The last day in Rome

Today was our last day in Rome. We spent the last day almost totally in the Vatican. There was so much to see and do we barely skimmed the surface.

The line for St. Peter's Basilica had been consistently long the three times we went to St. Peter's square. Like, snaking totally around the square so people are waiting for 2+ hours to get in. To beat the line, we got up early and headed over to go inside at 7:30am, a half hour after it opened. We walked right in, no waiting needed.

We first climbed to the top of the dome since that was really why we wanted to get there so early. It was NOT for the faint of heart.  After climbing the stairs, walking on the roof then climbing more stairs we walked through a door to see this:

This was Rachel's reaction:

We were standing on a catwalk that encircled the dome above the main alter at St. Peter's. Below you could see the whole layout of the church. (Which was neat as it was our first view of the church). Above you could see what looked like a beautiful painted ceiling.Except you looked to the side and could see it was a mosaic, not a painting. Here are some close-up views:

And this was the view to the bottom:

After taking it all in, we went to climb to the top of the dome. And climb we did. We didn't take pictures of the stairs since half-way up Rachel had a mild panic attack. The stairs were extremely narrow and very steep. At some point the ceiling was curved in as you were walking. At another point, there was just a vertical rope to hold on-to instead of a hand-rail since the stairs were so narrow.  Definitely not for the faint of heart.  

All that effort lead you to one of the best views of Rome. It was a 360 view of Rome and the surrounding cities. It was a bit hazy since it was so early but still breath-taking (once we caught our breath from all those stairs). It wasn't overcrowded yet so we had room to move around and really enjoy the views.

Going down wasn't as bad and gave us a chance to walk around on the roof. The statues lining the top of St. Peter's are huge! 

Then it was into the Basilica. Talk about beautiful. Words can not actually describe the experience of being in the Church that is the heart of the Catholic Church. We saw beautiful statues, understandably beautiful side-alters, and the final resting place of St. John Paul the Great. We could have spent the entire rest of the day walking around, looking at the alters and side alters. We were going to go to mass, but needed to get to the Vatican Museums for our tour.

Lining the center was the names of the major churches and their measurements. There was a plaque in the floor marking where they would be if place inside the basilica. 

Holy Batman, there were so many people!!!!!  We paid for a guided tour which let us enter without waiting in line, which was worth it's cost. The guide said on Saturday they had broken a record for the number of visitors to the museum in one day. She thought it would be worse today since the museum was closed Sunday.

We ended up seeing some really neat artwork. However, the whole experience was clouded by the amount of people crammed in around us. It made it really hard to stop and appreciate the space when a sea of people are pushing you to walk forward. You can see in the pictures some of our favorite views as well as the masses of people.

We met up with an old friend who is in seminary in Rome for lunch. He brought us to a restaurant with amazing tiramisu. Then we did some final shopping and back to the hotel to crash/pack for our flight in the morning. Can't believe we have just a few more hours left.