This morning was an early start. We ate breakfast at the buffet again and then hit the road. We left the hotel around 8:30 to walk to the Vatican. It only took about 15 minutes to walk there so we had to wait till 9:15 for our tour to start. Tours sometimes are really the way to go especially if you don’t have to stand in line because of it. We went straight on in and started the tour.

We spent almost an hour standing outside learning about the Sistine Chapel. They had posters outside with pictures of it because there is no talking allowed while in the Chapel. It was too hot for me to pay attention so I stood next to a giant pot that was producing some shade. Finally we went inside the Vatican museum to see all the art. My mom and I had been there before and nothing has changed, but it was still really cool to see. There were a few rooms that we went in on this visit that I had not seen before so that was exciting. My favorite things to see were the bathtubs carved out of a single piece of marble.

Eventually we made our way through the museum and then headed into the Sistine Chapel. Sadly things have changed in there since the last time we visited. They are no longer enforcing the rules like they use to. There are 3 rules in the Chapel, No taking pictures, No showing shoulders or knees, and No talking. I saw everyone disobeying those rules. Needless to say I felt very uncomfortable there. It was almost like there was a huge cloud of negative energy floating around the room. I wanted to get out of there as fast as we could.

Afterwards my family went into the Basilica while I waited outside in the shade. After that we headed to a restaurant to eat some lunch. We found a great place that had really good food and I got a 4 cheese cream sauce pizza. Sadly I bit down too hard and cracked the bone where my tooth was pulled. Caused me great pain. I'm so sick of these damn wisdom teeth.

Anyways after that we headed back to the hotel to take a rest.

After getting rested we headed out to the Piazza del Popolo to do some shopping. We went in a ton of stores but didn’t buy anything. So we found a place to eat dinner and rest for a bit. (Sure sounds like we need a lot of resting, but travel and heat can do it to you). Once we were done we went back to 1 store that seemed like it had some good stuff in it. We ended up shopping like crazy in that store and got me some great clothing to wear since I did not pack enough shirts.

Once we were done we went to sit in the Piazza and people watch. It was in the evening so it was cooling down and the sun was not beaming down. It was very fun to watch all the people, but we had to leave when the bugs came out and started attacking my dad.

We took our short stroll back to the hotel and had some drinks in the courtyard outside before going to bed for the night.