Rome: visit to Colesseum with lunch and a touch of confusion

The Colosseum of Rome doesn't really need introducing.  The building is indeed a colossus but its fame also is huge.  Built between 70 and 80AD, it is the largest ancient amphitheater in the world and immortalised in films from Roman Holiday to Gladiator.  We went there on a sunny day in February, firstly for lunch with a view and then to go inside.  Sounds simple.  With hindsight we were lucky to manage these two simple tasks.  I found it a confusing place to navigate but an amazing site to behold.

Coming from Australia, I always think of ruins as something apart from modern living.  The way the Colosseum and other ancient ruins in Rome seem part of everyday life makes my brain explode.  Staying near the Porta San Giovanni, I held my breath at the audacity every time a bus drove through the 3rd Century archways.  Mostly we took the 87 bus which drove close by the Colosseum.  Imagine this being part of your route to work each day!

Sylvia wanted to eat lunch looking over the Colosseum.  So she took me up a flight of stairs near the Metro Station to Via Nicola Salvi in hope of lunhc at Oppia cafe.  Although there are a lot of seats overlooking the Colosseum, they are in high demand.  We could not find one at Oppia but there was just one free at the next door cafe, La Biga Ristoracaffe Wine Food (Via Nicola Salvi, 65/66/67, 00184 Roma), 

When you dine with a view of the Colosseum, you don't skimp on lunch.  We ordered Bruschetta pomodoro, Cannelloni ricotta e spinaci (for me), Ravioli ricotta e spinaci (for Sylvia), and  Funghi, rucola parmigiano e noci insalate.  It amazes me how many of these Italian words are familiar to me.  It was a delicious meal with lots of parmesan on the pasta.  Sylvia's ravioli was quite al dente but my canneloni was soft and melting.  She had a Caffe Latte Soia and I was happy to drink fizzy water.

Sylvia loved the bruschetta which was fresh tomato and basil on grilled bread.  I liked it ok but think I might have liked it better with some seasoning.  Though I am not a huge fan of fresh tomatoes.  I also found it a bit messy because the chunks of tomato were just balancing on the bread and had to be held down or they just fell off.  

I loved the  mushroom and rocket salad with parmesan and walnuts.  It was the first salad I had ordered in Rome.  I was surprised it was undressed with olive oil, balsamic vinegar and seasoning served beside it.  And that there were no cutlery available to toss and serve the salad.  My cannelloni alone would have been fairly ordinary.  But with the dressed salad it was amazingly good.  I felt like we were dining like royalty.

The next challenge was to get into the Colosseum.  Sounded easy!  Right?  But when we walked down there were crowds of people everywhere and it was not clear where we got tickets and went in.  To make matters worse we were constantly approached by touts who told us they were information officers.  Their alarmist spiel went like this: if you want to buy a ticket, you have to queue for at least an hour, then you need to be given a time to enter and wait for that, then it is another hour to queue for security checks to get inside.  It was after 2pm by now and they warned that we might not even get in today.  They had a solution where we joined their English speaking tour and skipped the queue.  I waved them away but picked up some of their anxiety.  It would have been easier if we could see signs or official information people but they were not to be seen.

We joined a long queue for tickets, unsure of how long it would be.  It was about 15 minutes.  Sylvia had been unsure of going into the Colosseum and the queue made her more reluctant until we saw some cats through the fence in a part of the Forum area.  The cats amused her while we waited.  Once we had tickets at a ticket box near the Forum fence (free for 14 year old Sylvia), we had to find the entrance which was closer to the Colosseum.  We went through the security checks quickly without a queue and were inside fairly quickly.

Finally we were on the other side of those majestic arches.  We were in the outer passages but I was still confused about where we had to go.  Eventually we followed the crowds through an archway to the arena.  We were finally here.  But I had planned to do an audio tour.  I saw the first stop for the audio tour but was confused about where to get the headsets.  An information officer told me I had to return back through the archway to buy one.  Then I got growled at by someone who thought I was queue jumping!  I was just confused!

The first spot to listen to the headset was easy to spot but the rest of them were less easy and I ended up passing them out of order somehow.  I didn't find the headsets so useful but they added a little colour and information.  But the commentary included both visuals and then sections where I was told to look at the screen and either the sun cast too much glare on the screen or it was an old fashioned movie of which I could not understand the relevance.  And meanwhile Sylvia would be urging me to move along.

Once we were in the arena I had assumed we would be able to walk around but again it wasn't clear where to go next.  Again we followed the crowds out of the arena to the outer passages, passing these archways with tempting glimpses of the arena.  We found our way up to the floor with an exhibition about the history of the Colosseum.  This was quite useful but again Sylvia wanted to go faster so I read bits of pieces.  Between the audio tour and the exhibition I felt my information about the Colosseum was still quite patchy.

The exhibition included quite a bit about building the Colosseum in the first or second century AD.  It is amazing to think that people could build something of this size without modern machinery.  There were quite a lot of models and technical diagrams.  I could not work out if this frieze was related to construction of the building or just the crowds enjoying a day out.  Some people humble types carrying baskets but then others look like soldiers or aristocrats in ships.

I think this mosaic shows the lions and gladiators.  Or it is a tiger?  There were all types of animals kept in the maze of walls below the floor waiting to entertain the crowds with Gladiators fights and the execution of condemned criminals.  The Colosseum was built soon after the followers of Jesus Christ upset the ruling classes by challenging the current theologies.  While the Catholic Church regarded the Christians as martyrs in the Colosseum, scholars dispute this.  But there weren't the only ones to take on the unpleasant role of gladiator to stare death in the face.  Gladiators were also other undesirables like criminals.

I liked this montage of sketches of the Colosseum many decades later after it had fallen into ruin and then become a place of interest again.  Though I really can't see how something so gigantic as the Colosseum could be just forgotten.  A friend told me that there are holes somewhere in the walls where homeless people hung hammocks to sleep in.  I didn't see this in the information anywhere but I read afterwards that all the pock marks in the archways are from people taking iron clamps which had been used to support the building.  It did not just take the removal of iron clamps to threaten the building - it was hit by lightning, survived earthquakes and was used as a quarry for stone for other buildings of Rome throughout history.

The 76 arches in the lower level were entrances for the crowds of up to 65,000 to enter the Colosseum.  Each arch was numbered and entrants were given tickets with seat numbers and gate numbers.  Sounds like our big sporting events today!

The views of the archways through to the interior can be quite lovely but I think I liked the views out of the Colosseum more.

This view of the modern building seen through the ancient archways is a nice juxtaposition.

And here is a view of the modern traffic on the road. 

Walking around the upper floors gave great views of the interior.

And then just before the gift shop was the views of the crowds mulling around the busy area between the Forum and the Colosseum.  You can see some of the Forum in the background.  Our ticket entitled us to also see the Forum and I would have loved to have explored those ruins if only we  had had the time and energy.

We finished with a great view of the walls in the level below the arena where animals and gladiators waited for their moment in the spotlight.  I could see people down there.  I could see that there were headset guide spots down there.  But when I followed the signs I could not work out how to get there and Sylvia was too tired (and bored).  And so we left, as confused as when I had entered.

(And our train is about to get into Zurich.  It has been hard to concentrate on this blog post with all the views of the Swiss Alps!  But I have many more Rome posts to do, so I will end here and hope for more train time for blogging!)