At the airport, Mrs M and Doreen enjoy a drink. I say 'drink', it was glass with 5% fluid and 95% ice - and a mortgage necessary to buy it!
After a long easyJourney, we arrived in a very warm Italy and the first taxi driver we asked to take us from the airport to our B&B was clearly not aware of the 30 euro set fee. 'Taxi meter, taxi meter', he repeated. 'Geti stuffedi', we replied, and boarded the bus (total cost about 16 euros!).
The entrance to our lavish apartment had its own security guard!
It was owned by the restaurateurs over the road.
And whilst the first 'B' of B & B was provided in the 'guarded' building, the second 'B' was provided in the coffee shop next door. As well as tepid but tasty coffee, pastries and sandwiches, the place had slot machines, a tobacconists and what looked like a betting office within. An odd combo and one that had a steady stream of locals through it, drinking, eating and gambling together and all within about ten minutes! The scaffolding is because of the roof getting re-tiled.
So looking out of our 2nd floor window had Wanted straight ahead over the road, and to the right, a view of some old Roman ruin!
And so the walk to the Colloseum. Mrs M is the vision in pale blue, Steve (Do's other 'arf, is in dark blue and Do just ahead (the only time whilst we were there that Steve was NOT 100 yards in front with his trusted map!).
And Mrs M outside. That's not a shield and weapon on her back, she's in front of a road sign!
Outside shots.
And now the interior views. To keep the true spirit of times when BC became AD, temperatures of over 95 degrees C and clear skies - fresh off the set of Spartacus!
And now where the crowd entered.
And where the Emperor determined death or survival with the rotation of his thumb (he sat where the scaffolding is).
Nice view?
Today's chariots? For the clever historians reading, I realise that Ben Hur-like activity was not here, it was at the Circus Maximus.
And now three snaps from right to left to show the two under-floor levels that housed 'the condemned' and the animals that were destined to fight men or each other.
To prove we were here...................
And outside the Colloseum, sandwiched between it and The Forum, the Arch of Constantine.
The Forum, in part, as viewed from the Colloseum.
Some 'inside' pictures of The Forum. Fistly the Arco di Augusto, I believe, with the Monument to Vittorio Emanuele II back/right (with the chariot on the roof).
Cannot find this in the guide book!
And another view...................
Arco di Augusto in close up.
'The Wedding Cake' as it is affectionately known, or formally,the Monument to Vittorio Emanuele II.
And now the Trevi Fountain.
Coin ready - all the way from East Woodburn!
Wish made, and it's gone!
Five views of the Piazza Navona.
And the Castel Sant'Angelo.
St Peters Basilica (it's at the other end of the street to the Castel).
The famous statue "Pieta" of Mary and Jesus by Michelangelo.
