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091905 - Our PRIVATE tour of the Sistine Chapel and the best/biggest meal EVER -- what a day. |
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written
by julia625 / 09.29.2005 |
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Itinerary |
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| Photo by Julia Olson |
| Morning in the RC |
| Honors students “working” diligently (secretly Zinnia is playing solitaire and Judy is naming her brand new turtles) |
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| Photo by Julia Olson |
| Nervous Anticipation |
| After a short bus ride, we arrived and waited with excitement for the guards to let us in. Something to note: Davey and Judy are in the process of trading shoes... interesting... |
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| Photo by Julia Olson |
| In the Sculpture Garden in front of Apollo del Belvedere |
| Students are torn between listening to Lisa tell the awesome stories behind each sculpture and taking photographs to remember them.. tough choice.. |
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| Photo by Julia Olson |
| Sistine Chapel |
| Yes, what you've all been waiting for, this is us, alone, in the Sistine Chapel. As you can see, after a breif intro from Lisa, students just wandered around and took photos and stared.. |
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| Photo by Julia Olson |
| Sistine Chapel |
| It's hard to catch the glory in just on single photo, but here is the back wall where the altar is, and part of the ceiling.. Beautiful, isn't it? |
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| Photo by Julia Olson |
| Dinner Gifts |
| Lisa and Shawn after receiving their gifts... and an almost empty bottle of dessert wine.. hmm... actually we all shared it, but the other way is more interesting.. |
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| Shawn Wong |
| Sistine Chapel |
| Students gaze in "amazement" at the Sistine Chapel ceiling |
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Today was one of the rare days during this trip where all students had the morning free to do whatever they pleased. Some slept in, others went to visit monuments and churches they either hadn’t seen yet or didn’t get enough of the first time around, some just explored, and still others went on the quest for the perfect gelato (and claim they found it… field trip perhaps?). Most of the students, however, spent the bulk of the morning and afternoon in the University of Washington Rome Center. Here their time was spent catching up on various assignments and just generally preparing themselves for the best evening of this entire trip.
I’m sure this could be argued for every day so far, but today we really had a once in a lifetime experience. Today was our private tour of the Vatican Museums and Sistine Chapel. We arrived at 6:25 pm and at 6:30 pm, with a little “friendly encouragement” from Lisa, (in the form of all 20 of us standing right in front of the door), the guards let us in. After grabbing our tickets and being outfitted with two personal guards to escort the group, we headed off to the sculpture garden. Here we saw Apollo Belvedere, and Laocoon, among many others. We walked from piece to piece while Lisa explained to us the history behind each one. Limited by our two hour time limit, we headed down through the Gallery of Maps and the Gallery of Tapestries (interesting note, there were very few fully nude sculptures, instead there were nude sculptures with strategically placed fig leaves covering what were determined as indecencies by various popes over the years). After a quick stroll through the fascinating old libraries, we headed to the real gem of our tour; the Sistine Chapel.
Now up until this very point one could imagine what it may be like to explore the Vatican Museums without the overwhelming crowds. Being one of only 20 people (27 including the camera crew) in the Sistine Chapel is something that words simply do not do justice to. Thankfully the guards were feeling lenient and not only allowed us to talk, but take photographs (without flash of course) the entire time we were in there so we were able to visually document our adventure. We were not alone in the chapel; we were joined by a camera crew who had set up large spotlights that illuminated the entire chapel. We were able to see every tiny detail of the most intricate and beautiful ceiling in the world. It was indescribable. We were hardly even talking, the whole class was just staring upward, mesmerized, throughout the duration of our visit. One of the most interesting things we were able to see, besides everything in the entire chapel, was the few patches of dark soot left on the ceiling from its cleaning between 1980 and 1994. It’s amazing how dark the ceiling was, we could barely see the frescoes through the grime. After taking many, many pictures, our time was sadly up and we were forced to leave our peaceful sanctuary.
As disappointing as it was to leave, Shawn and Lisa had planned accordingly and led us on to yet another breathtaking experience; dinner at Tony and Dino’s Hosteria. I use the term “dinner” loosely, what I really mean was gourmet food of astounding quantities fed to us by a team of amazingly enthusiastic Italian men. We started out with a collection of traditional appetizers including spinach tart, breaded rice balls and breaded olives, to name a few. Oh did I mention that was just appetizer number one? Appetizer number two consisted of salami and prochutio, followed shortly by appetizer number three; an ensemble of three different kinds of pizza. Once all of that was finished (I mean finished; Tony would not clear your plate unless it was clean, or you begged him and suffered the disappointed look he left lingering above your head), we started the actual dinner dishes. Next came an amazing homemade penne pasta with tomato, cheese and basil sauce. At this point, most people were full or filling up. The next dish was pasta with pancetta and parmesan that was served within minutes of finishing course number one. When I heard the next dish was meat, I was secretly relieved (as a vegetarian) to have a break until Tony found out and took away my plate and re-filled it with pasta before returning it to me. After the second course of pasta came yet another meat and potatoes course, which less then half of the group could finish. After all eating our limit, they brought out the dessert; almond tarts, tiramisu, espresso with whip cream, a cream dish with raspberry sauce, crème brule, and so many more I can’t even remember. Needless to say, we all waddled out of the restaurant very satisfied and possibly with a small ciambella del' amore to show for it the next morning.
p.s. ciambella del' amore = love handles, directly translated = donut of love. Sweet, isn't it.
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Highlights |
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Obviously, being alone in the Sistine Chapel was a pretty big highlight in itself. The most amazing thing, however, was having the camera crew there. These large spotlights they were using to illuminate the ceiling so that they could take their pictures enabled us to see every tiny detail. Even Lisa, who had been to the Sistine Chapel countless times before, was noticing things like the gilded gold on some parts of the ceiling that she hadn't seen before.
This was also our last group dinner (tear) so the students presented the teachers with gifts we had gathered for them. Lisa got an awesome timed espresso machine and Shawn got a beautiful print of the Campo di Fiori. So sweet..
Although for everyone who was there, this doesn't even need to be said, but for all the folks back home, the food was definitely highlight number three. These men prided themselves on the quality of their restaurant and it seemed like they were on a mission to make sure that nobody left with even the smallest crevice of their stomach empty. It was delicious.
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