Lots of Site Changes

October 17, 2007 18:38 +0000 | Blogger Italy 3

I've been rather busy since I left Venice writing code for this site. The changes are finished and (mostly) tested, so I'm releasing them now. Please let me know if you find anything broken eh?

Changes include:

Imager comments
Offsite-linking disabled (if a site tries to link to my images rather than copy them (thereby stealing bandwidth) they get a nasty message instead).
Lots of bug fixes

I saw a great deal of Rome today and yesterday, but only have 25minutes here to write it all out... so I won't. I'll write it later and upload it even later than that. Just know that I walked through Piazza San Pietro (the square in front of the Vatican), saw the Pantheon, and the Coliseum briefly (my Dad and I will go for a more detailed visit later) and checked out the Protestant Cemetary (and cat sanctuary!) as well as Piazza Popoli. It's very pretty, but Rome, on the whole, is quite dirty. You should see the subway.

Alright, I'm rambling and I'm running out of time. I'll post in a couple days :-)

Oh right. I forgot to mention that I finished Harry Potter on my first night in Rome.

Comments

Janine Sebastian
18 Oct 2007, 3:48 a.m. |

And what did you think of HP?
*g* Told you you'd like the series if you'd just take time to read it...

I don't know if you'll still be there then, but apparently the board of tourism in Rome gives free tours on the last Saturday of every month... www.comune.roma.it

Okay, some things to see in Rome...
I won't give you things like the Colloseum and the Pantheon which I know you'll try to see even if only from a distance...

*The Chigi Chapel (Some of the sculptures are amazing.)
*Church of Santa Maria della Vittoria (ditto)
*Piazza Navona (Bernini's fountain and obelisk - there's a fake bird that sits atop it.)
*The Bridge of Angels
**There are tons of bridges and fountains in public spaces that are amazing works of art by true masters... and it's FREE to see them.
*g*
*Column of Trajan (it's 125 feet tall and has the story of the Dacian campaign carved in images spiraling up the column.)
*Arch of Constantine (look inside it at the relief carvings...)

Okay, that's all I could dig out of my Art History book that's not in Florence (tons) or in a museum, which I don't see you paying to get into.
That said, if you don't go into the Sistine Chapel, you will regret it.
*g*

Daniel
19 Oct 2007, 4:16 p.m. |

Thanks Jeanie! I went to the Sistine Chapel yesterday (will blog about it later), but I don't think I've been to any of the others (there's a church of Santa Maria Something every few blocks, so I'm not sure if I've seen the one you mentioned). The rest of the week is my Dad and I though so since I'm pretty happy with what I've seen, I'll likely leave it up to him to decide what we're going to do. I'll use your list as a guide though :-)

Janine Sebastian
20 Oct 2007, 12:30 a.m. |

Okay, this took some searching but the addy of Santa Maria della Vittoria (Where Bernini's Ecstacy of St. Theresa is...)

Santa Maria della Vittoria
Via XX Settember
I-00186 Rome

If you're looking at a map, it's almost dead centre of the big circle that A90 A91 and E821 make in the centre of Roma.

The church itself is amazingly constructed, and the sculptures inside are fantastic.

Mom suggested that you can usually get into churches if you go in for the service (yeah it'll be long and in Italian or Latin, but then you don't have to pay... or you can con your dad into paying entry fees... *g*)