The Pope

Now how do I explain this??

Try > LARGE <

Wandering towards The Vatican and St Peter's Basilica I remarked (rather irreverently) to my colleague how good it would be if The Pope popped out onto his "balcony" to say hi!

Approaching the square we were accosted by numerous "sellers" trying to persuade us to go with them into the Basilica when it opened at noon.
Firm "no's" all round but then one guy said to us - "hang around people, the Pope will be out in a minute to celebrate Mass" - we looked at each other in disbelief, then we looked at the massive crowds in front of The Vatican and thought that maybe it was true.

Ten minutes later out came the "Popemobile" to cheers and clapping and The Pope made a slow tour of the crowds - he was so close to us and, along with everyone else, I did my best to get a photo - sorry about the other cameras obscuring some of his face but nobody seemed to understand that I needed this as a clear shot for Blip!!!

I took over 100 photos (but no long lens - if only I had taken my 70-300 .....!!!) and couldn't decide which to post so made a small collage to show the full scene as well as The Pontiff close up (you can see how far away we were from the two smaller photos - one taken at full zoom in, one at full zoom out)