Last day in Europe

This morning we almost felt like just staying at the hotel all day again. But that felt a bit pathetic being that it was our last day here! We just didn't have anything else to really see. We could go back to places, but eh.

We decided to walk through Trastevere this afternoon. It's in the south east of Rome. My guide book made me laugh when it informed me that it was originally wasn't considered part of Rome...until 270 AD. I know, I know, there was a lot of time before that (and important historical stuff too), but the book made it sound like it was recently that it was added to Rome.

We had heard that Trastevere is often overlooked by tourists and that it was a shame. It was a pretty part of town, kind of on a hill. It seemed a little dead, but that's probably because it's overlooked by tourists and many Romans are on holiday so they closed their shop up. But we enjoyed our little stroll through the alleys and streets

An arch that we found. We didn't stay long enough to find out what it was because it had a pesky chirping sound on it. In a park near where we used to live, there's a gazebo that had one of those sounds. It's ear piercing. We always thought it was to discourage hobos from sleeping there. This was the first building that we encountered here that had one though. So we covered our ears and kept walking

View of Rome

This was a fountain across the street from where the above picture was taken. The water wasn't that cold, but we still wanted to jump in it. We didn't though because there were military guys nearby and I hear it's a hefty fine to swim in their fountains...

Pretty streets in Trastevere

And old buildings

Santa Maria Church in Trastevere

I love ivy!

Laundry and ivy. Picturesque

Then we walked along the river to find our way to our normal bus stop

We stumbled on more ruins. Signs were in Italian though...so we don't know what they were. But they were cool looking

We made it to the bus stop just as our bus pulled up and then pulled away. The stop is both the beginning and end of the route, so normally they wait 10 minutes before leaving. So we were shocked when he just took off. So we bought some gelato to pass the time to wait for the next bus (which was 40 minutes later). Doug got Strawberry and Lemon and loved it. Probably his favorite of the week (but I'm putting words in his mouth). I got watermelon and pineapple. I hoped the watermelon would be more candy flavored than tasting like the fruit, but I hoped wrong. It wasn't bad, but I did like the pineapple more. After we were done we waited some more for our bus on some steps in the shade.

It finally came and nearly passed us again. We were expecting it to stop, and luckily Doug signaled that we wanted the bus. I don't know how the bus works in the US cause I've never used it. But here you need to hail the buses, almost like hailing a taxi. But most bus drivers stop at every stop anyways. Not this bus driver. It was a pretty empty bus and we got to our stop in record time. It felt like teach-the-tourists-the-Italian-way day. We kept passing up stops and seeing the people get left behind (you could tell by the incredulous look on their face or how they moved toward the bus, but didn't signal). Another thing is that they have buttons on the bus to signal when you want to get off. The bus driver doesn't stop right when you push it, but at the next stop he will let you off. All of the buses we'd been on all week stopped at every stop and opened the doors, whether someone pushed the button or not. We were sure to push the button for our stop cause we guessed he would not be stopping otherwise.

So we made it back to our hotel pretty quick and headed for the pool. We cooled off in the water with more dunking, jumping, diving, and somersaults. And we soaked up the last of the Italian sun. After a while we came back upstairs, watched some How I Met Your Mother, and then went down to have our last meal in Europe at McDonalds. It some how seemed fitting :]

Then we came back and packed up our bags. Somehow I have a little more room than the trip here. We charged all of our electronics and are pretty much ready to go. Our flight isn't until 12:55, so luckily we don't have to get up super early. And Doug always makes sure we have plenty of time (even extra most of the time).

Now I'm off to eat my last Magnum ice cream bar and to watch more tv online :) It's been a great trip and we feel so blessed to have been able to come here. We're not sure if we're ready to come home yet. We're ready to leave Rome, but it'll be weird to be home. But it's time to resume our lives again and see what God has planned for us