Italy, Day 3: In Which We Get Drunk and Go to the Pantheon
We had breakfast at the hotel again. Weirdly, when we got to the breakfast area and I told the attendant our room number in Italian (I’d been practicing!), she had no idea what I was saying and we had to repeat the number in English. We decided that since this hotel was more for international travelers than Italians, she must have gotten the job based on knowing some English.
We decided to go over to Vatican city and explore that part of Rome. Jason’s feet were basically made of blisters because we had walked so much the day before, so we went to the nearest metro stop and bought tickets, then took the metro to the Vatican area. Upon our arrival, we realized two things: 1) getting into the Vatican would cost us either 400 euro or several hours and 2) I would not be allowed in at all because I was wearing a skirt without tights. This was particularly puzzling because there was no shortage of women in leggings in line. But, apparently, knee skin is much more scandalous than skintight fabric. I realize that this is probably a dumb American thing to think, but it seems silly all the same.
Because neither of us wanted to put in the effort to remedy these two things, we decided to wander off toward the Pantheon instead. On the way, we found the impressive and medieval-looking Castel Sant’Angelo, which was built over the mausoleum of Emperor Hadrian. It says something about the quality of this preserved castle/museum that we were able to get lost several times while guiding ourselves around. The views were beautiful, and several ceilings featured intricate frescos.
The view from the Castel Sant'Angelo (Photo/Jason Rafal)
After finding our way outside, we started looking for lunch. We have a habit of finding good-looking places using Yelp or Jason’s Rome app, and then instead stopping somewhere else on the way. Today, that means that we headed through a couple of beautiful Roman allies and found a pasta shop across the alley from a homemade pastry store on our way to somewhere else. We sat down and ordered pasta and a bottle of the house white wine, with Jason arguing that it was more economical than purchasing two glasses. We may have been behind on wine tasting, but we were definitely starting to catch up. We spent a lovely leisurely lunch hour eating ravioli (Jason) and pesto linguini (me) while we slowly drank the bottle. I amused the waiter by acting alarmed when he tried to take my plate when it still had a couple of noodles on it. It’s nice to eat slowly. I’m not sure why I usually eat so fast.
(Photo/Jason Rafal)
After lunch we teetered into the pastry shop and bought some dessert before heading out again. We found the Piazza Navona, and soon after we stumbled into the back of the Pantheon. We went in (apparently my knees were not as offensive here) and I pretty much just stared at the ceiling. If you’ve never seen the Pantheon ceiling, it’s a dome that looks like layered rock leading up to an open circle, through which we could see the blue sky. Not being religious, the ceiling was definitely the thing I most appreciated.
The Pantheon (Photo/Jason Rafal)
After managing to get out of the Pantheon without embarrassing ourselves (I hope), we went to the Trevi Fountain, and were both extremely disappointed to see it under construction. The fountain, and the building behind it, was coated in scaffolding, and a temporary walkway had been created so that tourists could go close enough to the fountain to throw in coins. We did not partake.
As we wandered around, we came across a parade, or a protest, that somehow involved the labor movement. There was lots of flag waving and shouting. The area was surrounded by police, but they seemed pretty relaxed.
(Photo/Jason Rafal)
We went home to regroup before taking the metro back out for dinner. I had wanted to go back to the area where we had lunch, but I couldn’t figure out where it was, so we wandered until we found a few restaurants in a small piazza and sat down. The couple who sat next to us at dinner were from Morocco—they had just come up to Rome for the weekend. It turned out that the man, who had excellent English, had gone to college. He did a year at UT before deciding to move to Virginia, where he went to JMU. He said that he moved to Los Angeles for a bit after school, and enthused about California.