Scene 9
St. Peters, Piazza Navona, Fontana di Trevi & More

Our first full day in Roma (Rome) - stunning (yes, I realize I overuse the word but no other word aptly describes my reaction to some of the sights.)

Heather and I ditched the administration-lead orientation tours and struck out on our own with her expertise and my Michelin Guide to Italy. We walked for five hours straight, just because each sight energized us to keep going:
I. The outside of St. Peter's - massive during the day since you can see the people lined up in front, appearing as ants before it.

It’s big, but it still hides it’s true size from the outside. You just can’t get a good feel for it by only looking at the façade. The sculptures on the top appear man-sized but eventually we’d find them to be some 20’ tall or more.

II. Piazza Navona – a stadium in Roman times, this square still retains a bit of the oval track shape. In the center is Bernini’s Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi, Fountain of the Four Rivers.

It’s interesting to see a Renaissance sculpture that copies ancient Roman-style, a style itself copied from the Greeks, topped with an Egyptian obelisk, crested by a Catholic saint or cross – post-modernism religion, some 500 years before post-modernism was born. But the one in the center of Piazza Novana is my personal favorite in all of Roma. Four fantastic figures represent a river from each of the four known continents of the day, towering over a lion, dragon, fish and plants, all surrounded by a dancing pool, topped by the ever-present monolith, complete with hieroglyphics and a cross. Everything you could want in a fountain all bundled up in one package. Fabulous, but it beckons for you to play in it. The people watching in the piazza ain’t bad either, and there’s another couple of fountains at either end worth seeing too.

III. Fontana di Trevi – The Trevi Fountain. On your first trip to Roma this may be the biggest surprise. There’s no way to approach the fountain and see it coming because it’s crammed into a tiny piazza. You turn the corner and BOOM – hit in the face with an explosion of sculpture. Nicola Salvi would design my swimming pool were he alive and I obscenely rich.

Personally, I like the Trevi best at night. The crowds are perhaps half as intense and the light shining up through the water really animates the sculptures.

In fact, I’d say I like all of Roma best at night. The garbage is harder to see, and the ruins of past empires creep out of the darkness giving everything a dark, mysterious feeling. The tourist crowds are thinner, and the locals stay out late partying. There are a few exceptions, but for the most part everything in Roma looks better half-lit.

IV. Vittoriano – locals call it “the typewriter” amongst less complementary titles. The most astounding structure I have ever seen. A monstrous pile of white marble topped with humongous green bronzes commemorating the first king of a united Italia, Vittorio Emanuele II, entombed in the structure. I was so struck by the thing that I lost Heather and instead of searching for her just stood and stared in awe. It’s not necessarily pretty, but it is awesome.

The only way to get an idea of the scale of the thing is to notice the guards standing on one level.

V. The Pantheon – Hadrian began renovations to this place in 119 and it’s barely changed a bit since, except being taken over by Christians in 606 and renamed Church of Santa Maria and Martyres. But everyone still knows it as The Pantheon.

The ceiling was the largest freestanding dome for something like 1500 years. It's still the largest freestanding concrete dome, not bad for a 2000 year old building!

Raphael is tucked away here too. But it’s the wonderful gracefulness of the place that gets you – there is a symmetrical beauty that does something instinctual to you. Marvelous. I just wish some pagans would rise up and pitch the Catholics out, ushering in a new era of sin and decadence, but then I wish that about a lot of places...

VI. Piazza di Spagna - the square containing the Spanish Steps, so named because the Spanish embassy used to be there. It's pretty but I think more people go there just so they can say they went there. By day there’s little to see - it's just a big staircase, sometimes with potted flowers around it but usually not, and an only moderately interesting fountain at the bottom. It’s surrounding by interesting, if spendy, shops, a McDonalds (some of our gang ate there, surprise surprise), and the AmEx office. The real reason to visit is at night. The place gets swarmed by whatever student groups are visiting at the time. They play guitars and sing, with bottles clinking on the steps for accidental percussion.

Mark Twain, my favorite U.S. author, if not my favorite author of them all, will get quoted often in this text. Why say what’s already been said? Better to quote that to plagiarize:
"GRANDSON. First visit to Europe?
HARRIS. Mine? Yes.
G.S. (With a soft reminiscent sigh suggestive of bygone joys that may be tasted in their freshness but once.) Ah, I know what it is to you. A first visit!--ah, the romance of it! I wish I could feel it again.
H. Yes, I find it exceeds all my dreams. It is enchantment. I go...
G.S. (With a dainty gesture of the hand signifying "Spare me your callow enthusiasms, good friend.") Yes, _I_ know, I know; you go to cathedrals, and exclaim; and you drag through league-long picture-galleries and exclaim; and you stand here, and there, and yonder, upon historic ground, and continue to exclaim; and you are permeated with your first crude conceptions of Art, and are proud and happy. Ah, yes, proud and happy--that expresses it. Yes-yes, enjoy it--it is right--it is an innocent revel."
From A Tramp Abroad