1st November, Saturday – Rome

It was like returning to our home away from home! Italy, where the people are warm-hearted, stylish and cool, the Roman traffic chaotic and noisy and the food delicious. The weather has been stormy each afternoon, but a nice moderate temperature after wintery Paris.

Our feet are still recovering from touring the Vatican museums, St Peter’s Basilica & square, the Colosseum, Pantheon, Spanish Steps, the Trevi Fountain and the many piazzas, churches and interesting little laneways that come together to create this wonderful city.

The Colosseum was fascinating and we had a guide who, although very knowledgeable, enjoyed the gory details of the historical battles in the arena a little too much!

We were particularly intrigued by the Basilica which seemed to go on and on – it was huge! No special appearance by the big guy, but we kept an eye out for those red shoes.

We love the way the locals disregard the road rules and among other things park wherever they like, including across pedestrian crossings. Crossings are another story – no car will stop at a crossing voluntarily, you need to walk out in front of the car (and the way they drive, it takes nerve) and it will always stop. This system took us a while to get used to, but we’re old-hands at it now! Considering the appearance of chaos and lack of control, everybody seems to play well together and road-rage as we know it doesn’t exist.

We are very excited to be starting our journey home tomorrow – we fly out of Rome to Bangkok for an 18 hr stop-over, then on to Sydney. We have had the most wonderful and special time in Europe, but there’s no place like home. The memories of our experiences, places visited, people we’ve met and the old friends we’ve caught up with will be with us for many years to come. It was well worth the long wait! But we’ve greatly missed our family and friends and it is with great anticipation and happiness that we return home.

I’m getting emotional now, so I’ll conclude our final blog with some statistics that Bruce and I put together while waiting for a bus this morning that didn’t turn up because it was All Saints feast day.

No. of days away: 42
Countries visited: 7 – Greece, Italy, Switzerland, Austria, Czech Republic, France & Thailand.
Planes: 8
Trains: 41
Buses: 25
Taxis: 3 (+ 2 chauffeur driven cars!)
Ferries: 7
Cable Cars: 10
Photos: Well over 3,000!!!

See you all very soon at home!