Rome: sleep and eat

I'm getting behind with posts and I know some people are anxious to hear and see photos about our Rome trip. We had a very nice time, although I can't say it was relaxing. With lots to see in a short time we were very busy. I needed a nice beach vacation after this trip! We walked and walked until I thought my legs would fall off....but we saw and did everything we wanted to. There was so much to our trip that it's hard to post it all now. So I've decided to break it up. The first being mostly about our hotel and the best part.....FOOD!!!

I tried to convince my stubborn loving husband that we needed two suitcases. In my defense we were going for 5 days AND with a toddler who needed diapers and at least a few toys, as well as Doug's suit! Our one suitcase was only allowed to weigh 30 pounds. Only an hour before we were suppose to leave the house with a 50 pound suitcase did he finally cave. We were so thankful we had the extra one. He tried to tell me we could just take a few pairs of pants and re-wear them, but although it's a nice city......ROME IS FILTHY. The old cobblestone streets kick up a lot of dust! Each and everyday we came back to our hotel to strip and shower. Ella didn't mind one bit, since our hotel had a bathtub. Such a luxury (even for me) since we only have a shower at our house.

Suitcases in hand we had a short one hour drive to the airport (a much smaller one than our usual take-off location in Amsterdam). Then with only a two hour plane ride we were there. I haven't been on that short of a plane ride ever!! I'm so use to the 8+ hour one that it was a piece of cake being on the flight with Ella. She did wonderful and settled in right away (even better we had an extra seat between Doug and I).

I think she's become quite the frequent flyer since she knew right what to do.

The airport we flew into in Rome was smaller than Scranton. We had to leave the plane and follow a path across the run-way area into the actual airport. A shuttle bus running to central station easily got us within walking distance to our hotel. It was about a 40 minute bus ride (similar to a charter bus) which should have been nice except the bus driver was quick to stomp on the break so often than I thought for sure I was going to hurl before we arrived.

Finally......although almost 8pm we arrived at our hotel. It was part of the Best Western chain you see in America, although nothing about it was American. We have stayed in a few different European hotels in France, Germany, Denmark, Holland, UK and now Italy.  This was one of the best as far as space and a comfortable bed. It doesn't meet American comfort by any means. A four star European hotel can be 4 star as far as  cleanliness, but the beds.....I don't know where they get them, but we haven't found one that make you say "awww... sleepy time" after a long day of exploring. 

Anyway here's what our hotel looked like:

little room before entering the room with our bed

 

 

 

nice little setup for Ella

    

 

Where's the tank on the toilet?

WAAAAY up there!!! (very different, or maybe I just need to get out more)

A nice hotel like I said before, but one that left us with a few questions.....

Hair dryer or vacuum.....?!?!

Hot or cold?

This took just about the entire vacation to get use to. I think the knobs were on backwards because we got the opposite results when trying for the correct temperature of water in the shower. "F" where a "C- for cold" would be expected in the U.S resulted in hot, hot, hot! I did a little investigating once we were home and found that the Italian word for ‘hot’ is ‘caldo’. Therefore a hot water tap (faucet) may be labelled with the letter ‘C’. The Italian word for ‘cold’ is ‘freddo’, so the cold tap may be labelled ‘F’. YEP....they were definitely switched!

The view from our hotel was nice:

Now for the yummiest part......

When you think of Italy what comes to mind.....pasta, pizza, wine? We were lucky enough to try it all! Our first night we didn't have a lot of time for dinner so we went to the pizza shop right next to our hotel. You could pick pizzas with different toppings to fill the box. Maybe it was the place we got it, or the fact that it was the end of the day, but it was not the greatest.  We did have pizza several other times at different locations and they were better. Doug loved it, Ella was too curious about everything else to even try it and I'm a crust person when it comes to pizza. Italian pizza has a very thin crust.

The pasta.......I'm in love! Homemade noodles I could eat everyday.  And as always we each ordered a different kind so we could share.

 

  

I spent some time researching Italy before we went and came across a website that mentioned food you MUST try when you are visiting. One that they mentioned was buffalo mozzarella. We got it one evening with our pasta as an appetizer. Doug fell in love! (he loves his cheeses). Just last week we were watching a show and the main character was given a last meal request before his death. This sparked a conversation between Doug and I about what we would choose. On his list....buffalo mozzarella.....guess it was THAT good!

Doug happens to work with a gentleman here in Holland who is Italian and actually comes from Rome. He had lots of advice for us before our trip and mentioned that we had to try Italian ice cream, known as "Gelato". Gelato is different from the traditional recipe of ice cream because it is lighter, due to lower butterfat content than traditional, factory made ice cream and has a different percent of sugar (lower I think). Whatever it is made of, it's like enjoying a little piece of heaven. Doug's Italian friend was able to tell us "THE" place to go for the best gelato. It was obvious to see why it was THE place. The lines were very long and it was elbow to elbow with people. We went on two different occasions. The first night we shared one cone with three flavors.

On our second visit it was a must that we EACH got a cone! There were so many flavors that you could easily go everyday for a month and never try the same one! They topped each cone with a big glob of homemade whipped cream. You had to eat it fast. We barely had time to snap a picture between licks as it melted away.

We happened to be walking past this shop on our way back to the hotel one evening. We decided a little treat was needed when we spotted their display of cannolis.

One other evening we opted out of dessert with dinner and splurged on some wine we could enjoy in our hotel. Since we had to past this shop again,  we decided dessert with the wine was appropriate. Since I'm the one with the sweet tooth can you tell which two I picked vs. Doug's choices?

Stayed tuned....there are more posts to come about The Pantheon, Trevi Fountain, Spanish Steps, Vatican City, Vatican Museum, Sistine Chapel, St. Peter's Basilica, Colosseum, The Forum and other little things in between. (told you we walked our legs off)