Rome, Days 1 & 2

That would be St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican, which I saw this morning along with the Vatican Museum, which houses the Sistine Chapel.

Rome, Day 1: It was Good Friday on our first full day in Rome so everything we wanted to see closed at around 3:00 PM so they could get the Colosseum ready for the Pope. We didn't see the Pope, but we did see the Colosseum right before closing time so there weren't very many people there. How people were able to build such things that have lasted through war and fire for all of these years, I will never be able to fathom. Two of my favorite pictures of my friends were taken there. After that we just took it easy since everything was closing.

Rome, Day 2: That'd be today. We woke up at around 7:00 to be in line at the Vatican Museum by 8 (it opens at 9:00). We got there at 8:20 and the line was already enormous, but we didn't wait longer than 20 minutes to get in. Once we did we enacted our strategic plan for getting through the museum: We dashed toward the Sistine Chapel first, which took forever as it is at the VERY end of this massive place, spent a good amount of time there (it'll leave you slack-jawed, it's so amazing), then tried to go backwards through the museum. It turned out that wasn't possible so a little of the way through we got sent BACK to the Sistine Chapel, but it turned out that a shortcut through the Vatican libraries takes you right back to the beginning. I postmarked my postcards at the post office there, then we set off through the galleries of treasures from ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, Greece, and Rome. We saw St. Peter's Basilica, but did not go inside as the line was HUGE. Oddly enough, we did see two girls that had been in our hostel in Florence in said huge line... it's a small world.

After that we saw some Roman ruins nearby the Colosseum that had been closed for Good Friday the previous day. And now we are getting up from a three hour nap. Can you blame us?