Rome (2nd night) 06-07-2010

Children hit the sack at 11pm last night, late sunsets and late dinners after much walking. A challenge to get going early in the morning but we managed it. Off to the Vatican museums, Sistine Chapel , San Pietro Duomo and then to the Colosseum , the Roman Forum and Palatine hill. The Sistine Chapel was packed with all these bloody tourists like us. Still it is amazing to stare up at the ceilings and admire Michelangelo’s fantastic work. The Egyptian Museum in the Vatican was interesting and had a great impact with the kids as there were real mummies.

Unfortunately when we got to St Peter’s Cathedral it was closed for the rest of the day due to a ceremony for a cardinal. So we didn’t get to see Michelangelo’s or Bernini’s works. It was a bit disappointing as Michelangelo’s La Pieta, was something we wanted to show the kids and see ourselves again.

Lunch at Palatine hill among the ancient ruins. The scale of the buildings there really had an impact. Ancient Rome had its own kind of sky scrapers. We walked through Augustus Caesar’s modest dwellings and into the Emperor Domitian’s extravagant palace. The excavations go incredibly deep so that you can imagine the sheer scale of the buildings. I spent my time thinking of the lluxury and sophistication of the city. The structures now left to see are mostly made of the distinctive Roman red bricks which are the internal material of the walls. Back then however, these were all rendered with a smooth concrete lining and had Frescoes painted on and carvings placed. The floors were often polished marble. The Colosseum is the same. To imagine it in its original state with shiny polished marble seats and pathways, ornate floors of green and pink marble designs, the great wooden floor of the blood thirsty arena really is breath taking. This structure would still rival the size of most modern sports stadiums!

Kailin's Word: Today we went to the Vatican Museum, where the Sistine Chapel is. There was an Egyptian museum exhibition on at the time, so we got to see statues of Egyptian gods by the Romans and thousand year old mummies... without their bandages. When we got to the Sistine Chapel, it was so packed there was barely any room to move. Because it was sacred, everybody was supposed to be quiet, but, of course, nobody was, so security guards patrolled around, and when you tried to ask someone where the exit was, they made shushing noises so loud they were making more noise than everyone else. After the Vatican, we went to Colosseum, and this time we got in. Once inside, we walked around the whole thing. The floor had rotted away, so we could see where they kept the animals and gladiators and things, and it was like a maze.

On our last day in Rome, and we went to the zoo. We saw impressive animals like lions, tigers, elephants, giraffes and various monkeys. It was funny when we got to the section on Australian animals. They made such a big thing of the creatures we see all the time. It was really fun but kind of sad as well. Like when we got the lions, and I saw a type of lion I hadn’t even known existed: the Asian lion. We discovered that the reason I hadn’t heard of them because was that there is only 300 of them left in the world. Then we realised we were running late and that if we didn’t go that second, we would miss our train. We hopped on a bus and arrived with moments to spare before the train pulled out of the station.