We had several days in Rome here at the tail end of our trip. We packed a lot into those few days. Looking back it might have been too much.
I'm not sure we ever found out what this building was. We saw it several times and there was always a line. The Statue looks like Caesar on a horse. Not sure if it is or not.
First order of business was going to the Vatican. Upon advice from friends we had gotten our tickets through the Vatican. A little bit about Vatican City. It is the world's smallest independent nation. It is only 110 acres. It is the center of the Roman Catholic Church. It is ruled by the Pope. The new Pope is Pope Leo. He is from the United State. We learned he is very popular. While we were in Rome he was actually heading to Barcelona. There's a lot there. You have St Peter's Basilica, Vatican Museums, and the Sistine Chapel. We had tickets for all of those.
We get there a little bit after our scheduled ticket time, but they had someone take us over where we needed to be. We weren't the only ones there was another tardy guest.
We went through security. It was actually tighter than airport security. I had to take my watch off and send it through the scanner. Now part of this is probably our fault but we didn't see any signs for the Sistine Chapel. We got in a line of people and made our way into a building. We had an audiotour.
The Vatican guard in the bright uniforms.
So we walked around and then went out the door. We walked up the street and found a place for lunch and we then realized that we totally missed the Sistine Chapel. We are not sure how we did that. But we both agree we never saw signs for anything. Next time.
We were looking for a bakery but ended up finding the best pizza we had in Italy. We were hot and thirsty and we walked by this place and the guy invited us in so we went. He turned the air down for me and brought us water. We each ordered a pizza and they were so good.
I ordered the pepperoni one. Very good. Lots of cheese.
Joe ordered the sausage one. It was good too.
They brought us these two cookies for dessert. They were almond flavored and very good. A family from our cruise was staying at our hotel and we told them about how good the pizza was and they stopped in on the day they went to the Vatican.
We learned something about pizza on this trip. I had always seen Margherita pizza but never really knew what it was. I knew it only had cheese but I thought it also had tomatoes. Well we know about it now. It was named for their Queen Margherita of Savoy in 1889. It is made of tomato sauce, really good mozzarella cheese and had basil. Red, white and green. The colors of the Italian flag.
That evening we took at pasta making class. We were to learn ravioli, fettuccine, and tiramisu. Joe really likes tiramisu so that is how I talked him into it. Chef Mimi was in charge of the class.
We started with the tiramisu so it could be put in the fridge for a while.
Now for the pasta. Both pastas are going to be made from the same dough.
Joe's pasta
And the cherry on top the tiramisu.
The class was a lot of fun and I'm glad we were able to do this. This might be something we look to do in other places as well.
