there were two people who met, fell in love and got married. Instead of presents, they asked for help honeymooning in Italy. This is our site all about our familu's adventure. We hope it will inspire you to love Italy just as much we do!


Here we are turning down our once of a lifetime opportunity to see the inside of the Vatican Museum.

Rome - What can words say?

I stood where the ancient Romans walked. I have walked the same roads as Caesar. I have walked beneath the vaulted arch of the Vatican where a hundred Popes have stood. I have looked at the rock of Peter and broken the no photographs rule.

Cobble stone streets, medieval architecture transposed with ancient roman ruins. Here is a picture of a little apartment I fell in love with.

Rome is like all the great cities of the Earth; it is a complicated tapestry of public life and private worlds. What else can be said about a city of millions that was founded before Christianity even existed. Everything is old, and everything is modern. The people are active and friendly urbanities who are very willing to help tourists - friendly at every turn, but also busy with their own lives. Being born and raised in New York City I fit right in.

Culture Shock

The first culture shock of the trip was the food; so good - well cooked and delicious. The Italians take their food seriously. Even the pizza was magnificent! Every time I turned around I would say - I will never eat this again - because nowhere in America will I ever find this as well prepared and delicious. I can't believe that we were worried about the children finding food they would like. Contrary - when we go home - they are going to whine so much over my cooking.

Having said all that - I need to remind you future travelers to Rome that the food is going to cost twice what you expected. 1) because Italians love to have multiple servings in a meal and 2) because you can’t stop eating such good food. To learn more about the food skip to the gardens page on day four or the cheese shop on day six.

The Vatican

In the afternoon, we stood in front of the famous Vatican Museum. Thinking that we would return tomorrow after recovering from our jet lag. There was no line - and we could have gotten in, though the museum was closing in 20 minutes! When we got back the next day the line was a mile long! Really no exaggeration, no joke.

The next morning when we realized our mistake we went into the Vatican proper and checked out hundreds of years of history. You have to go to the Vatican because it’s a chance to enter a whole other country for two hours.

Needless to say on our first day in Rome we had pretty bad jet lag and were really dragging ourselves around. But it was so exciting that we wouldn’t have been able to sleep anyway and so out we went in to the city to wander and be amazed by it's wonders.