Back to Rome

Our trip back to Rome really showed off how comfortable we had become traveling in Italy. First we tried to take a bus from the hotel to the pier but for reasons unexplained it never seemed to appear so we ended up in a taxi. Then a long wait for the ferry, at least the weather was nice so the ferry was very smooth.

Then an Italo rail trip from Naples to Rome. On our journeys in Italy we first rode Trenitalia, these are the green trains I mentioned before. They varied between the 1950s vintage train we took from Lamezia to Soverato, the fairly modern interurban train/trolley from Soverato to Reggio Calabria and the modern but slow and dirty Freccabianca from Reggio Calabria to Naples.

Italo rail is a whole different train company, these are the super modern red trains you'll see in most travelogs and they are vastly superior to Trenitalia. Faster, more comfortable, and they serve snacks like an airline does. 10/10, would ride again.

I don't have any pictures of the Rome subway but our second hotel in Rome (Hotel Tango) was near a subway stop so it was the easiest way to get there. The Roman subway is fantastic, easy to understand, clean, friendly. I apparently exude a "don't mess with me" vibe, as I've never ever been messed with on a subway. That was comforting as we had our bags and were obviously tourists.

Believe it or not this is the front door of our hotel. By this point we had gotten used to finding hotels by the little brass plate in the wall as an identifier. Opening this door was pretty hilarious using that big doorknob. Hotel Tango is actually a modern building inside of a much larger older building. We picked it because the rooms are all two stories which seemed cooler than it actually was. The inner building didn't have terrific sound insulation and the kids in the room next door to ours were a bit infuriating.

This is one part of the wall around Vatican City about 2 blocks from Hotel Tango which is another reason I had picked that hotel.

Look carefully in this shot and you'll find "The Godfather pigeon" who keep strolling around a restaurant we were eating in. He seemed very well behaved but the staff of the restaurant kept shooing him out in embarrassment.

I should have taken a picture of this pizza/calzone before we started eating it. As you may have heard pizzas in Italy don't come pre-cut, you end up just tearing it apart with your hands. This was half pizza, half calzone which is an idea was should totally bring to the US.

Angie scored us tickets to the Colosseum which is amazing. It starts with arriving off the subway at the Colosseo stop. As you exit the subway and your eyes adjust the Colosseum is right there across the street and its so big it amazes your eyes and it takes awhile to really sink in and for your brain to figure out what you're looking at...

 Our tickets included access inside to the underground portions. This is a reinvention of the elevator used to transport animals (like lions) from the underground portion to the floor of the Colosseum. Theres a NOVA documentary on the construction of this elevator which is worth seeing.

This is one of our guides, our tour package included a tour of the Roman Forum, a tour which we almost missed because we were busy filling our faces with more pizza. This part of the tour included the burial spot of Julius Caesar and the supposed birthplace of Romulus and Remus, the brothers who led to the founding of Rome. Having a tour guide was fantastic, both guides really added depth to our tour.

Angie in Vatican City. We didn't have time to tour the Vatican, this was the morning of our last day. We really needed another 2-3 days in Rome, probably at the outset of our trip, there is so much to see there.

Okay so looking back here are a couple pieces of advice:

1. Ignore most of the advice you see online, its ridiculous, specifically: Italians dress the same as you do, at least mostly. They wear jeans and sneakers, anybody saying otherwise hasn't spent any time in Italy or if they have they've only been in tour groups.

2. When going to a big attraction like the Coliseum get timed tickets. By that I mean get a ticket that has a specific start time. This will save you waiting through the miles long lines.

3. Naples to Sorrento has a local train but I couldn't find a way to buy tickets online. The ferry is difficult to get to in Naples traffic.

4. The Roman subway is terrific but you're limited in where it goes.

5. Not everybody in Rome speaks English but there are so many people that do that its rarely an issue. Everybody we met in Sorrento/Capri spoke excellent English.

5a. Few people in Soverato in the south spoke English but they all seemed excited to play the pantomime game. I think English speakers are fairly rare there and they were excited to see us.

In short if you're afraid of travel to Italy you shouldn't be, its easy. If we can do it you can do it too...