thirty dirty days in europe I'm so pumped to take this trip and I wanted a memento/journal of stories to have when I return as well as keep all of my loved ones back home updated on my traveling!

so we were supposed to take catch a train to florence today, after doing some sightseeing, but we decided to stay just one more day. Rome is amazing: the food, the people, the sights AND the place we are staying at is the best yet, so why rush we thought. Everything was pretty much closed yesterday, Monday, so we headed over to the colloseum and all the surrounding stuff. Rome is PACKED right now with tourists, so everything has been crowded. But the colloseum was pretty unbelievable. To think how many people died inside the colloseum, yikes. But the weather here has been amazing, sunny and gorgeous, perfect for walking all day like we have been. Today we got up, dropped it at a cafe for some cappuchinos and pastries and then got into what ended up being a two hour line to get into the Vatican museums, where the Sistine Chapel was. This place was overwhelming! Rooms and rooms full of statues and busts of famous works and then the Sistine Chapel, although so so crowded, was jawdropping. I took as many pictures as i could, but truly its something you just have to see in person. After that we grabbed some pizza (all we seem to be eating in italy!) and headed off to St. Peters Basilica, which is huge! Being as its our last night in this amazing hostel, we decided to eat in tonight. Blake, as we speak, is cooking up some gnocchis with fresh buffalo mozzerella and carmelized onions in the kitchen. We are going to sit out on the terrace tonight and drink italian beers and eat our yummy dinner mmmmmmmm. We are headed out to Florence tomorrow, so we will see how that compares...im sure it will be great too. Well for now, ciao!