The Trip of Awesomeness Commences

Here's some highlights from Rome:

--Gelato. I had the best dark chocolate gelato ever. I might move to Rome just for the ice cream.

--Sistine Chapel. Not what I expected in terms of shape and size but absolutely amazing! We learned all kinds of interesting facts about Michelangelo's sense of humor. He painted the Pope's face onto the figure of Peter the apostle (the Pope was his patron). He painted the Pope's secretary's face onto the figure of the devil becuase the secretary offended him. He also painted in Dante the poet and his own face.

--Colosseum. So the emperor Vespesian was the one that finished the Colosseum--the place where they would have the gladiator battles. Vespesian was very forward thinking and knew that 55,000 attendees would need restrooms, so he insisted on the first free public toilets. That's a great public administrator. To this day, public toilets in Italy are known by his name.

--St. Peter's Square. We had a nice little break just hanging out in the square and watching the people. I liked our rest stops so that we could sit and absorb Rome.

--Being a tourist. I must be out of practice. We went hard and strong in Rome because we only had one day there. By the end of the day we were sunburned and stumbling back to the hotel. It was a long 13 hour tourist day. But we pretty much conquered the city.