Past POIs - Sistine Chapel [Vatican City, Italy]

Sometimes, you visit a place that you have heard about and you are amazed, sometimes, you are disappointed, sometimes, you are confused.  This is one of those places where I felt a lot of things and one of the most shocking things for me was that I had the name wrong the whole time.  For some reason, I kept thinking that this place was called the 'sixteen chapel' as if there were fifteen other ones somewhere.

Source: wikipedia

The Sistine Chapel is part of the Vatican Museums and the museum is laid out such that you will see it half way through the exhibits as long as you follow the map and arrows.  Seeing this site is one of those things where, while I am amazed by the work that is involved with creating it, I had this impression that it would be much larger than it actually is.

Source: wikipedia

Unfortunately, you can't take photos in the Chapel, so all images are from their cited source instead of my own as per my use Past POI posts.  Given that this is a big tourist attraction, there are a lot of people and you will likely be standing shoulder to shoulder with other guests.  I felt that this took away from me appreciating it and my lack of understanding what the frescoes meant due to me not being religious.  While it was nice to see, it didn't have as much of a lasting impression as I thought it would.  Mind you, when I saw it, the frescoes look pretty real and given that the frescoes are on the ceiling and not on an entirely flat surface, it was amazing to see how it all works and looks so real.

Source: wikipedia

Construction started in 1473 and it was completed in 1483 with the first mass happening on August 15, 1483. It is a marvel to see, but I think my expectations were set too high for this one, plus my blunder with the name makes me feel somewhat silly. But don't let this dissuade you from visiting, I definitely think it is worth a visit.

Come back next Friday for another Past Point of Interest!

Italy 2013 - Day 3 (Rome)

Woke up to be at Vatican City at 10:00am.  I didn't expect it to be so big and crazy.  St Peter's Basilica was pretty overwhelming as well.  Both took us about 3 hours each.  Yes, 3 hours EACH.  We really liked Raphael's work the most (yes, more than Michelangelo).  I would also recommend pre-booking this item if you are going.  You skip the massive line up.  Be aware that there are a lot of tour groups here.

- Vatican Museums (includes Sistine Chapel), spent about 3 hours here.  Very big museum, crazy amount of old sculptures and paintings.  If you are a fan, this may take even longer.  Take a look at the mosaics.  Some are so small, you can't tell they were mosaics.  It is amazing how some of the paintings look like they are real.

- St Peter's Basilica, we spent about 3 hours here as well.  This includes the exterior and interior.  Once you go in, you are just overwhelmed by the amount of things that are inside.  But I kept wondering how much money was spent to make the place.  Lots of things were under restoration outside unfortunately, so a perfect picture was not possible.

- Piazza Navona we saw this time during the day, it looks nicer in the day in my opinion.  Same amount of street vendors though.  People selling you art, photos, caricatures, spray paint art (which is pretty cool).

- Pantheon, when we compared this to what we have seen already, I would suggest seeing this earlier.  The inside doesn't look very impressive.  The outside looks nice though.

- Trevi fountain we saw during the day this time and I think it looks nicer during the day as well.  Still as crazy busy though.  Plenty of Indians (from India) trying to sell you a polaroid of you there.

- Castel St. Angelo, we saw the exterior and it looks pretty nice at night, not sure about the day, nor did we go inside.  Right outside to the east there is a little market we saw at night with shops and live music.  It was a nice change of scenery.

- only 1 gelato today.