July 1: Rome, The Vatican museum, Sistine chapel, & St. Peter's Basillica

We packed up and left our room this morning, stopping at the BeeHive reception to leave our bags while we went to explore, and to have some breakfast in their little underground cafe. 

 

Good bye, teeny tiny room.

Waiting for the little elevator which we entirely filled with our bags and ourselves.

 

 

 

After breakfast we took the metro to Vatican city (the third country we visited on this trip 😉), where we took a guided tour of the Vatican Museum, the Sistene Chapel and St. Peter's Basillica. The lines to get into the Vatican museum stretched far down the street and it would have taken hours to get in without a tour. Even with the tour we had to wait a half hour to get to the door an another half an hour for security and to collect our audio headsets to listen to our guide. 

In all of our trip so far this is where we have seen the most amount of people crammed into one space. 

Apparently the Pope has declared a special year of Jubilee so there are countless numbers of pilgrims visiting Vatican city now, above and beyond the normal rush of summer travelers. 

The museum sights were breathtaking. I feel like you could spend all day in each hallway and still not get enough. 

The floors, walls, and ceilings are works of art in and of themselves, covered with mosaics, frescos, and tapestries. 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

This is a modern art sculpture in the courtyard garden. It is a sphere within a sphere. It symbolizes our soul within our body. With a slight push our guide started it slowly spinning. It was beautiful. 

The Sistene chapel was amazing. I wanted to lie on the floor for a full day to take it all in. We weren't allowed to take pictures though. 

Next we walked through St. Peter's Basilica. Wow! It is the largest basillica in the world and more inpressive than most museums. It was like a dozen beautiful cathedrals in one. 

 

 

 

So many people!

 

In front of the basillica. 

 

The famous swiss guards. Body guards of the pope. 

After leaving the Vatican we took the metro back to the hostel and collected our bags and then had a quick bite to eat at the train station before leaving for Florence. 

We took the high speed Italo train which got there in an hour and 20 minutes at a speed of over 160 mph. 

We took a bus a short ways to find our air b&b. It is a nice apartment with 3 guest rooms. We have one room and a private bathroom; there is a living room and kitchen that are shared by all guests. 

After a rest and a shower we headed out to a nearby trattoria to get dinner and watch the Euro Cup game between Wales and Belgium. Burt enjoyed the game. Wales won. ⚽️

 

It gets dark so late here. I am still getting used to it. We got back to the apartment and it was almost midnight!