Steps as in the 14,888 Lauren took today! Abby only wore her watch half the day.
And steps as in the Spanish Steps, which both girls walked all the way to the top of!
Backing up … we left our apt about 11, walked through Piazza Novana again, got a donut and a latte near there, and then walked up to the river. We walked along the river, found a cool water feature outside a small museum and sat there for a bit. Abby got her zen on (pic below). We then walked up Piazza de Popolo. The girls played by those fountains while Jeff found a place to buy sandwiches. We walked up a ton of stairs to get into Borghese gardens. We found a shady bench and sat. The 3 of us shared the sandwiches Jeff bought and Lauren had a PBJ. The girls had the most fun running around a small area collecting sticks and acorns (and assorted garbage 🙄) for their “house”.
We walked partway back down the hill to a public bathroom (I hate paying to use the bathroom - I’m not opposed to it, it’s just a pain always having to find change!) and then back into the park. The girls got more gelato and we walked a bit. We then rented a golf cart to drive around - we got it for an hour and it probably saved us. We got off once to see a fountain, once to play at a playground, and once to get a picture of a view, but it gave the girls’ legs a break!
From there we headed out the park from a different road and straight to the Spanish Steps. So crowded! The girls and Jeff walked partway up for me to take a picture … and then they kept going! When they KEPT going, I finally raced up after them. We made it all the way to the top! And then up more stairs to Trinita dei Monti church. I told the girls how much Jeff likes churches so they agreed to go in. The first chapel on the left had a beautiful statue of Jesus right after he was taken down off the cross (pic in the Wikipedia page for the church) and the light in the window when we went was stunning. The girls were mesmerized- we walked through the rest of the church and they asked to go back and see it again before we left. Then down the stairs and everyone needed to sit and eat candy before we could continue.
Next up - Trevi Fountain! Busier than the Spanish Steps! Lauren had been waiting for this! We each got a coin and made our way over to the center and made our wish.
We headed out of that packed touristy area and when we got back to the Parthenon, the girls couldn’t take another step. We sat for dinner (amazing view!). Lots of melt downs during dinner … Lauren ate pasta, I had pizza, Jeff had fettuccine bolognese. He meant to order a Greek salad, but ended up with tuna nicoise, which I enjoyed more than him! He tried a Campari spritzer and literally gagged it down (I really thought it was coming back up!). I had a Hugo spritz. Still not my fave, but I liked it better than the aperol. Lauren ate all the mint and limes from my drink - I told her next time I see a nonalcoholic mojito on the menu I’ll get it for her!
The girls were puddles when we left. Each wearing one of my/Jeff’s sweatshirts (they had gotten wet in a fountain), both begging to be carried. We made it back to the place with her cats, which kept them entertained for a min while Jeff ran back into the market for bananas and Diet Coke.
Other random things from the day:
Ugh, they sell crap for the kids at every tourist location. I finally broke down and bought the squishy ball things by the Trevi Fountain. When they show them, they splat them on a table and it makes almost a mooing noise and they slowly roll back into a ball. In reality… no noise and they quickly rebound.
We filled our water bottles a bunch in the public fountains! We discovered that some of them have and extra hole in the top of the spout; when you cover the bottom, it squirts out the top like a drinking fountain!
On our first day when we took a cab from the train station, the girls were most excited about riding sans car seats. (And I sat in the middle with no seat belt… seriously taking my life in my hands with these drivers and roads!)
(I just spent 30 min typing all this and then thought I lost it! I was about to make a new post that just said “we walked a lot, saw SS, TF, cried through dinner” and then it popped up that I had an auto saved post. Thank heavens.)
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