Since Rome is inland, we begun our 'Rome in a day' day at the port of Civitavecchia. The port is located about an hour by train or 90 minutes by bus from the centre of Rome and as we were wanting to spend as much time in Rome as possible, we opted to get the train.

After a slow start, the train ride to Rome was uneventful . As we were travelling to Rome on a private train organised by the ship, we had to wait for passengers from other ships to also arrive before we could depart.

Once we arrived at San Petro train station, Mum and I split up. She went off to go through the Vatican Museum while I decided to go and see something new and headed off to the Galleria Borghese.

The Vatican Museum houses one of the most impressive collections of art in the world as well as the somewhat famous Sistine Chapel. During peak season the line to buy a ticket to enter the museum can include a 2-3 hour wait in a long line that snakes along the outside walls of the Vatican City. Knowing this fact in advance, meant that we forked out the additional couple of Euros and pre-purchased Mum’s ticket in advance. She was supposed to have a 10:30am entry time, but due to us making good progress on the train and the guard at the museum entry being nice, she was able to get in a couple of minutes early . Many photos were taken, but she reports that unlike in previous years where you could get a sneaky Sistine Chapel photo, the guards manning the chapel area were very much on the look out for people being naughty and photographing the ceiling. Mum also reports that she had a lovely time and that it ‘was good’, however due to time constraints, she had to power through the Raphael rooms.

While Mum was working her way through the Vatican, I was making my way along the Rome Metro to the ‘Spagna’ station. This station not only was the closest one to the gallery, but is also the launching point for people who want to see the Spanish Steps and Trevi Fountain (which due to restoration work being done, currently has no water in it). I am happy to report that I survived my two trips on Metro with no incidents (information provided on the ship was that the metro was very dangerous).

The Villa Borghese was built in the 16^th Century for Cardinal Scipione Borghese, the nephew of Pope Paul V.

The gallery houses a substantial part of the Borghese collection of paintings, sculpture, and antiquities. Scipione was an early patron of Bernini and an avid collector of Caravaggio (it was the number of Caravaggio paintings that drew me to the gallery). Within the collection there are also works by Titan, Raphael and Rubens.

Having both gotten our culture fix, we reunited in St . Peter Square where we joined the long, yet fast moving queue to enter the actual basilica and to go through the associated security testing. Once again a family tradition came into play – over the years, a tradition has formed, namely that when ever someone visits Rome, they are required to climb to the top of the St. Peter Basilica dome. No wanting to break with tradition, we had to climb the dome.

It would appear that over the last couple of years, climbing the dome has become a bit of a tourist attraction. We assume this as there was a very long, slow moving line to just buy the ticket to the done climb. After waiting in line for about half an hour, it was our turn to hand over our money. We had both climbed the dome previously so we knew what we were letting ourselves in for… it was going to be a little bit of hard work with a nice view at the end and then it’s all down hill.

This particular climb wasn’t too bad. The sloping walls of the dome once again played tricks with our heads and while there were no thoughts of ‘oh dear god I’m going to die’, it was still off putting. Other than getting a little out of breath, the biggest issue we had was with the spiral staircase that seemed to go on forever – this particular part of the climb left us feeling a little bit claustrophobic as all you could see was stairs and the feet of the person in front of you and this was also around the time you started to get a little bit puffed .

The view from the top was pretty and crowded. After working our way to the edge and having a look around, we got the photographic proof of our climb and then made our way back down. This time the spiral staircase wasn’t too bad as it was coming up.

Next stop was the Basilica itself. St. Peter’s toe was rubbed, Bernini’s alter was looked at and we fought the crowd to check that the Pieta was still ok. We wandered around for a while taking in the atmosphere.

With only an hour or so left until we had to meet our guide to catch the train back to the port, we decided it was time to get some lunch. Unfortunately Rome had other ideas. The first couple of places we stopped at were closing (noting that it was about 3pm), finally we stumbled across a random café that had some sandwiches left. As we were hungry and thirsty, took what we could get and boy was it tasty. Who would have thought a simple cheese and salami sandwich would be so good.

Having eaten, we walked back to the train station and boarded our private train back to the port.

Fun fact:
The name Civitavecchia means ‘ancient town’.