marias mayhem: Roma

For Spring break we spent a few days in Rome, it was a dream. I never in my life thought that one day I'd be standing in the coliseum. All I can say is that pictures just don't compare to the real thing. Rome was beautiful!

Let me begin at the beginning, this was the first time that we have travelled off the island and it almost didn't happen. I sent off for our travel passports in February and I received mine in March. I was in a panic because Micky and Brody's had not come and after several e-mails, sleepless nights, and biting my nails till they almost bled, their passports arrived in the mail the day before we left.

I learned that to never fly out of Gatwick airport ever again because it's too far away. And I will never book an early flight, the money I saved on the early flight was spent on the hotel we had to get the night before to be at the airport on time.

We rented an apartment, and it was tiny and expensive and I didn't even use the kitchen that I really wanted. The best thing about the apartment was the location, we were literally across the street from the Roman Forum.

As soon as we arrived in Rome we all plopped on the bed from exhaustion because we'd been up since 4am. We took a nap for about 2 hours and got up refreshed and starved. First we decided to walk around since everything seemed so close.

One thing I have learned about Europe, is that things are always being renovated and unfortunately there was scaffolding on the coliseum, and some of the ruins in the Roman Forum.

This is the Victor Emmanuel Monument it's located on the northern slope of the Roman Forum. Construction began in 1885, which makes this a "new building" compared to almost every single other building. Underneath the statue in the middle lies the tomb of the unknown and it's guarded day and night just like the tomb of the unknown in the U.S.