Sunday in Rome (Part 1)

On Sunday Aaron and I took a walk around Rome to try to take some nice photos with our new camera. We got a Pentax DSLR, and we really like it. However, we are still lacking in our photography skills. We really need to practice using all the complex settings. We aren't great at choosing the right settings, but we are working on it.

We walked from our apartment to the historical center. When we left the house, we walked through our neighborhood and a large park called Villa Borghese. Then we walked to Via Veneto (tourist hotels) and Piazza di Spagna (Spanish Steps). We took a few pictures and then hit Quirinale, Fontana di Trevi, the Pantheon, and Piazza del Popolo. I will provide some extra information on each of these later on.

Today I'll show some pictures from the area around our apartment and Villa Borghese. Tomorrow I'll show the more touristy things. The pictures below are all unmodified JPEGs. I haven't had a chance to tweak the raw files yet. This is where I think I can really improve some of these photos. It isn't important for this moment though.

This is our street from Piazza Digione, a square near our apartment. Our building is the third one on the left. It is orange, but you can only see a sliver of the orange because the trees. These type of trees never lose their leaves, so this is what it looks like year round.



Kelly in Piazza Digione. Please excuse the bright coloring, but I had to show it because if you look in the background you can see a guy riding around on a 4 wheeler!


Kelly with our favorite neighborhood restaurant. The name is "Il Brutto Anatrocolo" (The Ugly Duckling). This is funny because there is a bakery a couple of doors down that is owned by the same people. That is called "Il Cigno" (The Swan).



This is Piazza Ungheria. It is a main intersection in Parioli (the name of our neighborhood).


A street in the area. Note that there aren't any cars. This is not normal for other days, but Sunday mornings are the best because there is not much traffic.


Kelly with a bus stop behind her and the entrace to Villa Borghese behind her.


The Bioparco Roma (zoo) is in Villa Borghese. This is part of the entrance to the zoo. We have been there two times (once during the day and once at night).


This is Aaron in front of Galleria Borghese. This is a gallery that has some really amazing sculptures. It is the only museum where I left thinking that I would like to go back.


This is Piazza di Siena and the Casino dell'Orologio (Clock building). Not much to tell here except that it looks nice!


This is the Museo Pietro Canonica (Museum). We went to this museum on Notte Bianca (a night where they have special events all night long and open the museums for free from 8 pm to 6 am or something like that). We thought it was a military museum, but it was the art of Pietro Canonica and others from the early 1900s. The art was very different for the older styles that are normally visible in Rome, but this was a nice change.


This is part of the dog park. People bring there dogs here, and let them run around. It is cool because most people train their dogs well so they don't need to be on a leash.


That is the first portion of the tour of Rome. Sorry that there aren't more photos of Aaron, but he carried the camera through the park. More to come from the famous sites!

Roma, Sunday, January 20, 2008