Day 3 Part I - Vatican City

We started out the day by heading over to Vatican City for our 9:30 entry reservation. When we got there, there was a line that stretched for about half a mile around the city walls to get tickets, but because Kari thought ahead and reserved us tickets we were actually able to skip the ~2 hour wait to get in. We decided to rent headsets for the museum, which definitely added a lot to the experience. There is an overwhelming amount of magnificent art in the building, but being able to hear short clips about the significance, the creation process, and the funny stories behind each piece really gave personality to everything we saw. Here are a few of our favorites:

A fully intact Egyptian mummy

Kari standing next to the giant bronze pine cone in the courtyard. I was fully expecting the audioguide to explain that this was a powerful symbol, or that there was some religious connotation assigned to pinecones, but, even the British narrator simply described it as a giant bronze pine cone.

This was a beautiful courtyard full of sculptures depicting Greek and Roman mythological figures. I've always loved Greek mythology, so I'll post a few of my favorites:

The statue of Laocoon, the Trojan priest who advised his city to burn the giant wooden horse left by the Greeks. According to the myth, the serpents depicted here were sent from the sea by Athena and Poseidon to kill the priest and his two sons. With the dissenter destroyed, the Trojans accepted the wooden horse, leading to Greek victory in Troy.

The victorious Perseus, holding the head of the slain Medusa.

In a nearby hallway was this massive bronze statue of Hercules.

Nearly every floor was covered in gorgeous Roman tiling:

And, again, I was blown away by the beauty of the artwork found on the ceilings of almost every single chamber:


The next section of the museum we explored contained a series of rooms with massive Frescoes, many either painted by, or designed by, Raphael. They were simply stunning, due not only to their beauty, but also to their enormous size and scale (which I'm sure is not captured in these photos).









Next followed a series of exhibits of religious artifacts numbering in the thousands, all gorgeous and impeccably preserved, as well as a series of exhibits of modern Catholic art. Here are a few highlights:




Unfortunately many of the most amazing rooms and exhibits (like the Sistine Chapel) actually forbid cameras, and many of the rooms forbid flashes, which is why many of the photos are a bit blurry, and why most of Michelangelo's highlights are missing.

After a few hours wandering the halls of the Vatican Museum we sat outside on a patio for a rest with a nice view of our next stop, St Peter's:


Arriving at St Peter's square you can't help but be blown away by the scale. It's really impossible to describe in writing or depict in photographs, but both the square itself and St Peter's Basilica were simply enormous. And aside from the shear size of everything, the beauty of every detail of both the outside and inside of the church were absolutely stunning. Every statue perched 100 ft above you in the square would be beautiful enough to be the centerpiece of a museum exhibit, and lining every wall, ceiling, nook, and cranny of St Peter's Basilica were shockingly beautiful pieces of art that you could spend hours admiring. And there were dozens upon dozens of these beauties filling every open space along the walls of the Basilica. It's really impossible to describe it in writing, but those of you who have been there can understand, I'm sure. Here are some photos that really don't do St Peter's square and Basilica justice (if you can't tell by my gushing, this was definitely my favorite part of the trip thus far):

Kari standing in front of the Basilica



It's getting late here and we've had a very long day, so I'm going to pause for the moment, with the promise of many more photos to come tomorrow. We've got hundreds of shots from the inside of the Basilica, the Pantheon, and a few other sites we saw yesterday afternoon, and, if we can figure out how to do so, I will try to upload some videos we took as well.

Goodnight from Rome

-Dan