TRAVELS AND TRIBULATIONS # 326

May 9, 2022

Today was out third and last excursion in Rome for this trip, an exclusive tour to the Vatican Museum and the Sistine Chapel.  Exclusive.  Well, with 5,000 of our closest friends.  But we knew that going in because we’ve been blessed to see the Sistine Chapel before.

Our guide, Katrina, was outstanding.  She has a PhD in history and her commentary was informative, varied, and honest – at one point she said, “Not everything in here is good art.  Some of it is here because there is no place else to put it.”  Love it!

The last section we went in before the Sistine Chapel was the Raphael Rooms.  I have one photo below of one of his paintings.  An outstanding artist, and I enjoyed seeing his work.

When we entered the Chapel, a guard took notice of Mom’s cane and directed us to a place to sit along the side where we could look up and see all of the beautiful paintings – done by one man, standing up, bending his neck back to work, and doing it daily for 4 years.  Well done, Michelangelo!  Many people didn’t obey the rules of silence and no photography, but we didn’t let it diminish our experience of being in that incredible worship space.

The wall of the Vatican.  Behind it is another country.

The dome in the distance is St. Peter's Cathedral

A small section of a wall-covering painting by Raphael. Aristotle is in red, Socrates is in blue.

Let's see if I can get the Pasta Class pictures to load today.

Tada!

Love,

Dad/Pappy/David

* * * * *

Well, I was up at about 6. I sat on the couch and played on my phone till he got up at 7. We both had a shower and dressed for the day and left for some breakfast at 8:30.

Went Mikey’s bar ( actually a quiet café on the corner of the street where the apartment is ). We both had a croissant drizzled with some honey and sprinkled with sugar. He had a coffee. After breakfast we headed for the metro to go to the Vatican. It takes about 30 minutes to walk from our place to the metro. We rode A today. It was rush hour time and we had to wait for the second train. Even that was standing room only and we hung on to the bars inside. We had a 20 minute ride. Very few people got off just more and more got on, packed like sardines. Most had masks. When we got to our stop it is basically push and shove to get off. The people start getting on before you can get off. They don’t know Gibb’s Rule 65!! Well, we were early. We started to follow the few meager directions we were given. We had a hour to find the steps we were to meet on beside the Caffe Vaticano. It is a good thing because the directions lead us no where. We stopped at a farmacia to ask for some help. A young man told us two lefts and a right. WRONG! We wound up walking off in the wrong direction for quite a while. Some how with one street name we were able to finally stumble onto the right set of steps and find the person with the flag. We got there with 10 minutes to spare. There were 10 of us in the group. All were Americans. One, a young jock,  from Charlotte NC, a couple from Utah and some others. I think there were 2 married couples beside us and two pairs of single couples.

 One person was late and they would only wait to 10:40 because you have a time constraint on entering. We were to enter at 10:30. She did not arrive.  We left without her. You have to wear a N95 or the Italian equivalent FFP2 mask. There were multitudes of guys selling the masks harassing you if you didn’t have the right mask to buy one. Definitely annoying. We had to wear the mask in through 2 or 3 checkpoints including a metal detector, which I set off and nobody did anything about.  The guide had told us outside we might have to show our vaccination card but nobody asked for it. Before we picked up the ear pieces to wear so we could hear the guide it was off to the toilette. There was a sign which said no drinks or food allowed in the museum. So we tossed our bottle of water. Shouldn’t have bothered because most people were carrying a bottle and drinking from it. No one said anything to them. Even though we were constantly walking past guards on duty.

We got our ear pieces which were extremely hard to put on with my glasses and the masks. It felt like it was falling off the whole time. The guide explained that it was impossible to see everything. If you looked at everything for one minute it would take you 5 years. So she picked the painter Raphael and we followed around basically on a path looking at his works and listening to stories about him. It was quite interesting. We saw a lot of other tapestries and, sculptures, paintings , etc.  In a large court area they have set up billboards which show the Sistine chapel and everything there because when you get there the guide leaves you as she can not talk in there. 

There are MANY steps up and up and down and down but finally we got to the chapel. As Dad said a guard pointed out a seat and we sat and enjoyed the beauty. I was trying to see it all and identify as many scenes as I could. The number of people in there was almost constantly about 500. They kept announcing “silenceo” and no photographs. And people just ignored them. It was very loud. I remember the last time we were here that it was absolutely silent. How times have changed. There are to be no shorts or revealing tops allowed, but there were many and the guards generally ignored it all. They would walk up to people taking pictures and tell them “no” but they just walked to the other end of the room and took them there. 

All of the souvenir places that used to be in the building as you walked through had been removed and there were only places as you went to the exits. We actually got lost trying to find our way out. But finally we did and used the toilette before we left.  The path down and out is a winding wide corkscrew pathway that had tiny steps and goes on almost forever it seems. But we finally got out safely. 

Bought one small souvenir. We exited right where we had entered and since it was after 12:30, we went to the Caffe Vaticano and had lunch sitting down. Way overpriced place, but we were hungry, thirsty and tired. We each had a bottle of still water (only drank one). I had spaghetti with tomato sauce and he had spaghetti carbonara. He also had a coffee Americano.  Then, we went outside and they had a gelato stand and we indulged (also very overpriced). I had cherry and caramel. He had chocolate and coffee. Very good. We ate it as we walked back to where we thought the Metro was. We were correct. We had to eat it before we got on the metro.

Again the metro was crowded and had more and more people as we rode back to the Rome termini. But we did manage to get a seat this time but had to push and shove when it was time to get off. We actually got lost [NO WE DIDN'T. WE WERE JUST CONFUSED] in the metro station but finally managed to find our way out. 

By this time it was after 3 and we were both very tired. We started our 30 minute walk back to the room. Glad when we finally got there. Took a short nap and then packed our suitcases in preparation for our departure tomorrow morning. We will get up early so we can leave by 8:30 for our 11:30 train ride. It is a first class train ride so it should be very nice. The next time we write we will be in Venice.

Love you all. Mom, Granny and Bonnie

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