Blog

Warning. This article is written in French. By that I mean it’s in English but I mostly complain.

Midnight passed, and with it I can claim I spent a night in Vatican City. I take the sleeping bag out and put myself in. Police passes by without caring. Good.

With my bag inside the sleeping bag and my smelly shoes as pillow, it wasn’t a great night. But at least it was not too painful and I wasn’t cold at all thanks to this good sleeping bag. I might have caried it for five months while it took easily a third of my backpack’s space, but I’m glad it’s here now.

All in all, I slept a good 30 min tonight. Could have been worse. At 5:30 AM, police goes around the place honking to wake homeless people and make them go away. It’s probably not very nice for the all gold-and-silver Vatican City to have homeless on its postcard, eh? At least, when the policeman quickly saw I was only a stupid tourist, he asked me politely to just pack and stand up. Oof… Not gonna lie, if I had been asked out after that night…

6:30 and finally the Square opens. That is such a relief. I was quite literally on the edge of failing all night, now I can stay « comfortably » inside the goal zone. I was second to enter, after an annoying little guy, and into the security (that were really lax: I showed them my swiss knife, and then I made the metal detector bip, but they couldn’t care less). A bit more wait, and we were let in the Basilica, the highlight of Città del Vaticano [Vatican City].

Wow! What a building! Magnificent, but mostly so freaking spacious! When I think that I slept on two square meters of pavement. Anyway… It is almost empty still, which is quite a privilege, as I’ll see later.

I go all the way to the Western end. Later I’ll realize that it’s the closest I’ll be to the Westermost point of Vatican City, which is also one of the two farthest points in the country. The other one is North of where I slept. So in a very broad way, one could say I crossed another country by foot between its two furthest point, getting a bit less than 500 m from both. But then again, since they are separated by 1.1 km, if you consider being within one kilometer a success, then everyone that has ever walked through St. Peter’s Square also unknowingly made this achievement. Congrats everyone, a round of applause for yourselves!

7:30, the 500+-step stairs to the Dome open! Again I’m one of the first. It starts gently by a wide helicoidal stair, until you make it to the roof of the Basilica. The view over Città del Vaticano and Roma [Rome] is already pretty good from there. But it gets much better next. Conveniently, on this level are toilets, my first go since yesterday 5 PM. Then I can end the climb.

The second part starts in the inside of the dome, far above the sea of tourists that have already flooded the ground level. Then you take some narrow stairs just beneath the roof, so that the ceiling is getting pretty circular, and it’s not that easy to climb when you are tall. The stairs change a few time, narrow and straight, large and zigzagging, until you reach the finaly extra-slim helicoidal stairs, with a simple rope as only handgrab.

But Holy shit (see what I did there?), what a view from the Heavens! Crazy, jaw-dropping 360 ° panorama over the entirety of the country of Vatican City, but also onthe Italian capital city. The only view that I’ll get of the gardens, and also of the railway station, mocking me from 100 m below.

Yes, as a reminder, Vatican City had a tour on Saturday mornings that included the museums, the gardens, but most importantly, you were leaving the country BY TRAIN. I was sooooo looking for that, already knowing that I need to enter the very first door and go to the very back of the train to stay in Vatican City proper. But not only Vatican City made me sleep on the damn street, they also cancelled this tour. THIS YEAR. Are you kidding me??!

It gets very crowded on this tiny space, so I go back on the roof. Here I get the confirmation I was scared of: there are no way to the museums from St. Peter’s square. You need to go through Italy. Seriously, Vatican City, fuck off. I am thus constrained to only the square and the basilica, until 14:33. It’s not even 10 yet.

Good thing, on this roof, there’s a small souvenir shop (keychain!) and a small coffee. I abused my stay there by a good hour, until I thought I should move. Not much else to do, so I climbed down the stairs. I know it’s a no-return (it costs eight euros to climb), but I’m getting bored.

Woooooow! People are here now! The basilica is packed with thousands of tourists, and the entrance is hard to navigate. I visit the caves, which has a number of tombs of former popes, and find another gift shop. Like I did up there, I asked if they had any circulating coins. Apparently it’s extremely rare even inside Vatican City, and only a few spots get their coins from the Bank of Vatican. Well, I still tried at every single cashier that I found today, to no avail. You could have at least done that to me Vatican City, you ungrateful pseudo-country! At least the chase through the gift shops occupied me for a bit, even though it was 90% made of religious items. Berk.

Finally, I pass the no-reentry sign, and brace myself for four last hours in Città del Vaticano main square. They were very boring. At 14:33, I scream victory, go for a final walk to be extra safe, and exit at 14:37.

MADE IT! I doubt I’ll ever return to Vatican City except if they reestablish the train tour. A shame for the museums though. But you know, while in Roma…

Ciao Italia!

Roma, precisely, yes. It’s a weird feeling to not force yourself to walk as slow as possible to keep you busy a couple minutes longer. I walk past a wonderful circular fortress, to the old Piazza Navona, and by the hyper crowded Trevi fountain, but I’m extenuated.

I take the metro, grab back my faithful backpack, and stay at the train station for a couple hours. You know what I noticed in the metro that was really missing in Vatican City? Music. In Roma metro, I saw a bass musician in the middle of an instrumental medley of classics. Why is there no music at all in Città del Vaticano?

It’s 20:16 now, and the night train to Siracusa [Syracuse, Sicily] glides off into the night. This time I have a bed, and by 21 I was already deep asleep, only barely woken up by other people entering the compartment.