This morning, our plane landed in Rome after around 10 hours. I was so excited to have finally made it to Rome after a day of travel; though, once again, day one and day two seem like one continuous day to me.

After collecting our luggage and using an ATM to trade dollars for euros, we made our way to the train that would take us to the city center terminal. The train ride was about a half hour, and I used the time to catch up on some much needed sleep.
After this, we boarded the metro, which is basically the same as the subways in New York City. As a matter of fact, this whole day, the city has reminded me of NYC. After getting off the subway, we arrived at our hotel to check our bags.
After this, we started off towards the Pantheon for our first self-guided tour in the city. On the way, we ate lunch at a great place called Pepy’s Bar. We also passed by the Trevi Fountain on the way to the Pantheon, which was so gorgeous! The pictures I saw online do not do it justice.
We arrived at the Pantheon, which is a giant cylindrical building first built around 2,000 years ago in dedication to the Roman gods. Later, though, the Catholic Church claimed it and now uses it to honor Mary and others. It was absolutely stunning, especially seeing as how it had been around for 2,000 years. My personal favorite thing about it was that I discovered that composer Arcangelo Corelli was buried in the Pantheon. Having been featured in school orchestra playing cello in a piece by Corelli, I found this incredibly cool! Other notable figures were buried in the Pantheon as well. Among these were the famous painter, Raphael, and two kings of Italy.
After this, we headed back to our hotel to refuel on energy. At this point, we’d all been out and about for over 24 hours with very little sleep, so we all took naps before dinner since in Rome, people eat dinner much later than Americans, usually starting around 8:00 at night.
After resting at the hotel, we went to dinner at a nearby ristorante, and it was absolutely delicious! My favorite part was the focaccia bread served with ham that we had. After this, we decided to make the 20 minute walk from our hotel to see the Coliseum, which is one of the places we’ll be touring tomorrow. It was so crazy to see it in real life; I couldn’t seem to convince my brain that it really was THE Coliseum. We ended the day with some delicious gelato right down the street from our hotel. All in all, while incredibly tiring, it was a great first day! Tomorrow, we have tickets to tour the Vatican, the Coliseum, and several other crazy architectural wonders along the way. I’m so excited for this!
