From the Roman Forum...

...along the Via del Fori Imperiali, past several other forums, and the Monumento a Vittorio Emanuele II. This is a momument to the first king of the unified Italy (he became king in 1861 - practically yesterday in terms of Italian history). It has various nicknames, including the wedding cake and the typewriter, and is pretty much derided by Italians young and old.


From there it was a hop, skip and a dash across the busy street to Piazza Venezia, which didn't have anything to hold my interest, so I strolled down the street, wandering in and out of shops, wishing I didn't have a credit card limit. I picked up a couple of souvenirs and eventually found my way to Piazza Navona.

This place was exactly what I'd imagined a piazza to be. I don't know if the stalls that were there are year-round or were just there for Christmas, but they sold everything from cheap crap to leather handbags. By this point in the day it was early afternoon, and I was a little peckish. I grabbed a panini and parked my butt on a railing around the Fontana del Nettuno. It was glorious - I sat there for quite a while, soaking up the sunshine, listening to the people (a good mix of tourists and locals), and trying hard to work out more of the language. It was that perfect temperature where I could have fallen asleep though, so I made myself get up and move on.

This time I headed for the Pantheon, which was only a few blocks away. I somehow managed to approach it from behind, which meant that I didn't really get the full effect of the columns until after I'd been inside. They're *massive*, and like the Colosseum, made me marvel at how they had been built so perfectly so many years ago. I went inside, and it was amazing. There are beautiful paintings everywhere, more huge columns, and, something I didn't realise beforehand, the tomb of Raphael, the painter and architect. It made me stop for a second, one of those 'wow' moments (there were a lot of them during the trip, but this was one of the first). I was suddenly standing before the tomb of someone whose name is bandied about so frequently when talking about history, and there it was, right in front of me.






The real 'wow' moment of the Pantheon though, for me, was the roof. This is a church, filled with priceless relics, and there's a gaping hole in the top of it. It's designed so that rain will drain away from small holes in the marble floor, which is great, but it's still kind of odd to go into somewhere like that and find that you're staring up at the sky whilst standing between the tombs of kings and queens.

I sat for a while here, too, to take it all in, before heading out into the piazza to take some photos of the front. In the end I didn't manage to get a photo of the whole front of it properly, but I did get most of it. It's just too big! I was about ready by this point for some dessert, so naturally I headed for the nearest gelati vendor. I bought a couple of scoops, saw lots of people sitting on the steps of this monument in the square, and figured I'd join them. I don't really know how I do it, but as soon as I sat down, a policewoman was telling me to bugger off. Turns out you can't sit anywhere even AROUND the monuments. Luckily, one of the easiest phrases of Italian sprung to mind, and "Mi scusi, mi scusi!" got me out of trouble!

Having nowhere to sit, I wandered up the street, with no real direction in mind. Eventually I saw a sign for the Fontana di Trevi, and seeing as that was on my list of places to go, headed for it. There's not much to say about it, apart from that it was truly spectacular. There wasn't a cloud in the sky, it was still warm, and there were so many parts of it all. I managed to wiggle my way into a seat in front of the fountain, and stayed there for a while, drinking it all in. I must have had my trustworthy face on, because I took photos for a stack of people while I was sitting there. In the end I was there for about two hours, just people watching and enjoying it all. I did throw a coin into the fountain, over my shoulder - now I get to go back!






It's a bit hard to make out in the photo above, but there's a guy leaning over in a khaki jacket and black beanie - he's got a magnet on the end of something like a television aerial, and he's fishing coins out of the fountain. Bastard.

I figured it wasn't yet time for dinner, but the sun was starting to go down. I had originally thought of going to the Spanish Steps as well, but then figured I'd leave it for another day, as I'd have very little to do otherwise. I decided to go back to the places I'd seen already, and take some night photos. That meant back first of all to the Pantheon, and then to Piazza Navona. I figured I'd eat somewhere in the Piazza, because there were lots of places to choose from and not so many on the way back to the Colosseum. I settled on this little out of the way place, which had very few people at it. One of the waiters was standing out the front, trying to convince people to come and eat there. He was funny, spoke enough English to understand my sarcastic retorts, and I was sold. Turns out, he wasn't even the charmer in the restaurant - the other waiter proposed to me! I couldn't really see myself married to a (hot) waiter in Rome, tempting though it was, and declined. Still, I can notch that up as a proposal all the same!

Finally I headed back through the piazza, past the Fountain of the Four Rivers, and back along past the Monumento a Vittorio Emanuele II, along the side of the Palatine and back to the Colesseum. I was exhausted by this point, so luckily for me it was time to head back to Termini and get the shuttle back to the hotel.

I saw this back at Termini - how exciting to see the Grandview on a poster in Rome!!