Belvedere Courtyard

Headquarters of the Roman Catholic Church and home to the Pope, the Vatican is a country within a country. Being the smallest “Country” in the world, it is a walled city-state surrounded by Rome. A visit to the Vatican provides access to a seemingly endless museum of iconic art and sculptures. Including the Sistine Chapel with its ceiling painted by Michelangelo.

When we locked in our flights to Rome we started researching what tickets we would need to book in advance. Being late in the tourist season we were surprised to find out that many Vatican and Colosseum tours were fully booked or almost full. And on top of that, very expensive! We decided that an early morning access to the Vatican would hopefully avoid the crowds and then allow us time to check out St Peter’s Basilica afterwards. We booked in for the Wednesday at 7:30 am with a “skip-the-line” ticket. While not essential to gain access, we were glad we paid the extra. At 7 am the lineup for general admission was already snaking along the external walls from the entry point to the museum, and growing by the minute.

Once inside, our tour guide took us along what was obviously the regular tour group route. In a permanent stream of people and groups, we passed through the various rooms and hallways. The tour guide gave us so much information that it was hard to retain any of it quickly enough before we were onto a new room or display. It was like drinking from a firehose while watching Oppenheimer. My highlights were the Roman and Egyptian rooms. Oversized marble sculptures of people and animals, full mummified remains in their coffins, tablets of stone with hieroglyphs carved into them. All very, very cool. There were endless rooms entirely painted with depictions of biblical accounts and other historically significant events from the time. And possibly the most impressive to me was a hallway with a series of hand-painted maps of Italy and its various regions, all seemingly perfectly to scale with mountains and natural features included. How this detail was even known, nevertheless able to be depicted on a map I have no idea. We finally entered the Sistine Chapel where we finished the tour and were left to soak in the incredible masterpiece in our own time.

What would usually be included in the tour is a direct passage from the Vatican to St Peter’s Basilica. However by chance on this particular Wednesday there was a special Catholic event happening and access was closed until after 1:30 pm. We’d heard it was well worth it so ventured back out of the Vatican and to the standard access to the Basilica thinking we would arrive in time to go straight in. Not a chance 😂 The queue was like it was to shake the Pope's hand himself. Deciding that we would prefer to explore some more of Rome, we went to find an Aperol Spritz and some gelato🍹🍧Read more