The Vatican City is a paradox of opulence and faith planted neatly in the middle of Rome.
Considered a separate country by the U.N., it really is nothing more than a massive palace and cathedral complex with a few interior courtyards and some eager Swiss fellows walking around keeping an eye on things. This trip and the original travelogue entries occurred a few weeks before Pope John Paul II died.
Click here for previous chapters of “A Week in Rome.”
We hopped on the Metro and jetted over to Stazione Musei Vaticani, which drops you off just a couple of blocks and a flight of steps from the entrance to the museum. The entrance takes you through a section of the Roman walls, which still surround much of the city.
Inside, one word is in order: opulence. These Popes spent, er, an awful lot of money on the palaces and religious areas of the Vatican. But one can only gripe about the hypocrisy so long before being forced to snap a few pictures. How about…golden ceilings! (yes, that’s real gold leaf, and no, you shouldn’t have asked)
Enormous murals!
Every crevice frescoed or gold-leafed until it positively hurts!
More! We want more!
Well, maybe Jesus didn’t authorize that particular room…ahem. Let’s move on.
If there is one room of which Jesus might have approved, it’s this one, the Sistene Chapel:
Now, I have a confession to make. Photography is strictly forbidden in the Sistene Chapel. However, I have two defenses: 1. I did not use flash; and 2. I am Unitarian and therefore am already going to hell.
The inner courtyard and statuary halls are worth a look, if for nothing else the sheer variety. Everybody, it seems, has gifted the Vatican with a statue over the years. Some of them were collected by the church as well. Lord only knows how this fellow snuck in:
At the top of the inner square, there is a giant artichoke.
At the other end of the square, is a giant ball bearing.
Using only these two symbols, intrepid treasure hunters can discover the key to the Great Mystery, which will take them to a secret vault under Nicolas Cage’s house containing the treasures of Cleopatra. You have to figure out the riddle yourself; these guys aren’t talking:
In a statuary courtyard, frightened tourists huddle to protect themselves from Giant Naked Slabs of Marble.
After an exensive period of being lost, during which we circuited the entire museum main floors TWICE, unable to turn back due to the force of the crowd, we finally left the Vatican Museum down a swirly ramp, sort of like being flushed down God’s toilet.
Note: if you found that circular ramp, you are very near the Vatican Post Office, which is a popular stop for tourists. You can buy stamps and mail your letters straight from the Vatican with that holy postmark.
The Vatican takes a full day to do right; the museum is huge, and just finding the Sistine Chapel is an exercise in navigation. You’ll want to do the rooftop tour (see separate post) of St. Peter’s, see the Basilica, and linger for a while in St. Peter’s square. There are a number of small souvenir shops inside the complex which have a pretty classy selection of Catholic-themed gifts. Even for those not of that particular faith, there are some beautiful decorative items. And if you actually are Catholic, you might want to stay longer, see this over two days – the closer you look, the more there is to see.
Table of Contents
The Colosseum
Palatine Hill
The Forum
The Pantheon
The Vatican
St. Peter in Chains
Imperial Lion
St. Peter’s Square and Basilica
Atop St. Peter’s Dome
Castel Sant’ Angelo (Pope hideaway on the Tiber River)
Day Trip to Florence
Castel Sant’ Angelo, Continued
St. Paul’s Outside the Walls (Vatican church in Rome’s Suburbs)
Great Fountains of Rome
Musei Capitolini (Capitoline Museum): Romulus and Remus and Random Body Parts
Victor Emmanuel Monument (VE Monument)
National Museum of Rome: A Treasure Vault and Lots of Heads
Wrap-Up-The-First – Summary of the Trip
Wrap-Up-The-Last – Final Summary of the Trip