25 June - Leaving Tuscany and Arriving In Rome

It was sad to leave our lovely farmhouse villa in Tarvanelle Val De Pesa. We got up early and packed the car. We had a last walk around the farmhouse and took some more pics. We walked through the rows of grape vines one last time.

We drove down the A1, the expressway (Autostrada) that runs down the middle of Italy. We saw incredible hilltop towns and castles and rolling hills of Tuscany then a region called Umbria then to Rome. We stopped at 2 Autogrills on the way. These are eating places on the Autostrada. At the second one we had lasagne and spaghetti and a mixed grill of different Italian meat, plus some wedges. The Autogrill went right across the Autostrada and we sat above it and took some more pics.

On the Autostrada Dad was driving at about 130 km/h but some cars passed us at probably 200km/h.

After about 3 hours we arrived on the outskirts of Rome. We drove into the centre of Rome to our new apartment, then we met the people with the keys and dad then drove to a Ciampino Airport to drop off the car. He got the bus back.

Driving into the city was extremely hairy but cool. Hundreds of cars were going everywhere, horns were going, no-one uses blinkers and at one stage by chance we had a Polizia car in front of us and one behind us. They were either giving us an escort or they were watching us. Not really. Dad and mum did good navigating through the maze of streets. I (Elodie) looked up my Rome App to get some “Driving In Rome” tips for them and it said that “Italian drivers are among the best in the world but they think they don’t need to follow the road rules. They think red lights and pedestrian crossings don’t exist. In fact they don’t think road rules exist. If you stop at a red light they will probably honk you”. The best tip on the App was “if thinking about driving in Rome – don’t”. Well we did and we made it but did get lost a little right at the end trying to find our street because it was one way and all the roads leading to it were one way - but it seemed always the wrong way for us.

Our apartment is in Via del Boschetto between the colosseum and the Trevi Fountain. It is a 2 bedroom apartment, very flash and comfortable. Elodie and Holly are in single beds in one room, mum and dad in another and Erin has a comfy sofa bed in the living room to herself. The Aircon was good when we arrived. It was a hot and sunny day.

We went for a walk in the evening. At the end of the street and to the left was the colosseum (colosseo). We walked to it and around it. It was incredible, massive and old and decayed but really beautiful. The sun was shining on it from the side and made it look even more impressive. It was started to be built in 72 AD. We will go through inside it tomorrow and see where the gladiators fought with slaves and wild animals. Mum said we might watch the movie Gladiator in the next week or so.

Then we walked around ruins of the Imperial Forums. There are different forums for various people such as Julius Caesar and Augustus and others. This was really amazing. We will go back tomorrow to walk through as much as we can. We noticed that there were still archaeological digs happening and new areas being uncovered. Most of this area dates back nearly 2000 years. For example the forum of Julius Caesar was built between 54 BC and 46 BC.

We had a competition to see how many cats we could see because the Forum is famous for the number of stray cats that live there but we only saw one. May have been too hot for them.

We also saw the Vittoriano, a monument dedicated to King Victor Emmanuelle the 2^nd. It was bright white with the setting sun shining directly on it. We read that italians don’t like it because the architecture doesn’t fit in with the nearby ruins.

We’ll explore a lot more tomorrow.

We then had dinner at a restaurant. We sat in the outdoor restaurant area overlooking the Forum. We had pizza and spaghetti. Yum again. We walked back home after dark. Another big day but it was amazing.

Elodie, Holly and Erin xxx