The Coliseum and other fabulous things

Thursday 19th June 2014

Blog post by the mother

A very warm day in Rome but the sun is shining and there are no thunderstorms - hurrah!  Caught the bus from Trastevere to the Coliseum this morning.  The cobbled roads in Rome make for rather bone rattling bus rides but they sure beat walking in the heat. 
We had another 'wow' moment when the kids first saw the Coliseum up close and personal.  Although to be fair the 'wow' could also have been at the sight of the tour buses lined up and the huge throng of people waiting to get in - at least a one hour wait in the queue.

Fortunately we had pre-booked our tickets online and that meant that we trotted happily to the front of the line and made our way inside. Although there is a lot of restoration work currently taking place the Coliseum is still an amazing place to visit. 

The girls were enthralled by all the gory details of the gladiators and animals that were part of the Coliseum's history.  They were particularly concerned about what happened to the children of the Christian's who were thrown to the lions - were they thrown to the lions too?  Our explanation that the children probably went to work as slaves was not met with any great sense of belief.  In order to set their own minds at rest the girls came up with a great scenario where the children would all hide in the cages meant for the beasts and then jump out and surprise the gladiators and the emperor. 
After spending quite a while in the Coliseum we went across to the Palatine Hill to visit the Forum.  On the way we spotted a Roman maiden who clearly is not enthralled with her job - or perhaps just had a late night?

Would you believe it?!  When we got across to the Forum there was a tiny sign taped to the closed gates - "Closed for the strike".  We walked up to the church at the top of the hill and in the end decided that enough was enough and headed home for a late afternoon siesta.  We had dinner at home and then went out to wander the Trastevere neighbourhood in the evening. 
Our local church 'St Maria de Trastevere' is one of the oldest churches in Rome. It is rather unassuming from the outside but on the inside is incredibly beautiful with gold mosaics from the 12th century.  Apparently Papa Francesco has been known to celebrate mass in the church - sadly not while we were there.

Part of our wandering also took us in search of a couple of local English language bookshops.  One had bargains and the other had a delightful English owner who gave us tips on which restaurants to avoid and also gave Mr 14 a discount off the book he purchased.