Day 2 was spent around the Colosseum. We chose to utilize our Roma Pass for Colosseum (Roman Forum & Capitoline Hill share the same ticket as Colosseum) & Villa Borghese. Anyway, let's get to Colosseum first.
To reach Colosseum, simply take the metro and stop at Colosseo. We did Capitoline Hill - Roman Forum - Colosseum. If you are using the Roma Pass, you can simply go in the lane for Roma Pass holders & group booking (and laugh at those who are queueing for 2 hours out there under the sunshine). To ease your tour inside there, go download the Rick Steves Colosseum & Roman Forum audioguides from the iTunes store. It also came with a map that you can download and print, but we didn't do that and it's still pretty okay for us. I'm not a history heavy person so I'm gonna skip the history part of Colosseum and whatnots... besides you can find them online too.
But to be sure, if ever you're thinking to skip visiting these places, please don't. It feels amazing to walk inside the neighborhood where the ancient Romans (like Julius Caesar!) used to walk on and see the stadium inside. The Colosseum was amazing too... we still couldn't believe it that the ancients built that by their own hands without any machinery at all! It's really well worth all the queue (if you plan to!) and the money to get in.
We spent about 3-4 hours to see all the places and then we walked out to Ciuri Ciuri, a Sicilian cafe to have a light lunch. I had brioche with gelato (!!!!) and my boyfriend had a ball of deep fried rice with some cheese and fish. They both tasted wonderful. I found out this little cafe online.
The reason why we had to have a light lunch was also because we're heading off to Villa Borghese after that. To go to Villa Borghese, simply take the metro down to Spagna station. From the exit, please look out for bus 52, 53, 217 or 920. Don't repeat what we did, we walked! And i think it took us almost more than one hour to reach there. It's super exhausting!
So what is Villa Borghese? What can I see at Villa Borghese? Is it worth visiting Villa Borghese? The answer is: HELL YES. Villa Borghese is a huge (with capital H) compound used to be owner by a rich guy... now inside there what you can find is a luscious greenery parks, gardens, lakes, and of course the Galleria Borghese! That's the main reason we're there.
Galleria Borghese is a gallery that houses some significant part of the Borghese collection of paintings, sculpture and antiques. Some of the works you could find inside are such as works by Bernini, Rafael, Canova, etc. You must reserve for tickets before going to Galleria Borghese. If you don't want to use Roma Pass for this, you can simply go to their website and reserve for it. But if you're using Roma Pass like we did, you have to call them and mention on what dates and what times you will be there. And they will give you the confirmation code shortly after. It's about 2-hour long, our slot was from 3pm - 5pm. It's really worth visiting.
After the museum, if you feel like strolling down the parks and gardens with your loved one (or even with family!) please do so outside the gallery. You can rent a bicycle, double bicycle, seigway, etc. to go around the huge park. We rented the double bicycle for 10 euro an hour and we really had fun with it. I think it's also one of the most romantic spots I've ever been to (our friend made a proposal to his girlfriend there.) It's not crowded and you can have your own little spot anywhere because it's that huge. There's also a lake behind where ducks swim... Highly recommended to visit :)
Total time spent was about 3-4 hours then we caught the bus to go back to Spagna to visit the Piazza di Spagna (aka Spanish Steps). I didn't imagine Spanish Steps to be like what we saw before we reached there, to be honest. It feels like the city centre where all the branded stores collided into one place. Peeeerfetto for little 'window shopping' :) The whole place was just crowded (beware of pickpocket and crazy stalkers!) and there you could find a lot of shops (no restaurants though) like LV, Prada, Chanel, Disney store, etc... But as I said, because it's the tourist spot, there are a lot of pickpocketers, stalkers and flower sellers who offer you a rose out of nowhere, but pretend like you don't see them. Never receive anything from strangers!
After strolling around the Piazza di Spagna, we casually went into a Chinese restaurant to unleash our craving and happily went back home.
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