Another lazy morning, as the long days and heat are definitely wearing us down, but we also knew we had time to spare today with our adventure to Ostia Antica. This is a roman ruin city about an hour away from Rome, which meant we had to master public transportation here. Fortunately it was easier than expected, although on the way back it was raining, so we ended up making a couple of extra changes to try to get closer to our apartment. We were only successful in the sense that it was not raining as hard when we arrived at our stop. We also made a friend leaving the metro — they wanted to know how far away we were from the Trevi Fountain, and since we are professionals now, we pulled out our map and showed them where to go.
Ostia Antica was pretty incredible — so big and so well preserved considering we are looking at 7th century BC. That’s over 2700 years old! There were definitely pieces of the town that were more ruins than others, but the ones that were in tact were amazing.
One of the buildings used to be a restaurant/bar back in the day, and the bar was still fully in tact…
The mosaics were breathtaking and so in tact after all these years…
Of course it wouldn’t be an Ennis Adventure if we weren’t causing mischief — we ended up on the wrong side of the gate by honest accident — but we were able to see an amazing sculpture that still had it’s head. A rarity when looking at Roman ruins since most of the statues depicted important political people of the time and new rulers removed their heads. Or if the person committed treason or some other crime, their head would be removed. So turning the corner to see this one was awesome, of course that’s when we noticed the ‘do not enter’ fence on the other side and realized our error. Oh well… damage had already been done, so might as well take a picture of him…
After a good four hours wandering around this city, we came back to the apartment to rest for a bit before heading out to find some food. We found a nice little pizza place that served by the slice, and then surprise surprise, we went back to the Gelato place from yesterday. We are basically regulars there since we walked in and the owner smiled real big and said ‘ahhh back again!’ Of course we would become regulars at a gelato place, of course we would. Regardless, Kevin tried their Green Apple, Strawberry and Dark Chocolate, and I had the chocolate and oreo. So good. We are going to miss this place the most I think.
Well we’ve got an early start in the morning – off on the train again – so I better get to packing my stuff and get to bed. Until tomorrow =)
