Our Trip to Europe

Day 29 – Rome, Italy

Up early for breakfast and then off to the Vatican. We had to wake the Metro and then walk around the Vatican City walls to get in line. There were thousands of people there in line when we arrived at 8am. Luckily we had an appointment time for entry and we didn’t have to wait long. The Vatican only stays open until 1:30 today and some of the individuals in line will stand there for hours and still may not get in.

We had another local guide and he toured us through the Vatican Museum first. There are a lot of sculptures in the Museum and the buildings themselves are beautiful with frescoed walls and woven tapestries hung everywhere.

The next part of our visit was through the Sistine Chapel to see the frescoes done by Michelangelo. We had to dress appropriately in order to gain entrance and no photographs were allowed as they tend to degrade the frescoes. Our guide had gone over everything we would see before we entered as silence is also requested while you are in the Chapel. Luckily they had cleaned the frescoes approximately 2 years ago and we were able to see them in brilliant color. They had left one little section uncleaned so that you could see exactly how bad it was prior to the cleaning. I think I would have been very disappointed if I had seen the Chapel prior to the cleaning as the walls and ceiling were almost black. There is no way you would have been able to see all the detail. Michelangelo painted his own face in the frescoes four different times which was very interesting. While we were touring through we were joined by some Monks also going through and I was able to sneak a pictures of them while we were still in the museum.

Our next stop was St. Peter’s Basilica. This place is huge and absolutely beautiful. There is sculpture everywhere, a huge carved brass alter from which only the Pope is allowed to deliver Mass and a fantastic Papal Chair that they said the Pope actually never uses as it is so high up and very difficult to get into. The dome in the Basilica was also designed by Michelangelo towards the end of his life. There are several tombs on display and we could have gone down under the church to see additional tombs, including Pope John Paul’s tomb, but we decided not to do that. Also on display is Michelangelo's Pieta, a statue of Mary holding Jesus’ body after he has been taken down from the cross. It is behind bullet-proof glass as it was attached by a madman at one time who hacked off Mary’s nose before they were able to stop him. We were able to take all the pictures we wanted to inside the Basilica so I took a lot of photos.

Once our Vatican tour was over, we had the remaining afternoon on our own. Paul and I spent additional time in the Basilica and then went in search of some lunch. We found a place recommended in our tour book, had some lunch and then hit the recommended gelateria and got what was probably the best gelato I’ve had since we got to Italy, chocolate orange – YUM!!

We took the Metro back to our hotel to rest up as we wanted to go over to the Spanish Steps this evening and to another restaurant over in that part of town. After a few hours rest, we joined Barbara, Bruce & Jeff and took the Metro over to the Spanish Steps. Our first choice of restaurant required reservations which we hadn’t been aware of and they could not accommodate us so we headed over to our second choice. They had open tables and we all decided to have the antipasti bar for our dinner. It was very good even though we couldn’t identify most of what we ate – probably best that we don’t know! We finished off our meal with tiramisu which is totally different from what we get in the states. They don’t use mascarpone cheese but rather zabaglione so it isn’t as rich and heavy as ours. Paul has been very surprised that they use so much less spice in their food than we had expected. He has had lasagna twice now in Italy and neither time did he find it to be nearly as spicy as what we get at home or what I fix myself.

We headed over to the Spanish Steps which was pretty much a disappointment. The pictures they have of them on postcards isn’t anything like the real thing. There wer hundreds of people there sitting on the steps and a small fountain in front that wasn’t very pretty and lots of street vendors trying to get you to buy their junk. We took a couple of pictures and headed back to the Metro at about 9:30pm to find that it closes at 9pm. Even though most Italians don’t even begin to eat their dinner before 8pm their public transportation system closes down at 9pm even on a weekend. The people here are very big on not working too much and spending free time with their family. Most businesses close up by 5 or 6 and many are not open at all on Sunday. There are no 24hr places of any kind.

We finally got a taxi, you can’t hail a taxi here you have to go to the taxi stand to get a taxi. We tried hailing a few and even though they didn’t have any passengers in their car they would not stop they would just stick their arm out the window and point up the hill towards the taxi stand. We weren’t actually that far from our hotel but we were all pretty bushed from a busy day with lots of walking and standing so we shared the taxi and it ended up costing the same as it would have cost us to take the Metro if it had been open.

Needless to say, the culture over here is totally different from ours. People aren’t in a hurry over anything and the reason they charge you to sit down at the restaurants is because once you sit down, the table is yours for the remainder of the evening if that is what you want. They will not come over to you or try to rush out of the restaurant and will not bring you your bill until you specifically ask for it.

Off to bed after an exhausting couple of days, partly due to the heat. We leave for our vacation from our vacation in the Cinque Terre tomorrow. We are all looking forward to it. We will meet our new tour guide, Jennifer, tomorrow also.