Pizza, Gnocchi and Gelato...

Heart-shaped pizza :)

Gelato... nothing more needs to be said.

...that has been our entire diet so far in Roma. And not that I am complaining. Today was amazing but tiring as well. We woke up early and went to the Pantheon, which is from the first century a.d. It was so beautiful to go inside and see all the art and sculptures, and the tomb of Vittorio Emmanuele II. The columns outside were massive and the Romans got them in Egypt, and to get them to Rome they floated them downriver. Pretty insane.

Pantheon

After that we went to Santa Maria Sopra Minerva, which is a church built on top of a temple to the goddess Minerva. Lo and behold, there was a statue in there by Michelangelo of Christ with the cross, which I actually got to run my hands over. Insane.

After our first church we went to the memorial to Vittorio Emmanuele, also known as the 'wedding cake' because it is so big. It is relatively new in the sense that it is not 1000 years old, and was pretty. The weather was absolutely gorgeous today so it was nice to walk around everywhere. From there we saw the column of Trajan, which is fro mthe 2nd century AD, and saw Trajan's forum right next to it, which is a haven for the city's cats. From there we saw the first permanent market, commissioned by Hadrian in the 2nd century. After that we went to Capitoline Hill (also known as the Piazza del Campidoglio), which is a piazza designed by Michelangelo. From there we saw the Roman forum which was somewhat insane, and the Colloseum. We didn't go into either one because they both cost money and by this point we are nearing the end of our financial rope, but we got good pictures of both.

After that we went to an awesome church, San Clemente, which was built in the 12th century on top of a 4th century church, which was built on top of a 1st century Pagan temple to Mithras. They had recently done a whole bunch of excavation work (and are still doing it) so we got to go down and see the layers of history, wonderfully preserved. It was INSANE; I touched walls that are almost 2,000 years old, which is something I will never be able to do again, most likely. It was so cool. AND we took lots of pictures, even though they weren't allowed (we didn't take them of the very old, carefully preserved frescoes because light can damage them; we may be tourists but we're not inconsiderate).

From there it was off to the Circus, Circus Maximus, where they used to hold the chariot races (and where U2 recently had a concert, to bring things to the present day). There was something huge going on nearby; I asked a cop why all the streets were closed off and policemen were everywhere but all he said was (I think) "Foul congress" which I didn't understand so I didn't press the issue. The circus was cool because you could see the old houses of the emperors where they would watch the races.

From there we went to one of the 7 hills of Rome, which is where Rome's wealthiest live. The view is incredible. The last churches we saw today were Santa Sabina and San Giovanni e Paolo. They were both pretty beautiful; Sabina had excavation work going on as well but it was closed so we couldn't go down to see.

We ate dinner in Trastevere, a cheap part of Rome with a lot of bars and restaurants. Jacob ate at an Italian place all the time last summer and we've gone there the past two nights because the service is incredible, they have the best gnocchi I've ever had, and they make my pizza in the shape of a heart. After dinner, we were headed back home when we happened to see Andrew in a pizza bar; we made plans to meet tomorrow and it was a nice surprise to run into him. Now we are headed back to our apartment for a nap; later tonight we are going to see the Trevi Fountain. Tomorrow it's Vatican City.

Ciao!