Rome

Zane was suppose to take over the blog when we went to Rome to spare some of the details, but he has slacked more in his duties than I use to, so I'm updating it instead.

June 28, 2011
We were able to experience our first Ryan Air flight. This meaning that the airport was a pain to get to. We had to get up at 5, to be on the metro at 5:30 (that was interesting to see business people and people that were just going home from their partying all night). We got off in the middle of nowhere and had to follow some people to actually find where the bus stop was. It was 30 Euros for the both of us to get to the airport. The bus would not leave until EVERY single seat was taken (extremely obnoxious when there are lines of busses for people to get onto). It took an hour and fifteen minutes to get to the airport (of course in the middle of nowhere). We were lucky that we only had backpacks b/c the guy didn't even bother weighing them (any carry-on can only weigh 10 kilos). We got through security and had no idea where to go. We finally figured out that they post your gate on the tv (but they do it right around the time you're suppose to board). It was a mad house up to gate D when it was posted. Luckily, we were in the front of the line. Ryan Air is like Southwest in the fact that you don't have assigned seats, so being at the front of the line is a wonderful thing. We arrived in Italy a half hour early. We bought Roma passes for 16 Euros for a week at a kiosk at the airport (it was a wonderful thing, considering that everyone else was trying to charge us 20-25 Euros for 3 days). We also bought a little pass to get us from the airport to the nearest metro stop (luckily, it was only about 15 minutes). For whatever reason both Zane and I thought that our hotel was near the Colosseum, so we went to that metro stop first. We got off and immediately upon exiting this guy pounced and talked Zane into a small private tour inside the Colosseum. We forked over the money (which I was upset at the time b/c the Roma pass will get you in for free) and waited for the entire group. With in a couple of minutes we had surpassed the 1-2 hour line and were in and having a guided tour (so it ended up being a wonderful thing, especially with how hot it was there). It was incredible to see everything and learn a little more about the history. We split for 45 minutes for us to look around on our own before meeting up for the second half of the tour.

Waiting for the tour to begin... isn't it beautiful?

Where the stage crew would hang out under the stage.

We met up with the group and headed up a path to the Forum. It was crazy to imagine how old this city is. It was just so amazing to be able to see the old builidings and temples. The group had quadrupled for this tour, so we weren't really able to catch anything the tour guide was saying b/c we were in the back. But it was still wonderful to be able to walk around and see everything.

My favorite place to get the full view of the Colosseum was just after we went to the old temple... I was able to wait out the crowd and get one without anyone standing in the way. Definitely one of my favorite photos!

After visiting the Colosseum we wanted to get to our hotel and drop off our back packs. We went to the info booth inside the metro station and the lady said she didn't know where our hotel was (I thought that was a bad sign, either it was super shady or we were in the wrong place). So we asked her where a McDonalds was and she told us to go to Termini. We hopped back on the train. We found a Mc Donalds, but sadly it was the first city that we haven't been able to connect to free wifi. We ended up going to a "internet cafe" and paid 50 cents for 15 minutes. We read that our hotel was near Cornelia. We got back on and were sad to see that it was the second to last stop. We got off and were looking around and asking several people if they could tell us where to go. A nice elderly woman told us we could take a bus up near it and that we needed to walk past a main square with a lot of trees. We decided to walk it (and it was one of the worst decisions we had made). It was hot, we were already tired and our back packs were starting to get to us. It took us about 45 minutes to find the hotel (after asking a couple more people to make sure we hadn't passed it) that ended up being in the middle of a neighborhood. It was a really nice hotel (and it should be for being a 4 star- Pineta Palace- it was really cheap! It was cheaper for 4 nights including breakfast than our 2 star hotel in Paris). We cooled off (yay for air conditioning!) and ended up eating at a pizza place down the street (Zane learned not to get "white pizza" b/c it is literally just the pizza dough that's baked with absolutely nothing on it).

June 29, 2011
We wanted to find the Trevi fountain, so the concierge told us what direct bus to get on that would take us into the main part of town.

Right around the bus stop was this beautiful building- Supreme Court

A really cool fountain that we found on our hunt for the Trevi fountain.

I am just in love with this square. It was always buzzing and full of people and incredible artists.

The Fountain of the 4 Rivers

The Pantheon

Yay! We found it! It was much more incredible than I expected. We were able to find a shady place on the steps to cool off. Zane went and got up some delicious Gelato down one of the alleys (a lot cheaper than the places right off to the side of the fountain).

Egyptian Obelisk

Spanish Steps! I couldn't find Tyra anywhere!

June 30, 2011

Zane allowed me to go shopping today. We were trying to find a mall (b/c the shop around the Spanish steps were clearly not for people that are poor--- Gucci, Armani, Prada, Coach, etc.-- we did find some sweet cufflinks, however), but all of the malls are actually on the outskirts of Rome and are bit difficult to get to if you don't know your way around. The concierge said that there were shops near Vatican City that were much more affordable, so that's where we headed b/c it only took us about 20 minutes on the bus the day before to get all the way to the end, which was about 5 minutes from the Vatican. While we waited for the bus, I counted the stops that it took to get there. Not before long we were getting off around a bunch of stores, but not close to where I thought the Vatican was. We were going in and out of the little shops. We found Zane some nice Italian leather shoes for cheap. We started to get hungry and stopped into one of the pizza places and got some of my favorite pizza that we tried while we were in Italy.

It doesn't look like much, but it was delicious! Who knew that I would like salt on my pizza?!

After lunch, I found another bus stop and realized that the words under the stops were adding more stops, so we had gotten off too early. We decided to walk down (the busses tend to be few and far between) towards the Vatican city. It actually didn't take very long and the next thing we knew we were in the smallest Sovereign state!

St Peter's Basilica

We sat and rested on the steps inside Vatica City. We went to a few of the shops around the small country and found really cheap suits that we wanted to get Zane in one of the stores that were closed. We decided to wait until they re-opened (they close for lunch). We ended up getting some gelato and going to a lot of little tourist shops. Finally, just after 4pm, the store re-opened and were able to find one suit that they could tailor to Zane. We got it for 79 Euros! And they told us to pick it up the following evening. We went back to the hotel for the night (keep in mind I was sick for all of this and was super weak sauce).


July 1, 2011

We got up early to try to beat the crowds for the Museum of the Vatican. We got off the bus right around where a group of people had started to line up, but Zane thought that we wanted to get in the huge line we saw the day before that was just inside the walls. We went there and there were barely any people in line. It ended up being the line to take us into the Basilica. I am so glad we went there. It was free and we were probably the only people that weren't worshipping as dressed up as we were. It was absolutely beautiful and it was so huge! We saw the memorial/shrine (don't know the proper term) for St Peter's grave. It was gorgeous. They had candles lit up around the stairs that led down to it.

We didn't want to use flash inside to be respectful, so this was one of the only pictures that turned out well. The details are super intricate and just incredible.

After leaving the basilica we went and got back into the line that we saw earlier (that probably doubled) and waited a little over an hour. Zane was able to get a discount for being a student which was nice! (they unfortunately don't except the Roma pass here). We enjoyed the beautiful art, but after an hour we were already at the Sistine Chapel. We took Pam's advice and got seats along the side as quickly as possible, so we could sit and stare at the beautiful artwork of Michelangelo! I swear he painted in 3D! It was nuts! (sadly you can't take pictures inside the Chapel). We didn't realize that after you go into the Sistine Chapel that you can't go back into the musuem, you must exit afterwards. So we ended up getting out.

One of the hallways in the musuem at the Vatican

After the musuem, we stopped at one of the restaurants to get lunch. I had some deliciously plain spaghetti and Zane had a delicious margherita pizza. We headed back to the hotel to change and take a nap. We went back out to go shop a little and walk around town (we were finally able to go inside of the Pantheon) before going back and picking up Zane's suit at 7:30. We went and dropped it off at the hotel and waited for it to get a little bit darker. Once it was getting darker we went back out and wanted to do a guided night tour that Pam had typed up for us (she did it while she was in Rome-- it was a Rick Stevens tour). It started at Bruno and ended at the Spanish steps. It was a super beautiful walk and definitely one of the best things to do on our last night in Rome.

Statue of Bruno

The 4 Rivers Fountain all lit up (the square is just as busy as it is during the day... I love it!)

July 2, 2011
Sadly it was our last day in the beautiful city of Rome. We had a wonderful time and were able to do most of the things that we wanted to (minus the trips outside of Rome...next time we'll come, we will have the money to venture out a little more and hopefully I won't be hacking up a lung either!) But my absolute favorite thing that we ended up doing on this entire trip was the morning of our last day. We owe it all to Zac too! Before leaving for Europe, Zac had told Zane about booking a reservation early to get to go to the catacombs under the Vatican Necropolis-Scavi. I would highly recommend anyone that goes to Rome to do just this! It was probably the coolest tour that we've been on! There was a whole city underneath the Vatican. The tour groups are small, so the guide doesn't have to talk loud and you can still hear them. We were able to see different roads, homes, graves/ashes, etc. It's two levels underneath the basilica and you can see where they built on top of each level. The end of the tour is led to the "graffiti wall" where you can actually be guided to see one of St Peter's bones from his grave. It was just such an incredible experience!

The Swiss Guards we had to pass to get to our tour

After our tour ended we walked through a room full of tombs of the past Popes that led to the exit across from one of the entrances to the Sistine Chapel. We were able to pick up our back packs (they have a drop off to leave your stuff, b/c they don't allow big bags into the tour; which definitely worked to our advantage). We left the walls for the last time and headed towards a metro stop. Along the way we stopped to get some lunch, while Zane got another pizza, I decided to branch out and have dessert for lunch...

It was delicious! And very refreshing

After lunch we walked around and found some different shops along the way and had fun looking at different things. We finally found a shop that actually sold cannoli (who knew it would be so hard?) Zane didn't like it b/c we've been spoiled with Zac's delicious cannoli, so I had to double up on it.

Around 3 we were all shopped out and decided we were just going to head to the airport and hang out there and maybe watch a movie or something. So we hopped on the metro and went all the way to the end. We had just missed the bus, so we sat and waited, we had time to kill... so we thought.

Killing time at the bus stop

We got to the airport and pulled out our itinerary to see what flight number we were and realized that our flight left at 6:30 (we thought we were leaving at 9! We were so lucky that we decided to go to the airport early). We hopped in the huge line and were able to make it through that and security quickly. We stopped in at a few of the shops (it was much nicer than the Beauvais airport!) and found things I wish we could take back with us. We were able to be second in line to wait for the flight. We were wondering why no one was coming to the gate to let us in at 6. Then at 6:15 a flight leaving at the same time as us was moved to the desk that was shared with our gate. I was wondering how they were going to have 2 planes leave at the exact same time that were right next to each other. Then we saw busses pull up outside of the gate and realized that they actually take us to the plane that's off in the middle of nowhere. Then they made an announcement saying that our gate had been moved to the one kiddie corner and behind us (except it was in Italian, so it took a minute to figure it out) We went from being in the front of the line to being shoved in this mass hysteria of people. Finally, Zane and I were able to get on the 3rd bus and ended up getting decent seats considering the situation. Around 7pm it seemed like everyone was on board, but we still weren't leaving. Finally at 7:30 they announced that one of the passengers wasn't feeling well, so that's why we hadn't left (if they would have just mentioned that earlier, I don't think so many people would have been upset and irritated, us included). We finally left and ended up landing around 10ish. We finally found the right bus to get on. We were some of the last people to get on, so we were split up. They of course waited another 10 minutes to fill up the last 4 seats before we could leave. We finally got back to the metro around 11:30 and had to manage to get to apartment (that we had only been to once before) in the dark. Finally, made it just after midnight.

First Weekend in Paris

25 June 2011
We hopped off the train with the girls and split up at the metro. We were headed to Place de Clichy to check into our hotel and planned on meeting up with the other girls at 4 at the Disney store. We were able to find our metro stop pretty easily and with only one transfer. Poor Zane had to drag my massive bag and his up several flights of stairs though (we found the escalator later). It took us a while to figure out where our hotel was though. We had to ask a few different people and finally the last guy google mapped it for us on his phone and told us it was around the next corner. It seriously was two blocks away from the metro stop (which made us both very happy). We finally got to the front of the hotel and it had a beautiful facade. The lobby was also nice, they had a glass table with little fishy inside. We checked in and to get to the fourth floor we had to go up one at a time (max of 1 person with 1 luggage or 2 people) to get to our room. I went up first and I spent forever trying to get into our room. The light went out and I couldn't see a darn thing and then Zane came up and opened the door right off... Our room was pretty ghetto. It was like staying at a hotel in the old strip in Vegas; gets the job done, but you don't want to pay more than $35-40 a night (and yet we were paying more than twice that for this place). I would upload a picture for you, but apparently I didn't take any. Let's just say I wouldn't go into the bathroom without my flip flops on. After getting our things in we left pretty quickly to meet up with the girls. We needed coins to buy more metro tickets so we stopped at a conveince store to buy some drinks first (this just added to our tardiness). We were able to get to the Champs Elysees stop without problems. When we finally stepped outside though, we were extremely overwhelmed. Everything was so big and we had no idea where to go. We found an info booth and the lady was able to tell us which way to go, so since it was already after 4, Zane dragged me (I swear I was flying behind him) to the store in just a couple of minutes. We found the girls who luckily hadn't been waiting for a long time for us. It became our mission to help Kate see as much as possible in the hour before we needed to have her back to the train station. I'm very disappointed that we only were able to get her to see the Arc de Triomphe and the spire of the Eiffel Tower. Zane and I hopped on the metro with Kate after that, so she wouldn't have to try to get back to the train station alone. We met back up with Pam, Malorie, and Kristy at our meeting spot and walked around aimlessly waiting for Cathy to arrive. We finally decided to head back towards our meeting point because we hadn't heard from Cathy in a while and sure enough she was there and her phone had died. We went to eat at one of the restaurants on the Champs Elysees and were able to dine outside. They had the menus in English, which was nice, unfortunately we didn't have a waitress in English. She seriously messed everything for Kristy up except for her wine. She tried giving her a ceasar salad instead of goat cheese (they looked completely different) and veal instead of scallops. We asked for more tap water and she brought out a bottle of natural water that we turned away, but she came back and said it was included for us. Pam and Cathy had also ordered the same main course (even though they came out at separate times), yet Pam had fries and Cathy had noodles (tell me how those are the same?). After a long night with this woman who luckily didn't understand the things that were being said about her at the table, we got the check. She freaking tried to charge us for the water and the ceasar salad!! And added another 5 Euros without specifying what it was for. We naturally just asked for the manager that had already been to our table a few times and spoke perfect English to come and help. She was able to get the tab right and we were finally able to leave. We were tired, so we ended up splitting off from the girls (Pam and Malorie were staying with Kristy for the night) and going back to the hotel for the night.

                      This was part of the really nice park that we found on our aimless walk around


26 June 2011
Pam, Malorie, and Kristy took a taxi to our hotel and met us around 930. We took Pam and Malorie's bags up to our room, while Malorie checked them in. We then set off for the metro, making a quick detour to find the Moulin Rouge, since we had yet to see it, even though it was only 100 meters from our hotel. We hopped on the metro and went back to the Champs Elysees in search for the "hop on, hop off" bus tours. We were able to find a stop right around the corner at the Grand Palace. While we were waiting for the next bus, Zane and I decided we couldn't afford to pay approx. $75 for the two of us to go on it, so we were just going to meet Pam and Malorie at the hotel at 6. (They had to leave the next day, so it really was the best way to see Paris in a day). Zane and I walked around and before the girls even got on their bus, I found the Eiffel Tower!! :D I was so very excited!! Poor Zane probably had a bruise from me getting so excited and trying to get his attention. I took several pictures before we crossed one of the most beautiful bridges in search of the Eiffel Tower. We stopped in a store to get drinks and a bakery to get some large pain au chocolat (it was a large baguette like thing with chocolate chips, so I don't know what else to call it). We made it to the Eiffel Tower in pretty good time! When we were walking around to get different pictures, I spotted Kristy and ran up to all of the girls to say hi! Out of the thousands of people that were there (apparently Sunday is one of the busiest days) we still ran into them! Zane and I walked across the Seine and went up to the Palais de Challiot to take amazing pictures of the Eiffel Tower and see some basketball show down going on. We sat in the park and cooled down before heading to the Louvre. It was a nice walk, but I was wearing flip flops, so we occasionally sat down to give my feet a break. On one occassion this man tried claiming that he "found" this gold wedding ring on the ground next to us and insisted on giving it to Zane. He walked away and within 30 seconds came back asking for us to give him money for food (I thought he was asking for a cigarette) and when we tried giving him cookies, he just took the ring and walked away. I decided we weren't going to take any more breaks until we got to the Louvre. We were able to walk through the beautiful gardens leading up to the Louvre and walked around and looked in. I even got to put my feet in the water in the fountains around the building. We then took off towards Notre Dame. It was absolutely beautiful. I loved the facade and the color of the building even more than the one in Strasbourg. We wanted to hear the bells go off, so we found a place in the shade to wait and right after the bells went off and we were getting up to leave, guess whose bus came by? I ran and yelled Puh-mel-uh! Knowing that it would get their attention. We waited for them and were able to go inside of the cathedral and grabbed some lunch afterwards. We then agreed to meet up with Pam and Malorie (Kristy's husband was coming in, so she had to meet up with him) at Sacre Coeur at 6pm. They hopped on their bus and we made a quick detour to see the flying buttresses in the back of the cathedral before taking off. We walked for what seemed like forever and finally made it into this mall (on the map there is a mall at the bottom of the hill where Sacre Coeur is), so I thought we were finally there. When we made it out of the mall and still couldn't see it we found our coordinates on the map and realized we weren't even close, we were barely halfway there. We asked a few people and ended up finding the nearest metro stop and just hopping on. We had to climb what seems like the hill of death just to get to at least 100 stairs to get to the top and we were late. It was about 6:15 and we spent the next 45 minutes trying to find the girls. We went into Sacre Coeur (and they were having a service going on, it was really beautiful, but really awkward), found painters square, and watched this amazing guy juggling a soccer ball with his feet while hanging by his hands from a light post. We were going to just head back to the hotel to find Pam and Malorie, but I wanted to go down a different way. We were looking down at the crowd when the girls spotted Zane and were able to grab his attention (I still hadn't managed to see them). We were able to meet up and go back and tour everything. We went back to the hotel to let the girls check in and clean up a bit before going back out to find Hard Rock Cafe (Pam collects something from each of them). We walked there and on our walk we were able to find the Opera House (which I thought was absolutely beautiful). We were in and out of Hard Rock in minutes and found the nearest metro stop and headed towards the Eiffel Tower.We were able to get a nice spot on the grass and admire it all lit up. Zane kept saying when is it going to be all lit up and I thought he was crazy. But he insisted that white lights would come on. We pulled out the Top 10 Things to do in Paris book that Pam and Malorie gave us and it said that every night on the hour after dusk the tower lights up like a Christmas tree and sparkles for 5 minutes. We didn't have to wait much longer for Zane to prove himself right. It was absolutely beautiful. I don't think I could ever get sick of looking at it. I was so happy we stayed! After that we headed back towards the hotel and grabbed some big bacon burgers from Quick/Quality burger and peaked at the Moulin Rouge all lit up before calling it a night.

If you were able to make it through all my gruesome details...

                                          The Grand Palais

                                          The awesome bridge!

                                          First glimpse

                                          Awesome bridge part 2

                                          Palais de Challiot

                                                    Obelisk

                                          The Louvre

                                Notre Dame (with lack of hunchbacks)

                                          Sacre Coeur Part Un

                                          Sacre Coeur Part Deux

27 June 2011
This morning we said goodbye to Pam and Malorie before taking off on our hunt for Zane's school. It took us a little while to find it, but we managed to stumble upon the school. We found K-Rae on the 4th floor. She had lots of apartments to choose from and all of the answers we were looking for (but she is still no Gianluca). She set up our appointment to meet with the apartment we were most interested in at 7pm and printed off a map for us. We went back to the hotel and did some laundry really quick, so we could pack for our trip to Rome (our backpacks could only weigh 10kg). It took longer than we expected and we finally had to break into the third suitcase in order to get everything to fit (we didn't realize how much we relied on our backpacks). We then made our way back to the school and were able to store them all under one of the tables in K-Rae's office. She then showed us how to get metro passes and a place to get a cell phone for our stay in Paris. We didn't have anything to do for another 4 hours, so we made our way back to the hotel to take a nap. We ended up waking up at 6 and had to sprint out of the hotel to make sure to make it on time. When we got off the metro, I realized that I didn't have the map in my purse because I had taken it out to look at it in the hotel. We started to panic, and decided to head towards the school to see if we could get K-Rae's number. The people there didn't really know what to do and the lady that could speak English was actually having her first day on the job and said they couldn't give us her phone number. We tried asking if we could online, but she just kept talking and wasting time. We pretty much started jogging down the street looking for a McDonalds. We finally found one by Bastille and logged on and found K-Rae's number. Luckily, we were the first students to check in and she remembered exactly where we needed to go. We somehow managed to get there in just a few minutes, but we didn't see anyone waiting at the front door (it was just after 7). When I called K-Rae back to double check, this nice woman asked if I was Jenny. HUZZAH! We found Stephanie! She gave us a quick tour and we loved it! She gave us the keys and set up a time to meet up with her after our trip to Rome. We were ready to be done with the night, so we ended up just going back to the hotel for the night.