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The final day of touring Rome was pretty spectacular. We started the day off on a tour of the Coliseum and the Roman Forums. I had just watched Gladiator the night before and was very excited to see everything. We ran into another pushy tour salesmen that we eventually decided to give in to. I think that these guides have been worth it. They give you so much more context than just the signs with short blurbs around the places you’re traveling. We did not get radios this time, which was a little worrisome, but we did get to skip the queues at both places!

Our guide at the Coliseum was very funny and kept picking on one of the girls in the group for demonstrations. She was blushing the entire time as he kept hitting on her in front of the group. (Italian men are simply relentless…) I thought the whole thing was very funny.

Eventually he handed us off to the next guide at the Forums who was not nearly as good. She was abrasive and sarcastic, but she did give us some good information. (She was from Seattle working on some sort of degree, but she did not have a future in tourism.) I had never really heard of the Palatine Hill or the Forums before, and these turned out to be pretty interesting.

Annelise and Christine were pretty worn down by this time in the trip. They weren’t up for nearly as much. Still, they did stick around and wait for me to do stuff, so I thank them for that!

After exploring the Forum a bit we headed over to the Monumento Nazionale a Vittorio Emanuele II. This dominated the skyline above the Forums and was incredibly impressive in size. I think they had just completed a renovation or cleaning of the entire thing and the marble was incredibly white—bright almost. The monument also has the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier for Italians and, weirdly, they had one armed guard and one who was taking pictures with anyone who wanted one.

At this point the girls were really tired and just went back to the hotel for a nap. I told them I’d meet them out for dinner later in the day and set off on my own again. I wanted to checkout the last remaining sights on the “Top 12” list that was on the back of my map. In order to do so I was able to quickly run through the Trevi Fountain and Pantheon again before making my way to Piazza Navona. As it turned out the ladies didn’t miss much here, but I did get to watch a number of street artists making sketches of people. Generally these artists are very talented and I almost thought of having a realistic one made of myself. I would have done so if I could have gotten a nude.

After a very long walk up the river Tevere, I eventually made it to Piazza del Popolo. (On the way into the plaza, I was very tempted to rent a Segway for an hour or so, but decided I didn’t have enough time before I had to meet Annelise and Christine for dinner.) The ladies definitely missed something here. It was a massive plaza that had another obelisk and a number of interesting entrances. (Twin churches marking the entrance to one street, city walls and entrances on another, and the hill and fountain topping it off.) Overlooking the plaza was a large fountain that you could climb to get on top of a hill for great views of the city. I got a number of good pictures from the top before strolling through a park behind an archeological dig.

At this point I still had an hour or so before I had to meet the ladies for dinner. I decided that my best option was to experience the phenomenon of the fast food beer. I stopped by Burger King outside of the Pope’s plaza and ordered a Heineken. Then I hopped on the subway, made my way to Italy’s very first McDonalds where I ordered another beer. I thought the whole thing was entertaining and I chuckled immaturely to myself about it.

The next day was just a bit of traveling. It was very uneventful and doesn’t really deserve its own post. I know I was glad to be back in Scotland, and the ladies were very glad to be back. I feel for Brian—not having English everywhere is quite a difficulty and gets old quickly!