Good luck getting in, suckers!
Trip Start
May 25, 2007
1
69
73
Trip End
Oct 29, 2007
Rome,
Italy
Monday, September 3, 2007
I had read that one of the worst days to try to visit the Vatican Museum is on a Monday. Now I know why. If I was to guess there were probably 4000 people waiting to get in when I walked by at about 11am. The line snaked all around the city walls and nearly back to the entrance to St. Peter's. Roughly speaking, about 5 blocks long. The best comparison I could come up with was Versailles = the line up for the men's toilet, and the Vatican = the line up for the women's. It was that bad. Most of those people had no chance of getting in the building. But at least they got to wait around all day in the heat.
The Vatican museum is one of the most famous and most popular museums in the world. So what did the Italians do to help deal the hoards of people? They shortened the hours the place is open. You read it right...the hours of business are now shorter! Go figure.
It's Monday, so nearly everything is closed, but I did manage a good sight-seeing day. I took the tour of the Coliseum, which I really liked. Even with my limited imagination I was able to picture what it must have been like 2000 years ago (OK, I'll admit it. My thoughts were just scenes from Gladiator). I strolled past the Spanish Steps, which are just that...a set of stairs. More interesting was the Basilica of Sts. Ambrose and Charles, located just around the corner. It is a stunning baroque church, and was nearly empty. It also helped beat the heat, which was easily over 30 deg.
Also today I saw the area where the Circus Maximus was, now just a big field, and a 2000 year old pyramid. It was not, as was most things from Egypt, looted and brought back to Rome. They actually built it themselves.
Right after this the battery in my camera died and I had forgotten to recharge my replacement. Good luck I still had the rest of the week to snap moore pics.
Rome itself, as far as I can tell, is similar to most big European cities, but with a much more free-for-all attitude. The traffic is much more difficult to deal with as there rarely seems to be any controlled cross-walks. Even the biggest of streets just have the lines painted on the road and you just gotta go and trust you won't get hit. And you wont so long as you don't flinch; walk a straight line and don't slow down.
Everywhere there are tourists (which means nearly everywhere) there will be people trying to sell you useless garbage you don't need or want. People have their head in the clouds and very few people seem to be unaware of their immediate surroundings (if I had a nickle for every time someone cut me off or walked into me...). The public transport is lacking in the city center, save for the very crowded buses. I realized later that there is no metro in much of the city because there is too much history buried underground, and digging tunnels would be impossible. So bring your walking shoes, folks, or get ready to pay €€€ for a cab or spend half your time here trying to figure out the buses (and get very friendly with your neighbors).
That being said, for a big city Rome has a lot of charm and should be a positive experience. It's crazy enough to be entertaining but not so much that it's overwhelming or scary. There also seems to be a never ending supply of things to do and see, as I would discover.
