Ciao Roma!

Our third day marked the end of our Roman excursion, but we couldn't leave without visiting a few more sites. Namely, the Roman Forum and the Colloseum. 

Tim and I have different ideas about how to pose in front of the Colloseum...

We had pre-signed up for second tour through Epic Roman Tours, a decision we do NOT regret! Again, our group was only 6 people and
It.Was.AWESOME.

This is the entire group on the way to our first stop, the Roman Forum, the heart of our tour. Here, our guide is explaining how the Roman empire expanded throughout the ages.

 After an unexpected (according to our guide) wait to get into the Forum, here's the central area...

 And this is the "newest" part, the Temple of the Vestal Virgins. I say "new," because it's only been open to the public for a relatively short amount of time.

We also learned the history of the Arch of Titus, which celebrates a, quite horrific period of time in Jewish history. I found two very surprising tidbits about the arch: 1) The Arc de Triomphe in Paris is based on this design and 2) This is one of the first pictures of a minorah and is the model for the menorah used on the emblem of Israel.

 Our next stop was the Colloseum, but the line to get in was around 1-2 hours. Fact: The ticket to the Roman Forum also gets you into the Colloseum. We didn't wait at all! Most people just go to the Colloseum first, whereas the Forum usually has no line.  And that is why a guide is important.

 Of course it wouldn't be a tourist attraction without dressed up characters...

 We spent about 45 minutes in the hot Colloseum before heading to the nearest Open110 stop to get dropped off closer to our next stop.

 Which was the Piazza Navona...

 and the Pantheon...

 By this the time we finished there, we had just enough time to run to the nearest Open110 stop and head back to the train station for our ride to Florence. Unfortunately we got the slowest-driver-EVER for the drive back.

Our train to Florence was pleasant and Tim managed to sleep for 80% of the ride, a trend that would continue for the rest of the trip. Once we got to Florence, we were off to find our hotel.

We wandered through the streets until we saw this sign...

Yep, this was the only sign for our hotel! We even had to be buzzed into the building every time we came back! Here's the first lobby...

 The entire hotel was actually located on the 1st floor (in Europe, the floor numbers start with 0, so what we call the 2nd floor is really the 1st floor), so after lugging our bags up the stairs (Tim's idea, not mine!), we were able to check in. I'm not sure why, but we got a pretty amazing room. It included a four poster bed and this beauty:

 Why, yes, that is a frescoed ceiling!

Of course, we had to hit the ground running, so we found the local bus tour and got ourselves some tickets. Somehow we managed to time it perfectly for a tour up into the Tuscan hills above Florence, to a town called Fiesole.

 On our way back down, we got off at Michelangelo Plaza to watch the sunset over the city...

It was a great way to relax and end the evening...or so we thought!

After dinner and getting back to the hotel, I jumped online to check opening times for the museums in the morning. I googled the main pages for the Uffizi galleries and discovered that, that night was the "Night at the Museums!" All of the major galleries were open until 1am and were FREE! It was 11:00 and Tim was practically asleep, but I dragged him out of bed and we booked it down to the Accademia to see David without (hopefully) hordes of tourists.  Well, we hit the jackpot! Not only did we get in free, but there was probably less than 100 people in the entire museum. If Tim hadn't been falling asleep standing up, I would have gone over to the Uffizi as well!