April 9- Rome

     I had been waiting for this day for an extremely long time! I had been planning out my European vacation for months, and it was finally here. Tara graciously drove us to the airport. We had a Starbucks drink, of course, before Emily and I went on through security. It was hard to say goodbye to Tara also because I don’t know when the next time I will see her will be, but I know without a doubt that I will see her again soon. She is also planning on playing volleyball again next season, but she doesn’t know where yet. I am certain that we will see each other again during the next volleyball season. It would be awesome if we were really close by each other again like this year.

     Our first stop on the trip was Rome, Italy. We had no issues with our flight, but we did have a little difficulty getting to our hotel. We had to take a bus from the airport to the main train station in Rome. Next, we had to take a train from that station to the closest station to our hotel. The directions ended with saying that the hotel was right at the top of a specific exit. We learned later on that we did not take the correct exit! We came up on the opposite side of the street. We found some street numbers and starting walking in the “right” direction. After walking three long blocks, I realized that all of the numbers were odd so we needed to cross the street to the even side. When we crossed the street, we learned that those numbers were not in alignment with the odd side. We ended up having to walk the three long blocks back to exactly where we came from, just on the other side of the street. Our hotel was right there.

     We checked in to our room, but we still had about 4 hours until my parents would arrive. We ate some pizza at the restaurant right next to our hotel before going for a walk. We knew that our hotel was very close to the Vatican City, but we didn’t realize how close. Emily and I had walked about four blocks when we saw some rather large pillars. We decided to just go and look to see what was on the other side before we headed back to the hotel. As it turned out, we walked right into the heart of the Vatican City! We were in the large square with St. Peter’s Basilica right in front of us. We found it on complete accident, but it was so awesome. We took some pictures and headed back to the hotel to take a little nap before my parents would arrive.

      It took Emily and I about 2 hours to get from the airport to our hotel so I figured it would be about the same for my parents. I set my alarm to wake up when I estimated that they would arrive. Emily continued to sleep when the alarm went off so I went outside by myself. I just stood on the street by myself looking at the exits from the metro. I waited for 9 minutes before I decided to go wake up Emily to keep me company while I watched for my parents. I had just pressed the buzzer to go back upstairs when for some reason that I don’t know besides just God turning my head, I looked back one more time. There standing at the top of the metro exit were my mom and dad. Thank goodness the green walking man was on because I ran straight across the street! I really can’t begin to explain how happy I was to see them. I had not seen them in 7 months. I don’t know if I have really ever experienced so much joy before as I did in that moment.

      We dropped off their bags in our room before going out for a walk and dinner. Our hotel owner/receptionist was a little tiny old man. He was really really old! He was very nice though and drew out a walking path on a map for me. The location of our hotel was perfect. We were able to see all of the big sights with a 10-minute walk or less between each sight (except for the Coliseum which is away from everything else). If anyone is planning a trip to Rome, I would highly recommend our hotel for a great location. We started walking the path, but we didn’t get too far before stopping for dinner. We all had pasta and pizza for dinner along with some wine. I went with the basic but classic spaghetti. When in Rome!