Ancient Rome: Not Built In A Day, But Seen In One

Saturday was a day devoted to Ancient Rome

We started out by Piazza Venizzi, climbed to the top, and found a random, gorgeous basilica, and went inside.

We walked down from here over to the Roman forum - the Roman ruins in between the Palatine Hill and the Capatoline Hill.

We then we climbed the Palatine hill for an awesome view of the Colliseum and of the Circus Maximus.

Next was the Colisseum, which is ginormous and meets all expectations. I can’t believe a structure like this existed so many years ago - the Romans were an impressive bunch, despite their propensity towards horrible forms of torture...

After this we wandered over to the Pantheon and went inside.

After a quick gelato break (mandatory), we went and people watched for a bit in Piazza Novani, where Bernini's statue of the Four Rivers is, as well as others that I really liked.

After finishing our ice cream we crossed the river into Travestere, a really neat district a little more removed from the typical tourist stuff, I really liked it.

Around 6:30 we made our way over to our chosen restaurant for the evening – Piazzaria Da Baffetto. This place was legit Italian owned by the cutest little Italian guy who pulled us into the restaurant with two other groups of two – since all the tables were full – he just put all 7 of us at a table together!

We decided to order 3: mushroom, zucchini, and tomato. I have to say, the tomato pizza was one of the best pizzas I’ve ever had, I’ve never tasted cherry tomatoes that fresh before. The zucchini was amazing as well. My favorite part was the thin, slightly burnt crust, because you could just taste the wood fire method of cooking – absolutely fantastic.