Civitavecchia!

Yesterday morning we woke up again to watch the sunrise over the city as we were sailing in.  It was, once again, breathtaking.  The sun came up over the misty mountains of Civitavecchia.  Then we all went back to bed for an hour or two.  I ended up going to Tarquinia with a girl name Maria, who I hung out with a little in Spain.  We walked around Civitavecchia for a few hours and found a huge open air market.  It was a lot of fun.  Finally we decided to go to the bus stop which wasn’t really a bus station, but rather, a bus stop.  We couldn’t figure out if this was the place we were supposed to be or not.  We also couldn’t figure out if we were supposed to get tickets before.  We walked up to a woman who was speaking English nearby to ask her if this was where we wanted to be.  She quickly told us that she was from Australia, but she wanted to help us anyway.  She brought us up to the bus stop and asked everyone there.  One woman originally from Nigeria answered her and the Australian woman asked if she could help us.  She said she would take us to Tarquinia.  While we were getting on the bus she asked us if we had our tickets.  When we told her we didn’t have any, she said it was ok this time.  We didn’t understand what this meant, so we got on the bus, assuming we would pay when we got on.  On the way there she explained to us that she was living in Rome and didn’t have a job.  She had been living there for six months.

 

When we got off the bus we realized that we just got a free ride since the bus driver never noticed we didn’t have tickets.  Tarquinia was beautiful.  It’s a little town on a hill (not quite as steep as Assisi, but similar).  When we got there we found another outdoor market.  There was a lot of really neat things there that I wanted, but I didn’t end up buying anything.  I did end up helping Maria buy some shoes since she doesn’t know any Italian.  The man she was buying from would tell me something about the shoes and I would relay it to her.  Luckily he wasn’t using too many complicated words and he spoke slowly for me.

 

For the entire day we wandered around this town feeling completely relaxed.  We sat for a while, we ate some gelato, had some really grose microwave lunch (we missed lunch time, so went to the only place open) and we shopped a little.  We ended up going to an awesome museum filled with sarcophaguses and things that would have been buried with people.  It was really interesting.  Some of the sarcophaguses still had some of their original paint on them and most had elaborate designs and people lying on the lid (not real, obviously, but statues).  The museum was inside of a palace, too so that was an extra bonus.

 

So, for the rest of the day we relaxed some more and explored the back roads.  Dinner was really good.  We found a small place that sold pizza and I got some with thinly sliced ham and Maria had the same, but with some asparagus.  Afterwards we sat in the shade and talked some more and then headed to the bus (after buying out ticket, of course).

 

Last night I came back and took a much needed shower and Maria and I tried to figure out what each of us wanted to do in Rome the next day (we were going on different trips to Rome and were going to figure out if we were going to meet up at all).  We decided it would be too difficult to meet up though, and instead helped each other figure out what we wanted to do.

 

This morning I woke up and went to breakfast and ate a nice long meal…at 8:20am I decided to look at what time I was leaving for Rome (I was under the impression that it was at 9:30, but I wanted to check) and I found out that we left at 8:30.  I quickly jumped up, shoved a croissant in my bag, ran to my room, grabbed my stuff and ran to the bus.  I got there just in time (if we had left on time).  Anyway, my one goal for Rome was to go to the Sistine Chapel, however when I talked to our guide (she was just there to give us suggestions and then leave us when we got to Rome) she told me that it would take me the entire day to get inside.  I decided that maybe I should just wait until I can come back to Rome on my own and spend a few days in the area.  So, when we got there, I joined three other people who were traveling together and went around first to the Pantheon which was very crowded, but really cool and then to the Trevi fountain.  We had been told by our tour guide how to throw coins into the fountain and what they meant.  One coin means you want to come back to Rome, two means you want to get married and three means you want a divorce.  Then you take the coin (or coins) in your right hand and throw it over your left shoulder.  We all threw one coin and took pictures then headed off to look for lunch.

 

Lunch was really good.  We had some pizzas at a little restaurant.  Afterwards, I did not want to go to the same places they were, so me and the guy with us went wandering around.  Our eventual goal was to go to the Piazza dei Fiori which I had read about in my travel book.  It’s a big open air market that apparently is really pretty and everything.  We slowly got there walking past some beautiful monuments and going into a few shops.  When we got to the Piazza, it was closing, so we walked around those that were still open then continued on our walk.  We had about 1 hour and 45 minutes to get back to the bus, so we decided it would be best to start to figure out where we were and how to get back.  We ended up just walking back along the river, stopping to get some gelato and finding our way slowly back to the bus.  I slept all the way back on the bus and when I got off I was so tired that I decided not to go out again.  I took a nice long shower and talked with my roommate a bit.  We went up to the top deck to eat some food because we were too tired to go out.  Now we’re watching Twilight…I know, I said I’d never see it again, but they were watching it in my room and I couldn’t resist a movie tonight.

 

Tomorrow I’m going to Orvieto all day, then tomorrow night we sail to Naples where we will stay for 2 days.  I am very excited.  It’s almost over now and I still need to send emails, so I’m going to go now.  Have a great night and day tomorrow!