24 HOURS IN ROME (what it's like in 2021)

good morning we have already found one positive change that covet has had on this travel experience this bed and breakfast that we booked is nothing super fancy we didn't pay for room service but this is how they're doing breakfast now stared at the ceiling for about three hours last night it's 2 am i'm wide awake and this is what's happening outside of our window the jet lag is real [Music] we're karen nate after traveling to 100 countries 2020 brought us back to the u.s where we bought a converted sprinter van that's been our home for the last year last week we traded our home on wheels for a bed in the sky and flew to italy where we got our first passport stamp in 14 months just crying and eating carbonara this is why i married you i think today is going to be a very special day not only is it our first full day of international travel in over 14 months but i also think we have a very unique opportunity to experience rome in a way that hopefully it will never be experienced again hear me out italy is welcoming back tourists but at least as americans it's not exactly easy to get to for us we had to fly in on a direct covet-tested flight and then once we landed we had to get another negative cova test and that was the only way we were able to enter the country without having to quarantine so that being said i think we have an opportunity to visit rome in peak season without the peak krauts [Music] so it is not even lunchtime yet but we just happen to be staying right down the road from what we've heard is one of the best gelaterias in rome and i think we've figured out why they literally dip the entire cone of gelato into it i'm not really sure what my strategy is here i guess i'm just gonna bite it is flavor can you not feel that [Music] wow we were here almost exactly four years ago and the line to get in the coliseum was three hours long that's about three hours i'm pretty sure we're in the exact same place and there's like no one here all right let's see how long this takes are we in three minutes it's 102. three minutes compared to three hours this is crazy last time we were here i feel like we were pretty much shoulder to shoulder with people the entire time not normal i mean it's definitely not empty but in comparison to last time this stuff is new or there were so many people that i didn't see it last time we were here this is pretty fascinating to think about that each one of these arches in the coliseum would have had a sculpture i didn't know if we'd be wasting our time redoing a few of the things that we did last time we came to rome but this is exactly what i was hoping for it's a completely different experience last time we were here we were on a tour and we learned a ton it was great but at the same time we just like rushed from one place to the next so this time we wanted to do a better job of being present and taking it all in so we found this spot in the shade with a beautiful breeze and we've just been listening to the rick steve's audio tour stepping inside you can almost hear the roar of ancient rome if you don't know who rick steves is he's probably the most famous guidebook writer in the world it's like listening to your adorable grandfather while he's sitting in his rocking chair just telling you everything you need to know about wherever you are with some very corny jokes thrown in he's like okay everybody are you ready to roam around the coliseum we just can't help but smile and listen to him and it's free this feels like old times just in case you don't know what the coliseum is it was probably the most iconic building from the roman empire and it's where they would hold the gladiator games which were insane they would literally kill people for entertainment they were you not entertained they are not entertained they would like throw prisoners of war in there completely naked and unarmed just to watch them get eaten by a lion just crazy stuff we learned in the audio tour that people were in charge of spraying perfume so the smell of the blood and the death wasn't as bad for the spectators i forget how much energy it takes to be a tourist the real italians don't sit down to drink their espresso it's just a quick in and out [Music] i'm going to share an unpopular opinion i don't love the espresso culture in italy much needed i mean i've tried to like it and it makes me sad to admit to myself that i don't but i just prefer a big light roast cup of coffee i totally feel that thank you walked right into the forum no line technically we came to the roman forum the first time we were here also known as the foro romano palatino but all i remember is just being hot tired and over it by the time we got here three of the biggest buildings in the city hence the name basilica big building right so we're gonna find us another shady place to sit and rick steves is going to tell us about this place the first romans mixed and mingled here in the valley between the famous seven hills of rome this became the roman forum it looks like something really cool that was neat that's pretty neat the roman forum is fascinating this was like the center of ancient rome this is where everybody came and hung out it's where all the shops were and so much history is here it's pretty cool to be able to like literally walk the streets that the ancient romans were walking on and i feel like we kind of run out of time again we like literally ran out of time they're closing [Music] what a way to end our time at the forum i have no clue who these people are or what they're warming up for but we've made our way up to the top we have a beautiful view overlooking the city and an entire orchestra and a boldly singing italian man making background music for us i feel disgusting that's better real quick we want to say a big thank you to simply say for sponsoring this video while we're here in italy our van is sitting all alone back at home in my parents driveway in tennessee everything that we own that isn't in our suitcase is in that van but thankfully simply safe's home security system gives us peace of mind in situations like this they make it super easy to protect your home all you have to do is go to their website and customize the solution that works for you every setup starts with a base station and a keypad and then you choose the other components that you need once the parts arrive they can easily be installed in less than an hour in our van we have entry sensors on all four doors a glass break sensor a panic button alarm off a smoke detector a carbon monoxide detector and a security camera so we can see what's going on in our van at all times from our phones you can also sign up for their professional monitoring service which will call the police if anything happens so you're protected 24 7 for just 50 cents a day if you're interested in protecting your home with simply safe just go to simplysafe.com forward slash carrier nate to learn more or click the link in the description below [Music] all right tonight we are going for the full italian dinner experience and there's a certain order that this has to be done in we didn't understand it last time we were here but thankfully we have two very special people meeting us tonight to help us explain are they hello if you've never met bob and gina before they are some of our best friends who live on the east coast of italy at this point we've probably spent three months of our lives living at their house and this is the first time we've seen each other in 18 months when we first heard that italian dinners lasted five hours that was unfathomable to me but now that we've been here a few times i think we've kind of gotten the hang of it and tonight we're gonna show you how it's done dinner will consist of three courses spread throughout the evening we'll start with aperitivo then we'll move on to dinner and finally we'll end the night with dj stevo how beautiful is our first stop such a gentleman that's fine before attempted sounding a towel is generally drier and has lower alcohol content but the important thing about aperitivo is the break between the work day and the beginning of what is part of the vibrant italian life life with let's all talk about how our cocktails describe our personalities mine is missing [Laughter] we're definitely at a more high-end place we paid a little more for these drinks but all of this food came for free in italy it's pretty rare to see people have a drink without at least some kind of food to go with it if it's a proper aperitivo the drinks always come with snacks all right so we chose that place one because it was supposed to have a good aperitivo but also because carol loved the purple flowers on the building and while you enjoyed your food and drinks you were staring at a temple that was built in 145 a.d that's almost 2 000 years old [Music] all right we got there at 6 00 p.m it is already 7 46 p.m so i think we're doing pretty good on our italian five-hour evening i think we're actually ahead of schedule i'm pretty sure dinner's supposed to start around nine and we're going at eight already feels super late to me this place is off to a great start they just brought out some fried cheese balls oh my gosh you know what this is this is carbonara and fried ball form it's not a cheese ball it's more than a cheese ball yes is there egg inside it is hot i knew it it tastes like carbonara in a bowl no okay no i shouldn't it's getting closer maybe for your feelings correct me when i'm wrong okay so we're in a frog pretty much every traditional italian menu that we've experienced is all the same an appetizer antipasti section then you have your creamy potty creamy potty is that what you said the creamy potty oh okay these are the pastas in the u.s if you're ordering pasta that's like the main event in italy that's your first plate then you have your second plate the second part of your dinner is typically like a meat meat fish no more carbs until you get to the dessert this partly explains why dinners last so long actually another reason dinners last so long here in italy is because there's no such thing as table turnover at restaurants in the u.s you get your bill pretty much halfway through the meal and are expected to leave as soon as you're done but not here if you make a dinner reservation that table is yours for the night we have three antipasti fun fact we've all been saying lasagna wrong this whole time lasagna is an italian word but it is one layer multiple layers so what we know as lasagna is lasagna [Music] i think one of my favorite parts about traveling internationally again especially in rome right now is that there are definitely tourists here there aren't a ton of english speaking tourists and i did not realize how much i loved just hearing different languages all around me having no idea what they're talking about this may be our favorite dish in all of rome this dish right you mean this thing right here yes see it's like perfect in italy like they translate to kind of what they look like i think the short sleeves are my favorite because the ingredients all just kind of like settle inside so every bite is this perfect combination of all things okay and this place specifically has the most perfectly al dente pasta which means they've pulled it out of the boiling water at the perfect time i have so much celebrating gina did cara talk it up too much it was fantastic i knew it i think they served me their own street tinted truffle makes it super rich yeah very pretty 10-15 we're still eating now we're being really tired so the italians do one more thing that's just so cute you take your bread and you fold it into this shape that they call this is like a wooden shoe so the purpose of this little shoe is to use the mediocre table bread as a tool to scoop up the leftover pasta sauce i think most people do this anyway the italians just have a phrase for it from what we understand no matter what time the italians finish their dinner in this case it is 10 45. you always end with espresso i'm convinced that espresso is a necessary part of the meal because you need the energy to get up from the table after eating that much food we've uh taken a break from the eating to come see the trevi fountain at night and i thought we were gonna be the only ones here and we're definitely not i actually kind of like it this way because you can see the whole thing unobstructed like there are not people all down in the water blocking the view it's just it seems bigger and grander this way i've never been a big fan of throwing money into things it's just always seemed very wasteful to me who's been very cheap but we actually learned that all the money that's thrown into the trevi fountain that doesn't go towards the upkeep of the fountain goes to charity for some reason tonight you can't get down to the pound so it'd have to be a very long throw to get it there man we are at our final stop of the night it is currently 11 58 we have been doing the full italian dinner experience since 6 p.m the final course of the evening is dj stevie which usually includes a bitter liquor to help settle everything down and we've chosen this place because it has a beautiful view of the pantheon we got an amaro for our djitrs depot and bob actually makes his own amaro so we'll let him explain what it is amaro is a bitter high alcohol drink that comes at the very end of the meal to help you make the most of whatever it is that you eat as you can see we love the italian dinner culture this act of separating the workday from our personal lives with an aperitivo and lengthy dinners with good conversation it's something we've incorporated into our lives ever since we first experienced it here tonight was especially enjoyable because we were in one of our favorite cities with some of our favorite people plus it's just great to be traveling again make sure you come to diddy rambo and when you order your preemie potty get the free cheese mezzai ryga tony it said it was an edible flower yeah sure do you eat marigolds we do now i'm not bad a cross between celery and carrots yes like a dirty piece of salad that's been left in the gutter you

Channel: Kara and Nate

Views: 910,103

Rating: 4.9451451 out of 5

Keywords: Travel, travel vlog, Rome, Italy, travel 2021, Europe travel 2021, kara and nate

Id: Mmc40SphbYc

Length: 18min 17sec (1097 seconds)

Published: Wed Jul 07 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/squidgy-beats]

I feel that this is Kara and Nate "back to their norm". I enjoyed this episode and felt that they enjoyed making it too.

I'm glad they threw themselves into it and experienced some Italian culture even though it was the tourist side of it and experienced the Med style of evening dining.

Italy has so much more to offer than just Rome. They could easily do a month's worth of episodes in Italy. They loved the Roman history so why not head South and visit Naples, climb Vesuvius and visit Pompeii? Then head North to the cities, the lakes, the mountains, the vineyards and finish in Venice. I hope this is next on the cards.

I started watching Kara and Nate in the Asia days and they have barely touched what Europe has to offer, I would like to see more of Europe and also South America and Africa again now the borders are slowly opening.

[u/Mtsummit603]

haven't watched in a while, just wasn't a huge fan of the vanlife videos. This was a good episode, only gripe is the talking about their meals. I'm a foodie and love to see the food but Kara just went on and on and on and on and on.

[u/Tossawaysfbay]

It’s irrelevant because it’s just who they are but I absolutely hate it when they talk about tourists in a derogatory way. Like “oh my gosh, there’s so many/not so many tourists here and they don’t speak English. Oh my gosh, the trevi fountain has tourists?!?!? Why would they be here?!?!?”

YOU ARE TOURISTS. YOU HAVE ALWAYS BEEN TOURISTS. YOU ARE EVEN WORSE BECAUSE YOU ARE WALKING AROUND SCREAMING AND FILMING EVERYTHING.

[u/Lizcatherine]

I love seeing them travel again and I love Rome 🥰

[u/hutter22]

Just unfollow them, I was following their trips for long time, those days were they had less than 300k subs. But I just can't take her anymore. Nate it was still ok, I do reckon that he is the master mind and the major designer of all the captions but her transition from a naive traveller to an arrogant diva has really drive me to push the unsubscribe.

They do not really show anything anymore ( not that they did much before ) but now is all about look how rich we are and how posh are the things we do. and well, just do not like the concept anymore.

Of course it is not a critic, it is their channel and of course they can do whatever they want, and no one, including this who writes, should tell them what direction to take, it just me sharing something.

[u/pyronautical]

Was this edited by someone else? The cuts to memes was kinda out of place (Not that I minded). Just something they didn't normally do.

[u/RedRobbbin]

Do they photoshop one old photo of Kara’s head into all their intro pics? I’m beginning to think so.

[u/Academic_Leg6596]

It seems they do only sponsored deals now. The IG stories about the yacht in Mallorca were really off-putting. They were just showing themselves swimming in luxury (literally), and it made no difference where in the world it was. Besides, all the airtravel in Europe also illustrates that they couldn't care less about responsible travel either.