I am a zombie mummy vampire

People of Rome... invent outdoor airconditioning... please... Okay, so day 2 in Rome started out by being hotter than the previous day, awesome. We started off the day by catching busses and trains etc into the city itself where we then proceeded to head directly towards the Vatican, wanting to try avoid queues etc. Surpirisingly enough there was absolutely no queues when we got there. I was expecting tons of people lined up for blocks. Hey, all the better for us.

So we headed in and then proceeded to start looking around at all the statues and paintings etc. Holy cow, they have a lot of them. Seriously. Like every surface is covered with stuff. Well, one of the main things that we wanted to see there was the Sisteen (spelling?) chapel so we headed off to see that. Now, I'm not going to say that it wasn't impressive, because it was, but my expectations were a little different from what was actually there. Anyone that knows about it knows that there is that picture with the guy whose hand is reaching out towards god's hand... you know the one I'm talking about? Well I always imagined it was this massive image that covered the ceiling... It isn't.

That picture is just a small one on the ceiling, it is in fact one of many pictures that cover the ceiling of chapel. I always expected it to be this massive thing, not a tiny little one. Whenever you hear about it or see it on TV it is always made out to be awesome. I was slightly dissapointed with that, but then again, the chapel itself is damn amazing. It's crazy how much work went into it. Anyway we headed out of there to go and grab some food before we continued to explore the various parts of the Vatican.

The Vatican clearly thinks it knows what people want to see. That is to say, they apparantly believe that EVERYONE wants to see the Sisteen chapel. Why? Because it seems that a large portion of the other exhibits that you can go see will lead you back to the entrance to the Sisteen chapel. Yes it is impressive... but a lot less so on your third trip around it. Oh well. After we had our fill of the different art pieces etc. in there we decided to head off to go explore the rest of Rome for a bit.

Oh, before we continue, I need to explain something. Lee-Anne hadn't brought any propper flip flops or anything like that for the trip, so she decided to get some the night before at the little market thingy at the camp site. This will be important, remember it.

After heading out the Vatican we headed around the corner (a really big corner) to go see St. Peter's Bascilica. Damn, that place is huge. I don't know how people managed to design places like that let alone build them. Or decorate them. The amount of gold in there is kind of crazy. Not to mention the paintings, murals, statues... you get the point right? The place was crazy awesome. I would have gone up the stairs to the top but then I wouldn't have had a chance to see anything else in Rome, I can't quite explain how long that queue was because I couldn't see the end of it. Oh well.

After we finished up there we decided to go look at the Circus Maximus. If you know about the place then you can see where this is going. Anyway, it was time for fun and games. Now, you remember those slops I mentioned earlier? Heres were the fun began. She got blisters on her feet, right where the top of the slops were. So she used micropore tape something or another to cover it. The slops kept eating it, oh well, reapply and continue. So we caught the metro to the Circus Maximus station, checked our maps and headed out to go see it. Well... we walked, and walked, and walked, and couldn't see it. You want to know why?

We couldn't see it because it 2006 the remains of it were torn down. Well now, damn wouldn't that have been useful information for our tour manager to have given us but noooooo, not even a mention. And the damn thing was still listed on the map that he gave us. That was a painful waste of time, mostly for me because I had to listen to her complaining about her feet the entire time. My poor ears, you cannot understand the pain... anyway.

After that failed walkabout we continued on to get some awesome pictures and views of the Roman forum. This was of course after we had paid rediculous prices for some drinks because it was so hot. The Forum was massive. A lot bigger than I had expected. We went from there and headed towards the colloseum when we had some real fun and games. We were just walking down the path as this guy with an umbrella is walking rather quickly towards us. Out of nowhere this HUGE guy slams his hand around the other guys throat and shoves him up against the fence. Now, we didn't want to make it look like we were paying attention to this so we just kept our same pace and continued walking in the same direction we had been going and definitely, nope nope definitely not, looking at what was going on. One problem, the big guy starts hauling the other guy the same direction we were going.

That was when we noticed it. Just up ahead there was an old Italian guy sitting on a ledge with some shopping bags, and this other darker skinned guy on his knees while another large italian guy is standing over him. The guy on his knees looks like he is begging and praying. Kind of creepy. Anyway, the guy moving in the same direction as us, brings umbrella guy to this scene, takes the umbrella and puts it into one of the packets that the old guy had. It's at this point that the guy who stole the umbrella (I'm assuming) starts beggging and praying as well. The old guy waves his hands and the big italian guys shove the two thieves (I'm assuming) away who then bolt.

It was kinda dodgey and creepy but you have to admire them. It was a damn effective way of getting back the stolen goods as well as scaring the bajeezus out of the thieves... and any tourists that happened to be near by. Well we vacated the area as fast as possible and headed off to our next stop. A little church in Rome where some Capputian (spelling?) monks had their crypts. Wow, I'd say they were wrong but as our tour manager keeps reminding us, it's just different. All of these crypts were decorated with bones. Human, animal, all just stuck in various patterns etc around the place. There were even some bodies that looked really well preserved that were just there in poses. The weird thing is that they were just out in the open air and it didn't seem like they were decaying all that much. It was kind of creepy.

After this, and much whining from miss silly slops, we decided to head back to the camp site where we had a "buffet" (it's not buffet if you can only go up to get food once damnit) dinner followed by more boiling as we tried to sleep amidst the horrendous amounts of noise that were coming from the bar. Oh well. Oh I should mention that she also went plummeting down the stairs at the train station on the way back and gave herself a rather nasty bruise. One again die to the slops. Lets just say that the slops did not meet a happy ending when we reached the camp site...

Score:
Me: 2
Her: 4
New Guy: 3
Chachi: 1
Bus: 2
Other Guy: 1
Vatican: 2