Rome! Our bonus city on our trip to Italy. We hadn’t originally planned to go here but the flights forced a change in our itinerary. And boy were we glad they did! What an amazing city. Our time was way too short there and I’m already certain that we’ll go back one day.
But first the back story on why our time was so short… You may recall from my pre-trip report that we booked reward tickets way far in advance and I had to take the boys up to my parent’s house in NJ first. So my flight to Rome originated in Newark and went through Charlotte, where I would meet up with Blair. Well funny thing about booking tickets way in advance. The airlines tend to change flights and connection times. I stupidly never checked the flights in the weeks leading up to the trip (and never received an email notification of any change). If I had, I would have seen the little (!) warning on my tickets that said “close connection”. Yes, they had changed the time of my flight from Newark to Charlotte so I now had just under an hour before my flight to Rome. Yikes!
When I woke up the morning of my flight, I knew I was in trouble. The forecast called for huge storms coming through the entire east coast. I immediately called American Airlines to see if I could change to an earlier Charlotte flight but because my 3pm flight wasn’t impacted yet, they couldn’t do anything. So I waited and hoped for the best. Once I got to the airport, it seemed clear that the best wasn’t going to happen. I watched as they pushed back the departure time 5 minutes, then 10, then 20, and kept going. I talked to the gate agent about my options. He said it was likely the flight from Charlotte to Rome would be delayed too so he thought I might still make it. The only other possibility was to put me on a flight direct to Rome from Philadelphia but I would have to get myself from Newark to Philly and that would have been tight too. So I stuck it out and continued to hope for the best.
Long story short, the best did not happen. We were significantly delayed and I had tears in my eyes when we landed in Charlotte 15 minutes after my Rome flight’s scheduled departure. To make it even worse, I texted my husband and found out that the plane was still sitting on the runway! But of course it was too late. I joined the line of almost 100 people who had missed their international connections that night and again hoped for the best. Blair had worked with the gate agents before he left to see if they could do anything. They had advised him not to stay and wait for me because it would be much harder to get both of us on another flight together and technically he wouldn’t have “missed” his flight so he would have had to pay. And although they said they couldn’t book anything for me until I arrived at the airport, I’m certain they did something to help. People in line ahead of me weren’t getting out until the weekend (this was a Thursday night) but somehow I got on a flight the next afternoon through Philadelphia. So I was relatively lucky. Also, instead of being stuck at the airport, I was in the unusual situation of connecting through my hometown so I could go home and sleep in my own bed (albeit without my luggage).
So my second attempt to get to Italy took place the next morning and was much more successful. I made it to Philadelphia and went on to Rome with no issues. After clearing customs, I hopped on the next train into the city. Blair and I had made plans to meet at the hotel in Rome but he surprised me in the train station and even brought me a latte (despite the fact that taking coffee to go in Italy is a major faux pas). Both were welcome sights to me after the ordeal of the past three days.
Now of course, missing a day of a relatively short trip sort of messed up our schedule. I still didn’t especially want to hop on a train and go straight to Florence, where we were spending that night. The past few days had been long and stressful travel days and I needed to unwind a little before heading on again. I also did not want to miss a chance to see even a small part of Rome. So Blair asked the hotel to give him a late check-out and they obliged. I was able to take a shower and the hotel held our bags while we headed out for some sight seeing. Most of it was a repeat for Blair, who had spent the first day of our anniversary trip exploring Rome on his own. But he was happy to show me around and relive some of the highlights. It was a picture perfect day in Rome – the sky was an impossible blue without a cloud in sight.
The Roman Colosseum was at the top of my list but the line was crazy long and the site itself ridiculously crowded. (In what was perhaps a sign of what was to come, I had spent the previous two weeks trying to book tickets to the Colosseum Underground tour but I could not find tickets despite hours of searching. Turned out to be lucky since we would have missed it!) So we opted for the lower key Roman Forum right down the street. It was a great choice. With the Rick Steve’s guide downloaded on Blair’s phone, I followed the audio tour around the site. It was easy to follow and really interesting. I highly recommend some type of tour – either with a guide or an audio tour. There is very little signage or explanations so without a tour of some sort, you are just wandering around amongst falling down buildings. Identifying the ruins and putting them in historical context really allows you to understand and appreciate the site and its significance.
Built in a valley between Capitoline Hill and Palatine Hill and surrounded by temples and other buildings, the Forum was a large open space that served as the center for social, political, religious and economic activity in ancient Rome. For over 700 years (starting around 500 BC), Rome grew in size and power, and the Forum was its heart. It housed some of the most famous buildings, temples, and monuments in Rome. But ultimately, after years of economic and political events shifted the focus of power away from Rome, the city went into period of decline and the Forum suffered. It fell into a state of disuse and disrepair. By the middle ages, it was nothing more than a cow field. It was rediscovered by archaeologists in the early 1800s and excavated over the next 100 years. Today you can walk in the footsteps of ancient Romans and explore the crumbling ruins. I’m not sure which was more impressive – the glimpses of the grandeur that used to be or the advanced state of disrepair that the ruins survive in today.
After exploring the Forum grounds, we headed up Palatine Hill for a bird’s eye view. (Your ticket to the Forum also allows access to Palatine Hill.) It is worth the trek up there to fully appreciate the size of the ruins. With the Temple of Saturn on one end and the Colosseum on the other and modern-day Rome in the background, it is an impressive sight. Columns standing alone with nothing to support. Archways to buildings that no longer stand. Headless statues dotting the landscape. It’s interesting to imagine what used to be as you stand there looking down on what remains.
After exploring the Forum for about two hours, we decided to grab lunch and walk around the city a little before heading to the train station. It’s hard to wrap your mind around the fact that so much history is hidden within the city. I couldn’t stop looking down the long street that dead ended in the Colosseum. To be standing amidst the hustle and bustle of a modern city and see a 2000 year old structure at the end of the street is a truly unique experience.
Since we were flying out of Rome at the end of our trip, we were booked at an airport hotel for our last night. But we had left open that last day and had several options of where to spend it – more time in Cinque Terre, a stop in Pisa, extra time in Rome. We decided that just this small taste of Rome wasn’t enough so we ended up spending our last day there as well. We took a train back from Cinque Terre, checked our bags in the train station, and explored a little more before checking into our airport hotel for an early morning flight.
Our main goal was to visit the Pantheon but we walked there by way of the Trevi Fountain. It was wall to wall people so I didn’t even get to throw in a coin (which legend says will ensure your return to Rome one day). I have a feeling I’ll be back for another visit anyway.
The Pantheon is a mathematical wonder and Rome’s best preserved monument. While other structures from its time period (roughly 120 AD) are now crumbling ruins, the Pantheon has withstood the test of time. The outside structure is fully intact but understandably showing its age. The inside, however, remains in stunningly beautiful condition. It is absolutely amazing to stand inside it and be awed at the ancient Romans’ ability to build a perfectly spherical concrete dome with nothing but their minds and hand-powered tools. To this day, nobody in the world has built a larger unreinforced concrete dome.
The dome is a perfect sphere – 142 feet tall and wide – that sits in a circular base. Amazingly, the only light in the structure comes from a single hole in the ceiling. The oculus (or the eye of the Pantheon) is a shocking 27 feet wide and lets both sun and rain inside. The floor inside was brilliantly designed with a slight slant and small holes to drain away the water.
There are 8 recessed spaces spread evenly around the outside walls. The grandest is the high altar. The remaining 7 niches are tombs for kings and famous artists (including Renaissance painter Raphael) and chapels.
It is absolutely worth a visit to the Pantheon to marvel at this architectural and artistic wonder. Again, we used the Rick Steves’ audio guide and found it interesting and informative. You can enjoy the site without a tour but to fully appreciate its significance, it is helpful to use some sort of written or audio guide.
On our way back to the train station, we walked by the impressive Monument of Victor Emmanuel II. The back of this massive white marble building can be seen from the Roman Forum, and indeed the monument stands out from many parts of the city. The late afternoon sun made the bright white marble pop against the blue sky.
I feel like we successfully squeezed in a lot of Rome’s main sites in two abbreviated days, but I know we only scratched the surface of what this amazing city has to offer. I often found myself thinking “oh the boys would love to see this!” as we walked around so I can definitely see us taking a family trip there in the future (despite the prevalence of naked statues!).
