The Vatican City

We booked into a great hotel in Rome, the only thing was it was the last stop on the metro so a bit far outside of the city, other than that it was great and safe parking for the bike. They had a shuttle to the metro stop in the morning and at night but we never managed to catch the ones at night as we didn’t time it right, so we walked a lot. By the time we were done Rome our feet were killing us and we were pooped, no one told me that travelling was so tiring?

There is so much to see in Rome, not only the main heritage sites but all the fountains, museums, churches, squares, shops etc. You could spend a month in this city and still not see it all.

We really enjoyed the Vatican City with St. Peters Basilica, said to be the biggest and richest church and built on the spot where St. Peter was buried, then onto the Sistine Chapel – wow. It makes me wish I had paid a little better attention in Sunday School because every painting tells a story and i didn’t know them all – shame on me. Trev said its the first church he has been in that gave him goosebumps but it still confuses him how much is spent in the show of power? We hardly had to line up for St. Peters Basilica and it was free to go in, we paid to go up to the top but didnt have to pay to go into the basement with the tombs of all the popes, there were people praying in front of the popes grave, the pope that most recently died, it is quite something to be in the presence of such faith, got to say a few prayers ourselves, very lovely. I thought about mom and dad and how they would have loved to visit here, I dont believe they ever did? and I still get to go to the Holy Land, I feel like when I'm here sometimes they are her with me so its ok.

The paintings are amazing, you are just mesmorized by them, you can just sit and look around for hours without moving from the same spot, we both decided to walk backwards, as we looked up at the ceiling and thru the halls of the Sistine Chapel as it was much easier to see the pictures, we got a bit dizzy and some funny looks but it just worked better, we started a real trend.

Sometimes we feel like a couple of kids that have skipped school, this travelling is too fun!

We bought the Rome Pass for $25.00 each but we wouldn’t recommend it as its not for the Vatican City at all, it covers the Collosseum and the Forum and two museums, all the buses and metro for 3 days but we still don’t think we got our monies worth out of it. By the time we had done the Vatican, the collosseum, the Forum and Palatine Hill, Piazza Navona, Trevi Fountain, Piazza de Campidoglio and more we were pooped and done with old roman ruins, our sponges were full, so we didn’t get to any museums.

Rome is not cheap, even if you can find a beer a pizza for $10.00 euro you get a bit sick of pizza.

You can easily get lost in Rome, the metro was great but the streets are really confusing especially when we are both going blind, neither of us could see the tiny maps clearly. It is a city however for great pictures, Trevor got lots of those!! One night we also found a quaint little restaurant for dinner, what caught our eye was the 3 kinds of mushrooms sitting in the baskets outside, the chef made us a great pasta made with all these mushrooms, yum. Plus we met a dutch couple that night and had the most interesting, unusual and lovely conversation and evening, sometimes you just meet people who beat to the same drum as you and its really energizing! I love it.

The Vatican City is quite big and well laid out, we were so lucky not to have to spend any time in lineups.