Apparently I don't like jet lag

The flight over to Milan was uneventful. I thought I would sleep the whole way, instead I woke up after ½ an hour (I was on ambien). We arrived early at about 7am, and it’s a good thing because the airport was confusing. Anyone transferring had to go through security again which took a while and then we had to go check in again which also took a while and we had to show our passports to get into our terminal which was a long line. We finally made it to the gate and only had to wait a few minutes board. The Milan flight was uneventful as well.

When we got to Rome we found a cab and drove to our hotel. The hotel is nice, older but clean. The beds are hard as rocks and the pillows are harder! We tried to get out and see some sights. We walked down to the Forum and the Coliseum. We didn’t last very long though. I was exhausted, I had been awake since 5am the day before and the time difference really threw me. We went back to the hotel and I napped for about an hour, read and napped some more. We went out to dinner a trattoria we wandered into. The food was delicious and we were the only English speaking customers which is kind of nice. After dinner we came back, read some more and finally went to sleep…at like 9:30.

We slept until 8am and went to the breakfast in the hotel. After breakfast we set out for Piazza Navona and meandered in that general direction. Since we have been to Rome before there was no pressure to see the big sights so we could walk around at leisure. After making it to the Piazza Navona we wandered along the Tiber River until we saw St. Peter’s Basilica. We went to the Vatican and just wandered around outside until it started to rain.

After the Vatican we found our way back to the river and continued along until we came to the Jewish Ghetto. We had heard great things about the carciofi fritti (fried artichokes). We stopped in a little restaurant and had a very lovely lunch, once again the only English speaking customers. I had pasta with tomatoes, grouper and zucchini blossoms which was delicious. My mom had pasta with tomatoes, basil and chili peppers, also delicious. We, of course, had the fried artichokes but didn’t really understand the attraction…I think I liked them stuffed better.

After lunch we meandered back towards out hotel, again stopping along the way. Before coming back to the hotel we went to the train station (conveniently located about a block away). We purchased train tickets…Venice tomorrow!