A big day and a big attraction: the Vatican! We were up at 8, breakfasted by 9 and it was another gorgeous sunny day. We took the Metro almost all the way to the Vatican and then stood in several lines: for entrance, for security, to exchange our vouchers for tickets, to pick up audio guides. We got in just after 11, which was almost an hour earlier than our scheduled prebooked time at 12. And we needed every minute of it. The Vatican museums are VAST and there is so much to see that you could literally spend days wandering from room to room, drinking in all the amazing art and exhibits. Rome was very good at collected and plundering things from all over the place.
There is an extensive section of Egyptian art and items…remember, the ancient Egyptians were as far back to the ancient Romans as the ancient Romans are to us! There is a huge gallery hallways lined floor to ceiling with busts and statues. It was particularly impressive how individual all the busts were. You don’t think about the fact that they are actually PORTRAITS when you just see one by itself. They were all such individual, idiosyncratic FACES of real people. Then there were two rooms stuffed full of animal sculptures. Sadly, they were roped off from the public, which was a shame, as they were also AMAZING. After that, a gigantic fountain basin made of red porphyry; incredibly large and one entire piece, which must have cost a fortune as it is the most expensive marble and was imported from Egypt.
A room full of tapestries, a room full of map frescoes, and every inch of every space in every room covered with beautiful decorations, including the ceilings and the marble floors. Your eyes got tired after awhile, there was so much…nowhere to rest your gaze before it was flitting off to the next beautiful thing. Then 4 rooms full of frescoes by Raphael, the comparatively drab Borgia apartments, followed by 55 (!) rooms of modern and contemporary art.
The School of Athens by Raphael
Il Precursore by Giulio Aristide Sartorio
Finally, at the end, the pièce de résistance: the Sistine Chapel with Michaelangelo’s masterpiece ceiling and the Last Judgement on the back wall. You weren’t supposed to take photos in the Sistine, as it’s a sacred space, and you are supposed to be quiet…which the guards yelled at the crowd every couple of minutes. Irony, much? There were actually benches around the perimeter, and I found a spot and sat and stared up at the ceiling, which is amazing. I certainly can’t do justice to the Sistine, you’ll just have to google the painting and glory in them for yourself.
Michelangelo’s Last Judgement with part of the ceiling above it (photo credit: Martin Ek)
I had read online that instead of turning left at the end of the Sistine to exit, that there was a “secret” passage from the Sistine directly to St. Peter’s Basilica if you went right instead. Alas, we were stymied by two guards at the doorway, stopping all of us riffraff from going that way. So, we had to go out through the exit to the gift shop, and then all the way out, around the Vatican, and back into line to get into the Basilica. We found a restaurant first: a German braukeller and had weisswurst, sauerkraut and potatoes, plus a big soft pretzel.
There have been 266 popes (91 of whom are interred in the Vatican) and the first was Peter, whose tomb is below the basilica. The whole place is so over the top with gold and marbles and sculptures and paintings everywhere. The Pietà, by Michelanglo, is immediately to the right as you enter the church, but it is behind glass and quite far away (because it was attacked and damaged by a maniac in 1972), and the lighting made it very difficult to take photos. I love Michelangleo’s work, so seeing the Sistene Chapel and the Pietà again were high on my agenda.
We walked around the church, stopped and listened to a choir singing during the end of a service and then walked down into the crypts where there are sarcophagi and tombs of various popes, including Peter. (here is a page of cool facts about St. Peter’s). The crypts ended up dumping us outside of the church, so we stopped and waited for Anders’ who was further behind us. Sitting on the steps, we were right in front of 2 of the Swiss Guards, who guard the Vatican, in their ridiculous red and blue and yellow striped, beribboned uniforms. At the very last gift shop, we succeeded in finding a 1000-piece panorama jigsaw puzzle of the Sistine ceiling!
After the Vatican, we took an Uber to one of the Ducati stores so Anders could do some shopping, and then took the Metro back to the hotel to rest for an hour. No gelato at all, sadly! We were definitely sliding into later hours for meals as we didn’t get moving again until 8 pm, when we headed out a few blocks away to a sushi place. It turned out to be all-you-can-eat, and we did. Yum! They had a super cute robot that delivered sushi orders to the tables. You patted its head when it had brought your order and its eyes lit up and squinched, and then it returned to the kitchen.
A very long, very draining, very uplifting, very inspiring day altogether!