Art, Faith & Fashion Trip - Rome

This is the fourth post of the series.  Rome - the city which has existed for more than two-and-a-half millennia.

We were to cover as much as possible in a single day. After the debacle of the previous day which almost jeopardized the whole day’s plan we were extra cautious and set out early for Vatican City. We took the shuttle operated by Camping Village Roma to Vatican City. We reached Vatican City museum entrance well in time. We had booked guided tour named “Vatican Museums and Saint Peter's Basilica - Art & Faith (duration of the tour was 3 hours)”. Click here to know more about the tour also book tickets online. The tour follows an itinerary which includes: the Pio Clementino Museum (classical antiquity), Museo Chiaramonti, the Gallery of the Candelabras, the Gallery of the Tapestries and the Gallery of the Geographical Maps (Renaissance Art), the Raphael Rooms, the Sistine Chapel and St. Peter's Basilica. For next three hours the guide fed us with a humungous amount of information. She sprinkled the tour interesting anecdotes. Let me share those stories with you in form of images captured by us.

Our friendly tour guide setting expectation for the tour.

Bottom panel of Giotto di Bondone Stefaneschi Triptych

Painting by Raphael - Oddi Altarpiece

Painting by Raphael – Transfiguration

One of the beautiful tapestries from the hall of tapestries

Painting by Leonardo da Vinci - St. Jerome in Wilderness

Painting by Caravaggio titled Entombment

Photo of the Pine cone (Fontana della Pigna) at Vatican courtyard.

One of a pair of Lions of Nectanebo (Egyptian Lions)

On the way to Museo Pio Clementino

Apollo Belvedere

Laocoon

The famous Belvedere Torso

Head of Jupiter

The discus thrower

The Gallery of Maps

Map of Italy

The Holy Door @ St. Peter’s Basilica

This is the door that is only opened for holy years it’s called, appropriately, the Holy Door. They're only opened in certain years “Jubilee years” and people who pass through them receive a plenary indulgence. We had entered the final phase of the tour that is we entered the St. Peter’s Basilica.

St. Peter's Square from St. Peter's Basilica entrance

Inside of St. Peter's Basilica

Painting in stone inside St. Peter's Basilica

St. Peter's Basilica from St. Peter's Square

With the tour of St. Peter’s Basilica, the Vatican Museums and Saint Peter's Basilica - Art & Faith Tour came to an end. We thanked our guide and exited St. Peter’s Square after taking pictures of course. All that walking and no breakfast had made us very hungry and we had decided that this was our only chance to have Italian in Italy. Till then we were mostly sticking to Indian or American. After scouting for decent nearby places we zeroed in on to Guily’s Café. It looked like a nice little place which served usual Italian fare like pastas, pizzas, omelette, bruschette, salads etc. We ordered Pizza and taste was nothing to write about but we devoured it as we were really very hungry.

After filling our stomach we headed for our next destination the Colosseum. To reach Colosseum from Vatican we took metro from stop Ottaviano-S. Pietro we got into line A (ANAGNINA) for 6 stops and got off at Termini and from Termini we took line B (LAURENTINA) to 2 stops and got off at Coloseo stop.

We had already booked tickets for entry into Colosseum (Flavian Amphitheatre). I would recommend to book entry tickets beforehand to avoid long queues. You can click here to book entry tickets online. Pictures of Colosseum would be a better way to talk about the monument.

The Arena

The raked areas that once held seating

Panoramic view of Colosseum with view of hypogeum

Outside view of Colosseum

Arch of Constantine

The Arch of Constantine is a triumphal arch situated between the Colosseum and the Palatine Hill.

A view of Palantine Hill from Colosseum

The plan was to see Colosseum, Palantine Hill and Roman Forum then walk to Piazza Navona, Pantheon, Trevi Fountain and Spanish Steps but we were running out of time and there were many more places to cover before we could call it a day. We decided to skip Palantine Hill, Roman Forum and Spanish Steps. And cover Piazza Navona, Pantheon, Trevi Fountain. The easiest way we found was to take the metro line B from Coloseo stop towards REBIBBIA for 2 stops got off at TERMINI and switched to metro line A towards BATITSTINI for 2 stops and got down at BARBERINI stop.

From BARBERINI station we walked to Trevi Fountain. But as luck would have had it was under renovation at that time. Please look for yourselves.

We were a bit disappointed but could not cry over it. We still had a number of places to cover before the day ended. We took the Trevi Fountain To Piazza Navona via The Pantheon walking route. The walk was basically through narrow alleys of cobbled stone streets following the directions for Pantheon.. As there was no traffic the walk was quite pleasant one.

The Pantheon and the Fontana del Pantheon was an amazing structure with fountain.

The Pantheon

The dome from inside

Interiors of Pantheon

From Pantheon we followed the directions and reached Piazza Navona. First we went inside the Sant' Agnese in Agose, a church that faces the Piazza from west side. It’s a breath taking structure to which entry is free though photography is not allowed inside. I was quite tired by all the walking and running. Like Milan here too I found one nice bench and settled down there and did my favorite activity ‘people watching’. The Piazza was teeming with tourists from across the globe. Also there were many street artists selling their art, street performers doing their unique acts. As evening sun started setting we decided to grab a quick dinner and head towards our hotel. Below are few pictures from Piazza Navona.

Sant'Agnese in Agone

Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi (Fountain of the Four Rivers)

Restaurants & Market around Piazza Navona

A Street Theatre Artist @ Piazza Navona

Streets and Alleys of Rome

While walking back from Piazza Navona we strolled around the streets and ended up in front of the Altare della Patria (Altar of the Fatherland) also known as the Monumento Nazionale a Vittorio Emanuele II (National Monument to Victor Emmanuel II). It was a classic example of the belief that while travelling many times its things or places that are not in your itinerary give you most pleasure.

Monumento Nazionale a Vittorio Emanuele II (National Monument to Victor Emmanuel II)

As we were standing in front of Altare della Patria contemplating how did we miss this monument from our itinerary, an elderly couple from India asked us the directions to Trevi fountain. They were visibly dissappionted when we informed them that its closed for repairs. We suggested still they should visit the place once as they have come this far. After dinner at Mac Donalds we headed for Camping Village. Next day we had to take an early morning flight to Paris so while passing by a taxi stand next to BARBERINI metro stop we enquired with the taxi drivers and one of them gave us the number of a Radio Taxi operator. We called and booked ourselves a taxi for Ciampino Airport. A useful article which mentions how to take a taxi in Rome without getting ripped off.

Finally after having refreshing swim at the pool inside the Camping Village we crashed into ours beds cherishing the memories of amazing day that had just concluded.

As the saying goes Rome was not built in a day. So naturally a day to see everything in Rome is also not enough. Like most of this trip we crammed as many places to see as we could into this one day we had at Rome. Though we had to skip some places but we ended up getting to see some place not in our original itinerary making the trip bit more memorable..

Our Walking route map

Rome Part 1 from Dhiman on Vimeo.

This is the first part of the video of our trip to Rome on 30-Jun-14. This part basically covers the Vatican Museums and Saint Peter's Basilica - Art & Faith tour.

Rome Part 2 from Dhiman on Vimeo.

This is the second part of videos of our trip to Rome on 30-Jun-2014. It covers the Colosseum.

Rome Part 3 from Dhiman on Vimeo.

This is the third and final part of our trip to Rome, Italy on 30-Jun-14. This video covers Pantheon, Piazza Navona etc.

Some useful links:
Information & maps related Rome metro : http://www.rometoolkit.com/transport/rome_metro.htm
Information about what to do in Rome : http://www.rometoolkit.com/mnu/rome_whattodo.htm
Rome tourism’s official ‘Not to be missed’ Itinerary: http://www.turismoroma.it/itinerari/da_non_perdere?lang=en

Art, Faith & Fashion Trip – Paris

This is the fifth and final post of the series. Paris – City of Romance, Fashion, Art and illustrious history.

We started early morning as planned and reached Rome’s Ciampino Airport well in advance of departure time. We took Ryan Air flight FR9631 at 6.35 AM which reached Paris Beauvais airport at 8.45 AM. On landing the first thing we noticed was the weather. The sky was overcast with strong winds blowing and the forecast was of rains. But that could hardly dampen our spirits. From the airport we took a shuttle to Paris’s Porte Malliot . You can view the timetable of shuttle from here.  We were to reach 13 Rue Auber for L’ Open Tour (Hop on Hop off tour of Paris). We almost lost our way inside the maze of Paris metro and RER trains. We could reach our destination with help from some kind hearted Parisians. We had six hours approximately to see Paris so we felt the best way make most of it is pre-book the one day Hop on Hop off tour and try to see most of Paris. The L’ Open Tour has four tour routes which covers the entire Paris. The routes are:

1. The longest tour, the Paris Grand Tour lasts 2 hours 15 minutes and shuttles visitors around many of the city's most popular sites, including the Louvre Museum, Eiffel Tower, and the Arc de Triomphe.
2. The Montparnasse tour lasts about an hour and covers some of the left bank's most storied places, including the Latin Quarter, Montparnasse and the Invalides.
3. The Montmartre Tour lasts a little over an hour and gives visitors a good overview of the edgier, more modern right bank, with notable stops at the Sacre Coeur basilica, the Moulin Rouge cabaret, the Saint-Martin canal area and classic Paris department stores (Grands Magasins).
4. The Bastille tour lasts around an hour and gives a good glimpse of Paris' dynamic center and Seine-side attractions, including the Centre Pompidou, the trendy Marais district, the Ile Saint Louis and Picasso Museum.

As you can see to do all the four tours it would roughly take six hours. However, due to our severe time constraints we decided to do only the Paris Grand tour, which would cover the most famous landmarks of Paris.

After reaching the tour company’s office we boarded the first bus that was waiting there. We were quite excited that we would soon see the iconic Eiffel Tower. But as I listened to the commentary I realized that we got into wrong bus it was the Montmartre Tour as we were in front of the famous Moulin Rouge. You should have seen the reaction on the faces of my friends when they realized that we were on the wrong tour. Well some pictures from the tour.

Palais Garnier Opera house

Streets of Paris

A black beauty

Moulin Rouge

Élysée Montmartre

Gare du Nord

Gare de Paris-Est

Musée Grévin

Another Beauty

One of the cafes of Paris

The bus then returned to the starting point and we waited for the right bus. This time before boarding we confirmed with the driver where were we going. The tour was quite long winding through the busy streets of Paris. It took quite some time to reach Eiffel Tower. Some pictures from the tour. You can get a glimpse of the dull weather as well.

Palais Garnier Opera house from other side

Hotel Du Louvre

Louvre Courtyard

Louvre Museum

Pont des Arts bridge on River Seine

An interesting news article in NY Times relating to flip-side of love locks on the bridge and bids to discontinue the tradition.

Notre Dame de Paris

Palais Bourbon (seat of the French National Assembly)

Champs-Élysées

Arc de Triomphe

La Paix de 1815

Finally when the bus reached the west pillar of Eiffel Tower we were ecstatic. We rushed down to lawns below the tower for photo session. After all it was one of most iconic monuments of the world and we needed proof that we were actually there. After clicking pictures to our hearts content we picked up few souvenirs from a stall near the tower. We found people sitting and relaxing on lush green garden across the street. We decided to give some rest to our weary legs. I sat on lush green grass and gazed at the wonderful piece of architecture in front of me. Couldn't help but take a moment to thank the universe for granting me the opportunity.

Looking at pictures you might have understood that this Paris trip was just about getting a glimpse of city from a distance (only place we got off the bus was at Eiffel tower). What else can you do with just six hours in your hands? As we were leaving Eiffel tower the Parisian sun which was elusive all day started smiling indicating that probably it was not our lucky day weather-wise.

From the west pillar we took the tour bus to take us back to its starting point. From there we took RoissyBus (a bus service that connects Paris-Opéra with Charles de Gaulle airport). Time was ticking away for our Air Baltic flight BT694 / BT325 to Helsinki which was to leave at 18:35. We were holding our breath as the bus was winding its way through busy streets of Paris. In the end the bus took a little more than an hour to reach airport. On reaching the departure gate we realized that we did not have a proper meal through the day and would need some dinner to survive the rest of the journey. The day eventually turned out to be a very long day as we crossed three time zones without any sleep for more than 24 hours. When we reached our apartment in Pori, Finland we were completely drained out.

Looking back at the whole trip I felt it ultimately turned out to be a memorable one. We had covered so many iconic places in such a less time. However, ideally it should have been a nine days ten nights trip instead of four days five nights one. But in life rarely things are ideal.