Arrivederci Roma!

Arrivederci Roma, It's time for us to part... sorry, I was channeling Dean 
Martin there for a minute! Oh Roma, you wild and crazy city. As my coin in the 
Trevi Fountain promises, I will return. So I took the fast train from Florence 
to Rome this morning and got here about 9:15 AM. It felt so much like home when 
I arrived. I know the layout of the train station, I saw the same guy selling 
souvenirs on my hotel's street, I was even greeted with a nice Buon Giorno from 
the man at the front desk who remembered me. Once you stay in Rome for a few 
days, it does get comfortable and you feel confident knowing where you're going. 
So my room was ready so I dropped off my stuff and went over to the National 
Museum of Rome. Not many people go to this but it has some great Roman art and 
Greek statues. I included a picture of the famous discus thrower. Just amazing 
the detail on these sculptures. 
 
I then headed up to see what was probably the creepiest thing I saw this whole 
trip, even creepier than the Catacombs. And that was the Cappuccin Crypt. I 
included a picture but I must warn you, it may give you nightmares! The whole 
place was made out of bones of the dead monks. Even the light fixtures!! You 
just couldn't help leaving the place humming... the foot bones connected to the 
knee bone... etc...  🙂 
 
I had reservations at the Borghese Gallery at 5:00 but it's tucked away in this 
beautiful park that I decided I'd get a little more bike riding in and rented a 
bike and took a spin around the Borghese Gardens. It's really not a garden but 
more like a Central Park but just on a smaller scale. It's actually sort of like 
a little piece of Lucca in the middle of hectic Rome. I included a picture of 
one of the tree lined streets where many people were riding bikes and there's no 
cars so it's really peaceful. I the went to the Gallery. It was a Cardinal's 
mansion that he stuffed with all this beautiful art and sculptures. I included a 
picture of the building which was really nice. They only allow so many people in 
and you have to make a reservation weeks in advance and you're only allowed to 
be in the gallery for 2 hours. They had a really good audio guide that described 
lots of the paintings and gave a lot of the history. I included a picture of 
Bernini's sculpture of Apollo chasing Daphne. The story of that one is that 
right when Apollo caught Daphne, she called out to her Father for help and he 
turned her into a tree so Apollo couldn't have her. Bummer! If you look closely, 
you may be able to see the leaves and branches around Daphne as well as her skin 
starting to turn to bark. Very cool stuff. 
 
Well, I've had a great trip and still need to make my way back across the pond 
tomorrow. I'll write one final email tomorrow and get all philosophical on 
you... I know you all look forward to that... or is that the one that you auto 
delete! LOL. Hope everyone's having a good Wednesday. Go Trivia team!!