Hi everyone,

Wow, what a busy day!! Have spent the day travelling around half of Rome and have already seen so much, but there is still plenty more to see over the next 3 days. Began by leaving my accommodation on Piazza Vittoria Emannuelle II and walking towards the Colosseum and Forum Romano-my plan wasn?t to visit these properly today, but my accommodation is only 5 minutes walk from the Colosseum and i will pass it every time i go into the city! So i saw the Colosseum from the outside for the first time and also walked past the ruins of the Foro Romano, which was where the Roman Empire was effectively run from during ancient times. From there i went to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier (i think every single country seems to have one of these), which was the most impressive of the ones that i have seen yet. The monument was originally created in honour of Vittoria Emannuelle II, but has now been appropriated for the tomb purpose.

From there i continued on to the Pantheon, which was constructed approximately 2000 years ago and is still effectively in perfect working condition, which makes it the best preserved building of that time. I was lucky enough after this to stumble upon Piazza Navona, which is a large open area near the Pantheon that is where a number of different local painters ply their trade. They are obviously all very talented, but because they are trying to each differentiate themselves from their competition for the tourist dollar, there is quite a lot of variance as to the portraits you can see. After a quick stop there it was on to the Trevi fountain (completed 1762) one of Rome?s best known sites, and certainly the best known of the cities many fountains. Once i had worked through the crowd at Trevi, i headed north to the Spanish Steps, which were actually once of the less satisfying aspects of the day...they are supposed to be quite famous and quit iconographic but they are really just a set of steps and nothing else-however i was comparing them to Sacre Couer at Montmartre, and they are nothing compared to Montmartre at all.

By that stage it was getting quite dark, so i decided to head back across the city toward my accommodation (Rome, with all its narrow streets is not the city to be wandering about in after dark, as (a) it is like amaze, so if you cant read the street signs and will surely get lost and (b) when you do wander off down the wrong narrow alleyway there is a high likelihood you will get mugged). At the same time I wanted to wait until it was late enough to see the Fora Romano at sunset and the Colosseum at dark. This was definitely worth it, as they are both quite something else during those periods of the day.

Well, i better go rest up, because tomorrow i plan to walk through the inside of the Colosseum and the Foro Romano, as well as hopefully visit the Musei Capotolini which is close by. I will write about those tomorrow hopefully!