The next morning we disembarked in Rome. When Ryan and I were booking our return flights, we thought we got off the boat on a Wednesday, so we booked afternoon flights out. Turns out we actually disembarked on Tuesday. Talk about a happy mistake! We decided it would be more fun to spend the night in and enjoy this beautiful city. We dropped our bags off at the hotel near Piazza Navona and immediately headed out for lunch. We kind of plan a lot of things around food! We found a lovely little cafe where we all enjoyed a delicious pasta lunch. There's really nothing like fresh Italian pasta.
From here, we were quite content to meander around. We've spent time in Rome before, so we were not anxious to feel like we "had" to see something in particular. We did make our way over towards the Pantheon which is such an impressive structure.
We loved seeing so many beautiful cathedrals; some seemed to just appear when you turned a corner. This is the Church of Santa Maria della Pace. We enjoyed visiting inside here for a little bit.
Walking through the piazza.
Such a gorgeous atrium in this building!
We did head over to the Trevi Fountain, and it was unbelievably packed with people!
This is the Church of Saint Agnesia in the Piazza Navona. We walked by here just before they closed it. I'm glad they allowed us to sneak in for a few minutes because it was truly stunning inside.
We didn't even catch the name of this beautiful cathedral, but we realized Mass was going on as we walked in, so we stayed in the very back and left after snapping this picture. I wish we'd been there at a different time because it was really beautiful.
We headed back to our hotel to cool off and rest up for a few minutes before we headed back out for our last planned activity. Ryan had found a pizza making class on Viator; we were excited to give this a try. There were 11 of us in the class. When we all got inside, it was time to take care of first things first - go wash our hands. Then we came back and the sweet instructor walked us through how to make delicious dough. She noted though that it's best to let dough sit for at least 24 hours, if not more, so it can expand before being cooked instead of expanding in our stomachs. Because of that, they had dough prepared for us to use.
We washed our hands again and then we were in the first group that headed into the kitchen. She showed us how to roll out our dough; we are going for a Roman pizza which is thicker than a thin crust but not quite as thick as what I consider "regular" pizza. Next was spreading out the tomato sauce, and this is where we figured out the key is to make sure it's a really thin layer. Mia and I especially love tomato sauce, but she explained how too much will make it where the dough can't cook.
Then we had our choice of toppings: pepperoni, spicy salami, olives, peppers, onions, and a variety of cheeses. Mia actually didn't want any of these (other than the cheese), so the instructor was very sweet to give her fresh tomatoes and basil which she loves. Here's my pizza before it was cooked up.
After we made our pizzas we headed outside where they served complimentary wine, juice, cokes, and water. Each pizza only takes 2-3 minutes in their huge open oven, so they delivered our pizzas pretty quickly after that.
The pizzas were all beautiful, and they tasted fantastic! We all gobbled ours down. They also gave us this delicious and fresh bruschetta which I absolutely loved. The adults were given a little bit of limoncello for dessert which was a great way to wrap up the meal.
Just as we made it back to our room, we received a text that our Stonehaven friends were now in Rome, and they wondered if we'd like to meet up. Of course we would! We headed right back out and walked a few minutes over back to the Pantheon. It was so fun to see them again! We enjoyed hanging out and walking around this area together for an hour or so before it was time for them to head on back.
Our family walked on back to our hotel and enjoyed a good night's sleep. Ryan woke up quite early the next morning, so he could go see the Trevi Fountain and Pantheon with few other visitors which he said was pretty cool. The other three of us slept in a little more. Soon though we all woke up, headed down for an easy buffet breakfast at the hotel, and then our driver was there to pick us up. We breezed through security at the airport and stopped to get our VAT back on a few purchases. We sat down to wait for our flight when suddenly our Stonehaven friends appeared again! I kept track of everyone's bags while they took some time to enjoy a little duty-free shopping. I think we were all delighted that we ended up running in to each other three different times on this trip! Soon though it was time for us to head to our Delta flight; they had just a bit longer to wait for their American flight. The flight home is fairly long at about 9 hours, but it's entirely during the day, so we all enjoyed several meals, movies, podcasts, and books. It was an easy flight home.
Ryan and I have been planning this for nearly two years. It could not have come together any better. We've made memories that will last a lifetime. We saw many incredibly places, had tons of fun experiences both on shore and on the boat, laughed a whole lot, ate quite a bit of delicious food, and truly enjoyed being together. I am so incredibly grateful for this family of mine and the adventures we have together!
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