Tom's embarrassing day with me

July 5, 2013

Woke up feeling a little groggy from all the wine we drank the night before. We had to be out at 10 from the hotel and we rolled out of bed at 9:42. Tom and I both showered , packed, tsulls cleaned the hotel, and we were out of there by 10:25. Pretty impressive.

We found our hostel called Two Ducks and went up this old fashion elevator to the 5th floor. We couldn't check in until 2 because it was "cleaning time". We stored our bags in this little closet with 10 or so other bags. The hostile was a little sketchy. Tsulls said it was the weirdest hostile he has ever stayed at. Thank goodness we only had to be there for a few hours since our flight was at 6:30 in the morning. 

We headed out for the day and went to termini station to find out how to take the bus in the morning to the airport. We ate breakfast/lunch at the station and relaxed there for a little while, talking with this sweet family from Texas. We were all a little lethargic. I am glad we were all on the same page. 

I bought a coca cola (did the trick) and we felt re-energized and ready to go so we took off for the metro to the Vatican City. We split up with Tsulls because he had already done the Vatican City tour a few days prior with his mom. Tom and I were pretty nervous to part with Tsulls because he has been our tour guide this whole trip. We had very little faith in ourselves.   

Tom and I kept hearing from tour companies and Tsulls that we would have to wait for an hour or two in line to get tickets. We were dreading it but something we were just expecting to do. We walked in to the Vatican bought our ticket and walked right in through the museum. Not a single line, thank goodness. We were on as great start to our day!

The Vatican was beautiful. Many gorgeous sculptures and paintings. We didn't get an audio guide so we just toured around listening in on tour guides. 

^ view from the Vatican 

The end of the tour, we finally made it to the Sistine chapel. It was a really neat feeling being in there. It was bizarre though because we were just all crowded in on top of each other. You are supposed to be silent and the noise levels would obviously pick up a little. The guards would "shhhhhhhh" about every 20 seconds in a deep, loud voice. 

We were really on a mission find a local Cafe to get a cup of coffee when we left. We just walked down this little side road (hardly even put thought into it) and there it was! No one spoke English which how you know it is a good local cafe. Delish coffee. Tom just ordered black coffee and it was served in a mug the size of a shot glass. I took a pic and every single person in the cafe looked at us. Poor tom had to spend the whole day with me,embarrassed to be seen with me. 

We kept wondering where the 

St. Peter's basilica was and said  "maybe since it wasn't apart of our tour it isn't open to the public". Well thank goodness for tom insisting on seeing it or we would have just continued on after coffee. It was very open to the public!!  It turned out to be one of our favorite parts of the day. Just being outside where we could enjoy the sculptures and beauty without being squished in a room (with 100 other stinky people doing the same thing) was very nice.  

Our next destination was Piazza Navona. We told ourself once we got there we could get gelato. Well the map we had was the worst. Reading the street signs and matching them up to the map was  near impossible. We ended up strolling down narrow cobble stone roads smushed in between colorful buildings. Walking around and exploring was definitely another highlight of the day for me. Seeing the sites and sounds of the day was a really great was to see the city and understand the culture (kind of). 

At this point we really were tired of walking and really wanted to just find Piazza Navona just so we could then get gelato. 

We see a big statue faintly down the road so we were so happy we found it! We took some pictures and a man selling roses just gave on to me. He took some pictures of Tom and I with the roses, asked for money and we said sorry and he took the rose back. (Another embarrassment for Tom)  When we were satisfied so we took off to find find gelato. Only to find out we were not at Piazza Navona but Piazza del Popolo, which is about a mile north. No clue how we managed to make it that far north! It was fun though :)

Oh, and I put my feet in the fountain to freshen up(others were doing it too!) and a public safety worker yelled at me (add that to the embarrassment list as well). It was well worth it!

But we couldn't stop at any gelato place. We wanted to find the local spot again with cozy seating. We walked by gelato shops that had neon blue lighting, a lot of tourists, or just an ugly inside with no outside seating. After about an hour of meandering through the streets of Rome, we finally found the perfect gelato shop. The lady didn't speak English so we knew it was a true local place. After 3 hours of talking about this dang gelato, it was the best stop of the day (i guess all of our stops were awesome) I got chocolate chip and strawberry and Tom got chocolate and strawberry. We enjoyed every bite and resting our legs was much needed. 

From there we were ready to get home. It was about 7 and we planned on meeting Tsulls at the hostile at 8. We made one more stop to the Pantheon. That was a really neat temple. I forgot to take a picture on my iPhone though! Sowwie. 

We walked past an awesome flea market and I thought Tom was going to die. He had to walk away because I was trying on pants and looking at dresses. He couldn't believe I was looking at clothes to buy outside on the street. 

He also doesn't like my picture selections. I like to take artsy photos outside and he likes to take pictures inside of all the museums. Oh boy...

We did have a great day together despite how embarrassing I was. 

Headed back at 7:30 and we were right on time. There were many times we were a little turned around but we just kept asking how to get to termini station  and we would know our way from there. We got to termini station around 8 so we were a little late to meet Tsulls. We were so confident on our way to the hostile but we couldn't seem to find it. We both had vivid details about what the roads looked like but we couldn't find it :( except we walked past this great dinner place, with bread and oil (yes!), so I took pictures all the way around it so I knew how to get there! We also were so thirsty and hadn't found a water fountain all day and we finally found one when we were lost! AND I SAW THE CUTEST YELLOW LAB! We both looked at each other as if this was a joke and then I saw an Internet cafe! We ran in and google mapped it! 

Pretty good idea I had there :) made it back to two ducks and Tsulls at 8:50. 

Headed back to that place for dinner without any trouble finding it. We all had an amazing last supper in Italy! WITH BREAD AND OIL. I learned furmancho means cheers but we switched over to water tonight :)  

Headed back to the hostile and it ended up working out great. We had our own beds and showered. 

We had a very very long walking day so we were dead but couldn't sleep. I blogged, went to bed at 1:30 and woke up at 3:45 for our bus!

^Picture of our hostile