Rome, Days 2 and 3... Yeah, I saw the Pope

Sat. Nov. 29

Wake up call: 7:20am

Colosseum tour: 9:15am

So our tour guide Mitra knew everything about anything you'd want to know about Roman history. We got lucky and were the only people in the tour, which lasted about three hours. Did you know that the Roman forum and Colosseum used to be covered in painted marble that was stolen by the popes when the Roman empire converted to Christianity during Constantine's reign and was consequently used to create the Trevi fountain, St. Peter's Basilica, tons of Vatican decorations, etc. etc, and that all the statues that line St. Peter's Square were stolen from the Colosseum and therefore have pagan roots, but were redesigned to give them a Christian flair? Crazy.

We also went to the Vatican museums and saw the Sistine Chapel, of course. You're not allowed to take pictures in there, either, and I think those guards were definitely the type to take your camera and smash it into a million pieces if they saw you breaking the rules. No joke... those men meant business. I've never seen more stone-faced police/security.

After we left the Vatican we went to St. Peter's square and basilica at night, which was gorgeous.

Bedtime: too late to think about :-(

Sun. Nov. 30th (last day in Roma)

Wake up call: 9:30am

We went back to St. Peter's square so we could actually get into the basilica. Let me tell you, if you go to Rome, you MUST go to the basilica. Even if you're not religious. First of all, the square itself blew my mind. I took a picture off of Wikipedia because it does the majesty and size of the square much more justice than any picture I took ever could. Then when you actually go inside the basilica... let's just say I am completely ruined for other churches for the rest of my life. The scope of that basilica was just out of this world, and to think that it was built so long ago is also unbelievable. GO THERE. You will not regret it, especially if you are religious.

Then didn't we get incredibly lucky because as we were exiting the basilica, there was a big crowd in the square and we could hear a voice over the loudspeaker... yeah, it was the Pope. The Pope himself. He speaks like 8 languages and was repeating himself a lot. It was amazing, absolutely amazing. A great end to a wonderful trip.

Afterwards we got lunch and then hopped our plane back to Paris.