Pinterest Addiction #13

Lately I've been pinning a whole load of mouth-watering recipes and I thought it would be quite selfish of me to keep them all to myself! (Note that there is only one savoury dish haha!)

1. This no-bake French silk pie probably takes its name from the smooth chocolate filling, and I'm saying YES to this!
2. Chocolate awesomeness all the way. And there's Baileys in it! Nom nom nom
3. I've never tried anything like this crescent ring, but it looks scrumptious
4. Cake heaven by Call me cupcake!
5. I've been wanting to do a crêpe cake for ages, and I think this recipe is one of the best (plus, I love butterscotch)!
6. And the savoury one to finish (yes, dessert is always first)! I'm a big fan of Mexican style food and this enchilada quinoa bake looks yummy and healthy (kind of) :)

Enjoy!

Our Holiday in Rome! (part 2)

Are you ready for this? Well, I'm just warning you as it's another very long post haha. But honestly, we've seen and done so much and I just want to share it all! So here it is... Drum roll please... Part 2!

Well, yes, we actually managed to visit the Colosseum in the end! I kept telling Jason "Oh my god, that's from Gladiator!" haha! Jokes aside, it's definitely a must as it was fascinating to see this place where hundreds of people would gather thousands of years ago, and cheer everytime somebody would die in atrocious conditions. And we where there. That's probably the best thing I like about historical buildings, thinking that years and years ago, people were actually stepping on the same ground as you, living a completely different life.

In the afternoon we first explored the Palatino and then the massive Roman Forum. Loved it! Like I always say, that's my kind of shit. That's one of the reasons why I really enjoyed Rome, it's all the history everywhere you go. Truly amazing. It was very hot (and sometimes we were actually almost running to reach the next piece of shade), but we enjoyed every bit of it.

Unfortunately by the end of the day, I realised that the small rash I started to get around both my ankles had gone way bigger and started to properly hurt me :(

On Friday, my rash was so bad that we only managed to visit Castel Sant'Angelo, close to the Vatican City. Even with this heat, I decided that the best I could do is wear jeans to make sure the sun wouldn't make it worse. By the end of the day though, my feet were three times their size and I realised I needed more than just a cream! Thankfully, the local pharmacy gave me some strong antihistamine tablets and I was much better everyday after that. Phew!

Other than that, as lovers of everything castle, we really enjoyed discovering this fortress that once was just a small mausoleum. There's even an elevated walkway that has been constructed especially for the pope to escape from the Vatican in troubled times! The views from the top were breathtaking, and even if I was walking like an injured little granny, it was the best relaxing sightseeing we did and was definitely worth it!

On Saturday, with my feet starting to get better, we headed off to Centro Storico early in the morning and got to the Pantheon only a few minutes after its opening. It was so nice to be able to discover this incredible building without crowds of people! I absolutely loved the area as well... All these small charming streets! It was a pleasure to walk around and stop here and there to take a couple of photos.

After a massive lunch, we took our time and walked down to Piazza Navona. You can tell it was created with a sense of grandeur as even the fountains were majestic. We ventured into the basilica in the heart of the main building and even though we couldn't go very far because some kind of christening was happening, I couldn't leave before snapping a photo of the ceiling. I mean, come on!

We finished the day with the Crypta Balbi that revealed the many historical layers of Rome. It started as a Roman theatre and then people built houses on top of it in the Middle Age. After that, more houses were built on top in Renaissance time, elevating the floor level quite a bit, which completely hid the Roman ruins. It was great to go under the museum to discover all the vestiges from thousands of years ago. Jason actually enjoyed it more than me!

As the weather was starting to get stormy, we headed back home and made sure to stop by a really nice restaurant to treat ourselves :)

Part 3 coming soon!

Our Holiday in Rome! (Part 1)

Without further ado, here is the first part of our awesome holiday in Rome! I know, I know... it's a bit long, but I have so much to show you! It was really hard to select just a few photos :)

I had to include this one. This was quite close to the apartment we were staying at, and I remember arriving at this piazza thinking "Is this a pyramid in the middle of the road?". Turns out, it's way older than the city walls.

We started off our first day in Rome at the Terme di Caracalla. Very impressive! Some of the ruins are in very good condition so it wasn't too hard to imagine how it would have looked at the time. I just couldn't believe how tall it was! We were lucky to see some of the original floors as well. You can easily spend hours in this place but we had planned some more sightseeing for the afternoon!

Staying in the Aventino & Testaccio area, we headed off to the Piazza dei Cavalieri di Malta where we found a couple of beautiful basilicas. We had an hour to kill, which we spent around a nice little park full of orange trees before visiting one of the basilicas, so I made sure to explore a bit more and snapped a few photos (those cute old cars were everywhere!).

On the second day, we decided to go and visit the Colosseum and the Roman Forum, but because of Repubblica Day being on the second of June (duh!), everything was closed until 12noon because of a big military parade. So we thought, sod it, we're not staying around! We ended at the Villa Borghese Park (the biggest in Rome), and we actually much preferred it as it was so beautiful and quiet. However, Jason being Jason, when he heard the sound of an old Porsche, he didn't think twice about following it and all of a sudden we found ourselves in the middle of a massive car show, full of rare expensive Porsches and Ferraris. Oh well!

The afternoon was hot and busy as we walked down to Piazza del Popolo, and then all the way to Piazza di Spagna and the well-known Spanish Steps. Except the fact that it was full of people, we were actually in awe with all these imposing buildings and the amazing views that you would get on top of the steps. We really enjoyed strolling around the nice quiet streets as well, and the Keats-Shelley museum was a really welcomed and educative break.

We explored the Vatican City during our third day in the capital, and wow, I know the Vatican museums are quite expensive, but you really can't miss it! I really struggled with limiting the amount of photos I was sharing with this place because we saw a lot. The funny thing is that even if the Sistine Chapel was impressive, Michelangelo's The Creation of Adam was much smaller than I thought! We weren't allowed to take any photos in the chapel though. I think my favourite part was the hall of hand-painted large scale maps. Even the ceiling was incredible!

We queued for about an hour in the heat to go inside St Peter's Basilica, and even if Jason kept telling me that "It's just another basilica", I knew we needed to see this one because it's THE basilica. And I was right! Absolutely jaw-dropping. We didn't know where to look because of the amount of details on absolutely everything. It was worth it! We were really tired though at the end of the day and we couldn't wait to get back home and eat a massive pizza without any guilt :)

Part 2 is coming soon so keep your eyes peeled!