A Half Day In Rome

 After getting our room key to work, we locked the door, put out the Do Not Disturb tag and tried to sleep a bit. Jet lag is awful and when you've had two large time adjustments within a week it's murderous. We awoke after a couple of hours feeling hungry and decided to take a walk and find something to eat along the way. 

The walk was a bit longer than we should have gone and, while gradual, we were walking downhill. We ended up at the Trevi Fountain and took a couple of pictures. We weren't up to elbowing through the crowd to toss a coin over our heads We'd done that before and sure enough, here we were back again. It must work. 

On a side street, we paused to look at a menu at a pizza/pasta sidewalk cafe. It was just long enough to feel a gentle pressure on the elbow and have a chair pulled out for us. All good. We ended up sitting between two American couples, one touring on their own and another with a large tour group. It was enjoyable conversation and hopefully ours made sense.

Real Italian pizza. Strangely, it tastes
a lot like American.

The temperature was rising. The sun was shining brightly and we were wearing down the longer we walked. We thought we would make it to the Colosseum but thought better of it. We glimpsed it down the street as we turned away to head for our hotel. 

As we walked, it felt like we had walked uphill both ways. At least it wasn't snowing but it was hot. A stop for water helped some but my legs were feeling like the water I'd drank and I was close to saying, "Call a cab before we have to call an ambulance." We made it though, stopping several times to rest and collapsed into bed again. 

Another hour of sleep and we were up to shower and find food again, not because we were hungry but because we needed to start to get on the right schedule for the time zone. We walked around the block and found the sweetest sidewalk restaurant. Cloths covered the tables, twinkling lights were strung through the bushes that hid the street mostly from view and the service was wonderful.

After a light dinner of salads, a bowl of tortellini in broth for me and a small plate of spaghetti Bolognese for Bob, we walked to the train station to get come gelato (for Bob). The train station is like a huge two floor mall with platforms for trains and then beneath the basement floor, the metro system. The mall is full of shops and quick places to eat. Bob's gelato was good and I almost wished I had some but I didn't need the stomachache just then.

Unlike Iceland, Italy has McDonald's. What they don't have is brewed McDonald's coffee. When Bob ordered what the kiosk said was American coffee, it turned out to be just Americano made from espresso. 

Back at the hotel, we watched a bit of the CNN channel and found that another UA flight to Rome out of Newark the day before ours had dropped suddenly 28,000 feet in the turbulence. Thank goodness I hadn't seen that before we boarded ours. 

Sleep came quickly once the lights were out. Buono Notte, Roma.