We had originally planned on taking a last minute trip to somewhere in Greece, but all of the flights we looked at were far too long.  One of the return flights would take a full 24 hours with all layovers included.  So, with only a few days set aside for travelling, we decided to change our destination and go instead to London.

We didn’t book a hotel in advance, thinking we’d be able to find something pretty easily.  So after our flight, we studied a map and tried to find a location central to what we wanted to do.  We started by strolling down to the London Bridge, then following along the river Thames towards the HMS Belfast.  At Hay’s galleria we stopped to eat and booked tickets for the Phantom of the Opera, and our day trip to Windsor castle, Stonehenge, and Bath.  We also grabbed a bite to eat and took a moment to check out the sculpture that looks like a steampunk version of some Willy Wanka pirate ship.  Cool and weird all at once.

Then we continued along the river, over the Tower Bridge to the Tower of London, where we rode the tube to Westminster.  We strolled along from there, pausing to take in some of the sights; Big Ben and Westminster Abby primarily.  At this point we hadn’t actually entered any of these sites yet, and only admired them from afar and took some photos.  Weather was stereotypically British as we searched for a hotel – overcast and drizzling, so we spent as much time indoors as possible.

We eventually found a somewhat sketchy place a short walk from Buckingham Palace, and booked a room for two nights, intending to find something nicer for our last night – though every other place we’d looked at so far was VERY expensive – over £100/night.

From there, we walked up to the palace and through the park nearby, making our way up to Piccadilly Circus.  The plan being to explore that area until it was time for the show.  We saw (but did not go into) the Ripley’s Believe-It-Or-Not museum, got some snacks and coffees at a cafe, and found a restaurant (The Mermaid’s Tail) that had gluten-free fish and chips, where we would be returning after the show for dinner.

All together we saw two shows and one movie while we were there: Phantom of the Opera, Wicked, and Up.  Phantom was really good, though not as good as when I saw it in Toronto.  I enjoyed Wicked, but not all of it.  Parts were really awesome, while I found others pretty bland.  We saw Up in 3D, and it was interesting.  The 3D effects weren’t all that necessary, but added some depth at a few exciting moments.  It wasn’t exactly what I expected, but it was still a good movie.

For our second day, we had booked a day long tour going to Windsor Castle, Stonehenge, then Bath.

Windsor castle was awesome.  Especially for a guy like me who likes castles probably a little too much.  The town around was very nice looking, and the castle itself was spectacular.  I felt like royalty just walking through.  It felt more like a museum than a living space, though, I suppose that’s what it is now.  It would be really cool if it was possible to spend a night there.

Unfortunately photographs weren’t allowed inside, so I only have pictures of the outside.  I would have liked to have more time to visit the surrounding town, and also more information while touring the inside of the castle, but we were pressed for time.

Stonehenge was a lot farther away than I had thought, but definitely worth the drive.  As it turns out, we were one of the last groups to go out there before they reconfigured the roads.  They’re going to be moving the roads so none of them pass close to the ancient monument, and in the future visitors will need to park several kilometers away and walk there through the fields.

 I was interested to learn that they had found some grains under one of the stones that was dated at around 9,000 years old!  The entire monument is so incredibly interesting, mysterious and beautiful in a raw, natural way.  It reminded me a lot of when I went to chichen itza, but with more of a natural feel.  It’s hard to believe that it was constructed thousands of years ago without modern tools, and the stones were brought from a distant mountain range.

After spending far too little time getting rained on while admiring the stones in the middle of a green field dotted with burial mounds, we shipped out to our next ancient monument: the city of Bath.

Bath is a city built around a natural hot spring, which was captured by the Romans.  The Romans, who loved to bathe, harnessed the geothermal energy to create an elaborate and elegant ancient spa, spotted with tributes to the gods.  A prosperous town sprung up around the baths, which is now a picturesque sprawling city with a large tourist draw.

As we came out from the baths, the rain stopped and the sun came out full force, illuminating the emerald green landscape and throwing a rainbow across the sky.

We drove home through some very picturesque landscape, made even more beautiful by the appearance of the sun and rainbow.

After that, we spent our last day touring Westminster Abbey and wandering through town.  The Abbey was another beautiful structure, though it was similar to most other cathedrals I’ve seen so far – very similar layout with tombs everywhere.  The most impressive section for me was the Writer’s Corner, where many famous writers and poets are interred or honored. 

It was a great trip, but too short and rushed.  I’d love to go back again, and maybe with some more people.  I think it would be a very fun place to go with a small group of friends.  We’re also planning another trip later, hoping to stay at a small castle that runs a bed and breakfast out near Bath that we’d heard is relatively inexpensive.

Though I had talked about it for a while and tossed around the idea, it was a fairly last minute decision for me to actually attend the Bavarian Beer Fest.

I booked a flight that ended up being about twice as expensive as when I first searched, several months earlier, but it was still a cheap (and short)  flight from Warsaw. 

Our first day was spent primarily at Oktoberfest.  We had a table reserved for 2 hours, during which time we had 250€ to spend on food and drinks.  We had a few rounds of Weißbier, and some food.  At first our tent was mostly empty and pretty quiet, but by the time we left the band had started and people were beginning to sing along and toast strangers with a lively "Prost!".

Afterwards, we made our way around the fairgrounds, trying to make our way through several tents.  Our most successful venture was the Nymphenburg Sekt (which we quickly renamed to the Nympho Sex tent).  Most of the other tents required that you sit at a table in order to be served, however that tent had servers walking around with crates of beer to sell.  It was still outside the tent, in the beergarten, and you needed a table to eat, but it was more than we got at most other tents.

Everywhere we went were jolly groups of drinkers, reciting folk songs or chanting some more modern tunes.  I was surprised at the lack of hostility, but security was pretty serious, so I imagine most offenders were quickly dragged off to where they couldn’t ruin the atmosphere for others.

Later that evening we found a niche for ourselves at another tent.  I can’t recall exactly which one (by that point, things were getting a bit fuzzy), but we managed to share a table with one of the bartenders and his wife, which meant some great service, and entertaining stories.  At what felt like 2am, but was really only around 10pm (or earlier), we returned to our hotel to sleep it off and prepare for the next day.

To avoid a day long drinking marathon, my friend, John, had planned an excursion to visit Neuschwanstein castle and invited me along.  I thought this was a great idea, so in the morning we headed out to meet with our tour group.

After about a 2 hour bus ride, we arrived at the ski lodge near the castle.  There we rode the alpine slide, had a good lunch (passed on the beers, though), and our tour guide performed some close-up magic.  After lunch, and before heading up to the castle, he offered to teach some of his tricks.  Having always been enamored with magic, and at one point trying to practice some tricks, I couldn’t pass up.  Of course it ended up he was selling DVDs, and of course I ended up buying them.  They were overpriced, sure, but I was compelled.

After all of that, we began hiking up the gorge that led to the castle.  A few people took the bus, but the rest opted for the hike.  The gorge was, well, gorgeous.  Though not as impressive, having lived in Ithaca, but still very impressive nonetheless. 

It was a foggy day, and we couldn’t see the castle from down below, so as we came out from the woods, the castle loomed over us.  Inside was covered with some pretty amazing artwork – the king’s bedroom was particularly impressive, having taken 14 woodworkers 4 years to complete it.  Unfortunately, though, only a small fraction of the room were ever finished, so there wasn’t much to see.  But what we saw was pretty spectacular.

The exterior of the castle was equally impressive, and was used in several movies (including Spaceballs, which we watched on the busride back) and was the inspiration for the castle at Disney.  It has tall, smooth towers and was clearly built more for appearance than defence.  Considering it was built in the mid 1800s, the age of the castle was pretty much over anyways.

After our tour of the castle, the bus dropped us off near the Oktoberfest fair grounds, along the route that was more travelled by the locals.  We got back and attempted to meet up with the rest of our group, finding only a few of them left (the others had been there since 10am, and it was around 7pm at that point).  We grabbed some great sausages from a stand outside of the tents, then went to find a place.  Eventually, we were able to sneek into one of the tents (Augustina I believe) later that night.  The area was immense and the people were so friendly and happy.

Among the songs everyone was singing was a Bavarian toast to happiness and well being.  I wasn’t able to tell what was being said, and I thought at first that they were saying "I’m Homesick".  I also heard "I’m Frozen" and "I’m Prosting", the second being the closest.  But the actual lyrics are:

Ein Prosit, ein Prosit
Der Gemütlichkeit
Ein Prosit, ein Prosit
Der Gemütlichkeit.

Translation:
A toast, A toast, To happiness

We decided in the end, that if we were to go back, we would have to be sure to reserve a table in one of the larger tents.  Going without reservations is all right, but not something I’d want to do twice.  Unless of course, I was going to spend more time in the carnival part, riding rides and whatnot.  I’d also like to go back and tour more of the city, and the Bavarian area in general.  What we saw was all very nice, and it seems like it would be a great place to spend some time.

My sister and cousin were taking an extended vacation in Greece, making their way through Athens and a few of the islands.  Being so close, I could hardly pass up an opportunity to meet up with then, if only for a weekend.  To make it more worthwhile, I planned for a 4-day weekend.

I flew out on Thursday, arriving in the early evening.  After a perilous cab ride through the winding streets, narrowly avoiding several pedestrians and scooters, I arrived at the hotel.  The hotel is situated just off of the beach.  At first glance, it wasn’t what I expected, but once I got inside, I could see it was much nicer than my first impression.  It took a few laps around before I was able to find the girls’ room, and I only got there moments before they were about to leave.

The first night, we walked down the beach and found a nice restaurant.  The food was so good.  Just like home, but a little better.  I’m not sure if it was because I hadn’t eaten like that in a while, or if it was a side effect of the long travel, but it was great.  Getting to see Laura and Kristen added to it, too!  We had a lot to talk about and stayed there for a while, enjoying the good food and view of the beach.

The next day we hung out on the beach by the hotel: Platis Gialos.  That evening we found another restaurant that was advertising Greek night, complete with dancing and plate breaking.  We had a great time there, but eventually had to leave.  After that we went downtown and out to the clubs.  At first it wasn’t very fun, but things picked up when we found a place with a little more room.  We danced under some napkin confetti, got some overpriced light sticks, then caught a cab (after, of course, Kristen made sure that we rode with the one who had been waiting the longest). 

The next day, we wanted to take an excursion, so we bought tickets on the ferry around the island to a secluded little beach called "Super".  When we first rounded the corner into this small, secluded cove, the view was amazing.  Like much of the rest of the island, it was rocky and mountainous, sharply descending to the clear, blue waters.  The beach was nearly empty when we arrived, but quickly filled up.  More secluded than the beach by our hotel, there were more people here who went completely nude.  It was a bit of a shock at first, but we quickly got over it.  Though we didn’t stop cracking jokes until we left.

After returning from "Super", we headed back into town for dinner and some wandering through the shops.  I wanted to get something for Jess, but it was all very expensive and nothing caught my eye.  We stopped in to a small little bar to have some drinks before heading home.

The next morning Kristen and Laura left, and I had lunch overlooking the beach.  I tried reaching Jess, but my phone had run out of money and it was a long, frustrating evening trying to reach her.  I was eventually able to send an email from an Internet cafe, and she got money on my phone and I was able to reach her.  I had a lot of time on my hands, so I decided to walk from the hotel into town.   There was some nice scenery along the way, but nothing too spectacular.  For the most part, it was very barren and rocky.

After I got into the town, I wandered among the shops for a bit, then stopped for some coffee at a cafe looking out over the bay.  Unfortunately I was too worried about trying to get a message out to really enjoy myself, so I had to go walk around some more and look for a way to get a message out to Jess.  Along the way, I stopped for a glass of wine, but again got too restless.  Once I finally got the message out, it was close enough to time to go to the airport, so I caught a cab and sat to read my book.  I had a long layover in Athens afterwards, and then I was home. 

By the time I got home I was very travel weary and happy to be back, but it was a great trip, and I’m looking forward to another visit to Greece in October!

It’s time to play a little catch-up.  When it comes to writing, I’ve been a bad little monkey lately.  So I’m finally going to take the time and get back on the wagon, starting with the tale of our vacation in Egypt.

Egypt is one of those places I’ve always wanted to visit.  There’s so much history there, and it’s so vastly different from where I grew up.  It’s a place that, to me, has always been mysterious and exotic, yet frighteningly alien.  And discouragingly far away.

But that’s different now.  Living in Warsaw has given me the opportunity to visit places I might never have otherwise been able to.

This past Spring (2009) my wife and I booked a last-minute deal vacation to Marsa Alam, at resort on the coast of the Red Sea, right on the reef.

The Resort

The resort was very nice, and relatively empty.  It was a man-made oasis in stark contrast to the barren surroundings, situated right next to a beautiful coral reef.

It was a fun place to stay.  It would have been more fun with more people playing games, or maybe a livelier "Animation" crew.  But the meals were good, and the facilities very nice.  And with fewer people, it was a very relaxing place to be.

There was a section of shops within the resort that we shied away from at first.  We had a good time visiting the shops, drinking tea with the proprietors and chatting with them while browsing through their goods.  It was unnerving and uncomfortable at first, but it wasn’t long before we were looking forward to our regular visits to the shops.

Camel Ride

One of the activities offered by the resort was a camel or horse ride through the desert.  This was intriguing to both of us because neither of us have ever ridden a camel, and I’ve never seen a desert in person.  Jess had been to deserts in the Mid-West, but they were very different than this.

We started out by riding up the coast to the next town.  This town was still being built, and was still empty.  It was strange to see a city in the middle of the desert with almost no people in it, but the main reason it was built was tourism, and it hadn’t been fully opened for tourists yet.  Though there were some divers who were based out of there.

After that we arced around, crossed the highway, and headed into the desert.  I’ve never seen anything so desolate and barren.  With the exception of the trash, there was just sand.  And not beach sand… it was like dead earth sand.  The sun was relentless, and as far as you could see was all sand.  It wasn’t long before we couldn’t see the sea or the resort anymore.

At one point the horses were given the opportunity to run.  One boy riding either wasn’t able to, or didn’t want to stop his horse, so we had to wait on our loping camels while the rest of the horses chased them down. 

It was very interesting and enlightening, but not something I think I’d like to do again.  At least, not without a purpose.  The desert is less than friendly, and the camels aren’t exactly comfortable, either.  Though being so high up does give the advantage of being above the heat radiating off of the sand.

Cairo

Our next stop was an excursion we had booked to Cairo.  Due to our still limited grasp of the Polish Language, we looked for an English group to go with.  We left from our hotel around 1am, and didn’t return until the same time the next day.  It was long, but worth it, despite the fact that on the bus ride to the airport I started to feel sick.

After a bus ride to Hurgada, and a short plane ride to Ciaro, we were on our way.  Our first stop was the Mosque of Muhammed Ali (not the boxer).  The Mosque is located within the fortress of Sala al-Din (A.K.A. Saladin).  The mosque is very plain, as mosques tend to be to emphasize the focus on God, but still impressive.

From outside of the mosque, you could just make out one of our next destinations, the pyramids at Giza.  If it had been less hazy, they would have been very visible.

Before that, though, we went to the National Museum.  We had a quick tour up to the King Tut exhibit, which was really cool.  Unfortunately, no cameras were allowed in the museum.  Other exhibits included ancient artifacts that were so old it boggled my mind.  It was incredible to be standing there, looking at something that someone made 5000 years ago.

We then took a bus right up to the pyramids.  It was really impressive to see them up close.  I knew they were big, but when you stand next to one of the blocks and it’s bigger than you, it’s pretty awe-inspiring.

Near the pyramids is the Sphynx.  Something else I had always wanted to see, and I wasn’t disappointed.  Though I would have like to have been able to get closer and really look at it, that’s reserved for the professionals, and opening it for tourists to climb all over is probably not a good idea.

After the sphyx we made a stop by the Grand Bazaar, but didn’t have enough time to really visit, and I was still feeling horribly sick.  After a small stop at a papyrus shop, we were on our way home.

Snorkeling on the Reef

After visiting all of the ancient man-made artifacts, we spent some time enjoying the natural wonders.  I’ve never seen anything like a reef, so for me this was another incredible experience.  Luckily we decided to buy an underwater camera.  It was amazing and really makes me want to take diving lessons, despite how much it hurts my ears.

We had an awesome time in Egypt, despite getting sick.  I would definitely like to go back some day, and hopefully visit the places we missed the first time around.

Jess had last week off, but I don’t have much vacation, so we decided to spend a few days in Prague, and then a few in Vienna before heading back to Warsaw and finishing off the week at home.

Since my hours are pretty flexible, the plan was for me to get in as many hours as I could before and during the trip, and then make up the rest after we got back.  We figured we could take the night train to save on hotel costs, but that didn’t work out quite as planned, as I’ll explain.

The trip didn’t really go as well as we had hoped or planned, but we made the best of it.

Things started out with the train tickets.  I thought about trying to order in Polish, but the woman at the counter spoke some English, so I went with that instead.  We asked for tickets from Warsaw to Prague, Prague to Vienna, and Vienna back to Warsaw.  What we got was Warsaw to Wels via Prague, and Vienna to Warsaw.  We thought the Wels ticket was for Vienna, because the station looked like an abbreviated version of the Vienna station, so I had assumed we were all set.  That wasn’t quite the way it would work out, as you’ll see.

But the more immediate problem was when we told her we had a dog…  I didn’t think to mention that she was a pocket-sized dog, and so we were charged an additional ticket for the dog.  The total being somewhere over 4000 pln, with the dog’s tickets probably just over 1000 of that.  In hindsight, it probably would have been cheaper and easier to fly.  One nice thing, though, is that the tickets are open ended, and are good for 60 days.  So we could have travelled at any time on any train going to the destination on the ticket.  Anyways, I thought to go ask about the dog tickets, but it was late and I was just glad that we finally had everything done, so I figured it might be a surcharge for bringing a dog and wanted to err on the side of caution.  Turns out, we didn’t need the extra tickets.

To make matters worse, the train arrived in Prague roughly 2 hours after the time indicated on our ticket.  This put our last 2 hours in near panic mode, thinking we’d possibly gone too far, or gotten on the wrong train.  Eventually, though, I saw a station with a sign pointing to Prague in the direction we were heading.  From there we switched from worry to anxiety.  Especially since the dog had already been caged for 8 hours, and we didn’t know how long she could wait.

To make matters worse, we hadn’t been able to sleep much on the train, and were both exhausted.

Once we finally did get to Prague, we made the mistake of trying to walk to the hotel.   I should mention that the weather was a constant, cold, misty drizzle that constantly varied it’s intensity, but never really stopped.  Combine that with sloughing all of our bags, plus one very wet dog, through the wet, muddy streets, and you have instant misery.

We finally got to the hotel, which seemed nice enough, until we got into the room.  The room was nice enough, but the shower (separate from the toilet) smelled like poo.  Which is weird, because it was nowhere near the toilet.  Unfortunately, this was right next to the bed, and prevented us from taking showers, or using that room at all, really.  The only really good thing was that they had free Wireless Internet access, so I was able to work from the room.

But at least now we had a place to put our stuff and coordinate our sightseeing from.  We decided to start with the castle, way up on the hill.  We hadn’t eaten yet, so we stopped in a nice cafe where I had the best beer I’ve had yet.  Unfortunately, by the time we finished eating and got to the top of the castle, the ticket booths had just closed.  So we wandered around and eventually headed back down to the old town to explore.

We saw a bit, figured out where some stuff was, and took some photos.  But we were pretty tired, so we headed back, wet and muddy, to our stinky hotel room.  We both did some work, then got some sleep.

The next day was a bit more organized, but we forgot to consider that we needed to check out of the hotel in the morning, and our train wasn’t leaving until midnight (or so we thought).  So, now that we had the public transit, and destinations figured out, we had the additional burden of all of our luggage.  We packed light, so it wasn’t terrible, but the huge laptop and bag (the bag weighs at least as much as the computer!) were pulling me to one side and we both had sore backs within minutes.

But we got to see some really cool stuff, and have some great food.  We even got to meet up with one of the other families from the school, who were arriving just before we were leaving, which was really nice.  We also tried to see a show at the Black Light Theater, but we think we went to the wrong one, and saw a really trippy Alice in Wonderland show.  It wasn’t bad, and there was some nudity, which is always a plus, but it wasn’t what we were looking for. 

Unfortunately, there was still more frustration to come.  Around 3 or so, we had gotten tired of lugging our stuff and decided to go to the train station, double check departure times, and shove our crap in a locker.  Well, it’s lucky we did, because it turned out there was a train leaving for Vienna right then!  We figured we were tired of lugging our stuff, so why not.  But they told us the ticket wasn’t for Vienna!  So we checked, and it took us to the other side of the country!  Now, this is the same ticket that got us to Prague, so it wasn’t a total waste, but we thought it went on to Vienna.  So after much frustration and looking around, we decided to simply buy a ticket to Vienna.  It was very cheap, and we didn’t buy the extra "dog" ticket.

This also cut our time in Prague short, so we didn’t get to see much.  Though we did see enough to know that we’d like to come back when weather was nicer and maybe with a better place to stay.  We’d hate to remember Prague as a place we didn’t like, and are constantly reminding ourselves that it wasn’t Prague, it was the trip.

So the train ride to Vienna was nice and short, and we were able to book another night at the same hotel we had already made reservations for (we had originally planned on taking the overnight train).

When we first arrived, it was late and pretty much the only thing open was the bars and strip clubs, and it seemed the closer we go to the hotel, the more of them there were!  Plus the neighborhood was a bit scary.  We were worried, but turns out it was much nicer than it seemed, and it was mostly just because it was night and dark.

This hotel was MUCH better.  Very clean and professional, plus they gave us maps and info when we got there.  They even called to set up the tour for us (who picked us up at the hotel).  Compared to the difficulties we had in Prague, this was such a relief.  Plus we were much less shy about storing our luggage and using public transit.

Without getting into many more details (because I’m tired and I’ve already covered a lot) our trip was much better from here on out.  We had a bit of a learning curve, which was mostly spent on our Prague experience, but things panned out in the end.  We saw some really cool stuff in Vienna (my favorite was the boatride on the underground lake where part of the Three Musketeers movie that Disney made was filmed.  A movie I greatly enjoy!)

But 2 days in each city wasn’t really enough time.  Especially considering how tired and stressed we were.  So we want to go back to both in fairer weather to more fully explore both of these really awesome cities!  I was going to post pictures here, but they’re on the other computer.  For now, check my facebook page (if you know it).

Since Jess and I are now living in Warszawa, and wouldn’t be going home for the Christmas holiday, we decided instead to spend the week in Roma. 

We got some cheap flights on Wizz Air, and an apartment in the heart of the city.

We were a bit worried about the flight, because we had heard some bad things about Wizz Air, but it was really a great flight.  The only noticeable difference from the bigger carriers was that there was no assigned seating.  But even though we expected a frantic shove-fest to get seats, it was really calm and everyone easily found seats.  I think part of that was due to the general observation that most Poles are very polite and respectful. 

We arrived at Fiumicino on-time, and easily took the Leonardo Express straight to Termini station.  From there we went around the building to the bus terminal, where we bought 7-day bus passes and hopped on the 40 Express.  This bus ran around to a lot of the major monuments and sites.  We got off at Chiesa Nuova, which was just about a block or so away from our apartment.  Our only delay in the whole process was waiting for the baggage claim.

We took only a moment to marvel at the outside of the Chiesa Nuova before heading to the apartment.  The apartment (Via Giulia, 105) was an attraction itself.  The owner had discovered some old relics below the apartment when doing some repairs and remodeling.  Rather than covering them up, he had a light and a glass door installed, so his guests could see the Roman relics.  The owner, Alessandro, helped us by pointing out some places on our map, and giving us pointers on where we could find some Gluten-Free food.

We were both tired the first night and Jess wasn’t feeling well, so we went out for dinner, then went to bed.  We ate at a local place and Jess just got a salad to be safe.  Though she did share my gelato (white truffle with coffee in the center – YUM).

The next day we went exploring around our apartment to see what was within walking distance.  The weather was so much warmer than what we had been used to that, by noon we had stripped off our jackets.  For most of the week we walked pretty much everywhere, and only took the bus a few times.  It was a great way to work up an appetite!

One of our main goals, aside from visiting all of the famous and historical sites, was to search out gluten-free restaurants!  We had a few on a list, which turned out to be pretty much the only ones.  We went to all of them that were nearby and open.  Our favorite, and the most geared towards GF food was Tulipano Nero (Via Roma Libera, 15), where Jess and I shared a meal of GF Pizza and Ravioli!  Finishing with a dessert that might not have been GF, but we’re not sure since Jess hadn’t been feeling well since before we arrived.  The other two restaurants we went to were Ripa 12 (Via di San Francesco a Ripa, 12), which was mostly seafood based, and La Fiorentina (Via Andrea Doria, 22) which could replace GF pasta for most of their pasta dishes.

Finding Gluten-Free food was not as easy as we had been led to believe.  However, only 2 or 3 people (of the many we asked) did not know what we meant by Gluten-Free, which is the exact opposite of our experiences in the US and Poland).  So at least we knew we could ask and get a response other than "What’s Gluten?".  But despite that, most places only had salad, meat or seafood to offer.  Which is not bad, except that Jess doesn’t eat much meat, and was sick of salads, and doesn’t want to eat seafood all the time.  We were able to find a good selection of foods at the pharmacies, which we used as supplements and snacks (protein bars and cookies), and also we were able to get some very good GF pasta, which we cooked up at our apartment for a few meals.

Our first stop was to walk over to the Piazza San Pietro, where we happened upon the Pope’s Sunday address.  The Piazza and Basilica ended up being our two favorite places, and we would return to them a few times during the trip.  We were blown away and humbled by the immense size of both places, as well as the magnificient artwork covering every inch of the place.  There is so much history and reverence there, that it’s impossible to ignore.  We made sure to return on Christmas morning both to walk through the Basilica (and I stopped at a quiet chapel to say a prayer) and to be present for the Pope’s Christmas address.

One of the first places we visited was the Pantheon.  Alessandro told us that, on Easter, firemen throw flowers through the hole in the domed ceiling for 15 minutes straight, and that it’s quite the site.  I could imagine that would be fairly impressive.  Especially with the right lighting, sending a sunbeam through the hole as well.  The structure was another very impressive, though somewhat smaller, religious site.

Everywhere we went there were magnificient nativity scenes being constructed.  Some were small and some where life-sized, but all were very impressive.  The largest, of course, was located in the center of the Piazza San Pietro.  It was unveiled on the night before Christmas and had life-sized figures and a stone (or something made to look like stone) building.  There was also another inside the Basilica that was very impressive, with a moving water wheel and a background that faded from day to night.  Each one was different and unique.

Another of the most impressive sites we visited was the Vatican Museum, which was actually inside of an old palace, which reminded us of the palace at Wilanów, but much more elaborate.  The museum tour ended in the Sistine Chapel.  We saw many priceless and amazing works of art, and got a good rundown of the history and other interesting facts from our tourguide.  This was the only tour we signed up for on the entire trip, as it was a bit expensive.  Though the tours are usually really good, because you can bypass a lot of the lines, we are earlybirds and there were no lines.  We were also the first to sign up for the tour, so we had to wait about 2 hours for more people to show up before the tour began.  But it was good, because even though we rushed through everything, we learned and saw a lot.  And even then, we would have to spend over a week in there if we wanted to view everything they had on exibit, and only if we spent a minimal amount of time at each piece.  I reccommend everyone see the museum, as some of the artwork is simply breathtaking, and the Sistine Chapel is beautiful, especially now that it has been restored to it’s original splendor (previously it had been darkened with soot from ages of burning candles for lighting).  Unfortunately as a result of the restoration, you are not allowed to take photographs because the Japanese company that funded the restoration now owns the rights to all photography in return.

We also spent a day exploring the Palatine Hill, one of the ancient sites, right next to the Colosseum, which we visited that same morning.  It was an amazing site walking up on the Colosseum with the morning sun streaming through the arches.  We spent 4€ a piece on audioguides instead of tours (whereas our tour of the Vatican Museum cost 50€ each).  The audioguides were good, but long winded, and since it was very cold that morning, it was difficult to stand in one place long enough to get all the way through to the end.  But there was a lot of very interesting information, and it was amazing to walk through the Colosseum and see where it was restored to how it would have been originally right next to how it looks today, which allowed you to see beneath where the arena floor was to the cavernous innards.

We visited several other sites, including the Piazza del Spagnolo (Spanish Plaza, where the Spanish Steps are), Piazza del Popolo, Piazza Navona (a great spot), Trevi Fountain (Beautiful!), Campo d’ Fiori and various churches we found along our walks.  I have to say that I was very happy to stroll through the city, even though at some points we walked steadily for several kilometers on empty stomachs.  I didn’t want to ride the buses and have it all pass by me quickly.  I wanted to live in Rome for a week, and that’s exactly what we did.  I wouldn’t call it a visit, or a vacation (even though it was), because we definitely lived there, and can’t wait to go back!