For a good time, strap on a baby

We hit the Vatican Museum today.  We thought, at the last minute, we might want to book a tour guide to tell us more about the different things on display, but our emails were bringing back news that the guide services were either all booked or the cost was astronomical.  And we had missed the opportunity to pre-purchase skip-the-line tickets ahead of time, they were all sold out.  So we were going to have to do things the old fashioned way and queue with all the other dummies that didn't pre-book tickets or guides.

After researching what we wanted to see and different things about the museum until 2am, Katie woke up at 6 (so Melissa was too), and the rest of the kids were up at 7:30.  The ticket office opened at 9, so we needed to leave by 8:15 at the latest so we could get there early.  We thought we were going to the right location, but we got to the back of the line (super far from the museum entrance even though we were 10-15 minutes early) where an information guy told us we needed tickets elsewhere, and the basilica was closing at 1pm today.  We said we only wanted the museum and he said "then [we] could buy them inside the museum. Okay well lets stand in line I guess.  Another guy at that line pointed to Katie, in the carrier on my front, and said "with baby quick line" and pointed right.  Nice, we can save some time at least.  Well we skipped past literally hundreds and hundreds of those dummies, but got to another checkpoint.  He said that we shouldn't be there and that it was only for pre-booked ticket holders or groups.  Well I just flashed my baby and he said "ok you can go here" and we skipped a bunch more people and got up close to the entrance.  Yeah, we had to wait then, since the museums weren't quite open yet, and then get through actual security.  But instead of what I can imagine was hours of standing in the sun, we were buying our tickets in less than 20 minutes.  And that, friends, is why you always want to know where your baby is and carry it with you.

Melissa's (and a little of my) planning really turned out to be helpful.  We used our new guidebook and walked pretty much all 4+ miles of museum gallery halls.  At least we think we read that number somewhere. From leaving to arriving back at our apartment, we were gone for probably 5 1/2 hours.  The collections were distributed mainly by era and not by quality, so it was easier to compare between master works and those done by a less-skilled hand. And we saw LOTS of art, mostly very good, some not so much. Some of Melissa's favorite rooms were painted by Raphael, some finished by his students after his sudden death at 37. There was a very large collection of Etruscan works, which even the Ancient Romans thought was ancient (double ancient).  The Sistine Chapel was amazing, and even though photos and video are prohibited, we (like everyone else) snuck a few. Some incredibly beautiful artwork went totally unnoticed by others - the mosaic tilework on the floors. I didn't see a single other person truly looking at the floors. With interest anyway.

Statues of Michelangelo and Raphael adorn the entrance

The navigators

Lily with Laocoon and his Sons

photobomb

Katie loved this animal room

Double-ancient jugs

Joey comparing differences between 2 similar containers 

Mary with an interactive Etruscan tomb tour

Hall of Maps

Raphael's School of Athens

Some of the less popular contemporary art

"A two year old could draw this!"

Yep, that's a mosaic

Zoomed in, see the tiles?

Kids enamored with some (I would guess ceremonial) picks and trowels

Raph Transfiguration - he died suddenly before finishing this painting,
and the lower portion was completed by two of his best pupils

Caravaggio

We rested at our apartment for a few hours, recovering from the Vatican mini-marathon. We bought some pizza and pasta from the joint around the corner, the Montecarlo, and supped around 5.  I decided, okay it's time to get out and about again, so we headed to a little play area over by Castel-Sant'Angelo. Only to find out from a police officer it closes at 6. Oh, well lets walk along the river down into Trastevere where another playground is hopefully still open. Well we get down there and it starts sprinkling. Then a little harder. Without our umbrellas we ducked into a church to avoid the rain, which happened to be Saint Cecilia convent. It houses the relics of St. Cecilia and her husband St Valerian, although we were there late and couldn't visit the crypt.  We were only there a short time, but the rain stopped by the time we were leaving. We stopped to get some gelato to reward the kids for walking so much today.  Well after gelato it started raining again, so we ran across the Tiber River to take cover under the trees on the other side.  On the bridge an umbrella pusher approached us, and we ended up bargaining for 3 umbrellas.  Just in time too, because it started downpouring about 5 minutes later. And then the pee-dancing started....

Found this stump carving along the Tiber

Beautiful Baroque sculpture of St Cecilia

We got back to the apartment just in time, and I kept the kids here while Melis ran out for some breakfast foods and to get some more contact solution.

Note from Melis: I took this while out shopping. I would never want to drive on these Italian streets. So narrow, and often crowded with people. See that bright light in the distance? That's an oncoming car!

At least one blog post here (maybe more, but it's already almost midnight), and some planning for our excursion tomorrow.  Hopefully a little less walking though :)