Italy: Day 3

Day 3:
Today was our Vatican day.

We had booked a morning tour thinking that would let us bypass the lines to the Vatican museum, but no, we had to wait in line with everyone else. And the line was so long! Turns out that the lines are only long in the mornings, and when we were leaving there was no line. Our advice: don't join a tour. Just wait till the afternoon, go on your own, and save the money.

Once inside, we saw hall after hall of amazing art work (and crowds).

The tour finished at the Sistine Chapel with Michelangelo's famous ceiling.

They warned us of no photos being allowed but once inside, everyone was taking pictures and they couldn't do anything about it.

Seeing the size of these paintings in person gave me a whole new appreciation of them.

The exit stairs were pretty cool too.


Then we went next door to see St. Peter's Basilica.

The Papal Swiss Guards. Now that's a uniform that commands respect.

The inside of the Basilica was beautiful. Very, um, holy.

Michelangelo's Pieta from 1499. He was only 24 when he did that.

We also got tickets to climb to the top of the Copula. Even after the short elevator ride, the climb through the super narrow winding stairs was really intense. Very tiring and dizzying.

But once there, the view was totally worth it.


That was one of the favourite moments of our trip. It was so nice at the top and we just sat there enjoying the view and the breeze. We also needed to rest and catch our breath after that hike!

When we got back down, we rested for a while more and Donna wrote postcards to mail through the Vatican's post system. They have their own post system separate from Italy's. For those of you who got Vatican post cards, here's the action shot of her mailing them to you.


In the afternoon, we walked to the Pantheon which I remember from a couple of my high school classes.

We keep hearing that rain rarely ever falls through the hole onto the floor but we still haven't figured out just how that works, or what happens once the rain does fall in. It's all slick marble floors.


At night, we crossed back over the Ponte Sant'Angelo facing the Castel Sant'Angelo.

The bridge is lined by Bernini's famous angels.

The Tiber at night.

Us in front of St. Peter's Basilica.


Since we had so much time in Rome, we were able to take day and night shots of several major landmarks!

We ran into some problems trying to get back to the hotel that night. Without getting into details, there was a taxi strike, the subway line closed early for construction, and bus ticket machines were located inside the subway station which was closed. If we hadn't run into that nice couple from New York, we might have ended up walking the whole city.