Hot and Sticky Adventures In Italy: Days 1 and 2 ROME

Yep, that about sums up our trip... lots of hot, lots of sticky, and lots of adventures. But what a GREAT time we had. This is one of those posts that will be mostly for my family history and probably won't be as interesting to the rest of you. Read if you want... don't if you have better things to do.

I will start by saying that this trip was "planned" about one year ago by my mom, her siblings, and her parents. I have an uncle (my mom's brother Patrick) who has been living in Bologna, Italy for the last 20 years. He served his mission there and married my Italian aunt, Alfonsina after he returned home. Pat is building a home (also called the castle) in the countryside, in a town called Montombraro and the Hopkins's decided that we should all go for a visit and reunion when his house was done. By the time we got there, though, the house still wasn't done.

In the typical year we do not find out where my mom is taking us until Christmas. However, with so many people planning this trip, the cat was let out of the bag early on. I got a phone call sometime in October of last year from my mom. She said, "everyone else already knows where we're going, so we figured we should tell you too." Thanks mom, for thinking of me. I was thrilled... it's just one of those place I've always wanted to visit... so much history.

So, it all began in the wee morning hours of June 18th. Brandon and Tabitha and I (having dropped the boys at their Nana's the night before) were dropped at the airport by Justin to begin our Italian Adventure. We flew from Phoenix to Atlanta and then into Rome where we were very surprised to find the weather much like it is at home. So, right off we knew that it wasn't going to be a break from the heat. We were fortunate, however, to be a little more accustomed to it than the 24 siblings, cousins, aunts, uncles, and granparents that travelled with us.

Upon our arrival in Rome at the Golden Tulip Ambra Palace Hotel we were informed by the desk clerk that our tour guide was waiting for us. WHAT? We've just been travelling for 24 hours and we have a tour scheduled? I thought I scheduled that for 3 this afternoon, not 9 this morning. Umm, apparently not. I called the guide and asked if there was any way he could come back at 3. Nope... but I'll give you til 11, he said. OK, that gives us an hour to shower and rest. Except that mine and Brandon's room wasn't ready yet so we camped out with my sister and her hubby. Tabitha had been pretty great on the flight over, but she was close to the end of her rope. I knew she just needed a LONG nap. It wasn't to be. We met our guide, Armondo, and hopped on the tour bus with him.
This is Armondo telling my family all about the St. Paolo Fuori le Mura or St. Paul's Basilica. Where is Mandy?, you might ask. I am on the bus with a screaming Tabitha who has HAD IT and isn't putting up with any more of this Italian Adventure stuff. I'm not sure I've ever seen her so upset.

She eventually fell asleep and Brandon and I agreed to switch off for the rest of the tour. I'm sad I missed this church. Here's some pics that Brandon took, with info that he shared with me.


The inside of the church. You can kind of see the marble canopy that stands over the high altar.

This is St. Paul himself. You can see that he is holding a knife and a cloth. Well, it's not really a cloth, it's his skin. Apparently many of the saints are depicted holding the instruments of their death. Paul was skinned. Nice. Moving on...


This pic is not nearly as beautiful as what we actually saw. Our guide took us to a wooden door that was set into a block wall. The door had a small hole in it. When you look through the hole you see a beautiful corridor covered in greenery and the dome of St. Peter's Basilica (in Vatican City) off in the distance. It was stunning.

This is a picture of Palatine Hill as we drove by on the bus. It is as close as we got. Palatine was where a bunch of emperors used to live. It's one of the places I would have loved to explore, but there just wasn't time. We did a four hour tour on the first day, and an 8 hour tour the second day. I feel like we barely scratched the surface of Rome. There is just SO MUCH history there. I guess we'll have to go back someday.

After the tour, and showers, and naps... My brother Chris hangs with Tabs and my cousin Ellie while we wait for everyone to gather for dinner.

Ah, dinner. A wonderful event each and every day of the trip. While we were in Rome we went to the same restaurant every night. I think it was called Cecia and it was about 1/2 mile from our hotel. They had these Gnocchi in four cheese sauce that were to DIE for. Brandon and I LOVE Gnocchi. We got it both nights. But, I also enjoyed my trusty friend, Caprese every night. Here's a picture of her:
YUM. I love Buffalo Mozz. I wish it were'nt so darn expensive here.

This is my Grandma with the family that owns Cecia. They were such nice people. The momma would hold my cousin's son while they ate. Bellisima!

Day 2:
8 Hour Tour with Armondo to all the major sights in Rome.
Load up the tour bus with 18 of us. Grandma and Grandpa opted out of this one. I don't blame them... it was a really long day.

Here's Tabitha all ready to go. She spent the entire trip strapped to Brandon. I only took her once or twice. She was a trooper.

This is the entrance to the Vatican Museum. It's set into that big wall that surrounds Vatican city. For those of you who haven't read all of Dan Brown's books... Vatican City is it's own state. It is ruled by the Pope. There are about 500 residents. It has it's own post office, banks, currency, judicial system, radio station, and a daily newspaper. Vatican City also issues it's own stamps and if you buy one there you have to mail it there. All this in only 106 acres. Pretty crazy place.

This was the first gallery we entered and it was lined with busts and sculptures. Tons of marble in this place. You can see Armondo in the foreground speaking into his microphone to us farners (foreigners, spoken in hick).

Part of our group, listening intently to Armondo. We may look bored, but really we're just trying to soak up every morsel of information. Armondo was an Encyclopedia on all things Rome.

Tabitha had a screaming fit in one of the galleries in the museum. It was VERY hot in the hallway that must have been 1/2 mile long with no exits. Armondo just kept talking, and talking, trying to tell us all about the Sistine Chapel before we entered. I thought we might die. She was just voicing the discomfort that we ALL felt. And then she zonked. That is her face covered by her hat.

This is a pic of the Sistine Chapel Ceiling. It wasn't taken by me. We weren't allowed to take pictures in the Chapel. Here's how the experience went. We walked in the door to the chapel and my first impression was how small it was. In high school I took an Art History class and we talked mucho about Michaelangelo's Sistine Chapel ceiling. I always imagined it was huge. That is not the case. It is still a very impressive amount of space to have painted such beautiful things on, but not nearly as big as I thought it would be. My next thought was, "how am I going to fit into this sea of people." It was packed. When you walk in the door you are a couple steps above the floor, so you're looking down on everyone's heads. Armondo plowed through though and found us a good spot. We oohed and ahhed (silently, since there was a be quiet policy) til our neck's cramped. We were off to St. Peter's Basilica.

St. Peters is HUGE. You'd think I'd have tons of pictures. I don't. I think I was mesmerized by it's space and all the art that is tucked in it's corners. From the time I studied Art History my favorite sculpture of all time is Michaelangelo's Pieta. It evokes much emotion from me. Michaelangelo created it in 1499 at the ripe old age of 25. Truly a master, that Michaelangelo. The Pieta is in St. Peter's, so I got to see it in person. It is protected by glass because of an attack on it back in the 70's, so this is someone else's picture.

Coming out of St. Peter's. Looking out on the Piazza San Pietro.

Brandon, Tabitha and I in front of St. Peter's. They were setting up for a big event. Thousands of plasic chairs and metal barricades kind of take away from the historic feel of the place.

Next, we took a break for lunch. Armondo took us to this place where we had a sampling of traditional roman foods. It was Yum.

With full bellies and a good attitude restored we moved on to the Colosseum. I'll tell you that when we were driving from the airport to our hotel we drove past the Colosseum and it is a very surreal experience to see such a monumental piece of art/architecture standing in the middle of a bustling, modern city. Wow, is the only word to explain the Colosseum.
Yep, that's me and my video camera. If you look on the left of the structure you can see the space between the inner wall and outer wall.

Still on approach.


The ruined interior wall. The holes appeared when all the metal was extracted from the building during one of the wars. I guess they needed it for weapons.

A better view of the exterior decorative wall and the interior wall.

Our group standing between the exterior and interior walls.


A picture taken to show the Doric, Ionic, and Coriniah columns, but mostly just focused on the back of my head (again). Sure glad I made a trip to Crystal before I left.


Look at those beautiful highlights!


A picture showing where the floor was in the original days. The wild animals were kept under the floor where all those ruins are. In AD 80 there were over 9,000 wilkd animals killed here during the inaugural games. Sad.

Standing where the breeze was.


Soaking in more morsels of information.


Trevi Fountain. Seen in LOTS of movies. The site originally marked the terminal of an aqueduct built by Agrippa in 19 BC to channel water into the baths. They say that if you throw in a penny you will return to Rome someday. We tossed ours in.
Um, I wanted to say that you shouldn't look too close to my bangs. I had an accident with a flat iron that morning that managed to singe a good portion of them. Needless to say, my wal-mart converter was no match for my instant-heat CHI. Hooray, bad hair in ALL my Italy pics!

After Trevi Fountain, and the Spanish steps (which I didn't get a picture of) we got back on the bus. We were tired and hot and we thought we were headed back to the hotel, since our 8 hours was up. Then Armondo stoppped the bus and started to get out. The look on the faces of my family was priceless. They were all looking at me (since I'd planned this whole excursion) with quizzical and exhausted looks. Griffin, my 8 year old cousin, said, "I'm not getting off this bus." He had more than one adult (5 maybe) volunteer to stay with him. The rest of us plodded off to the next adventure.

Brandon, Tabitha, and Steve (my bro-in-law) outside the Pantheon. It's a temple built in the 1st century and is VERY well preserved.

Another nap on the go.


Inside the Pantheon. The floor is original.


The dome. Solid concrete. Largest dome in the world.

That concludes our 8 (or 9) hour tour. It was exhausting, but I'm glad we (meaning most of us) stuck with it.
One more dinner at Cecia where baby Joshua ate his entire jar of baby food with his tongue sticking out.

Hot and Sticky Adventures In Italy: Off to Bologna

On day 3 we packed up and walked to the train station in Rome. We took the two hour train ride to Bologna. Bologna was our hub. It was actually a really great place to stay because it's in the middle of everything. A one to two hour train ride to some of the most important cities. Uncle Pat got us a hotel that was a 10 minute walk from the train station, and 5 minutes from good shopping and dining. The Albergo Atlantic was a small, quaint hotel that was clean and comfortable, and very affordable. The breakfast left a little to be desired, unless you were alright with croissants and nutella EVERY morning. I was ok with it most of the time. Nutella for breakfast is a TREAT!

This is our group leaving the train station in Bologna to walk to our hotel.
Quite the sight. We are a herd of "farners".

"Farners" with LOTS of luggage.

All those people waaayyy back there... they're with us too.

Sorry, more pictures of food. This is the balsamic vinegar being poured on Jessie's dessert. She said it wasn't bad. I'm not so sure. She also would eat bernnaise sauce on her ice cream.

We attended church at Pat's ward. There wasn't enough space for us to sit in the chapel, but we weren't sad because the room they put us in had much better air conditioning and we could let the kids play as loudly as they needed.

This is a picture of my Italian cousin Ethan, my cousin Michael's son Robbie, and Tabitha during sacrament meeting. I took three of these pictures and Robbie was blurry in each one. He doesn't sit still for long.

After church there was a "Family Meeting" where Grandma showed a slide show of all the major happenings since our last reunion in 2002. This is a pic of half the room. Not the most flattering picture of my family. Sorry bout that. I didn't take this, but I'm sure glad I'm not in it.


After the meeting we had our first Italian pizza. It was fine, but I am definately accustomed to the way we do pizza here in the good ole' US of A.
A not-so-great picture of Brandon and I in front of the church in Bologna.

My Aunt Jen (mom's youngest sister) had her birthday so we got her a gelato cake from our favorite gelato shop Gelateria Gianni. There were days we went there twice, even though it was at least a mile walk each way.

Monday was a day trip to Florence. From the train we walked to the Duomo.

It is enormous. I struggled to get the entire Campanile in this picture. It is 276 feet tall, and the dome in the background is 20 feet taller. Here's a stock photo of the Florence skyline... just to get an idea of the size:

This is a picture of a procession coming out of the baptistry. It was going from here to the Duomo when we arrived. I know nothing about the costumes and such that the Catholic clergy wear, but there were a lot of people in different religious clothing. We never did find out what this was all about, but the Duomo was closed until later in the afternoon. We decided to go scope out Michaelangelo's David in the meantime.

Oh, and this is the Gate of Paradise (or a copy since the real ones are in a safe place). It took the guy who made them 28 years to do so. These are also the doors in the previous picture on the baptistry.


On the way to the David we stopped for a minute. I turned around and this is what I saw. If you look closely you'll see three sleeping babies. Tabitha, Gabe, and Joshua were taking one more nap-on-the-go.

When we got the the place where the David is the line was about 2 hours long. Pat (our tour guide for the day) told us that the David is the only thing in that museum that we'd recognize so he recommended we spend our time waiting in line at the Uffizi instead, and we could see a copy of the David on our way. Since the line was in full sun most of us agreed that was a good plan. We walked to the Uffizi which is Italy's most famous art gallery. On the way, we passed through the Piazza della Signoria where we saw this:

This is the copy, but it stands in the place where the original stood until 1873.

We also saw this:
No, not the weird lady in the middle of my photographic masterpiece... it's the Rape of the Sabine Women. Carved by Giambologna in 1583. That's one piece of marble, people. Just stunning.


Oh, and one more thing before we got to the Uffizi. This is my mom's favorite glove store. We all know that Italy is known for it's leather goods. Florence is known for it's leather gloves. It's quite the luxurious experience to buy gloves here. They actually have you put your elbow on a pillow with your hand up in the air, and then they slide them onto your hands. Apparently gloves have a perfect fit.

OK, now onto the Ufizzi. The line here was two hours as well, but it was in the shade. Unfortunately, there was no picture taking allowed inside, so I'll just tell you that the most famous piece of art that I got to see was Botticelli's "The Birth of Venus".
After the Uffizi we went back to the Duomo to try to get in. Another 2 hour line. Ya'll are probably thinking we're slackers, but no one was interested in another line (this one was also in full sun). We decided to call it a day. On the walk back to the train station we came across a woman who had collapsed at the bottom of the stairs. Aunt Terri to the rescue:
My Uncle Kevin (Terri's husband) shamelessly took this picture. Forget that I'm shamelessly copying it. That is my Aunt Terri helping the woman. Terri is a PA on a small island called Tinian which is way in the middle of the Pacific. She's amazing at diagnoses and treatment. Remember my whole "PUPP" episode while I was pregnant? Terri is who kept me sane through all that. She determined that the woman was dehydrated and had passed out. It was definitely hot.

"More bars in more places," my cousin Ellie (in the middle) says. She's a crackup.