June 6, Wednesday - Audience with the Pope and Saint Peter’s Basilica

Today we got up early and headed to Vatican City for an audience with the pope. Rather than walking or taking a bus, three of us took a cab directly there and got seats relatively close to the front, about 12 rows back or so. We sat in the increasingly hot day, surrounded by an ever growing crowd of people while we waited for an hour and a half or so until the audience began. In the interim, choirs sang and a German band played some upbeat tunes.  People stood and cheered when he finally arrived, driving by in the "pope-mobile."

Then we listened as groups from different places were introduced to the pope, each in their own language and each followed by the cheering or some other display. Then the pope shared his short message in the same language. When they got to English, they announced the names of our schools and we cheered ... however our little trio was nowhere near the rest of our groups so our cheers were pretty quiet!

The whole thing was done in 7 different languages: English, Spanish, French, German, Russian, Portuguese and Italian. Then he said a blessing over the audience in Latin.

Afterwards we toured St. Peter's Basilica, which is stunning. I wish that we could have seen Michelangelo's Pieta without it being behind glass, but I understand the precaution after the statue was attacked by a crazy man with a hammer.

The carvings and mosaics are spectacular, the baldachino and throne were elaborate and stunning. I wasn't up to climbing the 500 or so stairs to the top of the dome but I sent my camera up and still got to see the views, at least second hand.