Sunday August 10th 2014
Today is our full day in Rome. The plan was to see as much of the must see Roman sites as possible & also make it to sacrament meeting.
The closest sacrament was at 11:20 and would take about 45 minutes to get there. So we decided we could get out of the apartment by 9 and have time to see The Colosseum. Wow, that was one of the coolest things I have ever seen!
Just our luck one of the first views we saw of it coming out of the metro was a wall of scaffolding. Typical! We keep running into that. Luckily this time it was only one little section, & since it's so huge it really didn't matter.
This thing was absolutely amazing. Anything that is well over 1,000 years old should not be in this good of shape, it blows my mind. It was fun to learn about, plenty of fun facts. Like did you know that the Colosseum could hold 50,000 people?
This shows the underground caverns, passageways & even elevators that were beneath the arena floor. It's uncovered now but originally it would have a massive wooden floor that then had 9 inches of sand on it.
There are over 80 entrances. The entire arena could be emptied in 15 minutes because of those doorways. People would spill out of there so quickly that it was like the Colosseum was vomiting...apparently that is actually where our modern use of the word vomit comes from. Who knew? 
Pieces of pottery with information painted on it were the "tickets" for people to get it. Also it was free charge! They even had there own version of concession stands.
There was graffiti in the Colosseum, but not the kind you're thinking of. Spectators & fans would carve names and pictures of their favorite gladiators into the stone like this:
Originally it was all white stone, can you imagine that?!
There was even a giant awning that an army of sailors would put out over the top to shade at least some of the people. It was set up like this:
The whole thing was incredible.
Thousands of gladiators and animals fought here for Roman entertainment. It was an absolute marvel then and now the way it is built. This really opened my eyes to how organized and structured the Roman Empire was.
It was pretty surreal to be at such an iconic landmark, we really enjoyed experiencing the Colosseum.
There were quite a few tourists in the ward, plenty of people using the translator sets like us! It was fun to hear so much Italian. Since I know Spanish I can understand a little bit, but mostly it's just really fun to hear such a beautiful language. The saints have a great, strong and faithful spirit here. There was a convert confirmation in this meeting as well. Pretty amazing story. It's this woman who is from Cairo, where the church is still not established. I'm not sure how she first found out about the church. But she came to Rome for the specific purpose of being taught by the missionaries for ten days and then getting baptized before going back to Cairo. How about that?! The mission president was there and did the confirmation, he actually gave it in English and they had a ward member translating over the pulpit.
Afterward we were able to talk to him (President Waddoup) and some other missionaries. Our cousin Stephanie Marsh is serving in that mission and they said she is doing great! 
The rest of the day was filled with Roman sites. I honestly don't remember a ton of details about a lot of these places, (definitely don't use me as a resource for your history test) but just being there was incredible. Literally in awe all the time.
Vittoriano
The Pantheon though. Whoo-wee that was awesome! Also super acient it was originally built to worship Greek/Roman gods and later on was changed to Christianity. At some points in history it was a "one size fits all" temple where as long as you were paying your taxes you could worship any god you wanted in there. It is surrounded by a big plaza (which those plazas are everywhere and I love them!)
This building felt very majestic, the entire thing is a monument, built in the early 1900's.
We went up top where there is a gorgeous view.
You really are thinking to yourself "is this real life?"
Haha we also had a great view of these people on a Segway tour! I may have been just a little bit jealous
Incredible.
We then wandered our way over to The Pantheon. And when I say wander I mean it, in this area it's like around every corner you are at something awesome. Even just the streets are fun to look at and be on.
See those giant pillars behind us? Those are the original ones, each pillar is all one piece of granite...that is huge! It's also why they have lasted so long.
The most incredible part about the Pantheon is the dome. Wow. 
It is mathematically perfect. 
The whole thing is made of concrete (which did you know the Romans invented concrete and bricks?!) they made the forms/molds for the concrete out of wood. I cannot even imagine that process with so much precision and that it is still so beautiful! 
The only light source is the hole at the top of the dome, which is 30 meters in diameter!
The great painter Raphael is buried here upon his request. Also some of the Italian kings and queens through history. One queen was named Margherita and she is who the famous Margherita pizza is named after. That pizza is also notorious for having the colors of the Italian flag; red for the sauce, white for the cheese and green for the basil leaves.
The Pantheon was one of our favorites, definitely one of the coolest things I have ever seen!
By now we were hungry and ready to get off our feet. We wandered a few blocks and then saw a restaurant we would try out. We were trying to find a restaurant that wasn't next to a major monument so it wouldn't be as expensive...but that's hard when the famous sites are literally just around almost every corner! Anyway we found something kind of out of the way (or so we thought).
Dinner was great, we were tired and needed the break! 
Very yummy meals: 
Believe it or not salad is Russ' and the steak is mine haha we are usually opposite. But we pretty much shared everything.
We quickly stepped into a church that we had eaten right next to, thinking it wouldn't be much to see.
Wrong!
It was the Basilica (tomb) of San Andrea and it was rather extravagant. 
Our necks hurt from looking at this shiny & elaborate ceiling.
The one thing that wasn't so great was this creepy doll....
Hahaha creepy right?! I don't know it's purpose...but I know I don't like it! The outside of San Andrea was also awesome, one of the many churches making the skyline so cool.
With a little more wandering we landed at another great plaza:
Eventually we made our way back towards all the things by the Colosseum and The Roman Forum.
There is another church there with a million steps. I just had to run up them, so I did :)
Felt good to get my blood really pumping and the view was great!
A lot of these next pictures are just amazing structures and/or ruins we saw. A lot of them are a part of The Roman Forum. Which unfortunately to actually go in to the Roman Forum we were a few minutes too late and it closed! Lame. But we still saw most of it from many angles.
Seeing this guy in Rome jut seemed fitting, right?
The Arch of Constantine
We sat down and relaxed by the arch and colosseum just before sunset. What a cool place to be!
These are the ruins of where thy used to chariot races and what not. It was so long! A lot of people would have fit in that stadium.
There are running fountains like this all over the place! You don't turn them on they are just always going. Sometimes the statues they come out of are fun, shooting out of mouths etc. It took us a while to decided that we were ok with drinking it...but so far so good!
For sunset we ended up being at the Basilica de San Paolo. It's not as famous but actually a beautiful building. There is a big park attached to it so we just later in the grass; resting our feet and thinking about how awesome this experience is. We are so happy that we are doing this.
We ended the night back by the Colosseum, which looks awesome at night! .... And of course, a little gelato ;)
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