Part IV

The next morning we were on the road by 7am! We beat the tourist rush to Pisa and took many pictures with the leaning tower. I laughed a lot while trying to get a good picture of John kicking the tower. I don’t think we actually got a good one but the process was very entertaining!

After our pit stop in Pisa we took the scenic route to Rome. We drove along the shore of Italy and got to see the Mediterranean Sea! It was quite beautiful.

We arrived in Roma and as expected it was the ultimate driving challenge for John. Haha This was the most chaotic traffic I have ever seen. Unlike the US- People here make their own lanes and the police see nothing wrong with this. It was a two-lane road turned into five-lanes. It was a mess. We found parking for our little car as soon as we could and then just walked to our Hostel. This was our first time staying in a large room at a Hostel. It was a 6-person room and I was really hoping I would not be the only girl in this room especially since John was going to leave early in the morning to return our car and I was going to stay alone (this saved us about 16 dollars). Luckily for me there was another girl in the room! :)

We explored the city that night and walked down to the Spanish steps and Piazza Venezia (we were told these places were cool when lit up at night). They were pretty cool but mostly we were just in awe of the fact that we were actually in Rome! We wanted pizza and walked around for a while looking for a place that was opened. We ended up getting ripped off and getting nasty old pizza for dinner. We headed back to our Hostel and called it a day.

The next morning we woke up to rain. Lucky us! We toughed it out and walked to Vatican City (mind you this was not a short walk). By the time we arrived our shoes and socks were soaked and we were cold. There was a long line at St. Peters but it moved pretty quickly. Admission was free which always makes me happy. The Basilica is pretty impressive. I am sure it would have been even more impressive if I was Catholic but it was still awesome to be in a place of such importance. We then stood in line to go up to the Cupula (dome). We were told this would be a very difficult climb but it was worth it. I was definitely out of breath by the time we made it to the first level which is the inside the dome of the basilica. It was pretty cool getting to see the basilica from up there! Don’t worry I took pictures. :)