Rome, Italy

I am nearing the end of blogging about our week in Italy with Rome being the last stop. I will definitely remember the lovely views of the Tuscan and Umbrian countryside. Being summer, the hills were like golden seas with blooming sunflowers. Unfortunately, the picture above is the best I could do from a moving vehicle. We could not find a stop along the highway to take any decent pictures.

There are also beautiful views of medieval towns along the way which looks so serene and inviting. A week (or even a month) is not enough time to truly experience this diverse country.

Alas,  the serenity did not last long. Rome is a major city like any other. Unfortunately, I was quite disappointed with Rome, possibly due to having too high an expectation. The city was actually quite dirty with rubbish on the streets and lots of grafitti on the walls. The first day also did not start very well. When we dropped off the Avis car and tried to claim the refund on the engine oil that we topped up (a mere 12.50 Euro), the very rude manager told us that she could not accept our receipt because it was a wrtten invoice and not a proper printout. We even showed her a photo of the flashing engine oil signal that I took with my camera. She told us that, in her very words "not my problem, but yours". Needless to say, and with regret now, her response made us really upset. In summary, we wasted close to an hour of our time dealing with this person. There was absolutely no customer service at all. This experience has really put me off renting cars on holiday in the future. Enough said about this, lets move on.

Despite my ambivalence towards the city, there were a few positives. We stayed in a quirky B&B called B&B Suites Trastevere which is run by a lovely guy name Marco. He basically planned our Rome stay- taught us how to catch the tram (4 short stops from the B&B- so convenient), booked our Vatican City tour for the next day, and gave us tips on where to eat. As you can see from the pics, each room was painted to a Roman theme. Ours was called the Trevi room after the Trevi fountain.

We spent the rest of the hot afternoon visiting a few sites.  The above is The Monumento Nazionale a Vittorio Emanuele II or the tomb of the unknown soldier and below, the Flavian Amphitheatre or more famously known as The Colosseum. The Colosseum was built in 70 AD, and it took 30,000 Judean slaves and 30 years to complete. A random fact- the workers were paid with salt as it was an expensive commodity at the time, important use to cure food. The Latin word for salt is salarium, hence the English word salary was derived from that.

Half of the top two floors collapsed after an earthquake. In its glory days, the Colosseum could seat up to 50,000 people.

The Swiss cheese appearance of the wall of the Colosseum were apparently made by the Germans during the 2nd WW. They were harvesting metal to make weapons during the war.

The Forum- what is left now is mainly ruins. It is left to your own imagination what it was like back in those times.

Inside the colosseum. As you can see, the floor has been part removed to show where the slaves and animals were kept for the barbaric games.

More pictures of the Forum. To get the most out of this, we joined a walking tour outside the Colosseum which is guided and takes you through the Colosseum, the Forum and the Palathian hill. Not only does it provide you the info you need on the ruins, it also allows you to bypass the long queues (trust me, the queues here are long).

As always, a gelati stop. Not a day has gone by that we did not have gelati.

We then had a very mediocre meal at a place called Ivo Trastevere. It was recommended by our host, plus you would think by the crowd that came here the food would be amazing. It wasn't at all. I guess tourist are lured by the decent prices. Suppose to serve the best pizza, but the base was actually soggy.

Grilled chicken with peppercorn sauce

Steak salad with balsamic sauce 

Mushroom and olive pizza

Prawn spaghetti                                                                               Eggplant penne

A very forgettable meal.............