more huffing- and getting my hair out of his face.
michelangelo designed not only the dome of san pietro's but also these fabulous duds that the swiss guards- la guardia di suisse- wear.
notice that the religious get a salute. so cool.
i like how these holy water font cherub statues are "daddy sized".
this is the canopy above the altar in san pietro's. looking up towards the dome- the words that go around the top of the WHOLE church are all the words spoken from Christ to peter. AND to give perspective they are 7 feet tall!
also- notice the four spiral pillars- at the foot of each pillar, carved into the support is the shield of the bernini family(it has three bees on it)- AND walking clockwise around the altar it is chronicled- the face of one of the bernini daughters in labor! the last face being that of the newborn babe!
confession anyone? they have a plentitude of confessionals in an assortment of languages.
this was something really cool to me. they can't have paintings up in san pietro's- due to the constant candle burning over many many centuries- so they made them mosaics. they look SO like a painting- like brush strokes- not like other mosaics that just have a mosaicized look.
another video- taken from the back of the church to give you perspective on the sheer giganticism of san pietro's.
swiss guard rain coats- i bet michelangelo didn't design these garments!
me mailing from the vatican post office.
then we did the vatican museo tour on a rented audio guide.
here- a video of a mummy, for my boys;)
we both really liked raphael's art the best. the colors were so vivid. i entered one room and kind of glanced over my shoulder casually and then did a double take. was that the school of athens?!?!? wow! it was! i never knew it was actually a fresco on a wall in the vatican! ok- maybe i did once upon a time, but don't tell my art history teacher i forgot- ok?
chris by a really neat modern painting of his name sake- in the vaticano museo.
we scouted out a seat on the edge of the sistene chapel so we could gaze at the ceiling in relative comfort. i switched my ipod on and we listened to yet another rick steve's podcast. i am NOT regretting these podcasts- they are golden!
it was a good and long podcast, well researched on the ceiling's history. after the museum we headed straight back for mass in the chapel- the one behind the main altar at s. pietro's. the choir was composed of american highschool age kids from connecticut. they were really good. they sang this really white choiry version of "this little light of mine" after communion. not gospely at all- different, but good.
after mass we walked through san pietro's square and across the street. we propped ourselves against a building facing the square so we could listen to the rick steve's podcast describing the square.
here is a video taken from one of the center points in the ellipse. from this point all the columns in each of the four rows on the near side of the ellipse line up to look like one column. but when we looked across to the far side, you could tell there were four rows because they didn't perfectly align. just some math and geometry nerdiness for you.
after this we walked towards castle s. angelo on the tiber. it was just about to close so we walked towards the metro.
the bridge by castle sant'angelo.
my shoes were well past soaked so on the way chris bought me some italian leather boots. i put my soggy mary jane's in the bag and gladly wore the dry boots. it was a big mistake- after walking to the metro, getting to our stop, and walking back to the hotel from our metro stop "cornelia"- i had blisterd worked up. so- i have blisters from my mary jane's, raw spots from the tethers of my chaco's, and blisters from my boots. my feet are very interesting looking- i will jst tell you about them instead of taking a picture.
metro riding.
these big black puffy shiny jackets are HOT in italy. guys, gals, babies. everybody has one.
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