Day 11: ROMA, ROMA, ROMA!

Where do I even begin?? I'll start with the basics--today was our field trip to discover Rome. We started at 8:00 a.m., walked the entire time (I'm guesstimating it's around 5 miles), only had one food break, and didn't end until around 6:00 p.m. ALL of this and I don't even think we saw half of what Rome has to offer, but we did hit some of the major points! I wish I could videotape me talking about all of these places (not really though, that'd be creepy) because I may get carpel tunnel if I type all that I learned today in captions. But I will do my very best! Here are the pictures I took -- and we are going back to Roma Friday and Saturday, so there will be more. Don't fret that these aren't really blog-worthy... I'll do better this weekend (I wasn't digging my outfit and the lighting was bad... the elements just weren't adding up).

The first stop on our tour was the Spanish Steps! You could burn some calories running up these babies (196 approx.) They're ginormous. This was the crowd at 9:15 in the morning and when we walked back past it around 5:00--the numbers had tripled! An insane amount of people visit and sit on these steps every day.

Kasi, Me and Stacy in the middle of some intersection (trying to not get lost). Notice Fendi behind us! We went on the street with all of the major designer stores like Dior, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Jimmy Choo and many more... I was practically drooling over their windows.

Brittany giving us her "Expert of the Day" on the Piazza Colona.

Me in front of Emperor Trajen's column that he built for himself. The height of this column is the height of the mountain that Roman slaves had to carve out in order to build Trajen's forum. Could you imagine hollowing out a mountain this tall, made of solid rock, in this heat? Never... those Romans had some work ethic!

Can you guess what this is?? Trevi Fountain!!

Anna Curl, Noelle, Shellie and I trying to not get pick-pocketed in front of the Trevi (we were successful--we all left with our wallets untouched).

Kasi, me and Becca about to toss our coinssss

This girl was having a photo shoot in front of the Trevi--it was hysterical, so I had to add the picture in the blog. We were so tempted to go jump in her pictures.

Noelle and I tossing our coins! Lets hope those two 5 cent Euros pay off :)

After the Trevi Fountain, the Pantheon was our next stop. The Pantheon was my "Expert of the Day" so I was sweating bullets on our walk from the Trevi because I was so nervous. I am not one to love speaking in front of crowds (Jess, I should've been with you in Raven's public speaking class), so I had been dreading this very moment. But, you'll be glad to know that I survived. I said it with minor blemishes in the presentation, so that's a relief. Once I had that over with and everyone was well versed on the history of the Pantheon (thank you wikipedia), we went inside. I think all of our jaws hit the ground because it was beyond belief. Considering it is Rome's best preserved monument, it was a lot to take in. I couldn't believe the amount of effort and attention to detail that went into constructing this building. It is 2000 years old, and still being used. C-razzzzy!

This is a picture of the Pantheon's dome, which has the Oculus at the top. This dome was the inspiration for the dome of St. Peter's Basilica and the dome of the White House in Washington, D.C. (shout-out America).

Cool picture of the sunlight coming in through the Oculus.

The alter inside of the Pantheon. It's still used today for Catholic Masses.

This is another stop on our journey through Rome -- San Luigi del Francesi Church. From the outside the church wasn't much to look at, and I had never heard of it so I was not expecting much when I walked in. Boy was I wrong. This church was amazing. The ceiling, the floor, the paintings... all of it was immaculate and indescribable. I tried to get the best pictures that I could, but I'm sure they still don't do it true justice.

This is the ceiling of the church... can you believe that? All that gold!

The main alter of the church

Another picture of the ceiling (can you tell I was obsessed with it?)

Some of the paintings inside the church. Everyone was huddled around these, so I assumed they were a pretty big deal.

This is Piazza Novona. Home to the Fountain of the Four Gods, which was featured in the movie Angels and Demons. It had some fabulous paintings for sale out in the square!

Noelle, me, Shellie and Caitlyn enjoying the Piazza Novona.

All of the group could barely function in the Piazza Novona because all we could think about was lunch and sitting down (we've been walking for about 3 hours now), so we were thrilled to hear that our next stop was Campo di Fiori for a lunch break. All I saw was a little restaurant with thin slice bread (the usual thick-sliced bread that everyone has in Italy is seriously going to give me TMJ it's so hard and tough), so I headed straight for it. Turns out that was a very good impulse decision because our lunch was delicious and cheap. 2 of my favorite adjectives. I had a panini with mozzarella and proscuittio and a coke zero. And we got to sit and enjoy it on this little bench--so picturesque.

This is the monument of Victor Emmanuel II... better known as the "Wedding Cake" because it is this MASSIVE white building in the heart of Rome. It's made completely of marble, but it's extremely white marble so it doesn't blend in with the rest of the city. Truth is, this white is what all of the marble buildings in ancient Rome used to look like, but they've just faded now because they're old.

I thought the Ivy on this building was beautiful (and with the Italian flag... perfection)!

Our LAST stop -- woohoo! The Church of Santa Maria del Popolo. It was gorgeous as well, but it was very hard to concentrate at this point during our journey.

Thought this was cool.. it's on the ground of the church.

I think I must have been delirious at this point because I'm not a very "skull and crossbones" kind of girl, but I felt the need to take a picture of this for some reason. And the picture turned out really cool, I thought! Don't judge for the brief spurt of goth-ness.

We all rode the train home and when I looked out the window at the Ciampino stop (the airport), I saw these planes outside of my window and started laughing to myself. I was thinking "what if this is the Ryan Air plane?" (because the flights are so cheap I think it has to be a scam)

Then, much to my relief, I saw this pull up on the tarmac and I felt better. It may not be Delta, but at least it's not the Wrights Brother's yellow toy plane pictured above!

When we got back to the Palace after our 15 minute walk from the train station in Albano, all I wanted to do was fall into my bed. I thoroughly enjoyed our tour of Rome and I think it will take a while for me to process everything I saw/learned. We are going back on Friday and Saturday to see the other sights (and to shop), so I'll try and get those pictures/posts up by Sunday. Hope everyone is having a good weekend! Ciao!