EuropeTour: Episode Two - Attack Of The Romans

G'Day All,

The tour of Europe has wrapped up.We've spent the last couple of days in London and we're flying hometomorrow night. Travelling has been fun, but I'm looking forward togetting home. We stop off in Bangkok for about 8 hours on the way.There's been a bit of strife in Bangkok lately so the airport couldbe in flames by the time we get there, we'll see what happens.

My last entry finished as I was headingfrom Antibes to Pisa, so I guess I had better fill you all in on whathappened between there and London. Again, I'll try to keep it asbrief as possible...

The Leaning Tower of Pisa was prettymuch what you would expect, yep it leans and it looks just like itdoes in all of the pictures you've seen. Apart from that there werelots of Africans hanging around peddling knock off designer handbags.

Next was Florence, home toMichaelangelo and the Medici's. It was a nice city. We only had onenight there so we didn't exactly get an in depth look at the placebut it was still enjoyable. Our campsite sat on a hill on the edge ofthe city and gave a pretty grand view of the place. We had a localItalian guide give us a tour of the main sites and explained a bitabout the Renaissance and other historical tidbits. The Piazza DellaSignoria held a brilliant collection of statues too. Unfortunately wedidn't catch the real “David” as time did not allow.

It was as we were about to leaveFlorence that we got some very sad and unfortunate family news. Iwon't go into it but sort of reminded me of how far away from home Ireally was, and how powerless I was to do anything about thesituation.

Well from Florence and sad news we leftfor Rome. Rome was epic. There is so much to squeeze in so I'll make itcondensed. First evening we saw the Spanish Steps, Trevi Fountain(awesome), the Pantheon (also awesome), Piazza Novona, the ruinswhere Julius Caesar was murdered and is now a cat sanctuary (can'tremember the name), Mussolini's old office, the Roman Forum, and theColosseum. A lot to squeeze in on our first night.

The next day we went to Vatican Cityand visited St Peter's Basilica, climbed to the top of the cupola(dome) and got a stunning view of Rome (and almost had a strokegetting up there). We then went for a wander through the city,crossed the River Tiber and meandered towards the Colosseum. We onlysaw the outside the night before and decided to go inside, same withthe Roman Forum. Both were very good. We then had a very late buttasty three course lunch, our waiter spoke at least four languagesand which made me feel very ignorant...oh well.

The next morning was the Vatican Museumwhich included to Sistene Chapel. Thank god (no pun intended) that wegot to the line before opening time, the queue looked like it was acouple of kilometers long by the time we finished in the museum. Themuseum was good, so was the Sistene Chapel but not quiet asawe-inspiring as expected. There were too many people there to reallytake the time to enjoy it fully.

My final Rome/Vatican experience washaving a gargantuan cone of dark chocolate and banana gelati. Yummy.I made an absolute mess of it and spent the last half hour of ourtime in the city looking for somewhere to wash my face and hands.

Okay, this is blowing out of proportionso I might just stop this entry here and make it a European trilogy.Stay tuned for th final European leg!

Take it easy, Justin.