Rome in Two Days

As mentioned in earlier posts, we had a trip planned to Rome last week. We left Tahina at a marina in Nouméa, and jumped on a series of planes to make our way half-way around the world to Rome. You would expect with today’s modern airplanes, that we could get there in a day. But, Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither was our travel. Our first plane was an hour late arriving to Nouméa, and then an hour later than expected leaving. As a result, we missed our connection in Sydney. Then, that plane was late due to a mechanical problem – twice. Our tickets had us going to London and they had heavy fog there (of course). So, we were late arriving and missed our connection to Rome. There we were booked on two more flights to Rome – which were cancelled. Before we finally caught a flight to Rome – which was also delayed. After 45 hours of traveling, we landed in Rome and waited for our baggage at the claim area. Only our 1 checked bag never showed up. We discovered our bag never made our plane in Sydney, and had to file a claim. We finally made it to our hotel after almost 48 hours of traveling. Ouch!

The purpose of our trip was actually to attend a meeting Google had organized for special contributors to the Google Earth Community. While there, I gave a presentation on how we have been using Google Earth for our trip on Tahina. Google also organized some tours around Rome. We visited the popular favorites including the Colosseum, the Forum, Trevi Fountain, Spanish steps, the Vatican, Sistine Chapel, and St. Peter’s Basilica. And, yes, we had lots of gelato!

A big thanks to Google for inviting us to go to Rome like this. What other company would bring people who volunteer to answer people’s questions about their product to Rome for some sightseeing? And, these volunteers have an amazing level of interest in geography and remote locations. Many of them have only traveled to these place vicariously through Google Earth. Now Google has given them a taste of the real thing. Kudos to Google!

Since there are many millions of tourist photos available in Google Earth and Maps for Rome, I only took a small sample of photos of the places we visited. I tried to take some non-traditional photos using HDR and our fish-eye lens for extra wide-angle perspectives. Especially in the Vatican and St. Peter’s Basilica. Unfortunately, they weren’t allowing us to take photos in the Sistine Chapel – but, I found an HDR photo someone took in the chapel which really demonstrates the colors of the paintings.

So, check out our gallery of photos from sightseeing in Rome:

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