Rome Round 2

So I guess 'tomorrow' is fern language for sometime in the not too distant future! Sorry about the break, that annoying little thing called work kind of intervened. Last week I was away in Manchester attending a meeting for an EU research project I have recently joined. Perhaps more on that later, but I have so many cool holiday places still to blog about that work in Manchester may not get a look in. I really need to get on with this holiday blogging thing though as it was now months ago that I was tripping around with Lies and sunning myself on foreign shores! So without any further ado - here is the rest of our visit to Rome.

On our last day, Liesl and I decided to sneak in a quick visit to the Colosseum before we went to the airport. Again, it was fiery hot and I looked jealously on at this little pigeon who had by far the best seat in the city! To help our maintain our sanity while standing in the sun with the lines of other people also waiting to walk around the ruins, we both bought chinese fans from some street vendors. This was the best investment of 2 euros I made during the whole holiday, both for that day in Rome and for the rest of the holiday in Croatia! That fan was truly my saviour - in the lines, in the underground, in the stuffy little ship rooms, and in any other location where the air hung around us as heavy as lead curtains. You may therefore see my little friend fan pop up in quite a few of the photos from now until the end! Now though, some shots of that big famous ancient Roman battleground.

First, the classic view...

Second, the view from inside...

Third, a detail view of the inside walls...

The brickwork was so diverse and so beautiful that even though this may look like a boring pic of a brickwall, I took it to remind myself of the detail and creativity of the ancient craft and to wonder why we don't build like this anymore...

Here is Liesl and I and the Chinese fan as tourists...
Now me as a lion...

and finally, Liesl as a gladiator :)

And that was our holiday in Italy! Absolutely fabulous. Great food. Great coffee. Great weather. Great sites. Great life. Would go back tomorrow if I could and still have my fingers crossed to work there next year - although that unfortunately is looking less and less certain with all kinds of problems facing the funding of the position. More on that though when I know more. Next post - we are off to Croatia! xxx