Day 8 Rome (History x3)

Today was the day that we had all been waiting for since the beginning of the trip. Rome! There was no stalling this morning, and because we all had a good nights sleep yesterday, we were all up and on our feet early. It definitely wasn't the best idea not to eat dinner last night, because everyone was starving again the next morning, and the breakfast bar was opening late due to an issue in the kitchen. When it opened at around 8:00, I grabbed a crossiant, while everyone else made Belgian Waffles. Luke's waffle came out of the toaster burnt, and we told him just to eat it anyway. He didn't argue, and simply drenched it in maple syrup and butter before eating it. After everyone had a quick spot of breakfast, we jumped into the car with our stuff and headed off to Rome.

As soon as we got to Rome, we parked our car on the side of the road and began to walk throughout the main part of the city, where they had lots of beautiful buildings and fountains to look at. We decided to stop at the Roman Colosseum, (HISTORY) where we took underground and stadium tours. We got to see the places that the gladiators would wait to be put into the arena, and the vast fighting area that would once be full of people fighting to the death. It was pretty cool to experience this, and we were all speechless throughout the whole tour. After we got done looking around underground, we climbed the stairs and overlooked the entire thing, which is much bigger than it looks in the pictures. There were also great views of the rest of Rome, since the Colosseum is so tall. We exited with lots of cool facts and pictures, and started to walk over to the Trevi Fountain, (HISTORY) another important part of the heart of Rome. It is the largest Baroque fountain in the city, and is one of the most well-known fountains around the world. We learned that it was built by Nicola Salvi in 1732, and was made completely out of marble. Another cool fact is that an estimated $4,000 is thrown into the fountain each day. Everyone was so preoccupied with the sight-seeing that we had forgotten to get lunch!

We stopped by the Baguetteria Del Fico, where everyone got an amazing lunch with ham and cheese rolls. There were also some great bagels that we ordered on the side, and we took the bagels with us to our car, and drove to one last place before we called it a day. The Uffizi Gallery (HISTORY) was on our way to our hotel, so we took another hour long self-guided tour, where we saw the largest collection of Renaissance art, collected by the Medici family during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. It was extremely crowded in the gallery, but there were around seventy rooms to walk through, so we never really got to stat in one place for long. After we finished in the gallery, we got back to the car and drove up to the Boscolo Exedra Roma, one of the fanciest hotels in the area. The fountain in the front was breathtaking, and so were the rooms. Everything was old-fashioned but extremely clean and shiny, from the marble shower and sinks to the designs of the balconies and the beds. There was an indoor pool on the lower level, and we all took a refreshing swim after a long day of touring.  Soon, we went up to our rooms and showered before having a late dinner. It was an ordinary dinner despite the elegant hotel, and we all got grilled chicken salads with Parmesan cheese. The salads were surprisingly filling, and we were all dead tired when we got up to our rooms. We all crashed on our beds, hoping that the next few days would be as good as today was.