Ancient Roma at Night

On Sunday night, we met our fellow tour-mates at a dinner in a local Italian restaurant.  Belinda, our tour guide, greeted us and explained our touring schedule.  She also offered extra touring options, which Mark promptly signed us up for.  Our "Easy Pace" tour is now a "run-for-the-finish line" tour.  For our first night, Belinda took a bunch of us on a bus tour through a few ancient Roman sights.  We saw first the coliseum - I will post more photos of the coliseum after the next day's tour: 

 

 

Next we drove by the true, original Caesar's Palace circa 1 AD -- somehow it doesn't match the Las Vegas version:

At sunset we visited the ancient Senate House, and political and government square where Romans gathered to express their political views, gossip about the latest conquests, and witness assassinations and political drama:

 

 After sunset, we stopped to look at the lights at the Basilica - our tour the following day will cover this Basilica, the Sistine Chapel, and the coliseum:

 

On this particular weekend, the Basilica will be visited by 53,000 altar boys and girls - they are everywhere in Rome!  The kids are in individual groups wearing colorful hats or scarves so they're easy to spot.  On Sunday, they will fill the plaza and Pope Francis will be there for them.