Day 11...Rome, Vatican, Rome

Sorry for not posting yesterday!  It was a really long day!! Our constant movement is beginning to catch up with us and is making it more difficult to get up in the mornings, but we have still been punctual to everything!




We started our day at the Colosseum in Rome.  Our guide is an archaeology student who has done some of her own excavations.  So, you can imagine how excited she was to tell us about the history of the Colosseum and the Roman Ruins!  She taught us quite a bit about the history of the Colosseum.  It was built by two different emperors almost 2000 years ago.  It was originally covered in shining white marble, but during the time that it was not in use, most of the marble was removed and used to build other buildings.  It was closed during the 4th century when Constantine converted people to Christianity and said there were to be more fights, closing the Colosseum.  We also discovered that the Colosseum was built with the ruins from Solomon's temple in Jerusalem after the Romans destroyed it!  



(Our friends from Indiana)

Next, we walked out of the Colosseum to the Roman Ruins.  It is unreal how much of the old city has been excavated and preserved!  




We had lunch just outside of the Vatican walls and started our tour at 3:30 p.m. with 12,000 steps already taken!!  The tour begins with a very fast-paced walk through the Vatican museum.  We saw frescoes (paintings done while the plaster on the wall is drying), statues, oil paintings, tapestries, and more.  Unfortunately, it was so fast, we were unable to really process what we were seeing.  The number of people in the museum at one time is literally breath-taking.  There is no way they would pass an American fire code!




We finally made it to the Sistine Chapel and St. Peter's Basillica!  Wow!  It was unreal.  We saw more art yesterday than our brains could really process!  Our guide had given us a little lesson on Michaelangelo's work in the Sistine Chapel before we went in. So, we were able to somewhat appreciate the Fresco masterpiece he created in on the ceiling of the Chapel.  It took him 4.5 years!  



We did not see the Pope, but we did see the window that we usually see on tv from which he blesses people.


Next, we walked into St. Peter's Basilica!  There are no words to describe it.  We have been to A LOT of cathedrals on this trip, but this one doesn't look like the others.  It is massive!  We saw Michaelangelo's Pieta first.  Then, our guide told us about the Papal altar, the dimensions of the church, etc.  We were also able to see several former Popes who are in crypts inside the Basilica.  This, of course, was fascinating to us all.  However, it was the third church in which we had seen a crypt with a body in it.  

(Pieta by Michaelangelo)

We ate dinner not too far from the Vatican, and then Miriam led us on a pretty long tour of the city- by foot. The city was alive, and even though we were tired, we enjoyed the music, dancing and conversations all around us!  We made wishes to return to Italy in the Trevi fountain.  We visited the Pantheon, which has been standing completely in tact for 2000 years, and we had "the best gelato in Rome". When we got back on our bus, we had over 26,000 steps for the day.  It was a long day, but it was amazing!




We said goodbye to Miriam and our friends from Indiana, and we met Simone, our tour guide for the remainder of the trip. Then, we went to bed!!

Day 10: Rome via Assisi

Today, we traveled to Rome, but we made a stop for a few hours in Assisi.  The town is gorgeous!  The Basilica was stunning.  We just cannot get over how this art has survived hundreds of years.  It is amazing to think how long it has survived and how many people it takes to preserve and restore it!

After our tour with a local guide around the Basilica, we had free time for lunch and a little shopping.   Many of us enjoyed more gelato because - why not?!



The town of Assisi is so much like what you think of when you think of Italy - rolling hills, cobblestone streets, narrow walkways, flowers in windows, and small stores lining the streets.




This is one of the courtyards at the hotel we are staying in the next two nights.  The grounds are beautiful.


Tomorrow we will say goodbye to our tour director and bus driver.  We will have a new director and bus driver for the last few days of our trip. It will be hard to say goodbye because we have grown very close to them.  We gave them our gifts from Texas tonight, and they were thrilled.



And...the moms and teachers had to take a picture with Giovanni!!

We are resting tonight for a BIG day tomorrow.  There will be a lot of walking and standing, but it is going to be great!!  

The Vatican and Rome Icons

Good evening!  It has been another full yet exhausting day!  Our constant movement is beginning to catch up with us and is making it more difficult to get up in the mornings, but we have still been punctual to everything!

We started our day with a 2-hour drive (think Houston traffic) to the Vatican.  We were a little overwhelmed when we arrived and found hundreds of people in line to get in.  However, it was a reminder of how great the EF system works. We immediately skipped probably over 500 people and went on in!

We did not realize how much there was to see and spent the first hour and a half walking through the museums of different types of art and statues with our local guide.  We were already exhausted, and it was warm inside.  So we were a little grumpy, but we finally made it to the Sistine Chapel and St. Peter's Basillica!  Wow!  It was unreal.  We saw more art today than our brains could really process!

The most exciting part to me was learning that St. Peter is buried under the Basillica!

We did not see the Pope, but we did see the window that we usually see in tv from which he blesses people.

We ate lunch in the Vatican, and then our bus driver, Paolo, took us to the center of Rome where we did a self-guided tour.  We made wishes to return to Italy in the Trevi fountain which is enormous.  We visited the Pantheon, which is now a working church but was built in the first century.

We also saw the Spanish steps which are under construction.  We were not able to get very close, but we did get a group selfie!

After a pizza party for dinner, we returned to the hotel.  Tomorrow morning, 19 of our group will leave for home while the other 24 move on to Pompeii.  Everyone is looking forward to where they are going but wouldn't mind trading places with someone either!  We're all tired, but none of us want to miss anything, either!

We will continue to update everyone until we are all back home!

Roman Colosseum

The kids are doing so good waking up each morning!  We are so proud of them and their behavior.  Everyone is punctual and respectful!  We are really having a great time with this group.

Today, we left Florence and headed to Rome.  We made a quick stop at a leather factory because a few people were unable to purchase items they wanted yesterday!  Then, we drove a few hours and stopped for lunch at a "rest stop" with many choices of foods!

We drove about another hour and arrived in Rome.  We were shocked at all the graffiti in the walls as we entered!  It kind of felt like they took us through the backdoor!

When we arrived at the colosseum, we were a little confused because it looked so much different than in pictures, but we soon discovered it was mainly the angle at which we entered!  We were all shocked that it was right in the middle of the city rather than off by itself.

It is unreal how much of the old city has been excavated and preserved!

We also discovered that the Colosseum was built with the ruins from Solomon's temple in Jerusalem after the Romans destroyed it!

Our local guide gave us a wonderful tour of the ruins around the colosseum, as well.

One thing we have loved is watching the kids get excited about the places or buildings that they did their project on.  Many of them have asked the tour guide specific questions about that site or for clarification on something they'd missed!  It has made it much more meaningful to them at those places!

We checked in to our "Gucci, Gucci" hotel at the top of a mountain, just before dinner.  The hotel is wonderful, but the view is stunning!  It is straight out of a movie!  Our tour guide said that in the 17 years he has been doing this, he had never stayed in such a nice hotel!

Dinner was in the hotel dining room where we were entertained by a few of our talented students.

We are in our rooms now and ready for the Vatican tomorrow.  We understand that the Pope is there, by we've been told not to expect to see him.

We are doing well.  Half of our group will be leaving on the 14th as the others will continue on to a few more cities!  Enjoy the pictures.