My Last Day in Rome (10-26)

This is my second post of the day, so if this is the first time you've checked back in a bit, then be sure to read up on my Siena post before proceeding to this one.

So, I have no pictures of my last day in Rome, but some to talk about. On the 25th when I got back from Siena, I had a lot of my classmates over to my apartment for a little Halloween get-together. A good time was had by all, and nothing in the apartment was broken or damaged, which is always a great way to end a successful rental. After the party at my place, we went out on the town for a little while, hitting Joe Rivetto's, the cafe/bar directly underneath where my classmates live. Joe Rivetto is an Italian fashion company that is very Americanized on purpose... that's the best i can explain it. A spinoff of this company was the opening of a bar in Campo de Fiori, which is a big American tourist spot within Rome... fitting. Anyway, the staff is very nice, and they are ALL friends with Amy at this point, so it made it a logical hangout for me during my time in Rome.

On the 26th, my FINAL full day in Rome, I woke up fairly early after a late night, and proceeded to packing. I had several eggs and a few other goodies in my refrigerator that needed polishing off, so I had a 7-egg breakfast along with 3 yogurts and a liter or so of iced tea... haste shalln't make waste here. Packing took a while, as I had to get everything I owned back into my two bags. Then I had to lug every bag (carry-on or not), over to the Campo De Fiori apartment, so I could store it there while I was away on my multitude of trips. It took 3 trips back and forth, and was not my favorite thing in the world, but at least it wasn't raining like when I first moved the stuff into my Via Giulia apartment.

After packing, moving out, and checking out was done, I joined the students in their apartment for lunch (as they had just gotten back from class), and then I was off for my day. First I went to a very local church called Sant'Andrea Della Valle. It is extremely close to Campo De Fiori, located right on Corso Vittorio Emmanuelle II, and is gigantic and absolutely gorgeous. Aside from St. Peter's and Il Gesu, it's definitely right up there on my favorites list for Italy. I listened to one of the self-guided machines, similar to the one that was "out of work" in Siena, and learned a lot, though also noted that their technology was out of date. I say this because the "visual" portion of my audio-visual tour was in the form of rear-projected slides... very 1970's!

After Sant'Andrea, I headed over to the Trevi Fountain, because dammit, I was going to throw those coins into that fountain. And, after admiring that fountain for a few minutes, I threw my THREE coins into the fountain, just like the movie and song say to do. I learned just yesterday actually, that around the time I was at the fountain that day (though not when I was there), someone poured a red dye into the water to raise some awareness on some issue they were hung up on, and apparently the fountain was blood-red for a good half-day and was spewing red water from all of its fountain-shooters... probably would have been interesting to see.

The last thing I did on the 26th, before collecting Amy and grabbing a bite to eat before our flight to Catania, Sicily, was to go into one of the mall-like shopping centers on Via Corso in Rome. I found a Joe Rivetto zip-up lightweight sweater at 20% off, so I picked it up, and I think it was a good purchase. I like it, Amy likes it, I guess that's all I can ask for... oh yeah, and it's comfy.

So that was my last day in Rome. Sure, I head back there for 5 hours or so on Tuesday, but for the sake of getting closure, that was the "last." I'll talk about the flight and the time in Sicily on the 26th during that blog entry. For now, I'm off to bed in my Bristol hotel. Like I said, I'll try to gradually catch up on these blogs, but I have a feeling I won't get fully caught up til after I'm home. Though you have my word, the entire blog will be warped up PROMPTLY after I get home at the latest. For now, churn your brain over what I've written tonight. Ciao, or as the British say, "good-bye" (I like that one).