Day 4 - From Rome to Florence

Day 3 Part 2 - The Vatican and the Borghese

 You can pay 7 euro for the privilege of climbing to the top of the dome on St. Peters.  It involves hundreds of steps up the narrow passageway.   The higher you get up inside the dome, the more the walls curve to match the outer shape of the dome.  This is not recommended if you (like the poor girl in front of me) are claustrophobic and decide to have a panic attack halfway up.  There is no emergency exit.  There is nowhere to go.  The stairs up are a one-way route.  You have to take different stairs to get down.  I have no idea how long it took her to climb past people on the way down. 

I'm not leaning.  It's the walls that curve.

Regardless of the effort involved, the views were spectacular.  This is a view right back down into St. Peter's square.  Rome is in the background across the Tiber River.  

Here is a zoomed in shot of Rome taken from the Dome.  Our Bed and Breakfast was just to the left of the Coliseum.  It was not a difficult walk to get from one end of this photo to the other.  Rome is easily accessible on foot.

Click on the photo to see it in its high resolution glory.

Having survived the ascent, I got this photo of Miranda with the dome behind her.  We are actually on the roof of the Basilica in this shot.  

Standing on the roof of the basilica after surviving the climb to the top of the dome.

A look back towards the square from the front of the basilica.  You can see the line of people along the back of the square, waiting to pass through the metal detectors in order to gain entrance to the church.  You can also see the scaffolding that has been set up for the news crews that were there to cover the papal conclave.

All things considered, the crowds in the square were reasonable.  I imagine they get much worse during peak season.

The statue of St. Peter makes a handy perch for a bird keeping an eye out for its next dive bombing victim.

That's me in front of the basilica.  Look at the people standing along the railing in front of the church.  Look how tiny they appear compared to the building.   The scope and scale of this church can not be described.  It has to be experienced.

One of the fountains in the square.

There is huge gap in time between photos here.  After St. Peter's, we jumped back on the Metro and hurried back to Rome.  We had reservations for the Borghese Gallery.  The Borghese was easily my favorite museum in all of Italy.  It was a small museum, but there seemed to be a masterpiece in every room.  Sculptures by Bernini (David, Rape of Proserpina, Apollo and Daphne) and paintings by Caravaggio, Raphael, Rubens, and Correggio were absolutely stunning.  If I could recommend one museum this would be it.  2 hours of amazement.  Unfortunately, the Borghese strictly enforces a no camera policy, but you will just have to take my word for it.  You can look at their Wikipedia page for examples of a number of their works.

We had some time to kill before our 9:30 dinner reservations, so we rested and talked for a bit on the Spanish Steps.  You can see a photo of us "talking" below.

And then dinner.  Oh yeah.  Dinner.  So amazing.  

Quit taking pictures so I can eat!

Day 3 Part 1 - The Vatican City

Day 2 - Leaving the Country

We woke up early and caught the metro to the Vatican City, the smallest country in the world.  First stop was the Vatican Museum.  It houses the art that has been collected by the Catholic Church over the years.  The sheer scope of the museum is staggering.  This hallway of marble busts shows just how overwhelming the museum can be.  At times your eyes just start to glaze over.  To truly appreciate the collections that span the several miles it would take multiple return visits.

I think I've got the look down.

This shot of the hallway of maps, shows just how amazing the museum is.  It's not just collections of art that make the museum significant, it's the museum itself.  In nearly every hallway and room, you had to remember to look up.

Walking along one of the hallways in the musem, I glanced out the window and took this photo of the dome of St Peter's Basilica.  You can see how close the two buildings are together.   More signifcantly, you can see the nondescript brown building that makes up the lower left corner of the photo.  That is west end of the Sistine Chapel.  The chapel, with its famous ceiling, is normally part of the museum, but was closed when we came through.  They gave us some lame excuse about a group of Cardinals choosing a new Pope. 

Probably one of the more famous museum exits in the world.

Once we finished with the museum, we traveled around to St Peter's Square.  The simple fact is this.  Pictures and words can not do justice to the sheer size of these buildings.  You can look at photos all day long, but when you walk into St Peter's for the first time, it is simply mind numbing at the scope and scale.  It's similar to staring into the Grand Canyon.  At some point your brain just gives up trying to comprehend the size.

Resting our weary legs on the pews.

The interior of the dome.  Once again, it is almost impossible to fathom the size of that dome.

 They had set up this scaffolding in the back of the square to accommodate the news crews that had traveled from all around the world to cover the papal conclave.

 Michelangelo's Pieta.  One of his more famous sculptures.  This was one of the few works that is protected by bullet proof glass.  The church felt it was necessary after a crazy man attacked the statue with a hammer in 1972.

Rest up.  For our next post, we are going to climb the dome.

Day 2 - Part 2 - Downtown

Day 2 - Part 2

After spending the entire morning exploring the ruins of Ancient Rome, we trecked up into the city center to explore the more modern areas.  (Never mind that the more "modern" parts of Rome still predate the start of our country by a few hundred years.)  After a delicious lunch we tried to avoid the rain by ducking into the original gothic churches in Rome.  Santa Maria sopra Minerva.  Besides the classic Gothic architecture, it was fascinating to be able to walk up the sculpture of Christ and Cross and see that it was an original Michelangelo.  No security guards.  No rope holding you back.  No plexiglass.  Just you, and the church, and the art.

The altar at Santa Maria sopra Minverva

 One block away from the church was the famed Pantheon.  I won't lie.  I had heard of the Pantheon, but until our 30 minute audio tour, I had no idea what it was.  Interesting facts:  The hole (oculus) in the center of the dome is a permanent fixture.  I guess having a giant hole in the ceiling solved the centuries old problem of getting some decent light into a cavernous building that has no windows.  While we were there it was raining, and the rain came straight down through the oculus in the dome make a large wet spot on the marble floor.  The dome is the worlds largest un-reinforced concrete dome.  (Yes, you are standing under 9,000 lbs of concrete.)  The Pantheon has been in continuous use since its construction.  In addition to a couple of Italian Kings the Pantheon also contains the tomb of the famous artist Raphael.

This is an 8 shot panorama of the interior.

Touring the Pantheon was exhausting, so it was time for some gelato.  We found a colorful, but somewhat generic gelato shop behind the Pantheon. 

 

Once we were done with our gelato, we did the only sensible thing we could think of.  We walked around until we could eat more gelato.  This time we ended up at one of the most famous gelato shops in all of Rome the world.  Giolitti.  We benefited from it being somewhat off season and the cool weather.  In the summer months, there can be lines out the door and down the street.

 
This wasn't even the half of it.  And all of it is fresh , from scratch, made on site from all natural ingredients.

Strawberry and Pistachio.  Keep in mind, that the "ch" in Italian is pronounced like a "k" so when in Rome, it's sounds more like "pistackio".  However you say it, it's delicious.

I took this next picture to illustrate one point.  Doors in Rome are HUGE.  I swear that ancient Romans must have all been 15 feet tall.  Everywhere we looked there were these gigantic doors.  It was really something.

 At this point we started wandering.  We walked around a corner and woah... Trevi Fountain.  That's quite the site to see when aren't expecting it.  It was on our itinerary for later but I think it was more fun to be suprised.  It is surrounded by buildings, so you don't see it until you are right on top of it.  And it is huge.  Really impressive.

 

At this point we were pretty exhausted so we started to wander back towards the hotel.  At one point I glanced back and saw this site.  The dome at St. Peter's Basilican (in the Vatican City) across the rooftops.  From where I took the photo, the dome is almost 2 miles away.  It's almost always visible from high points because by law no building in Rome is allowed to be taller.  (At least that's what I regularly read.  I don't know if that law is still on the books.)  That's where we are headed tomorrow.

Day 2 - Part 1 - Ancient Rome

Our hotel was conveniently located about 2 blocks from The Colosseum.  So that was our first stop on our tour of ancient Rome.  Some of the more interesting facts about the Colosseum include: In ancient times admission was free, but there was reserved seating and you had to have a ticket (a seat number written on a broken piece of pottery.)  In modern times admission is decidedly not free.  

Also, after it was no longer en vogue to have bloody battles to the death (around the 6th century), the Colosseum was used for storage, a market, a quarry and housing.  Finally, in 1749 Pope Benedict the XIV decided that because of all the Christians who had been martyred here, the site should be protected and preserved due to its historical significance.  The irony?  There is no record of any Christians ever being fed to the lions here, despite the endless Hollywood portrayals.

An 8 shot Panorama of the interior.

Standing on the second level of the Colosseum, you can look out and see the Arch of Constantine.  Interesting fact about this particular arch: Much of the work was stolen recycled from other works and reassembled here to create this ode to Constantine.

 Here is a shot of Miranda sitting in front of the Arch with the Colosseum behind her.

And finally a shot of me.  Miranda was determined that she not end up in every photo.  There needed to be some documentation that I was there.  You can see how close the Arch and the Colosseum are in this photo.

This is a rather unassuming photo, but the foundations and columns in this photo are what's left of the Roman Forum.  The political and cultural center of the world for hundreds of years.  Now there are just rocks and rubble.

Miranda listens to an audio guide with some huge building behind her.  I have no idea what that building is.  That's how amazing Rome is.  You have incredible buildings like this on every corner, and while they would be the centerpiece of many other towns, here they are "just another big building".

Miranda waiting patiently, while I stop to take another photo.  Again.

We finally made it out of the Forum and climbed Capitoline Hill.  This is the Altare della Patria (Altar of the Fatherland).  The men you see in the photo below are guarding Italy's Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

The polished marble around the buildings was incredibly slick in the rain.  Also, Miranda looked really good with those ancient domes behind her.  Also, she was sick of me taking her picture.

And that takes us to lunch on Day 2.