First stop: Rome

Our first stop was Rome:

We woke up rather early and headed for the airport. Once in Rome we realized we had such a short amount of time and we needed to put the "pedal to the metal". Basically, we hadn't done a whole lot of planning ahead of time, just going with the flow and hoping that any map we picked up told us where to go.

Once we finally made it to the center of Rome (they don't really tell you just how far the aiport is from Rome, 30 minutes by train and its a bit pricey as well, booo) we found the hostel we were to be staying at. We arrived at the front gate where we needed to "buzz" the ringer to get past the gate and we notice a sign that reads like this:

My words might not best describe the situation, but we were both in awkward zone. Where is the hostel? and why are we the only ones who need to ring for the portiere? So we do it and find a lady who explains in broken English/Italian that our hostel was overbooked and so she was taking us in at her B&B down the street. Nice start to our trip. ha ha.

So things worked out great, in the end we got a really nice room with a private bathroom and free breakfast and only had to pay the same rate we had been originally told. We set our stuff down and set out on our first adventure in Italy.

It's too early in the morning for our eyes to be open (at the airport in Paris)

me with the sign for the portiere 

first meal in rome, Pizza!

First gelatto (i accidentally ordered cantelope gelatto, won't be making that mistake again)

ruins near to the Colosseum

infront of the Altare della Patria (something important)

the view after we walked up all the steps

Alison was the 'navigational godess' the whole trip! she was a gem!

island in Rome (kind of like Ile-de-la-Cite in Paris)

some more ruins and I think where Ceasar with killed, these ruins were imporatant
but I can't remember exactly why

Famous fountain, the sinking ship, infront of the Spanish Steps

Our first view of the Spanish steps

Shortly after this, we found dinner and made our way back home. It was an early night for us. It was a nice start to a great trip! The weather was beautiful this day, althought a bit chilly, but the sun was out which was not the case for the majority of our trip.

Anyways, more to come later! Day one was tiring enough to recap muchless go through!

Ciao!