This morning we woke to sunshine and beautiful weather. Unfortunately we plan to visit the St. Peter’s Basilica and that meant I needed to wear long legged pants since shorts are not allowed. We headed out on the subway again to get to the Vatican City. Man what a crush that was and of course we are thinking of pick pockets which are common here too.
We walk out of the metro station to look at a wall in front of us, a tall wall. We started to walk in one direction but shortly was stopped by a tourist guide salesperson who wants to sell us a tour of the Vatican Museums (which is were we are headed first).
The Vatican Museums (Italian: Musei Vaticani), in Viale Vaticano in Rome, inside the Vatican City, are among the greatest museums in the world, since they display works from the immense collection built up by the Roman Catholic Church throughout the centuries, including some of the most renowned classical sculptures and most important masterpieces of Renaissance art in the world.
Pope Julius II founded the museums in the early 16th century. The Sistine Chapel and the Stanze della Segnatura decorated by Raphael are on the visitor route through the Vatican Museums. Rather than try to explain all the exhibits we saw I am going to do a pictorial presentation.
However, I feel the need to comment on that incredible size of the museum items, the bright vibrant colors of the paintings, the excellent representations of stories and the details in all aspects of the building and exhibits as being outstanding and worth the visit. If you want a closer look at any of the pictures I have left them in high enough quality that you can zoom into any of the sections. Everywhere you looked we saw expensive designs and decorations to the point of beauty and opulence.
We spent all morning and early afternoon walking through the various museums before leaving and heading over to Saint Peter’s Square. Saint Peter's Square (Italian: Piazza San Pietro) is located directly in front of St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City, the papal enclave within Rome.
The open space which lies before the basilica was redesigned by Gian Lorenzo Bernini from 1656 to 1667, under the direction of Pope Alexander VII, as an appropriate forecourt, designed "so that the greatest number of people could see the Pope give his blessing, either from the middle of the façade of the church or from a window in the Vatican Palace".
The obelisk marked a center, and a granite fountain by Carlo Maderno stood to one side: Bernini made the fountain appear to be one of the foci of the ellipse embraced by his colonnades and eventually matched it on the other side, in 1675, just five years before his death. The trapezoidal shape of the piazza has been praised as a masterstroke of Baroque theatre. On top of the colonnade are 140 statues of saints, crafted by a number of sculptors between 1662 and 1703.
At the center of the ellipse stands an Egyptian obelisk of red granite, 25.5 meters tall, supported on bronze lions and surmounted by the Chigi arms in bronze, in all 41 meters to the cross on its top. It was originally erected at Heliopolis by an unknown pharaoh of the Fifth dynasty of Egypt. The Emperor Augustus had it moved to the Julian Forum of Alexandria, where it stood until year 37 A.D., when Caligula ordered the forum demolished and the obelisk transferred to Rome. He placed it in the center of the Circus, where it would preside over Nero's countless brutal games. It was moved to its current site in 1586 under the direction of Pope Sixtus V. The Vatican Obelisk is the only obelisk in Rome that has not toppled since ancient Roman times.
From the square we headed to climb to the top of the Cupola. On the way up, you can take an elevator for the first part or climb stairs (yep we climbed stairs to save 4 euro and get the exercise since 5 hours on our feet walking has not been enough exercise!). However at the first level we walked out into the inside of Saint Peter’s Cupola so we had a chance to study the incredible artwork on the ceiling. We also had a chance to look down to the floor below and realize how far we had climbed. (I have not measurements to share but trust me, it was a long way down).
We then continued up to the top (320 steps from the walkway inside the cupola) to top of the dome on an outside walkway. The views were breathtaking (which is a problem since by the time you get to the top you have very little breath left) and we just walked and took pictures overlooking the city of Rome in 360 degrees of unobstructed views. Again, let the pictures tell the story.
We returned back to earth to find ourselves inside the Papal Basilica of Saint Peter, officially known in Italian as the Basilica Papale di San Pietro in Vaticano and commonly known as St. Peter's Basilica, is a Late Renaissance church located within the Vatican City. St. Peter's Basilica has the largest interior of any Christian church in the world. It is regarded as one of the holiest Catholic sites. It has been described as "holding a unique position in the Christian world" and as "the greatest of all churches of Christendom".
We completed our tour of the Papal Basilica of Saint Peter and headed to tour the Papal Burial crypts. (no pictures allowed) In Catholic tradition, the basilica is the burial site of its namesake Saint Peter, who was one of the twelve apostles of Jesus and, according to tradition, first Bishop of Rome and therefore first in the line of the papal succession. Tradition and some historical evidence hold that Saint Peter's tomb is directly below the altar of the basilica. For this reason, many Popes have been interred at St Peter's since the Early Christian period. There has been a church on this site since the 4th century. Construction of the present basilica, over the old Constantinian basilica, began on April 18, 1506 and was completed on November 18, 1626.
By the time we leave the Vatican City it is almost 3:30 pm and we have been on the go since 8:30 when we left the hotel. We feel the need to head back to the hotel, find some lunch (yes I know it is late for lunch) and take a rest. We have started a new habit this past few days of eating breakfast, going until mid afternoon (around 3) then stopping for a big lunch/dinner. Then we take a rest and sleep for a couple of hours and then do some more walking in the evening. Today we slept from 5 – 7 and then walked over to see the Trevi Fountain. I brought my tripod so we could try the camera on some night shots.
The Trevi Fountain (Italian: Fontana di Trevi) is a fountain in the Trevi rione in Rome, Italy. Standing 25.9 meters (85 feet) high and 19.8 meters (65 feet) wide, it is the largest Baroque fountain in the city and one of the most famous fountains in the world.
The fountain at the junction of three roads (tre vie) marks the terminal point of the "modern" Acqua Vergine, the revived Aqua Virgo, one of the ancient aqueducts that supplied water to ancient Rome. In 19 BC Roman technicians located a source of pure water some 13 km (8 miles) from the city. However, the eventual indirect route of the aqueduct made its length some 22 km (14 miles). This Aqua Virgo led the water into the Baths of Agrippa. It served Rome for more than four hundred years. The coup de grâce for the urban life of late classical Rome came when the Goth besiegers in 537/38 broke the aqueducts. Medieval Romans were reduced to drawing water from polluted wells and the Tiber River, which was also used as a sewer. The Roman custom of building a handsome fountain at the endpoint of an aqueduct that brought water to Rome was revived in the 15th century, with the Renaissance. In 1453, Pope Nicholas V finished mending the Acqua Vergine aqueduct and built a simple basin, designed by the humanist architect Leon Battista Alberti, to herald the water's arrival.
Once we had finished with the pictures here we decided to take the subway over and take a few night pictures of the coliseum.
That finished our day. I had over 200 pictures from today to sort through and organize. I hope you enjoy the pictures and remember, they can be zoomed in for a closer look at any of them.
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