When in Rome...

September 1st.

Surprise, we went to do some business with a CNG company in Italy and got to do a little sightseeing in Rome and Venice while we were there. We were in Regio Amelia for most of the week. This is a little church in the old town area. As far as the old and also more touristy places go, we liked Regio Amelia the best. It was the cleanest and more real and quaint than Rome and Venice, probably because it isn't over run with tourists but is more for the locals instead. We went out on Wednesday night, which in Italy is like an extra Friday night, and got to hang out with some locals. The best meal I had was also here in Regio Amelia, Salmon pasta, Yum!

This is part of the ancient city of Rome.

Here we are at a little cafe sitting at a table on the sidewalk. Most if not all of the places to eat had tables out on the sidewalk or even in the street. We paid 4 euro for the Cokes that we had here, that's 6 US Dollars for two teeny tiny, itty bitty, Cokes!

San Pietro (St. Peter in English) in the Vatican City. Designed and partially built by Michelangelo (he died before it was finished) it is the largest dome in Rome. I'm telling you, it is big! This is where the Pope goes to speak to the people.
The inside of St. Peter. OK, this place is massive. In modern terms it probably isn't that big but considering that it was built in the 1600s just blew our minds. The thing in the middle is St. Peter's Basilica. Supposedly the body of Peter (the apostle Peter from the bible) is under that.

The Plaza in front of St. Peter.

This is a real live castle!

The Colosseum at sunset (that is why it is so orange). This place is amazing just because it is so very, VERY old.

The inside of the Colosseum. On the bottom there are passageways and tunnels. So the ground of the Colosseum actually had tunnels underneath for moving that gladiators and animals. It was covered with a wooden "floor" and that was covered in sand.

A might tiger! Actually just a kitty but I bet that kitty didn't have to pay 11 euro to get in like we did!

Here is a pic of the outside again but if you look real close you can see how it is crumbling were they have reinforced the structure with brick. There is only about 40% of the structure remaining today.

The Vatican Museum was big and full of naked art! well, not all of the art was naked but there sure was a lot of it.

Not naked art but a real live mummy!

Venice

On our trip to Italy we went to Venice via train. We were in Venice Friday September 5th and Saturday the 6th then went back to Rome on Sunday.

This is one of my favorite pictures of the rivers in Venice (above). I don't really know if you would call them rivers or canals. It was actually sea water that smelled like dead fish.

Craig and I over the big river in Venice.

St. Mark's in Venice. I love this picture with the crowds and the girl in the black dress running. St. Mark's was beautiful with a gold mosaic ceiling and a Tile floor that Craig couldn't take his eyes off of. OK, so the floors were pretty great too. They are tiles that create different patterns and illusions. Unfortunately they don't allow people to take pictures inside.

Here are two gondolas in the big river. The actually move around with an oar, not a long pole like everyone thinks. The cool thing is that they only use the oar on one side of the boat but they manage to keep the boat going straight. We were going to take a gondola ride but it was WAY overpriced. $120 for a 20 minute ride! And it was even more after sunset.

This is a smaller canal and also more typical.

The "streets" of Venice. The doors of these buildings came right to the water and they were rotting away at the bottom. It made me wonder how people got inside.