Post 2: The Vatican Museum, The Sistine Chapel, St. Peters and a Gelato Tartufo
The Vatican at Night
I've never encountered a visitor to Rome that didn't fall madly in love with it.
Maybe it is the impossibly romantic imagery of Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck riding that Vespa in Roman Holiday.
Perhaps it is realizing that Rome is a city of full of contrasts. Although 4.3 million residents call it home, it also plays host to 35 million annual visitors.
Rome is an epicenter of western history full of majestic architecture and much of planet earth's most sublime art. And the lucky visitors that visit Rome will experience trendsetting design, enjoy wonderful food, and be surrounded by beautiful people that are impeccably dressed.
Linguini Con Vongole
Roman dinners, prepared in very casual restaurants, seem to consistently deliver simple, yet wonderful, food.
The Eternal City is a hard working modern city that happens to rest upon layers of ancient history.
Arriving
Rome is very accessible. Tourists arriving into FCO by air find many transfer options into the heart of the city that include: rail, bus, rental car, and taxi. Personally, I'd never rent a car in Rome (see accompanying photo). For this trip I climbed aboard the Leonardo Express and enjoyed its direct express rail service to Rome's Termini station.
Driving (and Parking) in Rome - Not for Wimps
There was a time when Termini was downright raunchy, but on this trip it was clean, efficient and offered direct connections to
my AirBNB via Rome's petite, but efficient, subway system.
And, once you arrive in Italy, traveling throughout the rest of the country is a joy using its truly wonderful intercity
high speed train network. Italian trains offer a relaxing center-to-center alternative to
hectic commuter flights. Sadly, Americans have so far have missed the boat on developing a coordinated high speed inner city rail network. Instead we bought miles of concrete ans asphalt, endless traffic jams and road rage. Here in Arizona many motorcyclists (and even some bicyclists) flagrantly travel with handguns holstered on their hips. Sidearms and gated communities; sure signs of a society in distress.
Once you reach the heart of Rome there is the full gamut of visitor accommodations from luxe hotels to cheerful hostels. My never-to-be-forgotten Roman hotel memory was a week spent at Rome's Cavalieri Hilton (now Waldorf Astoria) from the day after Christmas to NewYear's day.
Our spectacular room came with views of the Vatican Observatory, the hotel's lush grounds by day, and the illuminated dome of St. Peters by night.
The Exquisite Cavalieri
(website photo)
Fast forward to this trip. Knowing a major goal this visit involved a return to the Vatican Museums, I booked Vincenza's VRBO near the Cipro
Metro station. Here spacious apartment was also an easy walk to grocery stores and the Vatican. Even nicer was the fact that it was in a neighborhood didn't feel touristy.
Sights to See
I know my posts are out of sequence but for those that read Post #1 you may have noticed that after many previous visits to Rome this trip purposely skipped Rome's typical "must see" sights. So if you will be visiting the Eternal City for the first time, check off all the boxes; go visit the Coliseum, the Pantheon, the Borghese Gardens, the Vatican, the Roman Forum, the Spanish Steps, the Trevi Fountain, and even maybe venture out onto the Via Appia or to some outlying sights like Hadrian's Villa.
Unless you have no heartbeat everywhere you choose to explore will be amazing.
For me this visit was surgical. Get in, intensively hit two to three specific stops, then move on to Florence to start a bike trip. So this post (much like my last focusing on the Villa Borghese), has a limited focus: the Vatican Museums / Sistine Chapel with a few odds and ends tossed in.
The Refreshed Sistine Chapel
A major priority this trip was a return to the Vatican Museums and the Sistine Chapel. My last visit was in 1974. And, at that time, Michelangelo's magnificent art was coated with more than 500 years of accumulated candle wax and grime. The chapel was dark and the art felt eerie. It only hinted at its original glory.
Fast forward to 1984 when the Vatican commenced a controversial restoration of the Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel's frescoes. After seeing some photos of the refreshed chapel I promised myself to return and see the chapel again minus all that grime.
(This is a photo from a descriptive panel outside the chapel - alas photography is prohibited in the Chapel)
The meticulous restoration took a decade. So on this trip (already three decades after the completion of the restoration) I viewed fresco's that, once again, hint of their original magnificence.
Buy Tickets in Advance
The other big change 50 years later is finding out how mobbed the Vatican Museums are now. Unless you want to spend 6 hours (or more) waiting in an endless line to buy a same day ticket, I strongly advise buying a "skip the line" (scheduled) entrance ticket well in advance.
90 days before my trip, I checked the official Vatican website and saw it offered lots of skip-the-line so I figured I'd buy them closer to my travel dates. But, when I returned about a month before my arrival all the direct purchase tickets were gone.
I was now compelled to reserve a guided tour at about three times the price.
However, when walking past the Museum a couple of days before our scheduled tour we were approached by a tour guide who still had some same-day tours left. Knowing he'd eat any unsold tickets, he offered a great tour at about half the price of the online Viator tour I'd booked.
I cancelled Viator and pocketed about 184 euros in the process. Our replacement skip-the-line small group tour had a marvelous guide and efficiently presented the museum with a final stop in the Sistine Chapel.
The Vatican and it's Museum
First off a little background on the Vatican itself. It is more than the physical seat of the modern Catholic Church, and typically referred to as a "City", it is a tiny sovereign nation surrounded by the City of Rome. It has its own police services, banking systems, and governance.
(The Vatican Museums are Shaded on the Map)
If examined from Google Earth you will view apartments, office structures, the museum, and St. Peters Basilica all set in a highly secured walled oasis of manicured gardens few tourists will ever experience.
(The quality of the photo is poor. It was captured in the evening about 20 years ago and lightened)
While the Vatican as a nation is tiny, the shear size of its Museum is incredible. Second only to The Louvre in Paris, this is the worlds most visited museum. It welcomes nearly 7,000,000 visitors a year and employs an army of staff to care for, and protect, its priceless collection. To put the size of the palace in perspective it offers eleven miles of gallery space. You are gonna get your steps in.
A comprehensive visit here would take weeks (or a lifetime).
Our guide curated a tour of the "don't miss" spots saving me from wandering around being lost. It allowed for us to finish in the Sistine Chapel and now armed with an overview we could continue on in the museum to wander on our own.
All Gallery Surfaces are Embellished
The Artwork, the Floor, Wall or the Ceiling?
The Hall of Maps
The 395' long Hall of Maps is located on the west side of the Belvedere Courtyard. The Hall was commissioned by Pope Gregory XIII in 1580 and its walls contain 40 maps completed by Friar Ignazio Danti. The maps are said to be 80% accurate even by today's standards. Yet it was the Mannerist ceilings of the hall that left me speechless.
A sculpture that stopped me in my tracks was the Belvedere Torso. This fragment of a naked male torso dates back to the first century BC. Rediscovered in the 15th century it is one of the museums only original Greek sculptures. It's absolute anatomical perfection is said to have influenced Michelangelo and Raphael.
The Belvedere Torso
The
culmination of our tour was the Sistine Chapel. It is a sensory
overload, but time for visitors is limited to just 20 minutes.
This bronze and marble staircase is frequently and incorrectly referred to as the Bramante Staircase. It is actually not the Bramante staircase. Instead it is actually a modern interpretation of Bramante's 1505 staircase found in the Pio-Clementine Museum. The actual Bramante Staircase is typically not available for tourists to view.
The day of our tour coincided with a day St. Peters was closed so we deferred our visit to St. Peters for early the next morning before we were to board our train to Florence.
Instead after the museum we strolled across the river and stopped for slices of street pizza near the beautifully illuminated Pantheon.
Twilight The Pantheon
We capped the evening with a sentimental visit to Tre Scalini in Piazza Navona for a Gelato Tartufo.
For those poor souls that have never experienced a Gelato Tartufo; it is a confection created in 1946. This little chocolate gelato flavor bomb is composed of 13 different Belgian and Swiss cocoas wrapped around a cherry at its heart. It comes covered in rich soft (whipped) cream and is topped with a crispy wafer.
I added an espresso and a crock of more cream (so decadent!) to this mood swing on a plate. I am in good company in my adoration of this confection, Elizabeth Taylor was reportedly made special trips to Tre Scalini on her visits to Rome.
As I had one of these on my student trip back in 1974 and every bite brought back memories.
Twilight in Piazza Navona
Alas
the next morning was to be our last day in Rome and we still had not achieved a goal of revisiting St. Peters. So we got up very early to beat the lines at St. Peters and where there when it opened and walked right into the spectacular
church minus the normal crowds.
Looking Up
Compared to my last visit I was very impressed how wonderful the church looked. Every surface sparkled. Regrettably, we were unable to view Bernini's spectacular baldachin as it was under wraps.
Bernini's Baldachin is Under Wraps During Refurbishment
Although, our viewing of St. Peters had to be brief, we appreciated the dazzling array of incredible detailing found in this sacred space. An example was some amazing cast bronze doors.
Bronze Martyrs on the Doors to St. Peters
Even at 6:30 am, the serious Swiss Guards ever resplendent in their magnificent uniforms were on duty providing Vatican security.
A Swiss Guard
Our tour complete we quickly returned to the apartment, collected our luggage, and caught an exprerss train to Florence.
As we made our way to Termini I encountered this challenging bit of street art.
Buy A New Soul
Perhaps besides all else, the enigmatic soul of Rome contributes to what truly makes it eternal.
Roadboy's Travels © 2024
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