The Vatican
Today is the Day we see the Vatican! We had been warned that we may have to wait in line for house to enter the different sections of “Vatican City” as this is one of the most popular tourist attractions in Rome! (It strictly speaking is not part of Rome as it is in itself a different country and not governed by the Italian Government but by the Roman Catholic Church who own “Vatican City”)
We had an early breakfast, then took the short walk to Saint Peters Square to line up to enter the Vatican, things did not look good the line was already quite long but to our surprise it was moving quickly, and soon we were on the steps of Saint Peter's Basilica We walked past the Swiss Guards and into the Basilica itself, this was the Biggest and grandest of all the Churches owned by the Roman Catholic church.
The Building that stands in this site now was Built in the early 1500’s and has been added to and beautified by many of the Churches leaders (Popes) with many statues, murals and paintings, all of which are very beautiful.
We spent a long time just looking at the architecture, and the artwork marvelling at the details, and the shape and size of the supporting arches and domes.
We moved no from here to see the Sistine Chapel which has the most magnificent painting on it ceiling, a painting done in the 1500’s by the Italian artist Michelangelo this work took many years to complete, and is the story behind the movie “The Agony and the Ecstasy!”
Again we were told that the wait to get into the Museum and the Sistine Chapel would take time in fact hours, we set off on our walk around the outside of Vatican City to ward the entrance, it was not far and we soon reached the end of the line of people waiting to get in! it again did not look good as it was a long line, but like before it was moving reasonably Quick and it was only a 30 minute wait!
As we entered the museum we saw many artefacts from all over the Ancient Western World, there were statues from Ancient Greece and Egypt, as well as many other pieces of artwork.
Room after Room was filled with paintings of the great western masters some were very big filing the entire wall others were small enough to wear as a broach. Here we were allowed to take as many photographs as we liked (Which you can see in my Album) We even saw mosaics made with tiny pieces of glass they were made as broaches to wear but were very detailed, all of these things took our breath away with their beauty.
Eventually we arrived in the Sistine Chapel itself here unfortunately we were strictly forbidden to take photographs, and if we even looked like using a camera we were stopped. I did not really mind as I do not think any photograph just “SNAPPED” could do the artwork any justice photos here needed to be setup very carefully with on one else around so that light and exposure could be controlled! This ceiling needs to be seen words and photos do not do it any real justice! It is the most beautiful painting I have ever seen the size and the details are unbelievable! This was undoubtable the highlight of our visit!
We left Vatican city ad decided to once again walk the streets of Rome revisiting many of the places we had seen, like the Spanish steps, this time Carolann did not accept the roses that were forced into hand the first time (for which I later had to pay much more than they were worth) and on to the Trevi Fountain again. (This time it was dark when we arrived so I took more photos to contrast with the daylight photos)
Later we had a romantic dinner in a small restaurant near our hotel returning to our room for our last night in the Romantic city of Rome as tomorrow we were to catch a train to Tuscany for our week long stay in the medieval town of Lucca
Copyright
Viewgrant Pty Ltd 2025
Richardsclan
Welcome to Herman and Carolann’s Travels to Europe
Italy Trip 2008