Day 1 - Roma, Italy

We had planned to visit the Vatican City and the Sistine Chapel in the morning, however, when we arrived the line to go to the Sistine Chapel was about 500 meters long (without exaggerating)! We decided to just go to St Peters Basilica, which worked out great.

St Peters was amazing and beautiful Everywhere we looked had something beautiful to see, whether it was sculpture, painting mosaics or a priest holding a service. The picture cannot possibly do it justice.

We then decided to climb to the top of the dome and walked all the stairs to save €2 each. There were about 600 stairs and some were in very narrow and curved stairways. In the middle of the dome were more amazing mosaics and we could look down on the inside of the church. At the top we could see views of Rome.

We then decided to have a look around the area and grabbed a gelato for morning tea. Best ice cream ever! As it was chock full of tourists there were a lot of people trying to sell us stuff as we walked past - we came up with interesting reasons why we did not want them.

It was amazing simply walking around seeing all the beautiful buildings. We found a place with beer and Pizza for lunch for £9, and shared the Pizza.

We then had to head back to camp to join our topdeck crew. We made it back to the bus station, but missed the first bus because you have to buy tickets before you board. We ran down to buy the tickets and in the rush, and the 40 degree heat, Heidi was sick and had to stop and sit to stop from fainting! We then waited another hour before the next bus came, even though the timetable said every 10 minutes. When we arrived at camp we had missed our meeting by 1 and a half hours and missed joining up with the walking tour of Rome.

We headed straight back to town and to the Colosseum. We saw it as soon as we left the train station - wow. There was a short wait for tickets and then we had a look around inside. Our self made your then took us to the Trevi fountain.

We then headed back to camp to try find our topdeck leader and check in. At the same bus stop as earlier, we waiting half an hour for the bus. We then got on and waited 40 minutes while the bus driver stood outside fluffing around and talking! Needless to say we were pretty frustrated by this time.

We arrived back at camp at 8.30. We managed to find our tour leader and grabbed some prosciutto (so cheap over here!) and buns for dinner.

Rome was beautiful and spectacular. The buses were awful. Heading to Venice tomorrow, via Verona.

- Heidi