I am blogging in our hotel room after a great but tiring day in Rome. James is fast asleep beside me! We got up at 5 a.m. to catch our flight to Rome and we have been on the go ever since. We got the bus to Rome Termini station then walked to our hotel nearby, the Hotel Canada; it is the same hotel that I stayed in with the boys in 2006 and I chose it because it was very clean, comfortable and even quite stylish with red and gold decor and a nice little bar downstairs. I'm glad to say that it's still just as lovely. We went straight back out to make the most of our day in Rome and started off by going straight to Piazza Navona. Just as we arrived there was some thunder and it started to rain so we went into Tre Scala for an early lunch. It was still very warm despite the rain so we sat comfortably outside under the awning and watched all the people scurrying past with their umbrellas until the rain stopped, the sun came back out and the street vendors opened up their stalls again. An accordionist appeared and played O Sole Mio, the waiters were joking to some Chinese tourists about him, asking them to take him back to China! They couldn't resist singing along though! For dessert we had the famous Tartufo which has chocolate ice cream with fudge and cherries in the centre; James loved it.
After lunch we walked around the beautiful piazza and looked at Bernini's fountain representing four rivers of the world with characters from four continents holding up an obelisk. Africa's head is covered because when the statue was made the source of the Nile had still not been found.
Our next stop was the Pantheon, I will never get tired of going there, it's my favourite building in Rome with its amazing oculus and Raphael's tomb whose inscription I find very moving. We then visited Santa Maria sopra Minerva, a gothic church where we saw Michelangelo's "Risen Christ". It's really amazing; Jesus looks very strong and powerful, it looks as if it was just carved rather than being 500 years old, it has such skill and craftsmanship that its hard to believe that it was once just a block of marble. The next church we went to was Sant'Agostino where we saw Caravaggio's "Madonna del Loreto" which was painted in the early 17th century. It has such realism and life and light to it; as we walked around the rest of the church we could clearly see that none of the other paintings were anywhere near in the same league as it.
It was now time to get some fresh air and a bit of a walk, so after fortifying ourselves with a quick coffee we set off for the Forum. Except that we couldn't find the way in! For some reason I thought that we could get there by climbing up the white marble National Monument to Vittor Emmanuel II (whose tomb we had seen earlier at the Pantheon). This turned out not to be quite the case, but we saw some lovely views over Rome from the top and by exiting from a back stairway we came to an exit from the Forum, and then by walking round for a while we finally found an entrance. It was all fine though because we were in no hurry and we got a good look into it as we made our way round. We were not thrilled to be charged 12€ each to get in, especially since it was late afternoon by this time, but we both ended up enjoying it and I went to bits of it that I don't remember going to on my last sweltering visit with the boys, like the Temple of the Vestal Virgins with its slim but headless statues, and the huge arches of the Basilicus of Maxentia and Constantine. It was great to be able to linger around it without our heads boiling in the heat! As we exited towards the Colosseum it was all golden, lit up by the evening sun. James had some bad childhood experiences of Rome, when he spent a week there in the 1970s walking round it endlessly in a heat wave. Today I asked him if he likes it better now. While he was not hugely enthusiastic, partly I think because he was very tired after our early start, he said that he has enjoyed today. He even said something at one point about a future visit going direct from Edinburgh with BA; however when I said something about "When we come back..." James said "IF we come back!" so I'm not sure if he is completely convinced! Well I had better wake him up so that we can go out for our dinner.
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