Hi Everyone,

Well we arrived in Rome after a long, long, long ten hour bus journey so our first evening we settled into our campsite. We were very excited to have a fridge in our cabin which meant that our diet could be drastically increased to things like vegies and cold milk and cheese etc! its exciting stuff when you are a backpacker! Our camping grounds are really cool, two pools, outdoor cinema, bars, restaurants etc.

On our first day in Rome we caught the shuttle to the city and went straight into the Vatican...we had heard that there was usually really long lines so when we saw that there was not anyone in sight we made a run for it! We kept expecting to find a huge line around each corner but we were really lucky. We even managed to play the dumb tourists and managed to get in at student rates. It was absolutely amazing! We are not arty people at all but it was just so beautiful! We went and looked at the Roman sculptures first but were most impressed by the egyptian artefacts. After about an hour of walking we finally made it to the Sistine Chapel. Mike enjoyed taking the photos of the room! Such a daredevil!

After the Vatican we walked around towards St Peters Square where we enjoyed our picnic lunch and took some happy snaps. We then hit the road again and headed towards the Pantheon which Mike really wanted to check out. It was actually pretty amazing to be standing in a building that was finished in 27 BC. The architecture was breathtaking and it was free to get in which is a double bonus! Oh almost forgot! Bek found the arancini she had been after and it was everything she imagined and more. After this we headed home and managed to dodge the rain. Not before we got our daily dose of gelati!

In the evening we did some much needed washing. eight euro for a wash and dry..thats almost 16 bucks to do some washing. This is where Bek got her first symptoms of cabin fever! This is how it went.....Mike: "we need to go get our stuff out the dryer Bek"... Bek: " Why dont you go by yourself or I will go..we dont need two of us".Mike: "dont you want to come with me?". This is the part where Bek figuired out that in 65 days...she can count on one finger the amount of times that her and Mike had been seperated with more than 100 metres between them..it was once in London when she got a pedicure with Jenny...with this being said, she took a deep breath and skipped off into the sunset to collect the laundry with Mike and they lived happily ever after.

The next day we took off four our three day adventure down to the Amalfi Coast. I will put this part in the next blog!

Ok so after we returned from our trip we checked back into the camping ground and met up with lots of our old busabout friends who we had not seen in a few weeks. We had a quick dinner and then headed down to the pool for drinks in the hot roman evening!

The next morning we then went and met up with our friends Kate, Dan, Nathan and Kristian and set off to explore the Coleseum. Mike was fanastic and went and found out exactly what metros we had to take and chatted to the locals to make sure we were on the right path. The Coleseum was amazing, the most amusing part was that the locals just drive past it like its a petrol station! But we on the other hand, took hundreds of photos of every possible angle to get the money shot!! We sat and had a picnic in the shade right under the Coleseum and enjoyed watching all the tourists getting ripped off by the men dressed up as gladiators!

After the Coleseum we headed off for a a walk over to the Trevi Fountain and cooled off with the hundreds of other people who had the same idea. We watched everyone making their wishes and throwing their coins into the fountains. We then went off to the Spanish Steps, bit of a let down to tell you the truth and Beks hives were starting to flair up so it was time to return to the comforn of our air conditioned cabins.

That evening we had a dinner party and Kate and Dans cabin (sorry bungalow). Where everyone brought their own dinners and we sat outside and had drinks and chianti.

Today we had a quiet day, we needed a sleep in and a day to do nothing. It was raining was a perfect day to do it. Tonight we are having another dinner which might even include some candle light! Tomorrow we are on our way to Tuscany and Florence!

Thanks everyone for the emails and messages! We cant believe we will be home in 5 weeks its flying! Auntie Linda how is Julie going with the pregnancy? And Lauren we hope your trip was good fun! Roxy stop being naughty! And mum can you buy me a Jodie Picoult book and pass it onto Renee to take to Thailand for me??