We went to Rome and didn’t do a single tourist thing. Not one! This was partly because we’ve done it before and also because we just didn’t have time. That’s what made this trip to Rome so unique, we had a very short stay, a packed agenda and really had to limit ourselves to just our top priorities. Even though time was crunched, this trip still seemed way more relaxed than our usual trips to Rome. We really had the opportunity to do what we love: catching up with friends, enjoying a great meal, walking around the city at odd hours just taking it in. Of course we were there for an important reason, the World Wide Photo Walk, but other than that we had no agenda and it was wonderful!
We started our weekend on Friday afternoon with a drive to the Catania airport to catch a 5:00 flight to Rome. We found a great parking spot, although we were a tad confused when we pushed the button to enter the lot and out came a token with zero instruction, rather than the normal time stamped ticket. But we used our limited Italian language resources and figured it out. Check in at the airline was a breeze. We boarded our flight and were off for a bumpy, but quick trip to Rome.
A few months ago, Tony started reading about a site called airbnb.com. On this site you can search through entire homes, apartments, single rooms and even spare couches to rent in just about every city in the world! We did our research, read tons of home descriptions; renter reviews and house rules to find the place that best suited our needs for the weekend. We corresponded via email and text message with our host Alessandro and he met us at the house to give us our keys for the night. I highly recommend the use of airbnb.com for finding affordable accommodations on your next getaway.
After checking into our house, we took a quick cab ride over to meet up with the Scott and Kalebra Kelby and Serge and Karen Ramelli at a super cute little wine bar called “Mimi e Coco Wine Bar”. The restaurant was absolutely tiny, but so charming. The food was amazing and they had a nice wine selection. Tony and I both had a glass of wine (a rarity), we split a melon and prosciutto appetizer and a quatro formaggi pizza. Delicious! Serge had a plate of lasagna and said it was one of the best he’s ever had.
We wrapped up dinner at about 11pm, so naturally a gelato stop came next! Tony and I know where to find the absolute best gelato in Italy. Literally the best, I challenge you to find me a more delicious gelato. We took a quick detour to the house to grab the cameras and then we were off to Trevi Fountain for some nighttime shots. Okay, so I totally lied about not doing a single tourist thing, but “Trevi Fountain gelato” (as we call it) was a necessity! We shot photos of the Trevi Fountain for about an hour and then introduced everyone to our favorite Stracciatella gelato! Yum! After that we called it a night and walked back to our temporary home. We got some pretty neat midnight shots along the way with the nearly empty streets.
The next day we intended to wake up for sunrise photos of the Coliseum. Doesn’t that just sound magical? Well, it wasn’t. We woke to clouds and a big threat of rain. We ventured out anyways because we wanted a morning pastry and cappuccino from Tony’s favorite cafe, which overlooks the Coliseum. The cafe ended up being closed… some morning huh?
We decided to take a stroll behind the Coliseum towards where we might find another cafe. Turns out that we found that cafe just in time, because as we crunched into our first bites of cornetti, it started pouring down cats, dogs, thunderbolts and lightning! We waited out the bulk of the storm at the cafe and received an email from our WWPW leader Scott saying that the walk was cancelled due to the weather, but we would still meet up for lunch at the place that we had planned to go after the walk. Tony and I then received a direct email from Scott titled “Secret rainy day shoot” asking if we wanted to meet up for a little indoor shoot later on in the morning. Of course we were in to that! We still had a few hours to kill, so we decided to have our own little photo walk in the drizzle that remained. We got some pretty cool shots of areas in Rome that we had never been to and took a few portraits of people we met along the way.
Right before the “secret rainy day shoot” meet up, Tony and I ducked into “Bar Alex” for a quick cafe. Yes it was our second of the day, we’re really embracing the italian lifestyle. I ended up taking and some portraits of the owner.
At 11:30 we met up with the Kelby’s and Ramelli’s again plus our tour guide Ashley Turney for our private tour of Sant’Ivo alla Sapienza. Ashley arranged with the custodian of this beautiful church to open the doors just for us to shoot! This was a totally amazing and unique experience that we were so thankful to be included on! Ashley has spent years of her life in Italy and truly knows every nook and cranny of this country. Contact her for information on some of her beautiful trips that she organizes.
Next week, look for part two of this blog post which will include the rest of our day the Rome WWPW 2013 crew and find out if we were able to walk or got rained out…
//Lyndsay.
