Big Picture
Hello! This is part 3 of our Europe trip in 2013. In this post, we continued our Italian exploration with an excursion to Pisa to see the famous Leaning Tower, as well as going to the capital Rome.
- Part 1 Flight, Zurich, Florence
- Part 2 Pisa, Rome
- Part 3 Vatican, Rome (this post)
- Part 4 Venice
- Part 5 Salzburg
- Part 6 Neuschwanstein
- Part 7 Paris
- Part 8 Zermatt
- Part 9 Luzern
Vatican
We started the day with breakfast in McDonalds on via Nazionale. We took the metro from Repubblica station nearby towards Ottaviano station just outside the Vatican. It was crowded with tourists in Ottaviano, also not forgetting people selling Pope Francis flag and screaming “Unero! unero!” (only after that we realized they meant uno Euro – 1 Euro for a flag).
There were so many people walking towards the gate of St.Peter’s Basilica – you will not lost your way there. One thing that we didn’t know, on Wednesdays and Sundays there were general audience in the Basilica, which the Pope will lead a mass. So the crowd was because the Pope was down there somewhere! Had we known this, we would have started earlier in order to get closer to the front, but oh well. After the mass was ended apparently the Pope was parading the square on his Popemobile. A real shame that we didn’t manage to see him on person! We do manage to see His Holiness’ head through the big screen though. Oh well, better than nothing 😀
The basilica was very crowded and pretty much nothing can we do about that, thus we moved towards the Musei Vaticani, just outside the basilica. On exploring the museum you have the short route and the long route – the latter includes a visit to Sistine Chapel, the very place where conclave is held. (For those who don’t know, conclave is the process of electing new Pope.) One thing that struck me was that Italians loved to carve, or decorate their buildings with artistic works – from columns, pillars, and ceilings (!) were all artistic. I can’t imagine Michelangelo painting the ceiling, standing on top of a ladder, back arched, paint brush in one hand and pallete in the other! I will let the photos do the justice below, but no photos of Sistine Chapel, regrettably, because it was prohibited.
On the museum we met with my friend Haryono, who was with his other group of friend, happen to be in the Vatican at that same day. After completing the long route of Musei Vaticani, we went for lunch together somewhere down the road, the restaurant name was Dino & Tony. One of either Dino or Tony served us himself – he was very good natured and liked to joke around, especially with our broken Italian which was improving all the time. We had a lot of pizzas and pastas, learned a new word “antipasti” which means “starters”. There was a pizza with a bitter vegetable inside, maybe that was ‘foie gras’. We ended the lunch with a shot of lemonccino, a liquor with lemon taste but contains quite a high amount of alcohol (at least, according to me). That was a nice liquor on a chilly day.
Rome
After lunch we went back for a short time to the basilica again, thinking that maybe the crowd had dispersed, but it turned out not to be the case. Thus we splitted from Haryono’s group and continuing our plan of exploring Rome. Our first stop was Castle St Angelo. I forgot what is our objective to visit this castle. Nevertheless we didn’t manage to go inside because there was a renovation works then. So we continued walking, crossing a bridge which was rather unsafe (at least that was what I felt – very anxious on that bridge because seemed like there were pickpockets everywhere!)
Once we safely crossed that bridge we continued towards Piazza Navona. Those of you who have read Angels and Demons would recall the place where the 4th cardinal (“water”) was killed. The piazza was in front of a very large church, and as described in the book, there was huge fountain in front of it with an obelisk in the center of the fountain. Bernini’s masterpiece. There were a lot of tourist attractions there, including carricature painting, a pantomime, a flying guru, etc. Again I will let my photos do the describing.
Continuing our route, we walked towards the Pantheon. The Pantheon is essentially a church. It was another architectural masterpiece, with its circular dome and massive columns supporting it. I only learned afterwards that a lot of famous people in Italian history were buried there. There was a fountain in front of the building (Roman people seemed to like fountains a lot.)
https://plus.google.com/117136329312300820964/posts/dVdopWP96za
We finally walked to our last and most important destination of today which was Fontana di Trevi. This fountain is famous for people looking for love partner, and since all three of us needed one each too, we placed great emphasis on visiting this fountain, lol. And this fountain was HUGE. It felt like a pool instead of a fountain. And it was crowded – did all these people need love partners too? To get your wish granted, you need to toss a coin to the pool. I tossed 1 Euro coins and two of my friends tossed 1 Singapore Dollar coins each. So I would get an European girlfriend while my friends will get the Singaporeans! 😛
(Afterwards I realized that the way we threw the coins was wrong, according to Wikipedia. It was supposed to be this way: you stand with your back facing the fountain, then with your right hand toss the coin over your left shoulder to the pool without looking. Oh well, so maybe that’s why I haven’t had my wish granted yet…)
For the first time in 3 days, we had a proper dinner today, on a small shop nearby our hotel. And no gelato this time round. That wrapped the third day, and as always, follow our journey in the map below.