Friday, January 4, 2013

Italy: Ancient Ostia

It is pathetic that I am 1.5 years behind on my blog! Ugh, where does the time go? I can't believe how much I have forgotten about our trip as well! It's a great thing I have THIS (Our itinerary made by yours truly):


And THIS:



To help jog my memory! When Nathan saw my 12 page itinerary and our folder, which we had to take EVERYWHERE with us, I'm pretty sure he wanted so strangle me! It was awesome!

So we arrived in Rome, went to Vatican City, bla bla bla, it was amazing, overdosed on Gelato, which I don't regret, and not it was July 22. We woke up bright and early that morning for yet another tour. The bus picked us up, and if I remember correctly, it was late. This bus driver was a miracle worker too. You should have seen the ridiculously small streets he navigated that gigantic sucker through; it was like Harry Potter's ride on the night bus, except worse, because stop signs and road blocks didn't jump out of our way!

On a side note-  I sure do a lot of these- I loved pedestrians in Rome. They just walk out in front of a moving vehicle and hold their hand out! Kind of Moses-esque parting the traffic, and in staying with the Moses analogy, it was a miracle of God we didn't see anyone get ran over!

So we headed out, went past the Coliseum, which was amaze, and got to see a few other things on a quick drive by. It didn't take long to get to Ostia in reality, but it felt like ages because our tour was in 2 different languages! Oye!

Sadly, Nathan and I really knew nothing about Ancient Ostia before heading out on the tour. I really wish we would have prepared ourselves a little better because it ended up not being too horribly exciting, although we did get a valuable lesson in columns!

Anyway, here are some pictures of the Ancient Roman City. It was really fascinating and quite beautiful!




Don't you love his enthusiasm? 





This mosaic was actually a HUGE floor. 










Remember that mosaic I was talking about earlier? Well, this is the rest of it!




Sometime during our tour, we bought, any guesses, GELATO! We also bought bottled water because we were dying of thirst. I opened the water to take a big delicious gulp and BAM, carbonated water. I would rather die a dehydrated death than drink l'eau gazeuse ! Sick!

When we got back to Rome, we took a little trip to the Spanish Steps. We ate dinner at a restaurant right at the top of the stairs. It was ridiculously expensive and completely un-tasty! Even Nathan didn't enjoy it, which is saying something, because he ate fried alligator the other day when we were in Denver! This is a view from the restaurant, which does not show a picture of the steps!


Somewhere in that vicinity of time, we also wondered into a few little shops around the piazza. We walked into 2 or 3 optic centers and found my mom a rad pair of Gucci frames! She was pretty excited. I'm pretty sure she loved them too, you never know with moms though!


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