Rome – Vatican, Vespa and Cooking

May 28, 2024

The sky is bright blue and it’s raining, not sure how that happens but I am headed out for what is schedule to be a very busy day!

I head to the Vatican Museum where I have booked a ticket to skip the line right when the museum opens because it gets crazy busy and when I get there there are hundreds of people lined up in the rain!! So happy that I get to go right in.

The Vatican Museum holds the art treasures of the Catholic church. Our guide explained that there are so many object that if you spent 30 seconds looking at each one it would take you 3 years to complete the museum. Our guide was a professor of art history so he did an excellent job of guiding us to the most important works of art. When I entered the first room I was immediately overwhelmed with the sheer volume of art. By the end of our time my neck hurt from looking up since that is where the most spectacular works are. I had two favorites the first is the statue that has the theater mask on that they refer to as Hypocrite. This statue is named that because all theater is lies so he is a hypocrite!! The second favorite was the The School of Athens one of the most famous paintings by Raphael.

Way too soon we had to leave the museum to head to our appointed time slot for the Sistine Chapel The Sistine Chapel is famous for the ceiling that Michelangelo painted. Picture any 61-year-old man you know and imagine them painting a 42-foot high and 39-foot long wall for the next five years. It is truly amazing!!! I bought the pictures since no photography is allowed.

St Peter’s Basilica was next and the size of this building is completely overwhelming. All of the art is actually mosaics not painting. I found it a bit amusing to see Buddhist monks with cell phones taking selfies. There is even a wedding chapel where for just 750 euros you can get married in St. Peter’s if you are willing to wait up to 5 years.

The alter where the pope performs mass was under construction so we were not able to see that.

The square was lined up with chairs for Wednesday mass. The square is really not a square it is key shaped.

A couple of fun things that I learned about the Vatican
1. It is a separate county fully contained inside walls that separate it from Rome.
2. Swiss Guards are the security for the Vatican.
3. Just like every other country it has it’s own post office, fire department and even a pharmacy.
4. There are only 700 residence of the Vatican making it the smallest county by both size and population in the World.

With only an hour to get to my next adventure I walked the two miles while eating a gelato!!

I have wanted to ride a Vespa forever and today although I was not driving I got the opportunity!! It was beyond my expectations. Zipping along the crowded narrow streets was a full on adrenaline rush!! Bouncing around in the side car on the cobble stone streets was bone jeering but I loved every minute of it!! We explored the 7 hills of Rome stopping frequently for photo ops!!

Then off to my last adventure for the day, cooking class. The site was outside the city at a very rustic home. We made pizza that got fired in a wood burning oven. Made pasta and delicious sauces and ending the feast with tiramisu! It was so yummy.

By the time I got back to the hotel is was after midnight and I had left at 6:00 am so I was more than tired but I had experience so much of Rome that I went to sleep knowing that this was a “Best day ever….so far!!