Italy - Day 1 - Summary - Rome
Thursday, December 6th, 2007
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Wow, so Day 1 is done. It has been a blast so far, and, just like everyone said, I am so glad for having decided to come. This experience has taught me so much, but I'll save that for the end-of-trip summary. Here are the juicy details of day 1 - Rome.
** pictures may take until Sunday to get uploaded unless I find an internet cafe, sorry **
All future entries will be formatted like this entry. I will write a summary for the day and have links to each activity that was done. That way each entry doesn't get too long.
Getting out of Atlanta
What a hectic day! I was up until 3am getting last minute planning done for today. That was all a part of my plan since I wanted to make myself tired so that I would sleep well on the flight over.
I got up at 8am and took care of a few last minute things. I got a bike lock for my bag, some bells for guarding luggage at night, a power cord for my GPS, some money out of the bank, and a haircut.
My thanks to Daniel for taking me to the MARTA. He got me there at 12:45p and I made it to the airport by 1:45pm.
Checking in at the airport was easy enough. And even though the security line was much longer than I expected, I still arrived at my gate 2 hours before my 4:40pm flight.
While grabbing a bite to eat before my flight, I had an awesome experience meeting a US Army soldier, Jason Chavis, a nice guy from Suffolk, VA who was heading back to serve the second half of his tour in Iraq.
Read about that awesome grace-experience here
I have had so many ups-and-downs about this trip and that didn't change by being in the airport. I had to go to the bathroom about 3 times while waiting because I was so nervous, but at the same time I was confident in my travel plans. Maybe nervous isn't the right word, maybe it was more excitement than anything else.
 Flight
The flight started boarding at 4:15pm and we left Atlanta without a hitch. Now to the flight...
I would say I mastered the travel part of the trip pretty well so far. There was too much to put here, so you can check out the flight and train details by clicking here
ROME
Since you're reading this, I'd bet you can guess that I made it to town alright. I decided to stop by the hostel around 1pm so I had 5 hours to use sight-seeing. What would be better than a trip over to the Colosseum and the Forum?
 Click here to read about and see pictures of the Colosseum and forum.
Now that my back was killing me to my desired level, it was time to head over to the Hostel to check-in.
I don't know how I walked past the hostel on my way to the colosseum, but I did. I found them on the 2nd floor and was able to store my bag, but had to come back at 3 to gain access to my room. Since I wasn't about to hit up any more landmarks, I thought I should grab some lunch, so I headed over to .....RESTRauntNameHERE.... I ordered some Trefolie al Pesto and a coke. It was great, so great (and so much) that I had the left-overs again for dinner later.
 I headed back and checked into my room. Click here to see how the check-in went and to see more about the Alassandro Downtown Hostel
 After getting my stuff situated into my room I went to what was probably my most enjoyed place of the day, the Pantheon. Click here to read about the Pantheon and to see more pictures.
I headed over to the Trevi Fountain and grabbed a few night pictures before heading back to my room. (click here to read the details)
Once I was back at the Hostel, I decided to take it easy. Even though it was only 8:30pm, a days worth of walking and 2 nights of little sleep have made it feel much later.
 At the Hostel I was able to eat the rest of my lunch for dinner. I was also able to transfer my pictures to the laptop before I started to write up the record of todays activities. All of this was made more enjoyable by having Austin Powers playing on the TV in the common room.
I met a guy named Westin from Colorado who has been traveling around europe for the last 11 weeks and has 5 more weeks left. He has been just about everywhere, spending about 2 days in each city he visits. He arrived in Rome yesterday like me and we are going to travel together over to Vatican City in the morning to see the sights. That will be plesant having a traveling companion for a day or two. We'll see how it goes.
Well, that's about it. I'm headed to bed, it's 12pm now and I'll wait until the morning to take a shower (please have warm water!!). And it's realy hard to get stuff into a bag quietly when there are 5 other people in the room, I'll have to prepare earlier tomorrow so I don't disturb everyone sleeping.
What an awesome day, I can't wait to see what tomorrow brings!!!
-END DAY 1-
Click here to see day 2 |
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Dude, what an awesome write up! Thoroughly enjoyed it all; especially the part about meeting the Army soldier in the airport. Cool way to start off your trip. Can\'t wait for hear more. Be safe my friend.
-Brian |
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Posted by MrLiveAlerts (email) @ 12/08/2007 3:53 PM |
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