Rick Steves, our travel go-to, advised going to Vatican City early in the morning to avoid the long lines. We slept in and ended up at St. Peter's with about everyone else. The line moved at a steady pace and wasn't too terrible for us to wait in. The thing that slows everything down is the metal detectors and x-ray machines.
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| St. Peter's Basilica |
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| Waiting in line. |
LOTS and LOTS of Asian Tourists around
Doing THIS! Yep, she is quite the star. Actually this happens all over Europe, but it was really crazy here. Really crazy. She is actually a really good sport about it. Which isn't always a good thing. I try to coach her on just waving and walking by.
Inside St. Peter's. The place is Massive! We spent a couple of hours just looking inside.
Darin in front of Michelangelo's Pieta. Mary holding the crucified Christ. (He was only 24 when he finished this piece) It is behind glass because in the 80s some crazy person took a hammer to Mary's face.
Davis LOVES to look for the "lucky rubbing spots." He can tell because of the different colored metal. He takes every opportunity to rub where a billion other hands have touched, all in the name of Luck.
The tomb of John Paul II
More lucky spots. Waited in line for this opportunity. Although he likes to be lucky, he gets annoyed when his brothers want to follow suit.
Berini's alter in St. Peter's is Massive.
Looking down into the crypt where the tomb of St. Peter is said to be. We weren't willing to pay the extra money to see it.
Kids are done, but the dad is not.
Finally outside. The boys sitting on St. Peter's.
The Swiss guards.
Rome has fountains all over the city. We were constantly filling our water bottles. Probably one of the only trips in which the kids haven't thought they were going to die of thirst.
These are the walls that surround Vatican city/country. They are really tall. We decided that we wanted to walk around the smallest country in the world. We were the only ones that thought that was a fun thing to do. Got us away from the crowds.
Because we timed our visit to St. Peter's badly and waited in lines there, we ended up timing our visit to the Vatican museum and Sistine Chapel perfect! We walked straight up and in. We'd heard of the long lines and the hours of waiting, so when we didn't see lines we had to ask where the entrance was. We ended up being able to walk straight to the ticket booth. Turns out it is quite expensive, especially for a family with a bunch of kids, to visit. But, Pope needs to pay the Swiss guards somehow.
The museum was packed with statues, exhibits, tapestries, paintings, ceiling art etc.
Egyptian Mummy
Noah the Thinker
Cameras aren't allowed in the Sistine Chapel. Davis, being my son and not his rule following father's, snapped a bad blurry picture with his Ipod. I still need to copy it. The guards were constantly reminding people of no cameras, no talking, no fun. My thoughts about the Sistine Chapel...It was different than I'd thought it would be. It was much smaller, rectangle (in my mind it was a dome like the other chapels we've seen), and filled with many scenes from the Bible. The whole Adam/God famous painting is just a small section of the whole painting. Small section.
You walk in to a room in which everyone is looking straight up. Darin picked a really rotten day to have a kink in his neck. Funny watching him try to bend and lean backwards from the waist because his neck wouldn't move. Bad timing.
Vatican City family picture. Anya slept through the museum! Perfect timing.
St. Peter's at night
