Vatican City

On Sunday morning I got the 'red line' subway to the Vatican. It was a nice little 1 euro ride to the other side of the city so no complaints. Once there, the line to get inside was nearly wrapped around all of the walls. On every last Sunday of each month it's free to get into the Vatican, so naturally everyone comes out. Stood in line for 2 hours to get in. Once in, it was overwhelming. There was so much to look at.

I noticed they had the same spherical monument that Trinity has. Apparently there are a few in the world. No matter where you look, up, down, left, right, straight ahead, behind you, everywhere there was some other piece of priceless art. It took about 90 minutes to walk through the Vatican museum and the last stop was the Sistine Chapel. I made my first purchase here, a 4 gig memory card for my camera.

From there we walked to St. Peter's Basilica. This is where are the columns around a huge square are in the pictures. Apparently there are over 60,000 people buried there, but the coolest one is Peter, the disciple to deny Jesus 3 times. Yup, that one. You walk thru that section and see all these tombs and we even passed by coffin of the last Pope. They had a little place where you could stand and look at it and not cause traffic, and people were standing there or kneeling there praying at the coffin, including nuns. The next stop was actually the coolest for me b/c it was Peter's tomb. It was behind several panes of glass and it was the most decorated but nobody seemed to realize what they were looking at. When I said something to LeeAnn after we walked out she didnt even notice it. I know Catholics want to see the Pope. But that Pope will eventually be forgotten like the others. Peter tho, he lived with Jesus. But sadly, Jesus isnt always the main 'character' in stories and depictions, from what I saw. Oh well, I still took from it what I liked. Next we walked into the sanctuary of the Basilica. This was just as much or even more glamorous than Vatican museum. Gold, marble, glass, crystal, paintings, sculptures, mosaics. In the back right was a sculpture by Michelangelo of Mary holding Christ's body after his crucifixion.

We got lunch at a place a little disappointing, as sad tourist place, and I was going to stay with LeeAnn for mass but I was so sore and tired, I grabbed the subway back to our place to rest for a bit. Then met back up at the Trevi Fountain for more gelato and dinner at the same place as the night before. We shared the lasagna and a pizza.