Rome; Saturday, 11 November, 2017

I had a quick breakfast and then headed round to the metro stop to catch the train into town, thankfully the service was fully running this morning and so just 8 minutes later I was emerging out of the exit of Colosseum station and into the huge crowds of tourists milling around.

I joined the back of the security and ticket queue which whilst it was long was moving quite quickly – despite the claims of the touts trying to sell “skip the line” access that it would be hours before anyone would get in if they waited in the queue. Sure enough less than 40 minutes later I had passed through security, ticket purchasing and was standing on the second level of the colosseum looking over the arena floor.

I had a long look round the Colosseum before heading over the Piazza to the Palatine Hill, which was included in the entrance fee and spent most of the rest of the morning and the afternoon wandering round both that and the Roman Forum.

I stopped for a quick bite to eat at a restaurant near the forum for a very late lunch before heading round to the open-top bus tours stop and catching the first tour that came round – which happened to be City Sightseeing.

With a combination of Saturday afternoon traffic and a number of political demonstrations taking place across the city it took the bus some time to go round the tour and by the time we got to Termini, stop 1 on the tour, it was already getting dark – so I was able to stay on the bus and take a night time sightseeing tour through Rome.

I did a full circuit in the dark and then stayed on round until just after the Colosseum where I got off and headed in towards the centre of the city to go in hunt of dinner.

After a bit of walking I ended up at Piazza Navona which had several very nice restaurants round the edge so after a bit of menu reviewing I picked on with good views over the square and settled down to a very nice dinner.

Quite a bit later, and quite a lot fuller, I wandered out of the square and walked through the centre of the city over to the nearest metro station at the Spanish Steps where I caught the metro back to Termini to change and then on up to the hotel.

Back at the hotel I had a quick nightcap in the bar before turning in for the night.