A Day in Liam's Italy Journal: Rome

We have just capped ten days with my family in Rome and Florence.  My two youngest siblings are keeping journals to document their first trip in Europe.  Here is our first day in Rome as described in my nine year old brother's journal.  It follows the day that the family was supposed to leave for Rome, but their flight was canceled out of Charlotte and they had to spend a night in the Queen City.  I have edited it for spelling, but they are completely his own words.  All pictures were taken by him on his Nintendo DSi, unless stated otherwise.

Wednesday, July 25, 2010 - Fly in the Sky
In the second day in the airport we did the exact same thing as yesterday, except we rode the plane! The plane was humongous! There were about 45 rows! There was a movie/T.V. player but it cost money, though. I slept, read, ate and played DS the whole way. It was soooooooooo long! But we got there!

In Italy
Wow, in a whole different country. During the car ride, the driver was really nice. The drive was like a tour. I saw pyramids, bridges, lakes. Our REAL hotel was really nice. But it was exactly like our other hotel EXCEPT it had 3 big beds, a BIGGER T.V., and a great view. And a better thing than all those things, Jeffrey and Magge!!!!!!


The very first thing we did was go to the Spanish Steps, an obelisk, and a very large church. There were Egyptian hieroglyphics on the obelisk. If you go down the stairs there was a fountain called "Fountain of the Old Boat", or so it's called in English. We had lunch at a restaurant that was really nice. It had a cool breeze, too. I had spaghetti. It was amazing. Yum! I had my very first gelato (ice cream with butter*). You wouldn't think they mix well, would you?

The Spanish Steps

One of the many Egyptian obelisks in Rome

Later we went to the Pantheon (Pan-thee-on, not Parthenon). It was in the bible, I think. There were lots of saints. One like Mary, and Jesus, one like Zeus (Jupiter) with a lightning bolt thing and one even looked like a coffin. It was really neat.

The exterior of the Pantheon

Magge took this picture of Liam working hard to get the following picture of the Pantheon's huge domed ceiling:

The next thing was AMAZING. When I mean amazing I mean amazing!!!!!! I found it interesting. It was called Trevi Fountain. There was a god (well, titan) called Oceanus (Oshe-on-us), the titan of the water, with two minor gods by his side. One looked like Demeter, one looked like Athena. The fountain was HUGE! That was one of my favorite places in Rome.

The Trevi Fountain

Liam's artsy shot, where he got me with the reflection of the Trevi Fountain in the back

The next thing we went to in Rome was a fountain called "The Four Rivers". There was a mythical creature that looked part lion, part alligator, part fish with a scythe. It was weird! The reason it's called "The Four Rivers" is because there are four statues representing four rivers.

Well, that was my first day in Rome.

Five sixths of the Bell family, taken by Magge at the top of the Spanish Steps

*Liam and my mother had read that gelato differs from typical American ice cream in that it contains butter.  We later learned on a food tour that this is not true.  Actually, gelato contains less butterfat than American ice cream.