Santa Maria

We walked past this church every day on our way out of Trastevere, but tonight on the way home we decided to go in. Pretty extravagant interior.

Today we went to the Vatican. We queued for 2 1/2 hrs to get into the Museum because we really wanted to see the Sistine Chapel. Unfortunatley this meant shuffling through room after room of the Vatican museum (which in itself is pretty spectacular) along with everyone else. The chapel wasn't what I was expecting - it was very gloomy inside but Michelangelo had 2 of the windows blocked in so he had room to paint the last judgement - the rest of the chapel not being a big enough canvas for him apparently. Every now and then the guards blew their whistles and shouted at everyone to be quiet and stop taking photos. Did not feel very sacred. But peering up into the gloom you realised what a spectacular feat it was for one man to pretty much single handedly paint the ceiling of a vast chapel, laying on his back on a platform for 4 years! And it was good picking out all the detail you've seen on postcards or in books over the years.

St Peters was another wow. We went up the dome and had great views of Rome, though I found it hard to step away from the wall and peer over the edge. Our feet are on fire. Will be sad to leave tomorrow but as I have thrown my euro into the Trevi fountain then that means one day I'll be back.