Spring Break, Italy Edition.....day 1 Rome...The Vatican, Sistine Chapel, and St Peters

I haven't posted in a while because we have been saving up to tour Italy, for Spring Break.  We also decided to bring Zackary from Texas to come visit for 90 days and go with us to Italy.  Instead of flying and visiting one city we decided to drive and visit multiple cities.  We decided on Rome, Florence, Sienna, Pisa, Cinque Terre, Milan and Venice.  Let me just say that if you want to find the above mentioned cities you must spell them correctly.  Leave it to us Americans to change the spelling of major cities across the world for no reason.  Rome is Roma, Florence is Firenze, Sienna is Siena, Milan is Milano and Venice is Venezia. We will hit most of the major sites and get an idea of where we would like to go back and visit next time.  I am going to break the trip down and post by cities, there is just way to much stuff for one post.

We started off our trip by making the 12 hour drive from our house in Germany to the apartment we rented in Rome.  We love using the www.airbnb.com site for all of our lodging.  The tolls in Italy are pretty high so make sure you budget for it if you drive. You can use www.viamichelin.com to plan your route and check tolls for all of your cross country endeavors.

Our apt we rented in Rome was very close to the Colosseum and only 1 block from the subway station. If you are planning a trip to Rome for 3 or less people check out Michela's little apartment. Also if you do not want to spend all of your time waiting in line order your omnia vatican rome pass.  You get the hop on hop off tour bus, all public transport for free, skip the lines at the Vatican, St Peters, Sistine Chapel, Colosseum, Palatine hill,  and the prison where St Peter and St Paul where imprisoned.  All for 3 days, along with other discounts for museums and other sites, the web site explains all.

Our first stop was the Vatican and let me say it is well worth the money to buy the Omnia tickets and not wait in the blocks worth of people waiting in line.

 There is no way to describe the beauty and detail of the Vatican, the artwork is amazing.

these huge tapestries lined both sides of a huge hallway 

there is no way to describe the detail in the ceiling 

Van Gogh original "Pieta"

the center of Vatican city

 There are no pictures allowed in the Sistine Chapel but Zack didn't know till after he took this one of the ceiling.  It only took Michelangelo 4 years to paint the 6000 square foot ceiling.

St Peters Basilica 

 This is Michelangelo's Pieta, it is beautiful!

 98 foot tall bronze alter centered under the main dome.  Zack and I climbed to the upper portion of the dome.

Here is part of the 491 stairs to get to the top of the dome.

 We where amazed to see that what we thought were paintings on the dome are millions of 1/2 inch mosaic tiles.  It is absolutely a masterpiece! 

Looking out from the viewing platform at top of dome. Great pic of Vatican city and St Peters square.