Rome Part Three - Classical Rome

The center of ancient Rome, home to famous sites such as the Colosseum and forum, holds a special place in our imagination. David took four years of Latin in high school, and Paul took Latin and a Roman art and architecture course in college. Going in person is an amazing experience. So much of modern western culture, law and politics flow back to this place. That said, most of it is not in what you would call a state-of-good-repair. Time, thieves, and more than one greedy Pope have laid waste to many of these ancient monuments. Luckily, there is still plenty to see and do and what remains provides a base for your imagination to envision what this great city must have been like 2,000 years ago. Just be prepared to share it with a few thousand other tourists.

To start the morning, we went straight to the Colosseum with David E and Christina right as it opened. Purchasing tickets ahead of time, and going first thing, is almost a must. We arrived and entered the site with only a very short wait. Once inside, there are a few small exhibits explaining the site over time and diagrams of what it would have looked like when the structure was completed in 70 CE. There's a lot of information on the many uses of the Colosseum over the years: from a combat stage for gladiators during the Roman Empire to pasture land and housing during the middle ages when Rome was but a shadow of its former self. Despite popular belief, there is no evidence that Christians were fed to lions here - that's just another example of the church's propaganda machine obsession with martyrdom.

The structure itself is impressive in scale and design. At full capacity the Colosseum held around 50,000 people. Stadiums across the world still replicate the basic design and system of portholes for access/egress. The building was originally clad in marble and statues, and from our pictures below you can see that parts of the walls have fallen or been removed over time. Marble from the Colosseum can be found throughout Rome and elsewhere in Europe, in churches and other monuments. It was a lot easier to just steal the marble from ancient Roman buildings than to quarry and cut it yourself.

The Colosseum from the Palatine Hill.

The Colosseum's facade.

Morning sun rising over the edge of the Colosseum.

The under-structure of the Colosseum where slaves and animals were held for combat.

The empress disapproves....

The remains of the Temple of Venus and Roma as viewed from the Colosseum, with the belltower of the church of Santa Francesca Romana in the background.

Interior of the Colosseum.

The lighting in the morning was great.

The area near the Colosseum is super busy by late morning.

Mandatory Colosseum jumping shot.

After visiting the Colosseum, we made our way down the Via Sacria past the Arch of Constantine towards the Palatine Hill and the Roman Forum. The Palatine Hill is one of the seven historic hills of Rome. It was home to a variety of temples and the homes of high-ranking Romans. Today there's hardly anything left, unfortunately, but excavations are ongoing and the hill provides good viewpoints over the former site of the Circus Maximus (completely gone now) as well as the Roman Forum and Capitoline Hill.

The Forum sits in the valley between the Palatine and Capitoline Hills. It was the center point of Roman political and social life through much of the Republic and part of the Empire periods. The Forum had the highest concentration of government and religious buildings. It was the site of triumphal processions, criminal trials and religious ceremonies (among other things). Today, the Forum is almost completely in ruins, but - like the Colosseum - enough remains for your imagination to picture the site as Julius Caesar would have seen it before his assassination in 44 BCE.

The Arch of Constantine leading towards the Roman Forum.

Arch of Titus leading into the Forum.

Depiction of a menorah on Titus's Arch, from the sacking of Jerusalem.

The Palatine Hill was mostly empty. A nice break from the crowds!

There are still remains of villas on the hill.

View of the Roman Forum from atop the Palatine Hill.

David and the Roman Forum.

An original bronze door on the Temple of Romulus, now the basilica of Santi Cosma e Damiano.

The Temple of Antoninus and Faustina, also converted into a church.

After walking around the Palatine Hill and the Roman Forum for a few hours, it was time for lunch. Unfortunately, all the food around this area of town is pretty touristsy and crappy. We picked a random restaurant (Osteria Maracuja) that had ok reviews on Yelp. It was mediocre, but it was nice to sit and have an aperol spritz - the official drink of the vacation.

After lunch we walked to the Capitoline Museum. This museum is located on its namesake hill adjacent to Piazza Campidoglio and features antiquities and some medieval artifacts and art. The museum also has great views over the Roman Forum from the Tabularium which connects the two separate buildings of the museum. It houses some scale replicas that show how vast the ancient temples in the forum were 2,000 years ago (especially the Temple of Jupiter). It's a can't miss museum when visiting Rome, along with the Vatican Museums, Villa Borghese, and the Palazzo Altemps.

Aperol Spritz...the official drink of our Italian vacation.

Piazza del Campidoglio.

A view from the piazza looking at the Alter of the Fatherland.

Interior hallway of the Capitoline Museum.

The famous Capitoline Wolf in bronze - date unknown.

Emperor Marcus Aurelius on horseback in bronze from 175 CE.

Creepy man-baby.

View over part of the Forum from the Tabularium.

David E. being David E. at the Capitoline Museum

The Dying Gaul - An ancient Roman marble copy of a Hellenistic statue.

Lots of statues in the Capitoline Museum.

On the way back to the apartment, we made a quick unplanned stop at the chiesa di Santa Maria in campitelli (you stumble across a lot of impressive churches in Rome), and had some gelato and sticchi (popsicles).

Looking back at the piazza and museum.

Chiesa di Santa Maria in Campitelli, a 16th centure Baroque church.

The interior was impressive.

A view down the streets of Rome.

After resting at the AirBnB for a bit, David took his parents up the Janiculum Hill at sunset to enjoy the view. From there they went to Castel San Angelo - a defensive fortress built over centuries by the Popes around Hadrian's Mausoleum. The site has great views of Rome and the Vatican. Afterwards they walked to nearby Castrani (the fancy grocery store) to get more wine and candy almonds, a favorite of David's Mom.

Castel San Angelo

One of Bernini's Angels on the Ponte Sant'Angelo.

The evening lighting in Rome is beautiful!

Views from the top of the Castle are pretty great.

Sunset behind St. Peter's.

Meanwhile Paul went with his mother to the Basilica of San Giovanni in Laterano (St. John Lateran), Rome's official cathedral. It's a huge and impressive Basilica, consecrated in 324 CE, with the main building completed in 1735 in a Baroque/neoclassical style. There was a mass happening, with about 30 priests taking part and singing. We also saw the Obelisco Lateranense beside the church - the largest standing Egyptian obelisk on earth. It was constructed in the 15th century BCE, and a few thousand years later was moved to Rome in 357 CE and placed in the Circus Maximus. It was restored and re-erected in it's current location in 1588, where it now towers 150 feet above the plaza.

We also tried to enter the attached baptistery (San Giovanni in fonte), but couldn't find a way in. It might have been closed for the day, as evening was now approaching. We took a tram/streetcar back to the apartment.

The obelisk and side facade of the basilica.

The main facade is impressive.

The soaring and highly decorated interior.

A whole bunch of priests doing their thing.

Later that evening we went to dinner with Paul's Mom, Betsy and Chad at restaurant just a block away from our apartment, Taverna Trilussa. This was probably one of the fancier restaurants we ate at while in Rome and came recommended by Paola (the chef in our cooking class). Paola recommended the cacio e pepe here, which had already become one of David's favorite pasta dishes in Italy by his 3rd day in Italy. Paul loved the caprese salad and there was great cheese and wine from Lazio.

Caprese done right at Taverna Trilussa.

Cacio e Pepe!

That wraps up our (exhausting) day touring classical Rome, museums, and churches. Up next - a day trip to Florence!

Family Italian Cooking Class in Rome

On our trip to Rome, after exploring the Vatican, all eleven of us took an Italian cooking class together at Trustevertastes - a play on words of the neighborhood's name: Trastevere. The class was about two blocks from our AirBnB on the Piazza Santa Maria and was a great experience.

We had two Italian chefs showing us the ropes - Paola and Lilly. Paola is a professional chef with a cookbook coming out soon. Lilly served as the sous chef. Lilly was snarky and hilarious. At one point she called David's rambunctious Uncle Rick a "difficult man," and after seeing David E's attempt at pasta making she suggested he should just buy pasta from the store. Lilly also said the pici Paul rolled were too thin. Well, her exact phrase in Italian was "come si dici anorexia?" Needless to say, we loved Lilly's playful attitude.

Over the course of a few hours, we prepared three separate pasta dishes form scratch:

1) Lentil soup with "badly cut noodles" (maltagliati)
2) Pici noodles (a fat hand-rolled spaghetti) with an amatriciana sauce
3) Tagliatelle with a sausage, beef and veal ragu

Our favorite was the pici all'amatriciana. It's a very simple pasta (just semolina flour and water) in a delicious tomato and pork sauce. For dessert, the chefs prepared a peach gelato for us to enjoy and of course there was antipasti and plenty of wine. If you thought Italian food was heavy in general, try eating three courses of pasta with wine! We lost David E. midway through the meal (after the 2nd pasta course) because he got too sleepy. Betsy and Chad were troopers - they arrived earlier that morning but made it through the whole meal like champs.

David is ready to go!

Betsy and Chad with our first batch of pasta dough.

Paola helping Rick start the sauce.

Learning from the chefs.

Pici noodles.

Rolling out the pici by hand.

Lilly helped us with the egg noodles.

David and his Mom.

Here's a man that knows his way around a ragu!

Paul's heating up the oil for the ragu.

David's parents rolling pici.

Paul and David's Dad rolling out the tagliatelle.

Christina and David's mom getting ready to eat some pasta!

Paul and him mom making the tagliatelle.

Ragu Time with David E. & Paul.

Uncle Rick and David's Dad take this very seriously!

Sunset view from the cooking class window.

The finished product - a delicious lentil and pasta soup.

Pici all'amatriciana. Delicous!

The tagliatelle with ragu.

And dessert!

What a great evening in Rome! A cooking class is always a great way to learn more about the culture of the place you're visiting and we highly recommend this one in Rome if you have opportunity. Even David's family, who are Italian and have been making pasta for years, learned a few new tricks to improve their recipes.

Rome Part Two - Exploring the Vatican

After spending a few days exploring Rome, we left the country (well, technically) to take a tour of the Vatican. We had heard that the Vatican gets very crowded, so we pre-booked an official guided tour before arriving in Italy. We highly recommend this. We arrived at the Vatican Museum entrance at 8:45AM and the line was already hundreds of people long. Our taxi driver told us the line wasn't long yet, and it would stretch much further later in the morning. Since we pre-purchased tickets we were able to go right up to the group entrance and we were through security and met with our guide within 10 minutes.

Our guide, Maria, was very knowledgeable and also quite funny. The museum was packed with people, so she helped us to "conquer the space" and complimented us on how well we stood our ground against other tour groups. Maria was sassy and we could tell she thought some of the teachings of the church, and its past actions, were less than noble. We were all given ear pieces, so we could hear Maria clearly even with the masses of people. We hadn't seen these before, but we would see them later on the trip on tours in Florence and Pompeii. They're really a great development, as tour guides can speak in a normal voice instead of having to shout to be heard.

The Vatican Museums hold some of the great works of Western art. None of it is labeled very well, which is yet another reason to book a tour ahead of time. You could literally spend days here, so consider a tour guide if you just want the highlights. Our tour took us through the Pio Clementino Museum, the Gallery of the Candelabra, the Gallery of the Tapestries, the Gallery of the Geographical Maps and Raphael’s Rooms, before wrapping up at the Sistine Chapel. The bulk of the museum has an amazing collection of classical statues and mosaics, housed in halls rich with renaissance paintings and frescoes. We were particularly impressed by Raphael's frescoes, the 2000 year old Laocoön and his sons statue, the elaborate tapestries, and the hall of maps.

St. Peter's Square, the heart of the Vatican.

The Vatican museum entrance is on the north side of the Vatican's wall. This is only a small portion of the crowd that had gathered before 9AM.

Our guide, Maria, explaining the Sistine Chapel.

The dome of St. Peter's from inside the Vatican compound.

Closeup of the Apollo Belvedere statue.

Laocoön and his sons

An ancient Roman mosaic of David's resting bitch face...

A lot of the hallways are works of art themselves, but they're sometimes hard to enjoy with all of the crowds.

Just a chubby little baby with a goose!

The Popes really amassed a huge collection of classical and Renaissance art over the centuries.

The hall of tapestries, with a momentary free space before the next giant tour group.

Some of the incredible detail on the huge wall tapestries. These would take years to complete.

Julius Caesar getting his comeuppance!

David in the hall of maps.

A map of Italy painted on the wall.

Painting of Venice.

I think everyone liked the map room!

"The School of Athens," a huge wall painting by Raphael, from 1509-1511.

Raphael included his own face in the painting - the only figure looking at the viewer.

Our guide Maria left us just before entering the Sistine Chapel, as tours aren't allowed inside. The paintings on the Sistine Chapel are amazing, but it's so packed with people that you can't totally enjoy it. Occasionally the guard yells out for silence, or a recorded message plays in a few languages demanding silence, but the crowd noise persists. The feeling is that of being herded.

After leaving the Sistine Chapel, we took the shortcut into the area beside St. Peter's basilica, rather than exiting back out the Vatican museum main entrance. St. Peter's is an impressive structure, with a massive interior, every inch of which is lavishly decorated. It's a huge and breathtaking space. The construction and decoration of St. Peter's certainly had a huge contribution to art and architecture, but also a massive amount of money was spent that could have been spent on other things, especially given the supposed humanitarian mission of the Catholic church. I guess it's the same with any piece of grand religious architecture, but St. Peter's is a little more over the top than most.

We also ventured down in to the crypt, where several popes are buried. Some of them were moved from the catacombs outside the city. We also thought about climbing to the top of the dome, but there was a one hour wait to buy tickets, so we skipped it.


The line to climb the dome was over an hour long.

St. Peter's is pretty stunning! Here's a bonus video of the interior.

David's family in St. Peter's.

Paul and his Mom in St. Peter's.

The gigantic dome of St. Peter's.

Swiss Guard

The Vatican museums and St. Peter's are obviously a must visit in Rome, with their priceless collections of art and historic buildings. We actually had a discussion about how much St. Peter's is worth, and guessed it's in the trillion dollar range.

After finishing up at the Vatican, we were starving and walked to the nearby Pizzarium Bonci, which we had seen on an episode of Anthony Bourdain's The Layover. In general, we saw two main styles of pizza in Italy - Roman and Neapolitan. I guess that makes sense since we traveled mostly in Rome and Naples! The Neapolitan type is ubiquitous, and is what we got in sit-down restaurants. The crust is relatively thin, but not crispy, with thick edges, and not overloaded with sauce or toppings. You eat it with a knife and fork. The Roman style pizza we had is usually ordered at a counter and individual rectangular pieces are cut using scissors. You pay by weight, and can eat it with your hands. Pizzarium Bonci is a great example of Roman style pizza, and some of the best pizza we had on the trip thanks to the great crust and high quality toppings. We particularly enjoyed one with sautéed onions and another with pine nuts and peppers.

Pizzarium Bonci

You pick what kind you want and they cut you a slice.

David with his pizza.

Yum!

After eating, we took a taxi back to the apartment. We should mention that it's not easy to just hail a taxi from the street anywhere in Rome. We used the MyTaxi app, which was extremely useful. When we got back Paul's sister and brother-in-law, Betsy and Chad, had just arrived. After relaxing for a bit we walked around Trastevere to introduce them to the neighborhood. We came across an old lady who had gotten her car stuck on a curb, and we helped to pick up the car and put it back down on the street. I wish we had pictures! I guess it's helpful that cars in Europe are so tiny. We did note that most cars in Italy have a lot of scratches and dents. With the narrow streets and packed traffic, it's hard to keep a car in good shape. We walked back to the apartment and got ready for an Italian cooking class - but that will be the subject of another blog post. :)