Rome day 2

We woke up early again and headed to Vatican City to visit the Vatican Museum and St. Peter's Basilica (this was also dedicated to Uncle Tim and we thought about him a few times during the day). As the final day of our 3 week trip, we thought it was be fitting to have a relaxing day in the sacred city. First on the agenda was the Vatican Museum.  

Representative picture of the Vatican wall.

 St. Peter's dome

 

We started our tour of the religious memorabilia by looking at some paintings. The was about 10 or so rooms filled with gorgeous art; most of which arose during the Renaissance era. One of the famous ones was Rafael’s last painting. We’ll get to more of him later.

A practice sketch next to the final project to see the progression.

More amazing pieces of art.

Here is model of a statue using metal bars, sticks, and dried mud to practice on before sculpting the real thing.

Next we strolled down sculpture row. There was a couple rooms and courtyards dedicated to the topic.

Hall of sculptures.

Famous sculpture that was found and given to Michelangelo. He decided to leave it as is.

Another room.

We continued our journey through a few long hallways. One displayed old maps (can kind of see the maps - but the ceiling was impressive too).

After more rooms we arrived at one of the highlights of the museum, Raphel’s rooms.

FYI, Raphel was a stud – the Magic Johnson of his time (haha). His gift was discovered at a young age. At age 20 he was one of the top painters in the land. It was at this time that he was given 3 rooms to completely paint. This rooms held special importance with the Pope and the clergy.

When we arrived to the rooms, we were amazed. There were 3 rooms entirely covered with a colorful fresco. Each painting was a story or a unique scene that had a large meaning behind it. Fortunately for us, we were able to share a audio guide and learned the meanings behind the paintings. Quite special. He had a very imaginative mind at such a young age. However, this playboy died at a young age due to a STD. Guess he couldn’t contain the popularity. It’s a shame.

Raphel's room.

Raphel's room.

After Raphel’s rooms we finished with the “greatest painting of all time.” Everyone goes to the Vatican Museum just to see this part. It is the room that everyone knows. Its Michelangelos 4 year project. It houses the Pope’s election. It’s something that could be stared at for hours. Could it live up to its hype? Yes it did! What is it? It is one and only, the infamous, the never surpassed, the magnificent  Sistine Chapel. When we entered the Sistine Chapel we were blown away. The colored frescos filled the walls and ceiling. It was similar to the other great ceiling paintings (Duomo in Florence, Raphel’s rooms, and the numerous others), but now on a much greater scale. There was a few extremely famous sections that we felt honored to see. The room was broken down into 3 main parts. 

1) The Last Judgment on the front wall.

2) Man’s salvation depicted on the ceiling.

3) Jesus compared to Moses on the side walls.`

     

The Last Judgement shows Jesus’s glorious resurrections and conquering hell. The painting is done in great detail. The bottom of the wall is covered with Hellish characters and angels fighting each other. Up the wall, were more angels and famous religious leaders (Peter, Paul, Mary, etc). Further up the wall is all the angels in heaven. It’s a amazingly graphical piece. It is legendary because of its location (Vatican), its size, detail, imagery, human body characteristics, and overall colorfulness. It was a beautiful sight.

The ceiling was just as impressive. There were 9 main paintings, in 3 sets of 3. First 3 were the creation of the sun, earth, and stars (?). The next three were the creation of man and the original sin. The creation of man (Adam and God’s fingers nearly touching), is probably most famous of the entire room. The last 3 dealt with man overcoming sin and finding salvation. We were amazed at all of it. The creation painting was neat to see in person. Because of its hype, we thought it would take up a larger part of the room. Nevertheless, it was still astonishing.

Lastly, along the sides of the wall were 5 pictures of Jesus on one side and 5 pictures of Moses on the other. Each painting dealt with an important moment in their respected lives.

We spent an hour in the tourist filled room. There was constant yelling of the guards to be silent and stop taking photos. We wished we could have experienced the Chapel alone and with music on. When your cramped in the room like sardines, you tend to lose the connection. St. Peters Basilica was also filled with tourists and it was our next stop.

Cute picture of the old Pope John Paul II - a great man. His looks very young there. From the picture, you could imagine what he would look like as a child. 

Since we had heard numerous great things about St Peters Basilica, we wanted to make a proper entrance into the church. Therefore, we held hands, lowered our heads, and walked through the doors. Once inside we walked to the center of the main aisle with our head still down. We took a deep breath and counted to 3. Then we both looked up and gazed upon the immaculate sight. Chills ran down our spines and goose bumps crawled down our arm. It was another "WoW" moment for us. Being the largest church in the world, its monstrosity along blew us away. However, the best parts were the structure in the center of the church and the artful masterpiece laying beyond the alter. The pictures can show you what they were better than a description. Both were deep dark brown bronze with gold accents. A rich combo that we haven’t seen before. We immediately felt privileged to be standing where we were.

Along the sides of the church were numerous memorials to previous popes/saints.

Probably the most famous side piece was the original Pieta. Its Mary holding dead Jesus.

Under the main alter is St. Peter's remains. They were already there when they built the church. So in essence, they built the church on top of his grave. 

We toured the church until mass. Since it was a Saturday and we would be traveling all day on Sunday, we thought it would be a great idea to attend their Latin service at 5 o’clock. Glad we looked into this, because it was easily the highlight of the day. It carried so much soothing powers and completed our trip in an almost perfect way. Sitting in the 2^nd row, we were able to simply admire the masterpiece behind the alter. It is hands down the best. Interestingly, the design reminded us of LOST (most things do). It appears to be gold smoke building up from the base behind St. Peter’s Chair. If Jacob was gold smoke on LOST, that would have been sooo cool. Anyways, back to the mass. The service was in Latin, which was different, but a good experience. Thankfully, the priest took 4-5 mins at the end of his homily to summarize the 1^st, 2^nd, and gospel readings or we would have been lost. Overall, great great Great experience and by far the most relaxing part of the trip. It completed our trip entirely.

After mass, with the lights still on.

Outside after mass.












View of Vatican city. That's pretty much it.

A cool bridge near Vatican City.

 

After St Peters, we went to a suburbs of Rome that is known for having great food, Traverse. After roaming around the streets for a bit, we found a good Pizzeria to sit down at. Yes, our 2^nd prepared meal for us. Just like everything over seas, it was a small portion for a lot of money, but it was Italian pizza and it was very tasty.

With that we got a bus to the subway and got our bags from the storage area. Next we caught a train to the airport. There is a direct express shuttle from downtown to the airport for 14 euros ($21) and that is what everyone uses. But we were able to find local train outside the city that had a stop at the airport. So we made our way to that train and got to the airport for 1 euro. We sacrificed time, but at this point, we didn’t have much money and we had plenty of time to give. We arrived at the airport at 11 pm and found a nice floor to rest before our 8 am flight (trains from downtown Rome don’t leave until 6 and we wouldn’t have enough time to check in). After getting an hour or 2 of sleep we caught a plane to Madrid, then to NYC, then home to Columbus. A very long travel day, we made it safely home. At the end, we only had 0.20 euros left over. Now that’s great budgeting!

 It was a trip of a life time and shared priceless experiences along the way. With the help of parents, grandparents, aunts/uncles, good friends, and bosses, we were able to make the trip. Thanks to everyone for following the blog. Can’t wait to talk about it in person.  

Rome day 1

Rome – the final leg of the race… the last stop of our journey… the city that concludes our adventure.

Just going to start the blog off the right way. Rome was the best!!! Easily.

 

Now when we say best, we mean best tourist city. We don’t think we could live here, but if you want to visit a city rich in culture, has modern and ancient history side by side, great food, the Catholic church, and many other perks, Rome is the place to be. Even though we are feeling the fatigue of our trip, Rome kept us going. Every corner brought something new. Two days was not enough, but we explored from sun up to sun down and got as much out of it as possible (hence the late blog updates). Proof that Rome was a great tourist city was done by counting the number photos we took during the day. Even though we were conserving our batteries, we took 50 more pictures than the 2^nd highest city (Paris). That says enough.

We arrived into Rome late. We were hoping to see the city at night but we ran into some complications with our hotel. After getting everything sorted, we just went to bed.

We got up early on Friday morning to beat the lines into the Coliseum and the ancient ruins (Palatine Hill and Roman Forum). Thankfully, this portion of the trip was dedicated by Steven’s recently deceased uncle Tim. Thanks Tim! [On a side note, Amanda’s temporarily cell phone service in Rome is TIM – not sure what it stands for, but it was ironic and very fitting]. Our plan worked. We got the combo ticket for all sites without any wait. First we headed to Palatine Hill. There we saw the old buildings of Rome back in the 100s-300s AD. As you can see, its’ just bricks laying around in formation to what once was. It was fun to try and imagine the city life back then or games preformed at the stadiums. A museum on the grounds played a interesting movie that depicted the structures back then. They showed shining white marble floors, columns, fountains, and hot spring baths.

View from Palatine hill - that is St Peters

Inside one of their museums.

 

We then made our way to the Roman Forum. This part of the city was preserved from a later time period. Here we could imagine shops, a town hall, and large buildings from the tiny remnants left over. There was a couple small museums close to the forum that we briefly walked through too.

Up next was “The Beast.” Its the place where everlasting entertainment for the greatest of all took place and its one of the wonders of the ancient world. It upheld on its own pedestal. It’s the one and only, Thy Coliseum. It was truly a mighty beast (Steven’s word). 

Since we bought the combo pass, we skipped the hour wait and walked right in. Because we have seen numerous pictures of the place, there was not a huge “WoW,” but that did not belittle its greatness. The place was massive. Just as an example, the 2000 year old structure housed attendances similar to that of the Manchester City soccer stadium that we went to 3 weeks ago. Now that is a wonder.  

While inside, we spent over an hour and a half walking around, taking pictures, and reading some interesting facts about the place. It said that 500,000 people and 1 million animals died at that stadium. It wasn’t until the Catholic church stepped in, did it stop. Similar to the ruins, it was fun to point out sections of the Coliseum to each other and pretend what and who used to be there. Can you imagine how many people in the world over the last 2000 years has been or seen that place? It’s quite astonishing and humbling to think about it.

We tried our best to duplicate Steven’s brother (Tom) Coliseum picture when he visited it a couple years back. Steven had a mental picture of the background of Tom’s picture, but once inside it was hard to do.  We are curious to compare Tom’s picture when we return to see the difference.

(If this one is from a different, don’t worry we took a few just to make sure)

We spent 6 hours and half hours of the day at the 2 attractions. With 12 or so different attractions left on the itinerary we had to move on. From there, we stabbed westward. We walked along more ancient ruins, but didn’t have time to learn about them. Just a block away was one of the main gov’t buildings. It was made up of white marble and had a good selection of bronze statues on its steps. It was very easy to see that Romans are proud of their past. We were able to climb up 4 stories and had an okay view of the city.

Next we walked to a plaza (Plaza de Flori) that was on the map. When we arrived we noticed it was a market filled with venders selling fresh produce. In the center was a statue of scary monk (because his cloak hood was over his head). Nothing too special. However, if someone asked Steven a specific question 20 years from now, the conversation might go as so…

“Hey Steven!”

“Hey, What’s up?”

“Not much. Remember when you went to Rome and you visited Plaza de Flori?”

“Yeah.” Steven replied with a confused look on his face.

“Well, what do you remember the most?”

Without thinking Steven replied, “Having Joe Montana’s wife yell at me!”

Yeah… that happened. Joe Montana's wife yelled at Steven. But it’s not what you think. Let’s take it from the top. So, we were walking through the market when Steven noticed Joe Montana. He didn’t have any doubts. It was clear as day. It was the hall of famer and all time football legend in Rome. Steven quickly took off his camera and was going to give it to Amanda to take a picture of the 2 of them. Then, Steven’s conscience stepped in and thought it would be rude to invade his vacation. Therefore, Steven kept the camera and was going to snap a quick photo of just him. Even though Steven was sly about the situation, Joe Montana knew he was spotted. Steven tried to take a frontal photo, but Montana turned around and hid is face in a map.  

His wife and another lady also hid him. So, Steven nonchalantly tried to go around him and take a picture from the other side. At the time, Steven didn’t think he was spotted and still wanted a picture. When Steven walked around to his front side, Joe Montana quickly turned around and hid his face again. Hmmm… was it bad luck that he kept turning around or did Joe Montana catch on? Steven tried to aim for a shot of Joe Montana’s backside when all of a sudden he made eye contact with Joe Montana’s wife. With a frustrated look on her face she mouthed the word “No” a couple times. Steven heart started racing and a quick sweat started from his forehead. It was clear to Steven that he has been spotted and kindly agreed to not take a photo. As Steven walked 10 steps away he thought that he didn’t want to regret the moment and had to get some proof. So he stopped, turned around, and snapped a picture from a far. Haha.  Steven felt bad that he inflected a stressful moment to them. From Joe Montana’s wife’s expression, it’s seemed that Steven wasn’t the first one to spot him. (In the picture on the left he was wearing the plaid shorts) Oh well.

Next stop was Plaza de Navona. It’s a large rectangle square with current artists displaying their work and 3 famous fountains. We took photos of the them and walked through the galleries.

By this time, we have been touring Rome for an entire day and were getting tired. However, we knew that there was a free walking tour at 530 that had high reviews on TripAdvisor.com. Because of the fatigue and dehydration, it was a hard decision. But, like the famous quote from Anchorman, “When in Rome,” we saddled up and decided to do it.

First, we needed to refuel and hydrate ourselves. The long morning in the sun visiting the ruins and Coliseum took a tole on us (plus the 3 weeks leading up to this point). But, we did like the Romans and made the best of the moment. We joined the 530 tour and had a blast. The older gentleman has done the same solo tour everyday of the week for years. Even after giving tours for that long we could tell he loved his job. He showed his love for his city with his great enthusiasm and filling us in on hidden gems of Rome.The best part is that the tour visited a section of Rome that we haven’t explored yet. So it worked out great.

We first started by the Spanish steps. It’s a popular hangout for locals and tourist alike. There he gave us some history of Rome and summarized the tour for us. From there we headed out. He gave some insights into Roman culture and history.

Next to the Spanish Steps was a column with Mary on the top. They add flowers to the statue once a year, and the square is filled with people as a selected fireman gets the honors.

The 2.5 hour tour’s first major stop was a church. It was very plain from the outside but the inside was nothing but. We would have never known of its beauty if it wasn’t for the guide. Inside, there were famous religious paintings and sculptures. He gave us history to it, and we moved on.

Very detailed statue of an angel holding the crown of thorns.

Dome painting...

Rome has free water all over the city. Everyone uses it to fill up their water bottles during the hot days. The Romans knew the secret to retrieve water without having a water bottle and our tour guide told us how. Amanda demonstrates how to properly use two fingers to plug the bottom and allow the water flow upwards out of a hole. Amanda did it every chance she could. 

This is a column with Emperor Maximus at the top. Along the side of the column is a famous story. Its a story that most people should know. It's about the war at the beginning of the movie the Gladiator when Russell Crowe was the general.

Here is 2000 year old columns that were preserved and used as decoration for the side of a building. I don't think there is any of those in the US. haha

We saw a few more things before he hit up another church. This one was unique. The painting on the ceiling was an illusion. It was painted on a flat ceiling that appeared to go up. There was also a painting of a dome, when there wasn’t one… kinda cool. Guess you had to be there.

Here is our guide's favorite statue. Its by his famous artist Bernini.

Next we stopped by the Pantheon. It’s a 2000 year old temple. Its dome is only 1 meter smaller than St Peters (Vatican City – the largest). That is incredible considering its so old. Another ancient Roman wonder.

One of the interesting things about the dome is that there is big hole in the top.  This helps connect heaven and earth and cools the temple by allowing the hot air escape the top. They also had Raphel’s preserved body there (more on him tomorrow).

Last stop was the greatest fountain in Rome, The Trevi Fountian. Seeing this fountain for the first time had the “Wow” factor to it, simply because of its size. You see, Rome trys to display their wealth by having many fountain in the city. Up to this point, we have see many fountains, but when we saw Trevi, we were impressed. It’s a fountain of the Ocean God and guys restraining horses.

The tradition is to throw coins behind you with your right hand over your heart/shoulder into the fountain. Thus, we did.

We then went to get some food and came back to eat while we watched the lights come on as it got dark.

On the way back to hotel, we stopped by a couple more fountains. This was the Tritone Fountain. Pretty cool.















The last fountain was in front of a current gov't building. It was dark outside, but the green lights added a cool backdrop.