Tuesday morning dawned bright and early and we headed off to our next tour. We also did a tour of the Vatican because again you have access, and early access before the general public crowds, and you get to use an entrance between the sites so there's not so much walking, which in Italy was already plentiful. The Vatican was only a 10 minute walk from our house so off we headed. Kind of neat to see it empty.
See? No crowds where you want a good picture.
Again, even though we had a guide this time, the Vatican museum was just way too much to really take in, so we listened and learned and looked at what really interested us, but you could spend a week in just this one room studying the ceiling, floor, walls, and then all the sculptures and artifacts and still never be bored.
Our first real stop was the Sistene chapel. You're supposed to be quiet in here and sit on a bench around the outside of the room and look up. And I have to confess that no pictures are allowed so I may have pretended to be looking at my phone while I instead took a selfie (without myself) straight up at the ceiling. No flash of course. Apparently the company that paid to clean the paintings has a 50 year right to all the photos, so I could buy them, but not really put them in my blog. And I do appreciate them cleaning it. Apparently after a half century of candles burning, you could barely see the masterpiece. This one is my favorite though, even if it is small, Adam touching the finger of God.
And then a sneaky selfie of the inlaid marble floors.
Ok and one sneaky one of what it looked like with all the people milling about and the painting on the back wall.
Then is was back into the museums. These are actual original lead pipes used to bring water into the city of Rome through the aqueducts. They even have writing so you know what streets they were on. Neat, but maybe not so neat for the braincells that died from drinking lead pipe water.
This is an inlaid marble floor piece of the Vatican's crest.
Maps of Rome from AD 0 on. Pretty neat.
I wish I remember more of what I learned. This man with the black hat is a famous artist who put all these other famous artists, including himself, into this picture on one of the ceilings of one of the hundreds of rooms in the Vatican. It is truly astounding all you can see there.
Then we were out through the secret connecting door (only open to tours) and headed into St. Peter's Basilica. We had to wait a bit in a line because amazingly we arrived during a Jubilee Year. Catholics have Jubilee years every 25-50 years and there was one in 2000 but Pope Francis has declared this year an Extra Jubilee year of Mercy.
Here's the Jubilee door from the inside.
And right inside is La Pieta, a statue by Michelango of Christ and Mary after his crucifixion. It was truly a masterpiece to see.
After exploring inside, we headed to the top of the dome.
Even 5 stories above there are amazingly details mosaics and art. Just breathtaking.
We've already walked up 320 stairs and here come some more.
View from inside the dome as we're continuing to climb higher.
Every inch of the dome and every wall is covered. These are not even just paintings, they're tiny beautiful tiles put together to create this 3D angel mosaic.
The stairs got pretty steep and even curved in so you had to lean onto the column.
And then finally we were at the top and had the most amazing view of all of Rome.
Luckily there's a cage so no one is falling off.
After 7 hours exploring and being overwhelmed with art Taylor looked on TripAdvisor for the closest, best rated place to eat. And luckily it was just across the street and the pizza was the BEST I HAVE EVER EATEN! Seriously! BEST! And cheap and fast and delicious.
Then unfortunately Taylor remembered that he wanted to mail a postcard from the Vatican itself so we headed back to mail one postcard and then had to walk around the whole security area to get out.
I may have been tired and a little cranky so Taylor found us a gelato place to brighten my mood and it was amazingly just down the way and through this neat tunnel. Or so we thought until we remembered the story we'd heard that there was a special escape bridge built for the pope so he could run and hide at the Castel San Angel if there was ever a siege of the Vatican, which apparently there was and the pope was able to use this to escape. Kind of neat to see up close.
And we also stumbled across one of the public water fountains that is supposed to have clean, pure water still coming from the aqueducts. I made Taylor take a drink so I could get a picture. Although bathrooms are few and far between in this city- and NEVER have toilet paper or more importantly a toilet seat, there is plentiful clean, cold water... if you trust it.
And if you enjoy drinking out of strange things like this statues mouth. I think i prefer a regular water fountain spiket.
This wall is the escape bridge for the Vatican. It's really just like 5 feet wide.
And a short walk later we arrived at the Castel San Angel.
Some of the weapons used to defend said castle.
I love this statue of the angel with the sword.
And the bridge with all the angel statues was my favorite. It happened to be a 1 minute walk from our bed and breakfast so that may be why.
Of course this place had to also be covered head to toe in ornateness. A little overwhelming but still neat to see. After this we headed home for a much needed siesta and then it was lovely to come out again for dinner and a short walk around the city to people watch in the cool air.
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