Rome, Italy

April 22, 2025

Overnight we moved from Naples to Civitavacchia, which is the port City for Rome. Rome is the Capital of Italy with nearly 3. 8 million citizens.

We had an early morning to catch our bus to take us to the City of Rome for an all day trip. We left the ship at 7:30 this morning. The bus ride to Rome was roughly 1.5 hours. Our first stop would be at the Vatican. Our meeting with the Pope was cancelled, because he died yesterday. JD Vance beat us to it. So we visited the Vatican without Pope . There was a long line up to get into Saint Peter’s Basilica. We decided not to wait for that, but instead take a look around the area.There was a lot of Police around and the Press was busy setting up for the upcoming funeral. I noticed tv crews from all over the world. I wonder how they got there that quick. By the time we were ready to leave, the crowds started coming in steady. After our Vatican City the bus took us to our lunch spot, a restaurant along the Tigre River. Our lunch was not spectacular.(the tiramisu was slightly frozen). After our lunch we got on the bus for a short ride to the City center for a 2.5 hr walking tour. When we got off the bus, there were a lot of people in the streets. We stopped at the Trevi Fountain, The Forum, The Colosseum and the Basilica of Maxentius. All this time we were steady dodging crowd of tourists. We had to be on the look out for pickpockets all the time. There are over 900 churches in Rome, that will take years to visit them all. After our walking tour our feet were getting pretty tired. We were a happy bunch  when we sighted the bus coming down the street to pick us up. On the way out of the City we saw a bunch more historical buildings. A person can easily spend days to take in the history in this City. During our ride back we were fighting to keep our eyes open. Around 6:15 we arrived back on the ship. We were surprised to find that the crew had prepared a fantastic Italian dinner. This time the tiremasu was not frozen.

This was a fantastic day in Rome. I suggest re-reading your history books from high school before you plan to visit.

Cheers

Cor and Carol