Visiting the City within a City

We awoke extremely early on Christmas eve to make our way to Gatwick Airport for our 6.30 a.m. flight. That flight seemed like a good idea when we were booking it, but in reality, getting up at 2.30 a.m. is not great.

We had to get up so early because we had to get the bus to Victoria and then the train to Gatwick, so a full 4 hours before our flight!

But we arrived in time and took off as the sun was rising, which was a pretty amazing sight.

We arrived in Rome at about 10.30 a.m. and headed straight for the Vatican. We had pre-booked tickets for 12.30 p.m. because we heard the Vatican Museums were packed on Christmas Eve and the day after Boxing Day, because they were closed the two days in between.

In reality we walked right in with no problems! Though I think if we had waited until the 27th it would have been packed because Rome seemed to get busier the longer we were there.

We checked our bags into the cloakroom and headed off in the direction of the Sistine Chapel. Our plan was to head there first, and then wander back around the museums because we weren't sure what time they actually closed. 

The walk through the museums to the Sistine Chapel was extremely long, it took us like 45 minutes to get all the way there. There were huge crowds the closer we got, mostly tour groups, but we managed to maneuver our way past them quite easily.  

Unfortunately you can't take any photos inside, but it was stunning. Just the entire roof and all the walls were covered in amazing art and tapestries. It was also packed full of people, just standing or sitting and staring at the ceiling.

We spent a while in the Sistine Chapel, and then made our way back through the museum, stopping to look at all the amazing sculptures and paintings we missed on the way past.

Every ceiling in the Vatican Museums is also covered in amazing paintings and stunning designs. I have so many photo's of the ceilings!

Excited at the thought of a bathtub this huge!

Amazing ceilings! 

Ha! Bradley caught me staring at the ceilings. This is what everyone looked like in the Sistine Chapel.

I wasn't kidding about the amazing ceilings throughout the entire museum. Perhaps I've posted too many, but it was hard to choose the best ones! This is me posing in the Gallery of Maps, which has topographical maps of all of Italy.

Bradley doing another Captain Picard pose! He did the same pose in Venice here.

This statue was posed so differently to the other ones, it was so funny :)

While we were inside the Museum's it bucketed down with rain, luckily this was the only time it rained the whole weekend. This is the view towards St Peter's Basilica from the Museum entrance.

Vatican Post Office