Today was a day of wrong turns, but it did allow us to see sights of the city that we wouldn't have otherwise seen! It started first thing from the hotel when we decide to see if we can walk to the Vatican. Karen leads us away from the hotel, confident that she knows where we are going. A little later, I notice that we are getting close to the Roman Forum where we were yesterday (which is NOT on the way to the Vatican). So, we take a look at the map and decide to follow the Tiber River. It's a nice walk, but we later realize that we really were very far from the way we should have been!!
A few interesting observations- many priests and nuns around Rome and most in full dress and habits. Traffic is crazy and there is very little room. Most cars are very compact and they park practically touching the car next to them. We did watch a car pull out and another one pull in. We were quite impressed. Cobblestones are difficult to walk on. There are a lot of people walking dogs.
The Vatican is massive. Even the photos do not do the justice to just how large and ornate everything is. Our plan is to climb to the top of the cuppola and see the view from up there. The line is a little long and we wait patiently. Just as we are near the ticket booth, the guy goes on a 20 minute break!! UGH What are you to do? We purchase the lift (elevator) tickets for 7 Euro which lets us by-pass 200 stairs, but we still have 320 more stairs to climb!! These stairs are narrow and as you can see by some of our pictures, there are parts of the climb that you have to lean sideways a bit. The very last set of stairs are very, very narrow sprial stairs with only a rope in the middle for you to hold on to. We have a to take some rests along the way, but we are not alone. It ends up being worth it. The view from the top is quite beautiful. By passing 200 stairs, was definitely worth the extra 2 Euro!
Afterward we make our way to see the inside of San Pietro Basilica (St. Peter's Church). Immediately to the right is Michelangelo's famous Pieta statue. He finished this in 1499 when he was only 25 years old. Unfortunately it is now behind glass due to someone damaging it in the 1970's. We make our way around the basilica and there are so many different chapels. Everything is very large scale and very, very ornate. After that, we make a stop for our daily snack of gelato. I think I forgot to mention this before. Gelato is the Italian version of ice cream. Neither Karen or I are very big ice cream eaters, but we do end up having some type of gelato every day! YUM!
Dinner for this evening will be in the Jewish Ghetto. I had been reading on line before we left that the food was particularly good in this section of town and they are known for their preparation of artichokes, which I like to eat. Again, although we map our way, we make several wrong turns (and in all fairness the streets are narrow and the road meandering). In the end, we did find the restaurant we were looking for only to discover it was closed! We ate at another restaurant down the street and it was really good as well. We had the fried artichoke for first course and for the main course I had artichoke parmasean and Karen had veggie lasagna. The food was very good and this ended up being Karen's favorite meal.
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