Wed Nov 29
This would be our last day of sightseeing for Rome. We would leave the next morning, but we were out of the hotel by 6am and on a flight home by 9:30, so Wed would be it for us. After breakfast, we went to see Hadrian’s temple, which was really just a façade on the roman stock exchange.

the picture above is one I grabbed from wikipedia. I saw it, but since it wasn’t where google said it was supposed to be, I was busy trying to figure out what was happening and didn’t take my own photo.

But apparently, google maps has the wrong thing listed, so we ended up at Sant’Ignazio di Loyola church.

Shell and Tony went in, but I was going to stay outside. Then Nate went in and didn’t come out. We were starting to wonder if they all converted to Catholicism, but then Nate texted us that it was actually pretty impressive inside, so we all went in. They weren’t kidding… it was pretty impressive inside. The church was finished in 1650, and the ceiling fresco was by Andrea Pozzi.

But since we were going to the Vatican later, that wasn’t even the most impressive church we saw that day!

We then caught a bus over across the river to a viewspot on the Janiculum hill.

After that we went up to lunch at Arlù, close to the Vatican.

Then, at 2:30p, we had a tour of the Vatican Museums, the Sistine Chapel, and St. Peter’s basilica

After that we went home to rest and change for a high-end dinner at Imago.

That was basically the end of our trip. The next morning we were out early and on a flight home.

I had been afraid that in the middle of such a tourist area, everyone would speak better English than I do Italian, and therefore wouldn’t want to speak any Italian with me. But nearly everywhere I went, the staff answered me in Italian if I started with Italian. I was even thanked several times for making the effort. So overall, the trip was just great. We got very little rain, even though November is the rainiest month of the year. My sons were both with me in Italy again, this time old enough to really enjoy it. And I got to speak Italian for a week. we had no hitches in the scheduling and everyone was happy. I’m calling it a success.