Kid Fun in Rome

Ryan is trying to convince Dan he still fits in the stroller

Believe it or not, looking at piles of really old bricks isn't all that exciting for kids.  Of course for adults, the main reason we go to Rome is to marvel at all these piles of bricks and relish their historical importance! 

Luckily, every little kid can rally their tourist mojo for the Coliseum!  Kids are blessed with very active imaginations and when you can tell stories about gladiators battling to the death, they can finally get excited about seeing a really old building!  Especially after we made them walk 25 minutes in the rain to get there. 

Prior to our trip, Dan and I made use of the free audio tour podcasts that are available from Rick Steves.  We listened to all of the available podcasts about Rome so that we were prepared to offer tidbits of information about all the various sights around Rome.

 

To give the kids a break from all the 'old stuff', we headed over to the Borghese Gardens where there is a zoo.  To the kids' delight they found a playground on the way.  Most people go to the Borghese Gardens for the amazing art and sculpture at the Borghese Gallery-we went for a playground and zoo.  Travelling with kids definitely gives you a different perspective of a city!

 

The zoo was a typical city zoo with small habitats, and the kids enjoyed it.  We were grateful for the sunny day, and the chance to let the kids run around a bit. 

 

Ryan did really well with the amount of walking we did to get around the city.  Luckily, we realized that the best cure for tired feet is gelato, and Ryan was happy to keep walking along the streets of Rome with gelato in hand.  The kids ate gelato everyday we were in Rome, but to be honest, I don't think it is any better than American ice cream (gasp!)  I did find a place close to our hotel that had cannoli, which is right up my alley!

So, I think I may dedicate one or two more posts to our Rome trip, and then I am pretty sure everyone will be sick of hearing about Rome.  Luckily we will be going to Tuscany and Venice in a few weeks!  At some point I will get around to writing more about Germany and living as an expat...  

Exploring Rome- Vatican City and the Pantheon

Despite the rainy day, we hopped  on the city bus toward Vatican City.  Dan is Catholic and was very excited for the visit (he even wore a tie :-))  Ryan thought it was great that we were officially crossing into a different country, and had great fun hopping back and forth over the 'border' between Italy and Vatican City.

 

View of St. Peter's Basilica in the late afternoon

 

We had pre-purchased tickets to the Vatican Museum for scheduled entry at 2 pm, and there was a long security line to get into St. Peter's Basilica, which meant we didn't have as much time to linger there as we would have liked.  



Ryan in front of the Bernini statues



It goes without saying that the church is beautiful and an amazing celebration of Catholicism.  It is hard to believe that a church that is almost 400 years old is considered pretty modern in a city who's history spans thousands of years!  Of course, people have been praying at that location where St. Peter is buried long before the church was ever built. 

We did our best to engage the kids in observing and appreciating various pieces of art and sculpture.  I still can't believe that Michelangelo carved the Pieta when he was only 24 years old, and it was the first sculpture he ever carved! We had hoped to climb the dome, but unfortunately didn't have time.  If we had been dedicated tourists, we would have gotten an earlier start. 
 

The Vatican Museum is HUGE, with something like 9 miles of exhibits.  If it been only me and Dan, we could have spent the entire day there.  Unfortunately, there is only so much you can expect of kids in a place where they have to stand still, not touch anything, and keep their voices down, so we did a quick tour of the most important sections.  The kids' favorite part of the museum was seeing a real mummy in the Egyptian section.  For most people though, it's the Sistine Chapel that is the most exciting part! (You have to chuckle at what kids find interesting-an amazing masterpiece by one of the greatest artists in history is not too interesting, but a dead body is ultra-cool!)

A view worth remembering

Like I have mentioned before, I can't imagine how crowded it would be in the summertime when tourist season is in full-swing.  The closer you get to the Sistine Chapel, you become wedged into a horde of tour groups, and end up missing a lot of beautiful art because if you stop moving forward you would be trampled by the tour guides behind you.  I am pretty sure that the long umbrellas that the tour guides use as group beacons could easily turn into weapons if anyone gets in the way of their group.

On to the Pantheon!

The Pantheon one of the best preserved buildings of ancient Rome, and was originally used as a place of worship to all of the Ancient Roman Gods, but was converted to a place for Catholic worship in the 7th century.  The dome is almost two thousand years old, and is still the world's largest unreinforced concrete dome. 

The Oculus

So, in this post I shared two religious locations we visited in Rome, and in my next post I will share pics of some non-'churchy' locations we visited-the Colosseum, and the Zoo!

(Please forgive my lackluster I-Phone photography.  I intentionally left my good camera at home because of the rampant tourist-targeted theft in Rome.  There is no way that my mediocre photography skills can do justice to the beauty and character of this city!)

 

   



 

Our Trip to Roma!

On the corkboard in our kitchen we have a list of the top places we want to travel while we are lucky enough to live in Europe.  In the top spot we wrote Rome, and made it a priority to get ourselves there ASAP!

When I was 18 years old I travelled to Europe with my Mom and Sister, we spent a few days in Rome that were hazy from jetlag, but what I remember from that trip was thinking that Rome was definitely a place I wanted to visit again.  Finally 16 years later I finally found my way back with my own children and husband. 

 

We spent a week in Rome at a lovely hotel that was centrally located to all the must-see sights, and only a one minute walk from the Trevi Fountain.  We intentionally planned our trip to Rome in the tourism off-season, but the area still seemed very crowded, and I can't imagine being there in the heat of the summer when the tourist season is in full swing.

Sometimes I think to myself that it is too bad that the children won't remember all of our travels.  What I like about travelling with our kids is that it has taught us how to travel slowly and enjoy the time we are spending as a family.  It is not important to us to see every sight in Rome, but it is important that we come home from a vacation and feel like we have spent some quality time together. 

 

How much longer do we have to walk?

Much better!

Even though we travel slowly, we did see a lot on our trip, and it will take me a few blog posts to share what we saw, including Vatican City, the Colosseum, the Forum, the Pantheon, the zoo, and Ostia Antica.  Please forgive my lackluster photography skills-I only used my IPhone camera, and I am too lazy to improve them with Photoshop!

I do wish that I had taken more pictures of the restaurants we ate at, because of course, eating is the best part of an Italian vacation.  We found it very easy to travel around Rome, and many of the restaurants had  English speaking staff and menus.  Luckily, Italy is an easy place for kids to eat because of all the pizza, pasta, and gelato!  My kids are always more adventurous eaters when we are on vacation, and I was so surprised when they asked if we could order clams after they saw a woman at a nearby table eating a big bowl of clams.  I was even more surprised when they finished the bowl and asked if they could order more!  We also learned that Ryan's feet stopped hurting if he had a gelato while he walked.  I know that parenting guides say not to use sweets as a reward, but it really does help encourage good behavior while travelling!

In my next post I will talk about visiting Vatican City and the Pantheon.  Ciao!



Six Month Update

Hello Everyone!

This week marks six months of living as expats in Germany.  I would like to say that the time has flown by, but it hasn't.  At this point we are trudging through February along with everyone else, and grateful for the mild winter, especially in light of the harsh winter the USA has been experiencing.   

We can easily say that we are glad to have made the move.  Our city is great, in that it is bigger than the city we came from in the USA, but not too big and overwhelming.  We have found many good restaurants, and we can always find something fun to do on the weekend. 

Daily life for us is basically the same as it was in North Carolina.  Since both of the kids are in full day school now, I have a bit more free time.  I volunteer at the school twice a week, and try to keep myself occupied by running errands, studying German, etc.  I always assumed that when my kids were both in school I would start working again, but now I live in a country where I don't have a work visa!

I started going to the gym last month, and even had a session with a trainer.  I find that if I don't get out around people I get very lonely.  My German isn't good enough to strike up casual conversations, but physically being around people helps me to feel part of the community here.

The kids are very happy at their school, and that makes life much easier.  Since they speak English all day at school and at home, life for them isn't actually all that different.  Ryan has German lessons everyday, and is slowly leaning vocabulary and grammar basics.  It amazes me how many children at this school speak multiple languages.  In Ryan's classroom he is exposed to French, Danish, Japanese, Russian, Slovenian, and German language and culture due to the different backgrounds of the children in the class.  It is really nice to see that kids are happy to play together regardless of ethnicity and culture, and that they are interested in learning about the culture, foods, etc. of the kids in their classes.

On Friday we are headed to Rome for a week of eating and exploring.  When I was a teenager, my Mom took my sister and I to Rome as part of a whirlwind European bus tour.  That was 15 years ago, and I have been dreaming of returning ever since.  We are also planning another trip to Italy in April to visit Venice and Tuscany. 

So, all-in-all...we are very happy living in Germany, but definitely have many moments of home-sick.  We miss friends and family, and the ease of being able to easily converse with everyone around us.  Hopefully our German will continue to improve, and that aspect will get easier.  I often think about the future when we will have to move back to the USA, and that will not be easy either, since there are so many things we enjoy here.  Luckily, I don't have to worry about that now, and today I only have to worry about learning how to say 'More pasta, please' in Italian!  Ciao!
 

Getting the kids on skis

 

When we lived in North Carolina, we were about six hours away from the closest mountain.  Luckily, we lived close to the beach, which is a pretty fair trade-off. 

Now that we are in southern Germany, only an hour from the Alps, we knew that skiing was something that we would have to teach the kids.  We headed to the ski shop to stock up on all the necessary gear, and headed down to one of the smaller ski areas just across the Austrian border, called Jungholz. 

 

We rented our skis right at the bottom of the parking lot.  It was a bit overwhelming trying to muddle through the rental process, since our German is still terrible, and I still can never remember our European shoe sizes. 

 

 The kids has a good first experience.  Ryan was a bit intimidated at first, but he was having a great time just going up and down the kids slope.  The only way I could get Ryan off his skis was to lure him with schnitzel and French fries!  As we expected, Meredith got tired quickly, and Dan and I barely even got our skis on.  Next time we will not bother renting skis for ourselves!

The lifts closed at four o'clock, so we headed over to do some sledding and playing in the snow before heading home. 



 

Luckily we were able to introduce the kids to skiing this year, and hopefully by next year we will be able to jump right in when ski season rolls around.  We are still going to try to go a couple of more times this season, but there hasn't been as much snow as usual here.  Ironically there has been more snow in coastal North Carolina this year than we have had here in Ulm!  Luckily we can just zip down to the Alps and find snow there!

 



Climbing the Tallest Church in the World

The Ulm Munster

The Munster is in the city center of Ulm, and is the tallest church in the world, reaching 530 feet.  The foundation stone was laid in 1377, it was consecrated in 1405, but not officially completed until 1890.  When construction began, it was intended to be a Catholic Church, but in 1530 the citizen of Ulm converted to Protestantism, and the church is still a Lutheran place of worship today. 

About halfway up

 

 

For a small fee, you can climb all 768 steps to the top of the steeple.  While Sarah was here visiting over the holidays, we decided it was time to finally make the climb.  We knew Meredith would never make it, so Dan graciously offered to take Meredith to the grocery store while we climbed.

In December 1944 the city of Ulm was heavily bombed, but the church was left intact by the Allied bombers, who used it as a navigational landmark.  Nearly 80% of the city center was demolished, including almost everything surrounding the church, in the effort to destroy military installations and two large truck factories.

 



The column behind Ryan is the final staircase to the top.





From the top of the steeple, you could see the Alps in the distance, and the view over the city and Donau River was very special. It is overwhelming to look down on the city we live in, and to imagine it as it was after that air raid 69 years ago.   

View of the Donau (Danube) River

Ryan did great, and only made a few comments about how tired his legs were getting.  Since we did this on a Saturday, there were quite a few other people making the climb as well, which made it a bit difficult in some narrow sections. 

 

Sarah and Ryan

Climbing to the top of the Munster was something that we had talked about doing since we moved here, and it was a fun (but tiring) experience. 

 

We are Cuckoo!

Our son, Ryan, has been fascinated by cuckoo clocks for a long time.  Among the many promises we had to make in order to get him on board with a move to Germany (also visiting the Eiffel Tower and going to LEGOLAND), we also promised that we would buy an authentic German cuckoo clock. 

 

Our original plan had been to make a trip to the Black Forest (the cuckoo clock capital), but who knows when that will happen.  While we were in Rothenburg amongst all of the tourist tchotchke shops, there were a lot of cuckoo clocks to choose from, so we decided to make Ryan's cuckoo dreams come true. 

 

By the way, cuckoo clocks are NOT cheap.  I think that Ryan really knew what he was doing when he started his pre-Germany-move negotiations.  There are small battery operated clocks, which are cheaper, up to big clocks with multiple moving parts, which can cost over 1,000 Euro.

So now we have our little cuckoo bird who tells we (quite loudly) what time it is, and luckily we can turn him off at night.  Besides the bird that pops out, there is also a little girl who pulls the rope that is attached to a bell on the top of the house. 

The pinecones are weights that slowly go down through the day to power the clock, and they need to be pulled back up every day.  I think that pulling the pinecones up has become a compulsion for all of us, and anytime someone walks by, we pull the pinecones, even if they are still close to the top. 

We have had the clock up for a few weeks now, and the kids still love it and stop what they are doing to count the cuckoos on the top of the hour.  I also find the tic-tic sound relaxing during the day when I am home alone.  While it was an expensive purchase, I think we will have it for a long time, and it will be something that will remind us of our time here in Germany after we move back to the US.