Day 1 - Basilica di San Pietro in Vaticano

After arriving Sunday Morning in Rome, we checked in, took a very short cat nap, and headed out on foot from the hotel. 

Picture of our hotel street, the hotel is on the left...no way a bus is coming down this street.
















We did not have any tours scheduled for Sunday afternoon, we had planned a walking tour, but it was raining.  We ran into our tour guide, Fabrizio, and he suggested that we walk to St. Peter's Basilica since it is inside and there are things we can do that won't be on the tour tomorrow.

We had a good lunch at a Buona Forchetta, Pizza...as expected, it was very good and from there it was a short walk to the Vatican.  We strolled about St. Peter's square for a bit, it is a lot to take in.

The obligatory selfie.

Then got in line to go in the St. Peter's Basilica, it was about a 20 min wait, pretty short from what we were told.

Of course you have to pass the Swiss guards on the way in.












We have visited the Basilica in Washington DC and it reminded us of that but on a much grander scale. The opulence is not something that can be described, you have to experience it.  The word priceless came to my mind because you truly could never fathom what it would take to replace even one chapel in the Vatican.

After wondering around in the main basilica, we found our way to the entrance to the Crypts, it is like finding a secret stairway that winds below the Basilica.  Below the Basilica they have the tombs of Pope's, pictures are not allowed, but it is worth the tour. 

No pictures allowed in the Gratte. Tome Die Papi.



After the Gratte tour we wanted to go to the St. Peter's Dome, you can walk it in just under 500 stairs to take the elevator partway to make it 320 stairs...for 10 EU we took the elevator.  Well worth the effort.

As you get to the top, the stairs curve with the dome and it gets really narrow, not for the claustrophobic.

 The view from the top of the Dome is amazing.

 St. Peter's Square.

The statues from the square look small...they are not!

They are impressive in stature.













We ended our self guided tour of St. Peter's and headed back to the hotel for our orientation session and dinner. Monday is the first real day of the tour, we will go back to the Vatican but it will be very different than what we did.