After our first day in Rome by ourselves, my wife and I were looking forward to joining up with my family for several days. However, we were unsure if they had even arrived in Rome until after we ate breakfast at the hotel due to communication issues (As mentioned in the prior post my family had several flight issues and did not arrive in Rome until nearly midnight when they were supposed to arrive at 7:45 AM).

I do need to mention the breakfast at the Rome Cavalieri.  It was the most outstanding breakfast buffet I have ever been to.  The variety and quality were off the charts.  Unfortunately, I believe this has gone away as a benefit for Diamond members as of 1/1/14. We were lucky to be some of the last ones to get it 🙂  (I do not have pictures from breakfast because I still have not conquered my fear of  taking pictures in settings like that)

After breakfast, my wife and I hopped in a taxi to meet my family at their hotel (Hotel Lirico)(Approximately 20 Euro).  We had to take a taxi as the hotel shuttle leaves the hotel hourly and it was approaching 9:30,  we didn’t want to spend an additional 30 minutes waiting. Plus my mother likes everyone to be “On Schedule” so I didn’t want to rock the boat the first day.

Upon meeting up with my family we made our way on foot towards the Vatican.  Some pictures from the walk:

For some reason or another I do not have a good picture of my sister and her kids. Sorry!

Since this was most of my families first trip to Rome (with the exception of my mother) I was very excited to see their reactions upon the first view of St. Peter’s.  I have been to Rome 4 times now and each time you see St. Peter’s it is still amazing.  It is bigger than real life.  Here is the view after turning the final corner.

Upon getting to the Vatican we toured the Vatican Museum which is always pretty cool and then took the side entrance from the Sistine Chapel to St. Peter’s Basilica.  During my previous visits to the Vatican Museum I have not hired the services of a tour guide.  This time we did as the line to get into the Basilica was quite long and time was precious.  It was 35 Euro per person, including entrance fees, but in the end it was worth it as it provided a lot of depth to the items viewed during the museum tour and it saved some time.  For example, on each of my previous visits I had skipped past the tapestries gallery in the museum, turned out to be pretty interesting.  Would I recommend a tour guide?  Honestly, I am not sure, I think it comes down to time/value proposition that is unique for each person.  Here are some pictures from inside St. Peter’s:

Wanted to include one full group shot, perfect picture showing the difficulty in getting 11 people to do anything at once!

After touring the Vatican we headed on foot towards Piazza Navona to have a late lunch.  Even though it is super touristy and expensive the atmosphere was hard to pass up so we ate right on the square.  Honestly, I think we were all hungry enough to not even notice whether the food was good or lot.  Although, I think the food was pretty solid.  Group picture from lunch (not sure if you can see in the picture that my sister and niece ordered Pina Colada’s…….in Rome):

After dinner we meandered on foot back towards their hotel passing by the Pantheon and Spanish Steps on the way.  Some pictures from the walk back:

After the Spanish Steps my wife and I walked most of the way back to my families hotel with them as it was in the same general direction we were headed.  We were able to catch the 8 PM shuttle returning back to the Rome Cavalieri from Piazza Barberini and promptly crashed upon returning to the room.

Stay tuned for Day 3: The Forum and Coliseum.