Sunday, May 30

On Sunday morning those of us who came back to Rome instead of staying in Sorrento met up with Zach and Allen Ceen to go on a bike ride around the city walls of Rome.

We rented bikes, which were kind of crappy, and people’s chains kept falling off left and right. The bike road took about 4 hours, and we went all the way from the Pinciot Hill to where the walls meet the river and stop.  After that we had to book it through the city all the way back to where we rented the bikes. On the way back Tzao ran into two different people and took some nasty spills. He ran into one girl and she got pretty pissed, and then no more than a minute later came flying around a corner and clipped a guy coming out of a church right in front of my a flew off his bike. It looked so painful but he was ok.

After we returned the bikes, Nick, Brandon, Matt, Pat, Devon, Amanda and I headed to the Vatican. We changed into nice clothes along the way in some back alley. We waited in line for about 15 minutes to get into St. Peter’s. 

First we went into the church and it was absolutely unbelievable. I’ve never seen a church like this. 

I took so many pictures and we spent at least an hour in the church. We tried to find the Vatican Museum then to see that and the Sistine Chapel, which are supposed to be just as great if not greater than St. Peter’s. Of course it was closed so we weren’t able to go. We were so mad. I have to see the Sistine Chapel before I leave Rome and I don’t know when I’ll have time. We left the church and went down into the tombs where all the popes are buried. It wasn’t until I saw John Paul II that I realized how touching this whole thing was. There were flowers covering his tomb and a crowd of people all gathered around praying. It was quite a sad sight. After that we headed back to the apartment because we were so exhausted. It was such a long day, so we went back and napped.