Off to Rome

Today is Wednesday and we woke to a sunny and warm morning. We had breakfast in the garden at the villa for one last time and said our goodbyes. We can't think of a place that makes us so sad to leave. The peacefullness. The lovely people. The beautiful landscape. There must be a way to stay here the rest of our lives. Even the staff at the villa was begging us to stay. They were planning a huge party and wanted us to be there. But Rome was waiting, so off we go.

Along the way, we decided to take a side trip to the coast and had lunch in a little port town near Orvieto called Porta San Stephano. It is amazing how blue the Mediteranean is.

We drop the rental car at the Rome airport and took the train to the hotel. When we got to the hotel, there was a little problem with our reservations. Seems we had reservations for two single rooms. The hotel was kind enough to make some arrangements to get us into two double room (very small doubles). We dropped our stuff and decided we could fit in one more sight before ending the day. We decided on the Trevi Fointain. What a spectacular thing to see all lit up at night. We made sure we kissed the special person in our lives and threw our coins in the fountain to insure a trip back to Rome.

For dinner, we stopped at a restaurant called al Nuovo Fagianetto, which is right next to our hotel. We were referred by our friends Steve and Katy who are very familiar with the restaurant. In fact, they shared a bottle of al Nuovo Fagianetto house wine with us recently that they brought back from Rome. Our waiter, Vinnie, was thrilled to see a photo that we'd brought with us that pictured the bottle (pictured). We were given the VIP treatment. It was the biggest (and best) meal we'd seen the whole trip and turned out to be the least expensive. Before we left, we assured Vinnie we'd be back before we left Rome.

Today is bright and early Thursday morning and we're off the Vatican. Every fun adventure is sure to have a little snafu or two, right? Well, this one does! The Vatican snafu was Collette's fault. The confirmation/ticket (which we were told you absolutely, positively, without a doubt have to have) to get into the Vatican was left behind at the hotel. Oh, did I mention that we didn't discover this until we were due to be in line at the tour (also, we were told time and time again that you can't be late for your tour) so there wasn't time to go back and get it. UGH! Turns out, there is a little wiggle room. Our tour group was waiting for us in front of the Vatican. Whew!

It is not humanly possible to describe the Vatican. Between the Vatican museums and St. Peters we were there from 8 am until 5 pm. Collette managed to convince the group to climb the Duomo here also. This one hosts 552 stairs up to the top. What an amazing view of Rome! Exhausted, we decided to take a little break from pasta, pizza and vino and take in a little Americana and went to Hard Rock for a beer, burger and fries (and a very cute waiter that looks a little like Chris Daughtry).

What a day. Try to update you tomorrow.

Tom, Theresa, Tino & Collette