Monday May 21st

We began today bright and early by meeting at 8 this morning. Unlike our hotels in London and Barcelona, our hotel in Rome does not include breakfast with our rooms which makes the start of the morning a bit tougher. However, I’ll gladly exchange a free breakfast for a large room with a cheap pastry shop down the street as we have in Rome. After grabbing a few pastries, we were off to trudge through the rain to the Metro station. As I said before, our hotel is slightly off the beaten path so we were forced to walk about a mile through the pouring rain to board the Metro to the Vatican.

A hallway of the Vatican Museum

As we approached the Vatican, we were immediately met by two different but plentiful types of salesmen; umbrella and tour vendors. There were literally 50-plus men hawking umbrellas as we walked through the rain. The funny thing was, there was hardly any distance at all between the opposing men selling the umbrellas. As I was walking I thought to myself, “Do they not understand that if I didn’t buy the first umbrella I saw, that I wouldn’t buy one twenty feet later?” After passing the umbrella salesmen and getting closer to the Vatican, we met our next group of salesmen. Since the Vatican is an extremely popular tourist spot, the lines to enter the Catholic icon for individuals or small groups can stretch as far as the eye can see. However, if you have a large group and make a reservation, you bypass these lines for a much shorter line. Looking to capitalize on any way to make a quick Euro, these salesman make multiple daily reservations for tours and then fill these tours by luring in people on the street wanting to bypass the lines and are willing to pay a hefty fee. Luckily we had already made our own reservations, but countless salesmen belligerently offered their services as tour guides.

One of the many ornate rooms in the Vatican Museum

After making our way through the rain and the salesmen, we finally entered the Vatican and went straight to the Museum. The Vatican Museum is absolutely massive. In fact, if you spent one minute at every single piece in the museum, it would take 13 years to complete your visit. Needless to say, we took the abbreviated but enjoyable tour through the museum to see works from artists such as Leonardo Da Vinci and Michelangelo. Because the Vatican is so full of visitors, it is actually extremely hard to take good pictures of the many artifacts in the museum which is somewhat frustrating. Between the museum and our next stop was the Sistine Chapel. The Sistine Chapel was without a doubt the highlight of the day as we were able to see Michelangelo’s beautiful painting firsthand. Following our trip through the Sistine Chapel we next visited St. Peter’s Basilica, the largest Christian church in the world. One of the most interesting items in the church was Michelangelo’s Pietà, a sculpture showing Mary cradling the dead body of Jesus. While the sculpture is well-known for its beauty, it is also famous for being the only sculpture actually signed by Michelangelo. While it was incredible to see the massive, famous Basilica, the church honestly felt too opulent. It seemed to me that there was a much greater emphasis on the lavish decor and construction rather than useable space for worship.

St. Peter's Basilica

Following our trip to the Vatican, the group actually finished early for the day. With a decent amount of time left in the afternoon, the whole group realized that it was a perfect time to do some much-needed laundry. However, the only laundromat close to our hotel was a full-service shop where we could only drop off our clothes for them to wash. Fearful that the entire group coming at once would overwhelm the small shop, a couple of us grabbed a taxi from the Vatican so we could beat everyone else back to the hotel to be first in line at the laundromat. After successfully winning the laundry race, I grabbed a couple of slices of pizza and headed back to the hotel to relax and call it a day. I’m not sure what’s in store for tomorrow, but I’m sure it will be another eventful day in Rome.