No love from Rome

Greetings from Italy. I wish I could tell you that Rome is absolutely wonderful... we have had a really tough time here. We arrived around 11:00 Saturday night on a really old and junky train and due to a miscommunication within our group, Jolie booked the wrong nights at the hostel and we ended up having to stay at this really horrible place. Even though we had made a reservation, when we arrived, they didn't have enough beds for us and asked if we would share a twin bed. Um, no, we won't. So this guy goes and gets pieces of bunk beds from the basement and starts to assemble them in a room with 12 other people already in it. We reluctantly paid (although I really wanted to go to a hotel) and I "slept" in my clothes with my shoulder bag on top of me. Half the people in the room were snoring loudly so there wasn't much sleep to be had. The icing on the cake was that there was one disgusting shower and one toilet (with no toilet seat) for the 50-odd people staying at this horrible place. I bypassed the shower (which is a big deal for me) and wore the same clothes I'd worn the day before and all night. We left without saying a word to the people who run the place. Fortunately the place we are staying now is much better but it was not a very good introduction to Italy.

We have seen a lot of stuff in the last three days, the highlights have been tossing coins into the Trevi Fountain, waiting in line on the Piazza St. Pietro to get into St. Peter's for 2.5 hours in the sun, seeing the Sistine Chapel, eating gelato on the Piazza Navona, and wandering around the Colosseum. With the exception of my €20 dinner last night, the food has been unimpressive, it is extremely crowded (it doesn't help that we are here for Liberazione Day) and it has been very hot here. We are really hoping that things will go better for us in Florence; I am sure that under ordinary conditions, Rome is a fantastic place but it's just one of those places that I am ready to leave and try again some other time.

More from Florence in a few days!