Adventures in Rome

Today, we arrived in Civitavecchia (pronounced Chiv-it-a-vech-ia), and our plans today involved getting to and from Italy’s capital city, Rome.

The port of Civitavecchia is huge, and transit from ship to port gate is by shuttle bus; as far as we can tell, that goes for all ships – they don’t want pedestrians wandering around by themselves, getting into trouble.

Once we’d disembarked the shuttle bus, we fought our way through the gauntlet of taxi and minibus drivers, all offering us a lift into Rome for a ‘competitive’ rate, and proceeded to cross town to the railway station on foot; roughly a 20-minute walk.

At the railway station, we purchased two return tickets for 24 euros (12 euros each), and joined the few passengers waiting on platform 3. Prior research online had told us that trains into the city ran approximately every 20 minutes, and were rarely crowded. Unfortunately, I think we’d just missed a train, and found ourselves having to wait 45 minutes before the next one came along. By the time it arrived, there was barely standing room on the platform with more folks piling in behind us, and by the time everyone had boarded, the carriages were full to bursting. Luckily, we managed to bag ourselves seats, at least.

The journey to St Pietra station took roughly 40 minutes, with 4 stops along the way. We were a little concerned at how long it had taken us to get here from stepping off the ship; the time was almost a quarter to midday, and we hadn’t yet seen any of the city. Not knowing necessarily where to start, we followed the small throng of people who had just left the train, in the hope that they probably knew where they were going. Ten minutes later, we were approaching St Peter’s Square.

At this point, I should probably say that we hadn’t given any thought to what day it was, and assumed that the queues to pass through the security gates was a perfectly normal thing. On the other side of the security gates, a vast sea of people shimmered before us, and my thought was that the square seemed to be a particularly popular place. Several minutes later, at noon precisely, all eyes turned to a small window high up in one of the Vatican buildings, where a tiny white-robed figure appeared and started to address the crowd. For those who couldn’t see him, huge TV screens dotted around the square provided them with a close-up, and his voice echoed across the square through a booming PA system. Both Tracey and I glanced at each other in mild amazement at our naivety, and timing… of course; Midday every Sunday is when the big man himself addresses the people. These folks were all here to hear the Pope speak to them, and a great cheer went up the moment he appeared.

For the 10 or 15 minutes of the address, the gathered collective stood enraptured and focused on the Pope’s words. I have no idea what he was saying, but the crowd loved it.

When he’d finished, he disappeared back into the room behind him and the window simply became another unremarkable window in what was largely an unremarkable-looking building. As opposed to all the other buildings adjacent to it, which are far from unremarkable. This was our first taste of Rome, and to say that the architecture is spectacular would be a grave understatement.

Our plan had been to head for St Peter’s Basilica, but the moment the address ended, a huge queue immediately started to form to get into the church, so we decided to head elsewhere, and visit it on our way back later.

Loosely following a route of sorts, cobbled together from an online map, and a printed map we picked up from a Tourist Information kiosk, we found ourselves crossing the river and wandering through the grand Piazza Navona, to the Pantheon, where we joined another queue to see inside. From here, we zig-zagged our way through narrow, busy streets (zig-zagging because we kept getting lost and going the wrong way), until we came to the Trevi Fountain.

Once again, we were blown away by just how magnificent everything seems to be in Rome. I’d heard of the Trevi Fountain, but wasn’t quite prepared for just how impressive it actual is. Needless to say, it is also a magnet for every other tourist visiting Rome, and the crowd of people jockeying for position to take photos and snap selfies with the fountain in the background was, not surprisingly, quite immense.

From the Trevi Fountain, we walked towards the Colisseum, pausing along the way to gape in total awe at the towering white Palazza Venezia, Altare della Patria (I have no idea what all that means – I’ve simply copied its title from the map). This massive, awesome building surely typifies the glory of Rome, and I have images from several epic movies in which such a grand edifice might feature, complete with marching centurians and a robed Caesar presiding over the massed people below him.

The Colisseum, of course, needs no introduction, and didn’t disappoint. Should we find ourselves visiting Rome again, we’ll allow ourselves more time to explore the inside of the grand amphitheatre that features on almost every piece of tourist paraphenalia. Adjacent to the Colisseum, the Roman Palatino would also be on our return hit-list; as it was, time was against us, and if we were going to see inside St Peter’s Basilica, then we needed to be legging it back to Vatican City.

When we arrived back at St Peter’s Square, we found ourselves queuing once again, to pass through security that would allow us to enter the Basilica. It occurred to us that, had we gone straight to there after the Pope’s address, we wouldn’t have had to queue for security a second time, since we’d already done so to get into the square.

Hey ho; turning back wasn’t an option, so we joined the queue.

Walking alongside the queue were blokes selling lightweight shawls, pointing out helpfully to any ladies not properly dressed that showing knees or shoulders would be a breach of decency and that they would be refused entry. One such seller pounced upon Tracey who was wearing shorts, and the seed of doubt was duly planted. He really laid it on a bit heavy, saying that she’d be refused entry, and that this being Sunday would be the only opportunity to get in for free, and that it would cost 45 euros on any other day. The problem with all of this was that we know for a fact that the ’45 euros on any other day’ was an out and out porky, and that entry into the Basilica is always free on any day of the week. It also seemed that this particular seller had picked on Tracey, yet hadn’t accosted another lady further up the queue whose skirt was way above her kneecaps. He was originally asking for 5 euros for the scarf, but then came down to 4… either way, that seed of doubt had been cleverly planted, and we handed over 4 euros, on the basis that it would indeed be unfortunate to successfully get through security and right up to the entrance, only to be turned away because of being improperly dressed.

As it was… she was never asked. A clever bit of psychology had parted us from 4 euros. The moral of which is; always carry a light scarf/shawl in the rucksack for such occasions (which Tracey actually has, but didn’t have one us this time around).

The inside of St Peter’s Basilica is difficult to describe. The words ‘Spectacular’ and ‘Awesome’ go some way to conveying the experience, but I would say that one simply has to experience it oneself to properly appreciate its utter grandness, and spiritual magnificence. We spent a good 45 minutes or so inside, and could easily have spent longer if it wasn’t for the fact that we needed to think about catching a train back to Civitavecchia.

We didn’t have to wait quite so long for our return train (about 20 minutes), and was back in Civitavecchia by 7:20pm. The march across town, back to the port gate to catch the shuttle, took us approximately 20 minutes, and then had to wait about 10 minutes before the shuttle would ferry us back to the ship. This all felt like we were cutting things fine for getting into the bistro for dinner before it closed at 8:30. As it turned out, we needn’t have worried; it stayed open until 9pm.

It’s been a big, long day, then, but we’ve enjoyed every minute of it. Rome has instantly shot into our list of top favourite world city destinations, along with Istanbul and Athens. I look forward to, hopefully, returning one day.