Italian Adventures: Roma - Day 3 (Sunday)

We got up early to explore before our bus tour at 12:30. We had breakfast at the hotel then headed out to Campidoglio where there's a really good outlook over the Roman Forum. It was so cool! On the walk up to the overlook, we walked up some stairs and into a piazza with a statue of Marcus Aurellius. At the overlook, we took a ton of pictures and could see all over the Forum.

Piazza up on Campidoglio

Roman Forum

Me and the Roman Forum

Mary and I then went on our own little adventure down Via del Corso. We went back to the Spanish Steps and walked up to the top. We looked into the church at the top Trinita dei Monti and then walked back down and up to Piazza del Popolo, a large open piazza. There was a puppy playing with its owner in the piazza and I took a bunch of pictures, it was so cute!!

Spanish Steps

View from the Top

Top of the Spanish Steps

Piazza del Popolo

The cute dog I stalked haha

Fountain in Piazza del Popolo

After awhile, we walked back down Via del Corso. We saw a street band which was really cool. Then we made our way back to the Pantheon. We were hoping to go back into the Pantheon to look around, but there was a service going on so it was closed. We decided to find lunch and ended up at another little pizzeria. We brought our food down to the steps by the fountain across from the Pantheon and ate watching the people and admiring the Pantheon. Then we headed back to the hotel.

Street Band on Via del Corso

Outside the Pantheon

Our view while eating lunch

Our bus tour of Rome was really neat. We drove around several of the main sights - Piazza Venezia, Fori Imperiali, Piazza Republica, Villa Borghese, and Circo Massimo. Alfredo told us so many things, I wish I could remember them all. I do remember that we saw the oldest obelisk in Rome, it's 3500 years old. We also drove by Saint John's church which was originally built in 313! According to Alfredo, there are about 800 churches in Rome (including the chapels in the palaces), never mind the number, there are churches everywhere! One time when we were walking we passed a church on one side of the street and the next building down on the other side of the street was another church!

After the bus tour we went to the Colosseum! We also saw Constantine's Arch which is right next to the Colosseum. Alfredo gave us a really good tour, but it was a bit hard to hear him at points because we were a pretty large group. My bus had 34 people, I think, so we were all on one tour together. In the Colosseum there are some seats left over from right before it was closed, they still have the names of the aristocrats who sat in them carved into the marble! It was so cool! At the end of our tour, Alfredo said good-bye and then we had a bit of free time where we took some more photos and bought a few souvenirs. After that we met up and boarded the bus for the ride back to Florence.