S: Today was a busy day of being the ultimate tourists in Rome! Matt, Tobi, John, Meaghan and I all made our way over early in the morning to explore the colosseum.

The colosseum was massive! It was significantly larger than I expected, with the ability to hold anywhere from 50,000 to 90,000 spectators. We took a tour which explained that it was built for the people and was opened with 100 days of games. All citizens were allowed in for free, and had terra-cotta tickets that told you your seat number – organized by class. We had a lot of fun deciding what kind of roman citizen we would have been back in gladiatorial days, and what our weapons of choice would be had we ourselves been gladiators.

The tour was loaded with interesting and crazy facts about gladiators and the games, and has definitely given me an edge for my future trivial pursuit endeavours! One fact I found particularly interesting was that most gladiators left the arena alive, due to the emperors mercy (and the expense of killing them). Though many of them died weeks later due to their injuries and inability to recover from such extreme battling.

M: We continued our super-touristy day with the Roman Forum and the Palatine Hill. It was a beautiful day to wander around and imagine what this place used to be like so long ago. John and I are going to invent a pair of glasses like Google glass where you put them on and can see what a place was like in its heyday. You could see all the buildings intact, smell the smells and hear the sounds from Ancient Rome. These glasses are still only in our minds, but I think it would be pretty great. For today though, we settled for looking at the ruins and using our imaginations.

I tried to teach the group some fun facts on our walks between sites, courtesy of Tobi, but they were an unruly bunch. My favourite fact was about the initials SPQR seen all around the city. It stands for Senatus, Populusque Romanus. During the Roman Empire, soldiers used to go into battle carrying flags with these initials, as they were fighting for the Senate, the people and the republic. Today, SPQR is on all sorts of gates, pothole covers and even some modern-day logos.

S: One place I’ve always wanted to go was the Pantheon, though I can’t pinpoint why. Maybe because it was often featured or referenced in books I’ve read over the years and the word ‘Pantheon’ has stuck in my head. Often with things like this they don’t tend to live up to expectation – well this one did. I felt kind of speechless walking up to it. Seeing it come into view was incredible, but instead of feeling excited I felt totally relaxed. Like I’d finally seen something I was supposed to see… It’s difficult to explain this, and I’m still not sure why this particular sight gave me this feeling but it was a pleasant surprise.

M: When in Rome one must of course visit the Trevi Fountain and the Spanish Steps. We hit the Trevi Fountain and all flipped coins over our shoulders with a silent wish. My wish was to….just kidding, I can’t tell you! The Spanish Steps are just a few steps away, so we headed in that direction as the sun began to set. Matt and I did some fancy dance moves up the steps in honour of Audrey Hepburn. We sat near the top and chatted, soaking in all we had seen and watching what we could of the sunset from our vantage point.

S: After finally finishing a huge day of touristy-awesomeness we made our way over to a restaurant that Tobi’s friend had recommended to him. We were early, which is a no-no in Italy, so we stopped and split a bottle of wine and aperitifs at a natural wine bar up the street. It was the fanciest wine drinking I’d ever done! Suffice to say my plaid shirt didn’t fit in. At the restaurant Luzzis, the five of us spent the rest of the evening laughing and chatting over homemade pasta and wine.

S&M