I never travel anywhere without learning something new. In our travels, I saw reinforced, God’s hand in our lives and choices. So many incidents could have been disasters, so many opportunities could have been missed. We met a wonderful couple. We saw disappointments turn into joy. We saw we could do more than we thought we could at our age. We are so glad that wherever we go, God is with us. Not something we have to remember to bring along, but living in us through the Holy Spirit.  We are SO thankful for our children who are walking in the Lord. We pray for them daily.

Flying over the Alps on our way home.

I will be back to visit the kids in August when our newest grandbaby is born. Family time is awesome.

Our next Old People’s Adventure will be Western USA. Stay tuned!

We rested on Monday and packed for our return to USA. Our last tour planned was to Venice. Venice is not a super kid-friendly place, so Judah went to school for the day.

We walked to the train on Tuesday and took the local to Venice. When we got off the train, this is what we saw.

Venice has a lot of water. Lots of surrounding islands too.  We took a water bus to the Island of Murano, where glass is made and blown into all sorts of items, beads, sculptures, decorative glass ware etc.

Getting around in Venice.

Water bus

Packed in like sardines is the way of life.

Traveled to Murano.

Our beautiful, patient daughter-in-love Paige (with Baby Cooper in tow).

Wearing my souvenir from Venice.

We made it to St. Mark’s Square.

Romantic views – but it’s time to go home.

And then once again back to Vicenza.

Jesse and Paige had a nice plan to accompany us to a place they had not been either. The weather threatened to be cold and rainy as we set out Friday morning for Garmisch with the plan to see Neuschwanstein castle in Fussen.  The drive through the Alps was astounding! Such beauty and majesty with castles sprinkled all along the way.

We took a tour which included stops at a wood-carvers shop.

We stopped at a country Church where a famous statue of Jesus is located.

Here is the church.They say the Jesus statue cries tears.

At last we arrived at the castle. Only four rooms are finished inside. No pictures allowed.

Beautiful view from the long climb up to the castle.

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Judah enjoyed freedom of wandering in the square in Garmisch

Flowers to smell and running water to play in.

More Alps outside our windows.

We ate some German food.

Judah found some play activities.

Castles all along the way.

Our adventure was over Sunday and with the start of rain in the Alps, we headed back to Vicenza. It was a lovely time with our son and family. They are such amazing people!

We had a perfect plan for our last day in Rome. We’d get up kind of early, take our backpacks to the train station and stow them for the day, take a subway to the Vatican, do our tour, eat lunch, grab the subway back and hop on the train for Vicenza. Perfecto.  Not.

Our tour was scheduled at 9:30. That went well. First we toured the Vatican Museums. Not the whole museum, just a few rooms. It would take days, maybe even weeks to view the museum in its entirety.

Part of a painting by Rafael.

Door near the Sistine ChapelCeiling of the Sistine Chapel – illegal photo

The Pieta by Michelangelo – Mary’s face appears as a young girl, about the age she was when she gave birth to Jesus. The body sizes are out of proportion too. This is symbolic (according to our guide Stephanie) as it depicts Mary holding baby Jesus but envisioning him as the suffering Savior. Paintings and sculptures had multiple meanings. Often characters in the art were given faces of actual people the artist knew. Rafael often did this and even painted himself into some of the large frescoes.

Pope John Paul is entombed here. And all the other popes beneath in the crypts below St. Peter’s.

St Peter’s Basilica is a HUGE place. People wait 5 years to be married here!

Not a very good picture but the body of Saint Peter is supposedly in here.

Saint Peter’s Square. This is where the Pope addresses the people sometimes.

The Swiss guard.

After nearly 4 hours, we said goodbye to the Vatican, made our way to a McDonald’s (I know!) to have a hamburger, and then back to the subway. UNFORTUNATELY, the subway workers had gone on strike that afternoon and the subway was closed! EEEK! Only 40 minutes until our train would leave without  us! We ran back to the Vatican cab stand. A kind Italian woman who spoke English helped us hail a cab and explain we were in a hurry to get to the train. He got us there and with a lot of running, we claimed our backpacks and made it to the train JUST as it was starting to pull out of the station. WHEW! Too much fun for old folks! Back to Vincenza and the end of our independent adventures!

We got up early morning to meet our guides for the Coliseum. We had Francesco, who was a wonderful guide, giving lots of history of Rome and the buildings. We took the VIP tour which included the underground of the Coliseum as well as the upper sections, the Roman Forum and the Palatine Hill. We heard about Nero and Domitian and Constantine and Augustus. We saw a reconstruction of the cages used to raise the wild animals used in the games played in the Coliseum.

Slaves used a crank and ropes and pulleys to lift the animals up to the floor of the Coliseum which was covered with sand over wooden boards. The sand was to absorb all the blood and body fluids from the animals “hunted” for show. Gladiators fought here too, of course. The people decided the fate of the gladiators and the emperor could overrule.

Steps leading up to the galleries where the plebians sat. Admission to the Coliseum was free, but you had to have a ticket to get in. It could hold 70,000 people!

Here we are up on the third level.

We made friends with a couple doing an “empty nester” vacation tour. They are also Christians. We decided to continue or adventures for the rest of the day.  But first, more pictures of the Coliseum.

Here you can see the outlines of the cages and rooms under the floor of the arena.

After the Coliseum, we walked to the Palatine Hill and looking down could see the Roman Forum, the remnants of the temples of the Vestal Virgins..Now those Vestal Virgins were something else. If they broke their vow of chastity, they were buried alive because it was illegal to kill them!

After our tour of the Coliseum, we and our new friends, Mike and Julie, grabbed some lunch and then headed out to explore Rome on foot.  Our first stop was at the Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore.

A beautiful church, of course. We took a private tour of the living quarters above. Saw vestments of the Pope’s, copies of 1st Peter hand written in Greek, etc. Truly amazing and a lovely guide.

From the Basilica, we made our way to the Trevi fountain, a must-see while in Rome. It was hot, crowded and a long way to walk, but the old folks kept trudging and we made it! The boys wanted nothing to do with throwing a coin in, but the girls did, absolutely!

Yeah, it was tricky getting those shots in! I think my coin made it in too! Again, more beautiful churches on every corner.

After a short break and a change out of hot, sweaty clothes, we headed for dinner with our friends.

So we headed out to the Ristorante Tema for dinner. I gave it good reviews.  We got to the restaurant at a little after 8:00 pm.  We left at 11:30.  This is why Italians don’t eat much breakfast people. The house wine was delicious and here’s what Ron and I ate.

Note: Not pizza. Not lasagna. The tiramisu was to die for. We bid our friends adieu. Hope we meet again someday. But at least there’s Facebook!

Thank goodness for modern smart phones, SIM cards and google maps and translators! Jesse dropped us two old folks off at the TrenItalia station in Vicenza on Tuesday morning with our backpacks and tickets in hand.  Our solo adventure was about to happen! It was a 3-hour ride on a bullet train going 155 mph and faster! The countryside flew by, no good pictures, alas. We were dumped out in downtown Rome with a street address for our Airbnb.  The train was a little late (hey this is Italy, not Germany lol!) and we were starving.

Rome train station

Fortunately, the Coliseum tour we had planned for the afternoon had a glitch and we were able to change to Wednesday morning. Amazing how God knew that all along, didn’t let me change my train ticket, etc. There was a divine appointment coming!

Our first adventure was eating close to the train station. We were starving. We forgot Jesse’s warning: “Never eat close to the station”. We did. We were sorry. Don’t eat kebabs in Rome.

Our next adventure was finding our AirBNB.  We found it, I’m not sure what primo piano means but I know now it does not mean a first floor flat. Three at least flights of steps up.  Here’s the views on the way.

Our door

And out of our window. Notice the end of the street.

These were the ruins at the end of our street!

Since there were no breakfast items in our AirBNB, first order of business was exploring and finding a market to buy breakfast items. We explored our street, checked out the location of the Coliseum (our tour for the next morning) and bought some groceries. Italians only have cappuccino and brioche or cornetti for breakfast. We found out why later on in our stay in Rome.

These are some views of the Coliseum on our walk. Some might be paintable.  We shall see.

Yep, that’s us.  And we’re really here!

So he gets a rash from this plant!

We found our way to a restaurant – Diadema Cafe

We played it safe that night. Pizza and lasagna. I had lasagna 4 different restaurants. Different every time. The best was what Paige made at home, though. She’s a great cook!  We got back to our flat, trudged up those stairs and fell into bed.  What we didn’t know is that there was a bar underneath. Italians party till 1 or 2. We did not party. Our morning wake up was 6:30 because we had an appointment at the Coliseum at 9:00 the next morning.