Rome October 16-17

I spent my third day in Rome, Wednesday October 16, doing more sight-seeing. I first went to the Spanish Steps, where I found the view marred by an obtrusive Prada advertisement.
  

 

The view from the Spanish Steps with the advertisement for Prada

I then walked around the Villa Borghese park area. I was surprised to find a replica of Shakespeare’s London Globe Theater there where his plays are performed.

 

The Globe Theater

The Villa Borghese with its art museum is one of the places where visitors need to book admission tickets in advance, which I had not done. There were no tickets available for the next two days, so I kept on walking around the park grounds there.

One of the secondary monumental buildings in the Villa Borghese grounds

I then took a tram across the city and returned to the hotel for a nap. In the afternoon I went to the Circus Maximus and walked around the perimeter of the Forum area.

 

The Roman Forum

 I then reached the Capitolian Museums, which I toured for a couple of hours.

 

The statue in the courtyard of the Capitolian Museum getting its inscription repainted

Then after sunset I walked around further and visited the Church of Sts. Cosmas and Damianos, before returning to the hotel.

Later that evening I went to a movie theater near my hotel for the 10:30 showing of Gravity dubbed into Italian. My weak knowledge of Italian was not a problem for following the plot of this action film.

On my fourth day in Rome, Thursday October 17, I first went to the Castel Sant’Angelo and then walked around the city center, stopping at the Pantheon and the Trevi Fountain and other sites along the way, including a political demonstration.

The Castel Sant’Angelo 

 

The interior of the Pantheon

A small political demonstration at an Egyptian obelisk

 In the afternoon I went to the Church of Mary of the Angels and the adjacent Baths of Diocletian Museum and then at 6:30 I went to the Basilica of St. Paul, arriving just after it closed, so I walked around a while, before returning to the hotel.

 

The courtyard of the Museum at the Baths of Diocletian

I had hoped to meet Ivana Kvetanova again before I left, but our attempts to communicate were thwarted when the SMS messages she tried to send me that evening did not come through until my flight arrived in Chicago the following day.