Hello from Rome

Luminosity

No longer a newbie, moving up!
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Hiya spunkrats !

Thought I'd drop a line or three from sunny Rome !

Josh and I have caught up on some desperately needed R&R and are jumping ( or floppin ) over the jet lag hurdle. We arrived in London on the 8th with zero sleep in 48 hours ( man I was hurtin when we hit the Underground ), did the touristy thing, slept at our friends house for an hour and went off the meet Rob and Hertz :D...

We've been in Rome 3 days now and have been loving it, saw the Sistine Chapel, Vatican Museum, the colleseum, the Roman Forum, the Trevi Fountain, found the best place to sit outside and eat delicious pasta, garlic bread to end all garlic breads and they serve wine by the litre of half litre. Can we say boozy lunch ;)

Some impressions of Rome...

Graffitti everywhere, everyone in the city seems to own a dog, and almost every other store sells gelato, in every imaginable flavour. I've sampled the nutella and tiramisu flavours but I noticed there is a 'Kelloggs All Bran' flavour as well ( an ice cream that keeps you regular as well, niiiiice ).

Somethin that would be embarrassing if I didnt find it kinda funny is we woke up this mornin to a beautiful day and thought it might be an idea to day trip it up to Florence today....so I asked Aldo, the B&B owner and he told me it might be crowded....

I commented " Well, I guess it would be, it IS Saturday..."

To which he replied " Bella, it's Sunday today..."

Josh and I have been thinkin we're on the day before ever since we've arrived. We just kept thinkin we arrived in Wednesday ( reality, it was Thursday ) and went from there... We had to look at our itinerary in our room to get it straight in our minds because we thought HE was confused.
When we realized he was right ( uh yeah, tell the local what day it is ...)it was such a weird feeling. So yesterday was really Saturday when we thought it was Friday and so on...:lol:

Oh geez. Holidays screw with ya mind that way :blushing:
 
Wow! Sounds like you're having an awesome time!!! I can't wait to go to Rome someday. :p Thanks for keepin us updated!
 
Oh some more stuff to report...

We were sitting having coffee yesterday when we heard music and people marching on the road in front of the cafe so, I grabbed the camera and ran out onto the street and went click happy. I think everyone under the age of 40 was at the march, which was for the legalisation of marijuana.

A word of advice for anyone here that travels to Rome; keep your pockets empty at all times. Josh and I keep everything safe in a backpack that I wear on the front of me and I walk hugging it when we're out. The pickpockets are sooo good here that, if you werent aware they were around, you would never know they just had their hand in your pocket. As an afterthought, I felt a tickly feeling in my pockets but not enough to turn my head. On our way through the crowds, Josh saw three ppl, two guys and a girl pickpocket me and it happened to him three times, in the space of 10 mins. I never felt it in the walk through the crowd ! He told me afterwards.

Anyways, I've taken like 400 pics over the last 3 days so I'll upload as soon as I'm able.

Ciao bellas!
 
Lumi! Che bella sorpresa! :hug::

I envy you the down time; it sounds fabulous! So happy you had time to check in and let us know where you're at. Can't wait to see the pictures, too.

Take care, have fun - and watch out for those pickpockets! :lol:
 
Good to hear you are still having fun - and if I haven't said it already: it was lovely to meet the two of you.
 
Oh I'm in Italy wonderfulness ! We got up early this morning, caught a EuroStar train to Florence and walked around the amazing markets, basking in the warm sunshine and buying pressies for the fam back home.

The streets are so narrow and full of charm and character, everyone rides bicycles, some ride vespas. I didnt have to worry about holding my bag as much and watching it as we only spotted one gypsy today.

We bought wine, cheese, frenchsticks and other picnicky goodies and went to Giardino Di Boboli, the most massive garden grounds I have ever seen, attached to a museum.You could spend a week wandering around these amazing gardens, spying cats snoozing in the sun next to ancient roman statues, walking up winding, narrow cobblestoned staircases, lined by trees....

We wandered up one of these 'laneways' and came out to an opening that looked out over all of the city of Florence below and we stopped to picnic there in the solitude and quiet away from other tourists.

Walked back through the picturesque Tuscan streets at sunset, eating gelato, when we came to the river. I wish I could upload the photos I took to show you how beautiful this place is but we are sitting in an internet cafe awaiting our train back to Rome...thinking I'll be able to show pics when we get to Spain.

I wish wish wish we had only booked 2 or 3 days in Rome and spent the rest of our week here exploring the Tuscan region as THIS is the Italy I imagined. Florence is the more beautiful, poetic sister who actually bathes compared to Rome. If we come back here, we're definately avoiding Rome ( 2 days in Rome and you've seen everything you need to see ) and coming back to Florence, will head up to Venice etc.

Oh Flo, I love you so ;)
 
It was great meeting up with you and Rob, Hertz. Two fabulous gentlemen you both are,indeed :hugs:

Ter babe, it does feel so good to finally have some down time and not have to be anywhere. The both of us were doing ten to twelve hour days 5 to 6 days a week right up to the day before we left Toronto.

Wishing you all some good holiday time soon too !
 
It's great to hear from you! I'm loving hearing about your travels as they happen. I'm so glad you're getting a vacation after the busy, busy time you've had!
 
Don't know how I managed to miss this! Sounds like it was a good job you had a little warning about the pick pockets!! Glad you're enjoying yourselves and that you've had some sleep at last!!!

See ya round!

Rob
 
Shanks guys !

First night in Madrid and we are LOVING it here ! We are in an awesome hostal ( fyi, hostals are family run hotels as opposed to hostels where backpackers converge apon ). If you ever go to Madrid I'd definately recommend Hostal Adriano, the place we're at http://www.adrianohostal.com/ingles/habitaciones.htm

We're right in the heart of Madrid, we step out of the hostal and there's about 50 tapas bars, other eateries etc down all the little side streets surrounding us.We found a cosy place called Cafe del So(u)l and ordered so much food I thought I'd pop ! After we paid and were about to leave, the waiter bought us two shot glasses and a larger glass with water and two straws in it. We looked at him quizically and he explained how to drink it. He set the clear unnamed liquid in each shot glass alight, we took a straw, drank it fast and dipped the straws into the water as a chaser. Nice little rush ;) He showed us the bottle of where the contents of the shot glasses originated from and it was Absinth, with Cannibis written along the bottom. Can say it went down nicely and I think we just found our Madrid local :thumbsup: lol.

MadridDay1034.jpg


MadridDay1035.jpg




Didnt wanna spoil the ambience of the place by raising the camera to my eyes so a 'place the cam on the table and hope for the best' shot was in order..



Some pictures from today...none of Rome in this lot but I'll upload those when I go through em ( there's too bloody many to face right now haha )

josh.jpg


fooooooodgoooooood.jpg


busker.jpg


The disco below our balcony...

MadridDay1044.jpg


Lots of yummy Spanish boys here but I can only look at the menu and not ordddderrrr ! Thats ok coz I've been pointin out hot chicas to the lad too, so it's even :mrgreen:

I dunno what it is that about us, but if there's a seedy part of town, we find it. We wandered up a busy street during the day where, at every lamp post, there was a hooker. Some looked no older then 16 !

By the way, Josh got bitchslapped on the back of his head by a scary transexual in Rome the other day :lol:
 
If you get the opportunity go to Barcellona - far superior to Madrid.
And did you notice the two separate populations? Spanish and Catalan? They don't recognise each others' existence :lol:
 

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