Rome -Vatican







 Plan for today was to climb the dome of St Peter’s first thing and then attend the Papal audience. Unfortunately the dome was closed until after the audience. It was pretty cool being so close to the pope but we had little interest in the ancillary speakers, so we did not stay for the whole thing.

We left Vatican City and grabbed cabs to get to the Catacombs. We went to St Domitilla Catacomb. They have modernized the tour since we were here last. The passageways are now lit which is nice and reduces the creepiness factor. We had a nice tour and everyone seemed to find it interesting. 

After the tour, the kids headed to lunch and we headed to a WWII memorial. It was very somber. It commemorates the slaughter of over 300 citizens by the Nazis. The memorial is built into the cave where it happened and was really interesting. Along the way we stopped at a cafe and had a rooftop garden all to ourselves. We really needed to stop somewhere to have a nap but our Vatican tour was scheduled for 3:45

Vatican Museums close at 4:00, right when we were getting started. Having the place almost to ourselves was fantastic! Especially in the Sistine  Chapel. Our group and another group of 15 were the only ones in it! Some of the group could have stayed for a day in the museums, others thought the tour was too long. After the tour we had happy hour in the Pinecone Courtyard of the Vatican, it was awesome! 



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