Once again, I'm addicted to the Internet.

I've checked my e-mail WAY too many times since I've had access to the internet. Although, it does take awhile when you have 6 different addresses...

I'm posting another update to my blog...so here it goes (this one probably won't be as long):

July 11, 2005
We woke up around 8:30ish and got breakfast. We got ready to go and signed up for a tour of the Vatican. We packed our stuff and moved it to the storage room.

Kelsey, Amber, Dustin and I went on the tour of the Vatican with about 10 other people. Our tour guide, Maya, was VERY eclectic and she had a lot of interesting views on the world. She was born in Portugal and also lived in California, Rome and a bunch of other places. Every five years she said she moved to a new place.

We saw the St. Peter's Basilica first. Then, we went through the Vatican Museum and the Sistine Chapel. I was more impressed with St. Peter’s than the Sistine Chapel. Michelangelo’s Pietza was there. It was so beautiful and made me want to cry for some reason. It seemed so alive!

We ran into Markus and Ryan in the line to the Vatican Museum (although, they weren’t on the tour). After the tour was over, we went back to St. Peter’s and walked around taking more pictures with Markus and Ryan. Amber and Kelsey decided to walk up to the dome of the Basilica but my feet hurt, so I decided to go back to the hostel with Markus, Ryan and Dustin to write in my journal and rest.

We got back and Dustin waited to start his laundry. Markus and I talked for awhile, then he went upstairs to rest and I started writing. I wrote about 10 pages :-) and listened to music on my iPod.

Ryan, Siobhan and Markus came downstairs before they left to go out. Dustin and I made plans with them to meet at Termini (the main train station in Rome) around 8:30 for dinner. They left to go shopping and Dustin and I waited for Amber and Kelsey to return and also for Dustin’s laundry to finish. Amber and Kelsey came back around 6:45 and we told them about our dinner plans. We waited for Dustin’s laundry to finish drying and for him to pack his stuff, then we checked out and picked up our two free drink tickets that came with the tour.

We walked to the train station and got on the subway to head to our stop so we could get to the hotel. We had almost 14 stops before we got to the right one. We anxiously waited for our stop and got off. We walked outside and looked for the Holiday Inn courtesy van, which was nowhere to be found :-(. Amber called the hotel and asked where it was supposed to be. They said it would be there in 15 minutes. We were running out of time, but we waited (because it’s all we could do). It came in about 10 minutes but after we got in, it just sat there for another 10 minutes waiting.

When we FINALLY got to the hotel, we went to check in but the manager (who was the only one of the employees who seemed to understand English) was on the phone the whole time we were checking in. One of the other employees helped us, but he was only in his early 20’s and didn’t understand English very well. Right when he gave us our card, we tried to go upstairs to drop our stuff off and get back to the courtesy van on time, but he stopped us before we could get on the elevator to ask for our passports. He also asked for Amber’s credit card, which seemed kind of fishy because the room was supposed to be paid for with points, because he wanted to make a copy of it. When we got the situation cleared up, we left our passports with him to go upstairs and drop off our stuff.

We hurried up to the room and back down to pick up our passports and leave. However, when we got to the main floor, Amber realized she had forgotten her wallet. We planned to just lend her money and we picked up our passports from the front desk. When we looked outside, the courtesy van was already gone. We would have to wait another ½ hour for it to come back.

We went to our room to sit down and rest for a bit (also so Amber could grab her wallet). Kelsey wasn’t feeling well and her feet hurt from walking to the top of the Basilica. We waited there for a bit and then went downstairs to sit outside and wait for the courtesy van.

It finally came and we got on. We asked the driver for information about how to get back to the hotel after the courtesy van stopped running at 11pm. We got back to the subway and missed the train by a minute. We had to wait for another 10 minutes for the next train to come (which sucked).

We arrived at Termini shortly after 9pm and went to look for Markus, Ryan and Siobhan. Sadly, they were already gone. We were going to try to eat at the train station, but Kelsey didn’t think anything looked very appetizing so we decided to go to the pizza place where Ryan, Markus and Siobhan had pizza the first night we met them. We walked to the pizza place and then went to the bar at the Alessandro Palace to redeem our free drink tickets.

We finished our pizza (which was very good) and tried to decide what to get to drink. Amber decided that she didn’t want wine or beer, so she was going to try a shot. Amber, Kelsey and I went to the bar to figure out what shot to get. We asked the bartender for something sweet and he made (what he called) “The Greatest Shot in the World” which contained vodka, Malibu and Midori. AMBER HAD HER FIRST SHOT!!! I wasn’t a huge fan of the taste and Amber didn’t like being able to taste the vodka. After the shot, I got a Bacardi Breezer (lime again) to get rid of the aftertaste. We convinced Amber to try one more shot. Dustin, Amber and Kelsey had a “Brain Haemorrhage” (peach tree, bailey’s and grenadine). I took a picture of the shot because it looked so cool and then a picture of them as they took it. They all really liked it a lot. We sat and talked for a little while longer and waited to see if Markus, Ryan and Siobhan would show up. I had the front desk call the Alessandro Downtown and leave a message for them when we first arrived at the bar saying we’d be there till 10:30. When I finished the Bacardi Breezer, Dustin and Kelsey convinced me to get one more shot with them before we left. Dustin and Kelsey had a “Nuclear Sunrise” (tequila and other stuff…not really sure) and I tried a “Brain Haemorrhage.” We made a triangle with the shot glasses and the Bacardi bottle and I took a picture. It was about 10:30, so we left to go back to the hotel.

We got on the subway and went to our stop. We looked at the directions and got on the correct bus (public bus) and waited for the sixth stop (which was what the directions said to do). However, it came and went because it was obvious that it wasn’t anywhere close to our hotel. We stopped at another station because the bus driver was going to turn around and go through all his stops again and we asked where to get off to go to the Holiday Inn. He told us we should have gotten off at the 4th stop (which was at least 8 stops back) and he would stop and tell us where to get off on the way back. We waited and then he stopped on the side of a VERY busy street about a ½ mile from the Holiday Inn and pointed to a sidewalk across the four lanes of traffic lined by bushes taller than I was with no lighting. It looked really sketchy. The only comforting thing was that we could see the Holiday Inn in the distance.

We hurried down the sidewalk towards the hotel. I could see a group of people standing and squatting further down the sidewalk where we were headed. I thought it was a group of guys. My first thought was that they were going to attack us. As we got closer, one of the people stood up and pulled their pants up! At this point, I realized it was a group of girls. However, this realization wasn’t very comforting. We walked by them without any incident and made it to the end of the sidewalk, which was blocked off by a wall. Dustin wanted to go around the wall and through a field even though there was no sidewalk in that direction, but we vetoed that idea and moved to the sidewalk about 50 feet from the one we were on that headed towards the hotel. A car pulled up and slowed down. I was scared that the driver was going to get out and try to approach us, so I started walking faster. We finally made it to the hotel and I breathed a big sigh of relief.

We went up to our room, took showers and went to bed.