Day 15 - Tuesday 26th September - Rome

After a good night's sleep we headed out to get tickets for the hop-on hop-off bus. There was a booth just near our apartment for The Big Rome Bus so we bought or tickets and then walked around to the stop at the back of the colosseum. (Can't get used to being so close to the colosseum when we leave our place. Love it! ) Hopped on the bus along with lots of others.  All the dozens of buses are pretty full all the time. Soooo many tourists!  We decided to get off at Castello Sant Angelo and have a wander around. There was a queue for the Castello and we don't do long queues so we had a lovely walk around it, through a pretty park full of the tall pine trees that are everywhere in Rome - they have tall thin trunks and all the greenery in a bunch at the top. There were market stalls among the banks of the Tiber as on the Left Bank in Paris, selling souvenirs but there were also book stalls, so quite like Paris but not as long. We stopped there for a coffee and pastry, sitting under the trees. From here we walked back past the castle and towards St Peter's Square. Oh my, so many people, so we'll make sure we're nowhere near this place tomorrow when Popey Yopey make his appearance. We spoke to one of the MANY young people trying to sell guided tours to the Vatican Museum like we did in 2009 at Sophie's great suggestion. We asked him if there are less tourists in the winter. He said yes, the best time to go is November-December - sounds good to me. We looked in a couple of shops, bought some hats for the kids and people watched. We are very disappointed to see so many priests, monks, nuns who all seem to be far too well fed (and some the priests seem to be kids)! We started to make our way back to the bus stop by crossing the Tiber over a different bridge and before long it arrived because they came along every 15mins, which is great. We got back on and went around til we got back to Circus Maximus, where the chariot races took place. It's a park of sorts now where people take their dogs walking and they hold concerts. All the tiered seating is gone, looted when Rome fell, there are still a few remnants of buildings at one end and the track is still partially there. We got off at this stop so we could go to Bocca Della Verità but on the way there we stopped in at Circus Maximus Pizzeria for a bite of lunch. Great place where you chose the size of pizza slice you wanted and they then weigh it. We had potato & rosemary pizza and a variety of arancini. Yum. We headed to Bocca Della Verità which is a huge marble mask hanging in a portico outside a church. In the movie Roman Holiday Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck visit it. Legend has it that if you are a liar, when you put your fingers in the mouth they will be chopped off. Anyway there was a huge queue to walk into the portico to take photos by the mask and with your fingers in its mouth. So I took some photos of the mask from the side, through the gate and device to come early one morning or leave it for next time. We had to get to the next bus stop and on the way passed one of the most intact Roman buildings in Rome, the Temple of Hercules Victor, the remnants of a 2nd smaller amphitheatre which was used for concerts. It's just wonderful walking past all the remnants from such a fascinating part of history. The next stop was in Piazza Venezia and we headed to the Piazza Barberini stop so we could make our way to Trevi Fountain. Made a wrong direction choice at first but eventually got there. PACKED with tourists and local police and volunteers everywhere with whistles to tell people they were doing something wrong, like sitting on the edge of the fountain, or standing on the benches. We pushed our way to the fountain, took some photos - John even took one of me throwing yet another coin in the fountain .... so I'll be back. It was quite warm so we bought an ice cream and enjoyed that on our way to The Pantheon and Piazza Navona. My foot's still been extremely painful to walk on so it's taking us ages to get places but that's just the way it is. All you have to do is pretty much follow the crowds to get to the popular places. Found the Pantheon but too many people to go in, so we didn't worry about it as we'd gone in with Sophie in 2009. So we continued on to Piazza Navona, had a little walk around and then sat out the front in a cafe and enjoyed a Spritz and a busker playing gorgeous music on an electric guitar. At one point a young couple started dancing a nice slow jive - they were great. When this young Keith Urban look-alike took a break from his guitar playing his older, round, elderly side-kick in an interesting outfit of khaki shorts, red tshirt with an eagle, boots, black socks pulled half way up his calves and a stripy beanie, started singing some Roman songs in the Roman dialect. He was very good but he should work on his outfit. Finished our drinks and headed for the bus stop so we wouldn't miss the last bus. Hopped on at Piazza Barberini and headed home. When we got to Termini train station we had to get off that bus and hop on the last bus leaving in a few minutes. By the time we got off at Colosseum it was dark and what a beautiful sight the Colosseum  was all lit up. We freshened up,  had a rest and then went to dinner at a little restaurant we'd passed around the corner from our apartment called Pasqualino al Colosseo. John had ricotta & spinach ravioli with Cingiale sauce and I had Canelloni di Carne ..... deelicious.