Sun 1 Feb 2009
***********Friday*********
Hailey and I met Chelsea and Derek at Porta Romana to catch an early 10:55 train to Roma. All the others, 15 of us total, would be arriving later either from Viterbo or from the trip to Tivoli that the gardens class went on. I saw pictures later, those were some gorgeous gardens.
Starting Thursday, it had been the first nice day in a while, so we were in high spirits, light jackets and sunglasses. For me, I was in my new 5 euro yellow hipster shades, which may or may not be in some of the pictures I'll be posting, I can't recall.
On the train and the way to the hotel, Derek played tour guide and pointed out all the important sites. Balsano is the largest volcanic lake in Italia, one of the largest in the world, and we will be going back there. Basticciano (?) where we were laid over on the train ride back home today houses the castle where Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes got married, and it is seriously a massive stone building hovering over a tiny town (with really good cioccolato caldo, but we'll get to that in time).
Finding the hotel was simple, and we were hungry by the time we got there. We put our bags down in the room and went back into the sunshine to enjoy seeing natural light again and weave our way down side streets to find a place to eat.
Derek said the best places to eat in Roma are all hidden on random side streets, because that's where the authentic, non-tourist trap places are. I really have to hand it to him on that one. We entered a tiny cafe on a road with vines, dried up from winter, hanging from the power lines. I couldn't tell you what it was called or probably how to get back there, but it had the best parmeggiano di melazano (eggplant parm) I've ever had in my life. For six euro.
It was fantastic and filling, but as they say, there's always room for gelato. When in Roma, right? We found a place we had passed on the way to the ristoranti, and it had cioccolato di arancia. Choco and orange has become my fave combo recently, I couldn't tell you why. But I saw that and I was sold. Like all the gelato here, it was bellisimo.
The Santa Maria di Gradi church was right around the corner from our hostel and beautiful from the outside, especially in the sunshine, so we decided to take a look inside. The Duomo in Firenze still has me sold on most amazing architecture so far (other than the Pantheon, but that's a whole different story), but Santa Maria had the most intricate art inside I've ever seen. The alter was huge and everything was gilded and carved so carefully. I need to find myself a thesaurus or start learning some more adjectives, because I know I've said it about tons of sites already, but this place was breathtaking. Definitely check pictures of it on Flickr, because I took a whole bunch.
We went back to the hotel to just chill a bit before the others got in and we'd start going out. Chelsea, Hailey and I went back to our room of seven beds, four still waiting to be filled, while Derek went back to his room of six, but only waiting for three more people. I must have been more tired than I thought, because after probably less than 15 minutes I passed out. I think I was down for about half an hour. Soon after I woke up, we went to meet the others who would be coming in to Termini soon.
The Termini reunion brought with it Lauren, Seul, Felicia, Maryland Alex, Stefano, Brooks, Brooks' friend Rob who is studying in Firenze where we'd met him before, Christine, Kally, Coreen and Alex. Phew. To the hostel. To the metro. To the Spanish Steps. Splitting up for dinner. Kally, Christine, MD Alex and I went to find some quick slices of pizza. The plan was to reconvene on the Spanish Steps with some vino, because, so say all the tourist books, drinking on the Spanish Steps at night is the thing to do.
Apparently, another thing to do is meet at the Spanish Steps so PubCrawlRome.com can nab 20 of your euro and take you to three bars. When we met back with everyone at the top of the steps, we just chilled for a while when I learned we would be embarking on an official Roman pub crawl. After a bit of confusion about where we were supposed to meet the group and a lack of a reservation, we joined the crawl. First to a place more reminiscent of an Irish pub, with a soccer game on in the corner and walls not nearly wide enough to hold everyone inside. But it also came with a free T-shirt and free pizza, so I'm really not complaining. Bar number two came with a U2 cover band. But bar number three was the true winner. I'm pretty sure it was called Apocalypse, or something along those lines. We were led through a Tabbacchi, some kind of café, some kind of ristoranti, and final to a staircase that led to the basement club. The place was a maze, with walls made to look like a cave and outfitted with mirrors in the strangest places to make it more confusing. On the bus to that last bar, we met two Brits, Mark the breakdancer and Sam T. Himself. They proved to be hilarious, dancy company for the night, especially when we left the club.
I have no idea how many hours we spent dancing. But at the end of the night, we either neglected or lacked the common sense to realize that there was a bus stop right near the club that could take us back to Termini and a few blocks from our hostel. Instead, we felt the need to find the way back on foot. Now, the next day we did a similar walk to the one we were about to embark on. It took about 20 minutes to walk from the area to our hotel. On this night, we left the club around 02:30 a.m. We got back to the hotel at 04:30. We figured it out the next day, and we're pretty sure we circled every block around the hotel about 3 times, asked two cabbies and one bread delivery guy for (unhelpful) directions before finally turning down the right street. Maybe things would have been different if we'd left earlier. Maybe it would've been different if we all left at the same time rather than Kally, Hailey, Lauren, Seul, two Brits and I walking back towards Termini. But honestly, this was probably the best way the night could have ended: getting hopelessly lost at night in Roma with a hostel marked at the wrong spot on the map, a Brit who could fake an accent from just about anywhere, and a Brit who could've been a court jester in a past life.
Around 04:30, we got to sleep.
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EDIT: days II and III to come, also check photos on http://www.flickr.com/photos/manda_face/
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