for our last night in Rome. The next morning we were headed for our final destination - The Amalfi Coast.

Out of all the cities we visited, I would say that I was most looking forward to visiting Rome. There’s something about the city where modern civilization seemingly started - a city rich with both religious and political history - that made me anxious to visit it. I think that what I envisioned was something more like Paris or Venice, where the historical parts of Rome were preserved instead of intermingled with a bustling metropolis. Rome just seemed crazy to me and I didn’t like it nearly as much as I wanted to. Perhaps the terrific hotel room spoiled it for us; maybe it made us just want to hang in our room more than explore the city. I still wouldn’t trade that hotel room (and that breakfast!) for anything.

After another great night’s sleep and another wonderful breakfast, we once again found ourselves on a train headed for a new location. This time, our destination was Naples, but only briefly, as we would then meet the head of the Italian Taxi Mob himself, Claudio, who would then take us to our last stop on the trip - Villa Scarpariello Relais.

And yes…that was the view out of our room.

UPDATE: Alli’s Rome post.

One of the things that we were really excited about our trip was that we were going to get to celebrate our 7th Wedding Anniversary in a foreign country! It worked out that we the day of our anniversary ended up being our travel day from Florence to Rome. Even so, what lied ahead of us in Rome was reason enough to celebrate.

I spent the short train ride to Rome catching up on some reading (I ended up reading 3 books while on vacation, I think, which was so nice) and when we arrived, we quickly realized that, compared to Florence, Rome was a whole other ballgame. Roma Termini (the main train station in Rome) is the size of some airport terminals and about 10 times busier. We made our way off the terminal toward the exit, looking for the taxi stand.

As we neared the taxi stand, I saw an older fellow standing by some other drivers and he hurriedly grabbed our bags and shoved them into his dilapidated old brown Mercedes station wagon that curiously didn’t have anything close to a sign that said “Taxi” on it. CRAP.

We took the taxi anyway up to our hotel, The Rome Cavalieri Hilton, named one of the best hotels in the world. You might ask how we managed to stay at such a beautiful place. Well, the truth is this: my dad travels all over the world for business and had a TON of points. He converted those points for an anniversary present to us - a wonderful anniversary present that allowed us to stay in our nicest hotel yet.

Our room was huge - a big, clean bathroom, a sitting area, a king-size bed with 4 pillows each, and room-darkening shutters. You heard me correctly - Room. Darkening. Shutters. When we got into our room, Alli was running around in it just because she could. After almost 2 weeks of small hotels and bed & breakfasts, this really was a welcome luxury, especially on our anniversary!

Once we unpacked all our things (the first time we’d actually unpacked out of our suitcases), we took the hotel shuttle down into the main area of Rome, craving some good food. I realized that we were quite close to the Spanish Steps, so we took a side street and ended up at the top of the steps. We were just getting ready to walk down the steps when I heard a vaguely familiar voice. I turned around to see who it was and my jaw dropped.

Life goes by pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.

That’s right. Ferris FREAKING BUELLER. Looking closer, I realized that the person that Matthew Broderick was talking to was none other than his wife, Miss Sex-and-the-City-Carrie-Bradshaw-herself, Sarah Jessica Parker. Don’t believe me?

That’s her with the two bags in the middle. The navy blue-shirted guy (whose face you can’t see) to her right is Broderick and the non-entity that both are addressing between them is their son. With the lesson of Jude Law behind us, we knew we must photograph the occasion, so we snapped this picture and a couple others. Unfortunately, I tried to be all coy about it and they didn’t turn out quite as well as I would have liked, but still…Carrie Bradshaw and Ferris Bueller. HOW COOL!

Since their son was with them, we again left them alone and went off in search of food. We found a great cafe just around the corner called Caffe Leonardo. It was a relatively small place, but given its location near a very touristy area of Rome, almost their entire staff spoke great English and they were more than willing to help us out. We liked Caffe Leonardo so much that we ended up eating there every night we were in Rome. Some might call that short-sighted or unimaginative, but we enjoyed the atmosphere and the fact that by the second time we came back, they remembered us.

The next day we decided to tackle the Vatican Museum and the Sistine Chapel. We also ended up visiting St. Peter’s Basilica and Square as well, but not after waiting in one heck of a line to get into the museum. We got in line at about 8:00 AM, 2 full hours before the doors opened to the general public. With this in mind, we were still a good half to 3/4 of a mile back in a line that seemed to go on forever. We were surrounded by touring groups of students who…I’ll stop there before I say too much.

The Vatican’s collection is rivaled by few museums in the world; it is fascinating and massive and includes works from many different eras. Obviously, the collection of religious art is unequaled anywhere in the world. Alli and I made our way slowly through the galleries, savoring every moment in that we could. Passing through the rooms containing Raphael’s beautiful frescoes was so inspirational. Alli and I were glad that we’d invested the €6 to have the informational walkie-talkies along the way. We learned a lot about the vast collection and enjoyed hearing the stories behind the pieces that we liked.

Everything leads you to the Sistine Chapel. It’s a maze of rooms previously occupied by popes and other important Vatican figures. Finally, after seeing 100 or so signs reading “Capella Sistina” you arrive in the small chapel considered as the pope’s church and famous for the beautiful frescoes on the walls and ceiling designed by Michelangelo.

This was moment was one of the biggest reasons for making the trip. As an artist, Alli had always dreamed of coming to Italy and seeing these works of the masters and the Sistine Chapel was at the top of the list. You’d have to ask her to be sure, but I think that the look on her face would tell you that it was worth the wait. Many people had mentioned that it is smaller than you think it will be, but that wasn’t what startled me…it was the absolute magnificence of Michelangelo’s work. Alli and I stood in the Sistine Chapel for at least an hour, just craning our necks and staring all around us at this unbelievable expression of what human beings are capable of when God helps. It is truly spectacular.

After our time in the Sistine Chapel, we exited the museum through an absolutely beautiful staircase that someone said was designed by Michelangelo as well. and made our way toward St. Peter’s Square. The plan was at least to see the inside of the basilica, but we ended up taking the cupola tour, which was about 700 steps up winding, narrow staircases to the very top of the largest cathedral in the world.

You get some spectacular views on the tour, first from the inside of the basilica looking down into it:

Then once you get to the top you can see all of Rome:

To get there, you have to climb up staircases that look like this:

Insane.

OK…before this post goes on and on, I’ll split it up over two. So…

To be continued…