| Glenn's Rome Journals 4-24-02 Today we were up early (7:00 am) to catch the metro to the Vatican to make sure we could get a seat to see the Pope speak. We were ready to leave the hostel around 8:15, which is when the beginning of breakfast was being served, but to no avail as the young lady running the breakfast area was not quite ready. This is Italy by the way!!! Off we were, with Sylvia and Andres, to the metro. While we were in the station, we stopped into a supermarket to buy breakfast for our journey, including orange juice, bread, and yogurt. Then we packed into the next metro heading to the Vatican. We had been told that the Pope would speak sometime after 10:00 am and that the crowds could be tremendous, as you can imagine. We arrived around 9:30 am and luckily, since it was a Wednesday, and it was not Easter, the crowds were plenty but not overly packed. We managed seats in the first section to the right of where the Pope would be seated. We waited patiently for the Pope to arrive while enjoying the breakfast we had purchased earlier. The crowds started to stir around 10:20 am in anticipation of the Pope's arrival. The Pope arrived in a car which drove him through the aisles surrounding the crowds so he could wave to all before being seated up front. What an amazing sight as you wonder in amazement how much influence the Pope has on our lives. The Pope has definitely aged over the years but that did not stop him from speaking to the crowds for over an hour in over 8 different languages. Again, what an amazing man. Seated near the Pope during the ceremony, which we did not realize until later, were the USA Cardinals that had been invited to the Vatican to discuss the sexual allegations against Catholic churches in the U.S.. I was even interviewed by a French television station about the topic. Erin just laughed, later, as they picked us out of crowd of people and asked if we were American and then our thoughts on the topic. We will never know if I ever made it on French television. From here we were scheduled to meet some friends of Andres and Sylvia's (Dario and Paola) that were driving in from Como to spend a few days with them before they left Europe. We met up with then around noon in the center of St. Peter's Square, made formal introductions, and then took off to the Vatican museum. In the Vatican, Erin and I decided that we really wanted to take a tour to get more of the feel for the place. We also wanted to learn more than we thought we would by just wandering around by ourselves. Andres, Sylvia, Dario, and Paola all took off on their own as we decided to meet up at 7:00 pm for dinner. Erin and I checked into English speaking tours, decided we did not want to wait, and took an audio tour of the Vatican museum and Sistine Chapel. Pictures were not allowed in most of the museum and I am not sure where I would start writing about what we experienced without writing a separate novel. When in Rome visit the Vatican museum and Sistine Chapel and take a tour of some sort to get the full affect of the amazing history made available to the public. Wow!!! We stayed for over 3 hours and we were not completely done enjoying and learning about all of the items in the museum. Go early, as they closed at 3:30 pm the day we went and this helped end our tour of the museum. We then went on to St. Peter's Basilica / Square (again no pictures) and spent well over an hour viewing the history. After the Basilica we stopped into the post office in Vatican City (as it is it's own city with own post office, security, etc...) to buy postcards and have them mailed there so they would have the Vatican city stamp on them. We hope our friends that received them will appreciate them. By now it was getting close to 7:00 pm, so we headed off to our designated meeting location to find the others. We met up with the ladies, as the men had gone to the hostel to pay for Dario and Paola's accomodations for the night. With a little help from Paola and Dario having a cell phone, we managed to all meet back up around 8:00 pm near Trastevere, where we had been given advice that the eats were very good and well priced for us budget travelers. We found a great little restaurant that provided the 6 of us a great meal for less than 10 Euro's per person along with more of the local atmosphere. After dinner we adventured our way in the rain back to a bus station to catch a bus back to the hostel. We were a little wet upon our return but were happy with the events of the day and the decent accomodations that we had. We agreed that we would see everyone in the morning as we headed off to bed. |
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| The Pope is the one in white, seated at the foot of St. Peter's Cathedral |
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| Basilica di San Pietro (St. Peter's Cathedral) |
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