Blogs from Vatican City, Europe - page 2

Woolly says – I had planned an early start, practised my questions and even borrowed Zoe’s brush (don’t tell her) to spruce myself up for this most auspicious day, what were the others doing.....sleeping! Which is what normal people do at six in the morning! Having kept my eyes closed for as long as possible given the fact that he was batting my nose with his trunk I sent him for breakfast so we could have some peace and quiet while we got ready. Woolly says – hours and hours passed and having managed two croissants I was considering heading off on my own when they finally appeared.... I’ve told you a million times not to exaggerate Woolly, we were half an hour if that! Woolly says – ......my clock moves much faster than theirs! Two ... read more

Another early start today for the Vatican. Up at 6:00 to make sure we met the tour group at 7:55 for the skip the line tour. A sound check with the “whisper” machines and in we go for the walk through the museum. All of the masters are here, Rafael, Michaelangelo, Caravaggio, Botticelli, Leonardo & Donatello. We were just awestruck with looking at these great works of art and this is just a small part of the treasures that the Vatican has. Every room has a selection of paintings, statues, frescoes and tapestries and then we are told that some of these rooms were the living quarters of some of the popes. After a while it all turns into a blur and becomes overwhelming. We walked through the Sistine Chapel (no pictures???) which was just amazing. ... read more

We've booked a morning tour of the Vatican. We need to be there a bit before 8am, so it's another early start after a long day of travelling yesterday. We're both feeling a bit tired. It's really hot again, and Issy says she's feeling the heat here even more than she did in Marrakech. The queues outside the Vatican Museums are massive. Fortunately we've booked a group tour so we get to jump to the front. Everyone told us before we left home about the advantages of booking on-line in advance; I'm glad we listened. The operators here seem to have mass tourism down to a very fine art. Our names are ticked off as we arrive, and we're told to stand in a very specific place. Our guide then hands out head sets so we ... read more

At least, it's the final FULL day in those places. I'll be flying to Orlando tomorrow afternoon, via Oslo. But this morning I spent in St. Peter's Square for a "general audience" with the Pope, and that was a pretty decent way to cap off this Eurotrip. Eno left on Tuesday morning - early. So that made my day a little more subdued than otherwise. I mean, we did travel around Italy for 10 days together, so now I'm just passing my time, really. There isn't any other sight (tourist or else) that has attracted my interest, so I've just been sitting back and soaking in the atmosphere. It's been more enjoyable for me than I would've thought, but then I have been running ragged for the past couple of weeks. After Eno left, I spent ... read more

Thursday 30 April: Yes, Asterix you may well have been right. To be fair though, most of the madness we witnessed today can be put down to non-Romans. After an excellent night’s sleep we caught a train into the city and then connected to the Metro line to go to the world’s tiniest country: Vatican City. If we thought the Dubai and London Metros were nuts we hadn’t seen anything yet. When we arrived, we soon established that the queues were ridiculously long. We hadn’t managed to get tickets online beforehand so decided that, with a 3 year old in tow, we would opt for convenience. We found an official tour who would allow us to skip the lines to get into the Vatican Museum and Galleries, the Sistine Chapel, and then St Peter’s Basilica as ... read more