Rome: 6.21.07

Lofty site-seeing goals meet us this morning. Take the metro to San Pietro once again in hopes of gaining entry to the famous domed ceiling of the basilica as well as the Sistine Chapel...then reality slaps us in the face: lines wrap around the complex in all directions and our situation is hopeless.

The disaster of a queue at San Pietro is not on the menu for today.

(Image Source: Internet)

Back to the Metro, we ride on to the center of the city where swarms of visitors flock around the most famous sight in Rome: The Colosseum. When opened in 80 AD, the festivities lasted for 100 days and included death matches with rare animals and even sea battles!

Sprinklers are a relief in the relentless heat.

Hair already dry, the sweat pours as we enter the ongoing excavation area of the ruins of the Roman Forum (Forum Magnum). Historically used as an area for commerce, this largest forum in Rome later became a center for religion, philosophy, and politics.

View of the Forum looking west.

High on the Palatine Hill, luxurious dwellings of the upper class overlook the Forum.

A team of young Roman women excavate and record ruins near the House of the Vestal Virgins and the Temple of Vesta.

Three columns at the Temple of Castor and the ruins of the Imperial Palace on Palatine Hill.


 
The end of the sun scorched plain is in sight at the base of the Capitoline Hill, once the political center of the city, and home to the Arch of Septimius Severus. 

A last look at the Temple of Saturn in the most crowded deserted place in the world.

A giant among Italian military police vehicles...


 
Seen from all over Rome, we finally approach the National Monument of Victor Emmanuel II, the first king of unified Italy.

Completed in 1935, the structure also frames the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

The Temple of Hercules Victor, the oldest surviving marble edifice, dates from 120 BC.

Walking further on, a grassy park opens in front of us that once was the infamous racing track, The Circus Maximus.

Overlooking the Circus and

the imperial palace on Palatine Hill.

(Reconstruction Image Source: Internet)

Yet another casualty of the heat...!

 



An interesting end to a long hot day:
The Pyramid of Cestius. The last remaining of as many as four pyramids in the city, it was erected in 330 days around 18 BC.