Day 3 of Rome

I LOVE ITALY! I am so glad I tossed my coin into the Trevi fountain, because I must return here very soon! The entire country is gorgeous, and the food is delicious! What more could a girl want from life?

Today we got a little bit of a late start, but headed to the Colosseum after our hostel breakfast again. The Colosseum was SO NEAT! It was my second favorite site, behind the Vatican. It was built in 7 years in 80 AD by 15,000 slaves... woah! I wish I could have seen it in its glory days, because the 38% remaining after an earthquake and 2000 years later was awesome still! We paid for a tour guide and once again were very impressed with the wealth of information they offered on the history and architecture.

Our tour also included a guide for Palentine Hill and the Roman forums. We spent several hours there wandering around the remains of the emperor's palace. After the tour, we ate at a small ristorante and I enjoyed my first dish of pasta here. It was a spinach ravioli dish and I of course needed nutella gelato to top it off! I wish I could eat like this every day! Dinner later consisted of a tuna fish and onion pizza by the way.... and I was impressed. I ate the entire thing! Italy has made my stomach very happy.

Our group tried to see the Pantheon this afternoon, but it was closed due to the holiday- the Epiphany. The entire city was chaotic because of the holiday! Streets were closed. People crowded the streets. We ended up walking for hours, and eventually getting lost so resorted to a metro to return home. That turned into a situation when the masses of Italian people overcrowded the station and literally people started piling up at the bottom of escalators!!! It was very frightening for a few minutes as police ran to the scene and Italians screamed to each other. There were announcements made in Italian, but that did not explain anything to us. For a split second, I thought maybe I was walking into a terrorist attack or something as frightening! I was relieved to find it was just an overcrowded metro stop and we quietly waited until we could find a train with room for us. It was the best euro we spent all day, as we walked for over 7 hours and our legs were killing us! At least the walking is making up for all the Italian pizza and gelato I am indulging in!

I blew through my entire first set of euros from the ATM, which was a few hundred dollars. Slightly alarming, but I think I will be able to budget better in France when I am with a host family and going to class instead of site seeing all day.

I am really excited for France and to meet my host family! It's going to be nice to have a normal life with a routine for class and a family that will show us around town. Courtney and I cannot wait to meet them!

I could not have asked for a better trip to Roma! 3 days was the perfect amount of time to see everything and enjoy the culture. I might have gotten seriously fat or poor if I was here any longer! But I must return soon, hopefully in a summer season to experience the town when it's a little warmer :)

It's almost midnight here and I am determined to run off some of my tuna fish pizza before we depart for our flight! Stories from France to come soon!