There is a Metro station that opens onto the street directly across the road from the Colosseum, so as you are walking to the door you can already see people gathered around at the base of the amphitheater.
The Colosseum is a lot larger than both of us expected. We knew that it was big, but this was HUGE. And to think that it was constructed by hand about 2,000 years ago. That is a pretty impressive feat. We walked around to the entrance to purchase tickets. Luckily we had bought Roma Passes yesterday, so we walked right past the hundreds of people waiting to buy tickets, easily saving ourselves two hours wait in line.
About 10 days ago the Colosseum opened a new portion of the amphitheater to the public. They now offer guided tours of the subterranean levels as well as the third level of seating. These had to be reserved ahead of time, and apparently not a lot of people knew about it. There were 15 people in our tour and thousands of other people confined to the area for “normal” people. The crazy thing was that they were charging four Euros to rent an audioguide for the normal portion of the Colosseum. But we paid eight Euros, got our own personal guide and were able to see two extra areas that had never been open to the public before. We think we got a good deal.
During the first part of our tour, we got to walk out onto the wooden portion of the main floor of the Colosseum. It was pretty cool as you got a first-hand look at what the gladiators would have seen. The walls are so high around the main floor, they seem to stretch up to the sky.
We then walked down to the subterranean portion of the amphitheater. The guide showed us where wild animals were led into the Colosseum and the cages where they were held. We also got to see where the Ancient Romans had trap doors and elevator systems to lift gladiators and animals to the main floor. It was very eerie to be down under the main floor, almost like you were close to the death that came before.
We walked up to the third floor next and were treated to a spectacular bird’s eye view of the whole stadium. It is crazy to think that there were more seats in the original Colosseum that would have still been 75 feet higher than we were at the top.
After the Colosseum, our next stop was the Palatine Hill. This is the area where all the Emperor’s built their palaces. The house of Flavian was easily the largest and most ornate, even 2,000 years later. He had his own smaller stadium in his house along with gardens, reception areas and plenty of rooms.
I was very excited to see Circus Maximus, the old chariot race course that is seen from one of the terraces at Flavian’s house. Once we got there we saw that it was completely covered in white tents and military vehicles and equipment. There was apparently some sort of festival or demonstration that was taking place right on Circus Maximus.
Next we walked over to the Roman Forum (the Colosseum, Palatine Hill and Roman Forum are all connected, so it is very easy to go from one to the other). We had downloaded an audio guide from Rick Steves, so we listened to this guide as we walked around the main street of Ancient Rome. Huge arches, large basilicas and temples stretched around the main square. We saw the temple for Julius Ceasar and the Temple of the Vestal Virgins.
These ruins are still spectacular to see, even in their somewhat depleted state. It gets your mind racing, trying to imagine what life was like in Ancient Rome.
When we left the main area of Ancient Rome, we had planned to run back to the hotel to drop some gear in the room and then go to Stadio Olimpico to watch the AS Roma soccer match, we even bought Forza Roma scarves to wear. We made the slightly out of the way combination of Metro and bus routes to the stadium. Unfortunately the match had already started and they stop selling tickets ten minutes before the match begins. Bummer.
Oh well. We decided to go back into the center area of Rome to look for a nice place to eat dinner. To take away some of the pain of not going to the soccer match we decided that we whatever amount of money we would have spent on soccer tickets, we would instead spend it on dinner.
We took the bus and Metro back to the Trevi fountain area. We walked up toward the fountain, and could hear it before it was even in sight. Between the rushing water and the throng of people around it, the Trevi fountain is extremely loud. It is also very magnificent to see in person. We walked down to the edge of the fountain and each threw in some money, guaranteeing our return to Rome. We started walking down a side street, intending to walk to a restaurant we had noted that was in the area close to Piazza Navona. But as we were walking a restaurant caught Jessica’s eye. It was called L’Arte della Pizza and it was located on Via della Sabini. It was a very “mom and pop” type place; just the kind of place we were looking for.
We started out with an order of bruschetta and a half liter of the house white wine. Both were unbelievable. The wine seemed to be similar to a pinot grigio and the bruschetta was to die for. There were three large pieces, not the small bite-sized pieces of bruschetta that we were used to in the United States. One piece had an olive paste, one had artichoke paste and the other had quartered tomatoes. All three were amazing, but I think the winner went to the tomato bruschetta. The tomatoes were quartered and had a little dressing and a lot of herbs and spices. Even Jessica agreed that it was the best, and she doesn’t even like tomatoes.
For our main course, Jessica ordered lasagna and I had tortellini with meat sauce. Both were very good. You could taste how fresh the ingredients were that they used. We ate every bit of both dishes. We finished the meal with a couple glasses of limoncello. This is a lemon-infused alcohol mixed with a simple syrup. Everyone’s is homemade and everyone’s is the best.
We finished the night with the Rick Steves “La Dolce Vita” walk up Via del Corso to the Piazza del Popolo (an open piazza with no cars). We then walked back down Via del Babuino to the Spanish Steps. In front of the Spanish Steps is a smaller fountain, and there were plenty of people out enjoying the night by sitting on the steps, even though it was already past 11 p.m. We sat along with them and enjoyed the moment before walking back to the Metro and taking our ride back to Termini station.
We are resting up from our first full day in Rome and looking forward to tomorrow when we visit the Pantheon, Piazza Navona and the Capitaline Museums, among others. Until then, Ciao!
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