Continued from yesterday… Then we hopped on the subway and went back to the Vatican, this time to see St. Peter’s Basilica. As we walked around the Vatican walls towards St. Peter’s, we noticed a white line painted in the street paralleling the walls. We think that is the border. We passed by the entrance into Vatican City, guarded by two real Swiss guards. Their uniforms are Continue reading
Yesterday we decided we needed a complete and total day of rest, a true Sabbath where you do absolutely nothing at all. It was what the doctor ordered. We awoke today feeling less tired and zombiesque and more like ourselves, though we didn’t feel totally back to normal, either.
This morning we took the train back into Rome. We went to the Colosseum first, a noticeably shorter subway ride than the Vatican. As you exit the “Colosseum” station, you are literally across the famous structure. We weren’t expecting it to be so close and we gaped in awe at it. Of course, we were immediately pegged as tourists and recruited to join a tour. The Colosseum, Palantine, and Roman Forums are all side by side and a guided tour of all three was only $17.00 USD each. They even gave us headsets so we could hear the tour guide. It was cheaper than getting the audio guide to all three places, so we joined the tour.
The Colosseum tour was excellent. The guide did a good job. From the outside, the Colosseum looks exactly like the photos you have all seen. The theater was a Greek invention (semicircle around a stage) but the amphitheater (sticking two theaters together) was a Roman invention. The Colosseum held 50,000 70,000 people (depending on which source you site), but, believe it or not, was not the largest stadium built in their day. No one made another amphitheater as large as the Colosseum until the twentieth century.
The Colosseum was built by the Emperor Vespain to “please the people”, meaning to provide entertainment to distract people from their dreary lives. It was inaugurated in Continue reading
Continued from yesterday”¦ Going back to the dozen or so painted rooms “¦ Some of the rooms were chapels, some living quarters or offices of the popes. Most of these rooms were painted by incredibly famous artists, such as Raphael and Perugino. Most were done in roughly the same time period as the Sistine (late 1400’s through the 1500’s). Every inch of ceiling and wall were painted. Each painting had a religious theme. Something that really struck us as odd is that many of these paintings incorporated images of pagan Greek/Roman gods and goddesses, as well as Greek scholars and philosophers, alongside Jesus and bishops. There were also scenes depicting stories from pagan mythology, both Greek and Egyptian. We think the paintings are bizarre given how adamant the church was at destroying heretical pagan religious beliefs and repressing Greek knowledge. There are some bible scenes depicted, as well (of course). Probably the majority of the artwork was depictions of martyrdoms, conquests, miracles and other significant events from post bible Christian history. Every one of these rooms was spectacular. Every one of the rooms you could sit in for days just staring at the walls and ceilings before you really could fully take in and appreciate the artwork. Here are a couple photos. We know the paintings look small, but remember that these are whole entire walls in fairly large rooms.
In addition to the regular tour, there were several optional galleries along the way, as well, usually doorways off to the side where you could leave the main trail. Every single optional gallery was huge, with a trove of exhibits. The Greek & Roman art gallery has Continue reading
Human settlements dating back to 700,000 BC have been found around the Italian Peninsula. Several distinct people groups emerged over time, including the Latins. One of the cities the Latins formed was Rome, named after the legendary founder of the city, Romulus, a descendant of the goddess Venus, and founded in 753 BC.
Another people group was called the Continue reading
We were supposed to meet our friend, Tai, in Palermo today with Kosmos. Unfortunately, the weather did not cooperate with our plans. It was windy and choppy on the seas. So, we rented a car, instead. We drove up to Cinisi to pick Tai up from his hotel. Cinisi is a small town near the Palermo airport, about 31 kilometers west of from the city of Palermo.
Outside the town of Trapani, the landscape is exactly what you imagine Italy to be. Gently rolling hills with acre upon acre of farmland, empty windy roads, and a farmhouse dotting the landscape here and there. It looks like a sports car ad. It is beautiful. Here there are more vineyards and less fruit orchards. There also seems to be a bigger variety of produce grown than on the other side of the island.
Cinisi is a seaside community, and even has its own little marina. The town is adorable and quaint. We found Tai and headed on to Palermo. We had no real plan for sightseeing, and we weren’t really sure where to go. We followed signs that said “city center”. When we got to where the buildings looked really old, we parked. We had no clue whatsoever where we were. We immediately saw that we had stumbled across one of the three open air markets in the city’s old center. This market was basically vendors selling assorted items from folding tables a long a series of narrow streets. There was a lot of produce, cheese, fish and meats, which made for an interesting combination of smells that Tai commented “is not always pleasant”. There were also a lot of low end miscellaneous items you’d find at a 99 cents store. It was hard to get a good look at the buildings behind the vendors, but they looked pretty run down from what we could tell. We made our way through the market and continued on, finding the train station. Ah ha! A land marker! We now knew where we were, but, unfortunately, not where we had left the car.
We decided to head to the center of the historic district, Quattro Canti (four corners). We followed a main road northwest. What is interesting is Continue reading