ROME, ITALY, Monday, March 21, 2011 — OK, so don’t get excited: Rick didn’t really find Jesus, but he did discover a new-found love for the great Renaissance painter Raffaello Sanzio, also known as Raphael, when we ventured into the Vatican Museums’ Pinoteca and stood before his great “Transfiguration.” After rooms of Medieval flat-perspective paintings, we entered the farthest room and boom, there it was, a huge wall-sized painting with heavenly blues, beautiful roses and greens, twisted passionate human figures pointing many directions but all leading your eye up, up, up to a beautiful, very human figure of Jesus, arms raised, seemingly bursting forth from the clouds. It was a wow moment.

Unfortunately, we had then to pass (increasingly quickly) some pretty grisly Caravaggios, and a really hairy painting of poor St. Peter being crucified upside down, and some other horrific martyr paintings that traumatized Will, (I just hope he missed the two flaying paintings that turned my stomach) who only began speaking again after we ducked into the very safe wing housing funeral inscriptions and sarcophagi from Ancient Rome.

Will then hit his stride identifying emperors, finding the Laocoon sculpture of the doomed Trojan priest and his sons that so inspired Michelangelo, an enormous porphyry tub used by Nero, and other treasures stolen, I mean, collected by the Popes over the centuries. (As Rick commented as we gazed on the gigantic Baldacchino, or cover, over the altar in St. Peter’s Basilica — it’s harder to appreciate it knowing the bronze was taken from the Pantheon. The ancient sites were merely a quarry for the Church to glorify itself and show its supposed superiority over the pagan past. But don’t get me going…)

Anyhow, my big quest for the day was to find the 6th century BC black-figure amphora by Exekias that shows Achilles playing a board game against Ajax. There are a lot of pots at the Vatican, and I described the amphora to Will and he went after it, finding it after just a few minutes. I’d obviously only seen the vase in pictures, and seeing it in person gave me chills, like the time we saw the great funeral urns in the national museum at Athens. It really is a breath-taking piece of work, with amazing detail on their cloaks, beautiful feet, just a tour de force. But don’t get me going….

But the third most breathtaking thing of the day was the hours-long, seemingly not-moving line leading to the ticket booth to get into the museum. Not to gloat or anything, but every guide book in the world tells you to buy your ticket in advance on-line, and so we did that a few weeks ago. We breezed in 30 minutes before the museum even opened. When we left the museum, we were appalled at the line — it literally went at least a half mile, maybe not quite that far, but it was unbelievable. I’m sorry, but no museum can be worth standing in line that long.

After the Vatican and a visit to St. Peter’s Basilica (Will loved the 6-foot-tall cherubs), we had a nice lunch of pasta and seafood at a classic, old Roman restaurant in the Prati neighborhood near Hadrian’s tomb (turned fortress hideout for the Popes, complete with secret underground passageway from the Vatican). We then decided to brave the lines at the Colosseo — which turned out to be nil. Will didn’t really like it, though, and I’m not sure why. He hates any place with lots of people — he loves to be able to wander and imagine. It’s also a grim place. Plus we saw such better preserved amphitheaters in the south of France — thanks Nigel! So then we walked back to our neighborhood and ducked into the Pantheon for the first time. The dome truly is amazing. It is hard to believe how well it has survived nearly two millennia; again, the fact that it was converted into a Christian church is the only thing that ensured its survival (OK, minus the bronze). As a special bonus, we came across Raphael’s tomb in the Pantheon.

We are now tired, but trying to hang in there for the late (for us, early for Romans) dinner hour of 8. We have reservations at one of the restaurants we were recommended by our friend the Portland restaurateur, and we are looking forward to our first sit-down dinner in Italy.

On another note, Mitchell tells us Zeus has yet to attack anyone. Also, we forgot to mention that as we first taxied into town on Saturday, we passed not one, but two, French bulldogs in one block, the first dogs we saw in Italy. Turns out the poor Romans were duped by their cute little faces as well. Rick is homesick for his dog. Seriously.