Hanging Out with the Pope... okay, just kidding

Today we visited the one, the only... Vatican City. The smallest city state, country in the world, the Vatican is home to the Vatican Museum, Sistine Chapel, St. Peter's Basilica, and the Pope. Oh yeah- and the entire Catholic Church as a whole. So much history is here and surrounds this place everyday.

We started by touring the Vatican Museum which includes lots of cool artwork- sculptures, paintings, etc. The big finale is what's important... the Sistine Chapel. Michelangelo spent four years of his young adult life painting frescoes covering this ENTIRE room. While the chapel as a room was a lot smaller than we anticipated, the paintings were definitely NOT disappointing. These pieces are absolutely amazing, depicting scenes from throughout the Bible and religious history. Michelangelo was a complete genius. We were amazed at how one man could do so much brilliant work, including sculpture, painting, and architecture that we've seen all throughout Europe on our trip.

Speaking of Michelangelo, we followed the Sistine up by heading to the top of the dome at St. Peter's Basilica. This is the highest point in all of Rome (nothing is allowed to be built higher) and is also the largest dome in the world (over a football field tall). We climbed to the tiny, claustrophobic cupola at the top for outstanding views! Next we went to the bottom and toured the church itself. This is the largest church we've been to and was covered in intricate mosaics- completely STUNNING!

We decided to take it a little easier afterwards and spent some time outside eating gelato and lunch at a cafe by the river and then walked around one of our favorite squares, Piazza Novana, where street performers were everywhere. We have fallen in love with these performers; they do everything from play instruments to be live statues, paint, do tarot cards, make caricatures... anything and everything is here! It's so fun to walk around and find your favorite act. Then, we were sitting outside of the Pantheon when we saw tons of mobs, security guards and equipment. We found out that we had just walked on to the set of the new Tom Hanks film, "Angels and Demons!" We were excited to have stumbled by here and are planning on going back!

We finished out the night with a good dinner outside and TWO servings of gelato and two of Rome's most famous gelaterias... THAT'S the way to do it, people! Miss you all like crazy, but we are getting home very soon...

Love you,
Tripp and Laura