The lost pictures of Paris

Ryan has been holding out on us!!! Here is a sampling of the newest uploads today for our viewing pleasure:

Imagine this one without all of the people...magnificent hall in Versailles Palace

My favorite room in Versailles

Part of the garden of Versailles

Exploring with our kayak!

We decided to go exploring with our new tender for The Perfect Temperature....it was such a gorgeous evening!

Fragola Gelato

On our secondo giorno (second day), my friends from London met us at our hostel and we all walked together to meet Ryan's family at the Arch of Constanstine (you can just see it in the back in the above photo), which is adjacent to the Colosseum and makes an excellent meeting place if you lose your group! Ryan's fam decided to join a guided tour but we opted for the cheaper and more independent "walk on our own" tour which was just as lovely! The only downside was that we lost Ryan's family but fate was with us that day and we saw them a little later as we walked around the Forum.

The Colosseum is absolutely amazing and I have a hard time not including the 800 million pictures Ryan took of it on this post but I will restrain myself! It is amazing to me that they allow so many people to tour it each day and it is still standing. Handy tip: if you go right when it opens, the crowds aren't as crazy and you can enjoy it in relative peace.









It sounds ridiculous but by the end of our trip, the Colosseum had become just another landmark in our neighborhood since we saw it more than a few times each day on our way to other attractions. That doesn't mean it became any less impressive, it just became like an old familiar friend....another reason I loved Rome so much, it felt like home after a few hours...similar to another of my favorite places, Utila.





Directly adjacent to the Colosseum is the Roman Forum or, more simply, the Forum. This used to be the center of Rome and it is where you can imagine yourself walking around, in sandals, as an Ancient Roman...well, that's what I did anyhow. It also is the home of Mussolini's summer home, pictured below.

After the Forum, we were off to the Pantheon which is a temple originally built for all the gods of Ancient Rome but was later converted by the Catholic church and is still used for Mass today. The ceiling is a massive dome with an opening to the sky called an oculus. The only sources of light in the temple are from the entrance and the oculus...they are also the only means of cooling and ventilation. When it rains, there is a drainage system beneath the floor that collects any rainwater that comes in through the oculus. Imagine your church with a giant, gaping hole in the ceiling....it does seem to work very well though and you can't help but marvel at the intelligent design.



That evening, after a day of sightseeing, I got my obligatory gelato for the day (Strawberry (fragola) and hazelnut) and then we had a casual dinner near our hostel before crashing to rest up before our next day at Vatican City!

Random Photos

The oculus

The Forum

 Inside the Colosseum

Old staircase in Colosseum

 The Forum

 Sweet tree in the Forum

Original cobblestone road leading to Rome

Benvenuti in Italia!

Alright my little adventurers, now we have entered into our favorite part of the trip: Rome! I'm not sure why Ryan and I liked Rome more (probably a mixture of warmer weather, less walking and PIZZA/GELATO) but we did. Since I am so enamored with Rome, it's going to take up a few posts :) Ryan's mom and sisters enjoyed Paris more, so it really is just a matter of opinion. My opinion is that while we were in Rome, I felt like I was living in a movie. I loved throwing open the windows of our guesthouse and letting in the sights and sounds of neighbors hanging laundry from their balconies, birds flying around like crazies and diners from the restaurants below.

The first thing we did when we arrived in Rome was....check in with our hostel! I know you were expecting me to say "EAT" because that's the kinda girl I am, but we were patient and left our luggage with the front desk of our hostel first since we were a few hours early to get into our room. Then we went and got some pizza and vino bianco at a great place called Meid in Nepols where the service was friendly and the food was delicious! For about 15 euro we shared a delicious mushroom pizza and a half liter of white wine. My Italian is pretty bad but they had an English speaker who seated us and the servers were incredibly kind and patient with us and our mangling of their language :)

After lunch, it was finally time to check in so we picked up our luggage at the hostel and headed to our guesthouse. The main hostel, The Beehive, is super amazing but we actually stayed in an offsite guesthouse they own called "Acacia" which is essentially a massive 3 bedroom apartment next to the Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore (pictured to the right). For 80 euro/night we had a private room with a shared bathroom and living area. Since we were there for four nights, the other guests changed a few times but it was usually young couples that we only saw in passing and everyone was very quiet and respectful. I felt like a local as I used my key to slip into a nondescript door on the street, head up the tiny 2-4 person elevator and enter my temporary home.

Since we beat Ryan's family to Rome, we were on our own that first night so we decided to go exploring! We walked down to the Colosseum which was just a short walk from our house. I got some pistacchio and coconut gelato and it was the happiest moment of all time. Handy tip I read in a guide book for choosing a good gelato place: look at the pistacchio flavor! If it's bright green RUN!! It should be a light olive color because that means they didn't add a bunch of artificial crap. Here are a few more tips for choosing a good gelateria that I wish I had read before we arrived, it also mentions choosing gelato based on natural colors.

We wandered around to a few shops on the way back to our house but with a long day of traveling behind us, we both welcomed an early bedtime so that we'd be nice and refreshed for seeing our family and friends the next day at....the Colosseum!

Jacksonville Suns Baseball

This weekend Ryan and I faced a dilemma: we had a free Sunday afternoon and a very limited amount of money in cash because both of our debit cards had to be cancelled. Why were they cancelled? Well, apparently, the privacy information was compromised somewhere in the US that Ryan used his debit card, so they froze his account when we were in Paris! Then, when we got home from Rome, I got a call that 2 transactions had been denied in Rome...even though I was no longer there.  Sigh. So, because of some crazy people trying to steal our hard earned moola, we are without debit cards for at least another 3-5 days. I don't know how people survived before debit cards...what do you do when you need money?! I guess people used to carry more cash or more places accepted checks? First world problems. 

 

Anyway, because of all of this, we decided to check out our local minor league baseball team, the Jacksonville Suns. For 2 bleacher tickets, we paid just $15! Not too shabby! After robbing our piggy bank, we even managed to do what the song says and got some: 

I have to say, Cracker Jack's are not as delicious as I remembered as a kid! Despite the tummyache from my cherry Coke and peanuts and Cracker Jack's (I wanted ice cream and cotton candy and popcorn and cappuccino too...I'm like a 3 year old), it was still a really nice afternoon enjoying America's pastime. So the next time you have a free afternoon and not a ton of cash, support your local baseball team! (Tip: If you don't mind a little walk, don't pay the $5 for parking....if it's during the weekend, parking on the street is free!)