Heights, the Pope, and Fireworks

The one day our professor was sick so he canceled our 4-hour studio leaving us free for the whole afternoon. After handing in our project, we headed to St. Peter’s Basilica to climb to the top of the dome. To climb to the top was a total of 550 stairs!! The climb is in a circular motion around the dome so at points it’s like a spiral staircase, very narrow and dizzying, while at others its quite wide with shallow steps. The first 300 stairs took us to the ledge that rings the inside of the bottom of the dome. I could not get over the views inside! It was so much higher than I expected. The people walking near the altar below looked like ants. The view gave such a unique perspective to the church’s size. It’s hard to tell from below how truly grand the dome is because of the lack of scale (no people). Leaving the interior volume of the dome, we entered again into the cavity between the exterior of the dome and the interior of the church. Once inside, the steps started rising in an incredibly tight spiral and then started zigzagging back and forth. As you near the top, the walls became so slanted that you had to bend your body too! The outside views of Rome were definitely gorgeous because it is the highest point in Rome (nothing can be built taller than St. Peter’s), but I’d say the experience of the stairs and the views into the interior volume of the church were my favorite part! 

Yes- the walls really were this slanted!!

On Ash Wednesday, the Pope has a procession from one church to another on Aventine Hill before saying Mass in the Church of San Sabina. Only a ten-minute walk from our apartment, we headed out early to make sure that we could get a good view to see the Pope. We didn’t have the tickets to allow us into the church, but a big screen TV had been set up so that those outside the church could also participate. We took a seat in that area and watched the procession on the TV start at the other church and then end directly in front of us. It was so exciting to see the Pope come towards us on his Pope mobile and pass no more than within 20 yards of us! Afterwards, the Pope said Mass, and we received the Eucharist and ashes blessed by him. Getting ashes was definitely a unique experience because unlike the U.S. where the ashes are very dark in color and are made into the sign of a cross on one’s forehead, here they had very light colored ashes and sprinkled them onto the top of people’s heads as they came forward. 

Although we went to Viareggio for Carnevale, actual Fat Tuesday occurred when we were here in Rome. The city of Rome also holds a celebration, so Kelly and I went after class on Tuesday to Piazza del Popolo. There were various street performers including the one in my picture that was walking on stilts. In anticipation of the fireworks, Kelly and I decided to wait through what we thought would be a 40 minute show. It ended up turning into an almost 2 hour show! After a day of classes, I didn’t have the patience to fully enjoy the various horse and story acts… however the fireworks were definitely worth the wait!  I was impressed when we saw the fireworks for Cinese Capodanno, but these ones were even better. They even incorporated shooting some off the fountain so that they almost fell like water! The event turned out to be quite a walk and quite a wait, but it was worth the effort to go because I haven’t seen fireworks like that in a long time!  

Part 3: Pisa, Lucca and Viareggio

Viareggio, which was our home base for the weekend, is a coastal town that truly dies out for the winter- that is except for Carnevale weekend! During the day the town was completely dead and almost creepy because there were few people to be seen walking around. However at night everyone from 2-year-old children to 90-year-old grandparents were out and about dancing in the streets!  Carnevale in Italy is absolutely nothing like Mardi Gras-New Orleans style. For people here Carnevale=Halloween! I lost track of how many adult furry onesies that I saw each night! People literally dressed head to toe in every imaginable animal outfit. Instead of all the beads and flashing of Mardi Gras, Carnevale is all about the dancing and costumes. The atmosphere of Carnevale was so exciting because the music could be heard long before arriving and the colors of the costumes lit up the night. Also, the dancing mostly happens down by the pier with gorgeous views overlooking dock after dock of yachts and other boats. It is also exciting how the sound systems are set up so that as you walk down the street it feels as though you are actually going through room after room as you walk from one dj to the next. Two of the girls I was with bought masks, but Kelly and I decided to experiment and made our own- with makeup! It was definitely an entertaining process and outcome!

 

 

 

 

On Sunday we spent the day in Viareggio because it was the day of the parade and actual celebration. It poured all morning, but just as we arrived at the parade area, it stopped for us and held off the rest of the day! The entire experience was nothing like I’d seen before- the floats were MASSIVE and incredible construction. The best part was that the movements were all done by hand and coordinated so that you couldn’t even tell it was remote controlled until you noticed that some of the people on the floats were pulling on cords or turning wheels. The topics of the floats were also really surprising because they definitely made various political statements and commentary that you just wouldn’t see in a U.S. parade. It was also different that we could walk through the streets with nothing barricaded. You just had to make sure you were aware of when the floats were coming and move out of the way. Overall the parade blew away my expectations and was probably my favorite parade that I have ever seen. Luckily the rain held off because if it had continued, the parade would not have happened!

 

Overall, every single moment and decision of the trip went in our favor. We had a million laughs together and all didn’t want to leave when the weekend came to an end!

Part 2: Pisa, Lucca and Viareggio

Saturday afternoon we headed to Lucca, a fortified town near to Pisa and Viareggio. We spent the afternoon wandering through the antique market, churches and different piazzas around the town. The best part of the day was when we rented bikes and rode around the top of the walls! It was an interesting perspective to see the new town of Lucca on one side of the wall and the historic town with its many corner towers on the other side. The town literally feels as though it hasn’t changed since the medieval times! At the end of the day we saw yet another gorgeous sunset from the town walls and then headed back to the apartment for a delicious pasta dinner.

Hard to see but a heart in the sky with a faint Carnevale mask above it

Family Dinner

Part 1: Pisa, Lucca and Viareggio

Yet another successful weekend was spent exploring the towns of Pisa, Lucca and Viareggio. Hopping on a train to Pisa early Friday morning, five of my friends and I spent a morning leisurely exploring the town of Pisa before heading over towards the Field of Miracles (location of famous Leaning Tower of Pisa). The historic and winding streets were a lot of fun to explore with local markets and narrow and quaint alleyways. We walked through many porticoes, which line both of the sides of the street below beautiful buildings with terra cotta roofs and stucco walls of Tuscany hues. Those who visit Pisa just to see the Leaning Tower miss out on a lovely afternoon of walking through a historic town of various architectural styles with great people-watching opportunities!

Sunrise at the train station

Town of Pisa

 After making it to the Campo di Miracoli (Field of Miracles) we climbed the 296 stairs to the top of the tower. Laughing as we stumbled up the stairs from one side of a sloped tread to the other, we were met with views that couldn’t have been prettier due to the gorgeous day. Spending more than our allotted time on top of the tower, we headed to the ground and took some classic photographs of the Leaning Tower. 

It was entertaining to watch all the tourists pose with the tower- look closely

Duomo and Baptistry

Visiting the Duomo and the Baptistry were very awe-inspiring! The Duomo has impressively high ceilings and throughout it the level of detail of is almost dumbfounding. Known for its long reverberation time, people standing at the center can actually sing chords with themselves. Most people only experience the amazing acoustics when the guard sings every thirty minutes. However, we also got to hear the acoustics within seconds of entering… that is through a HUGE and echoing boom that reverberated for more than just a few embarrassing seconds when Will accidentally allowed the door to slam shut behind us in the otherwise completely silent Baptistry…

Inside the Duomo

Inside the circular Baptistry

View to Duomo and Leaning Tower from upper level of Baptistry

After exploring Pisa some more and experiencing my first cannoli, we jumped on a train to Viareggio, which is where our apartment was for the weekend. Before dinner we got to see a lovely sunset on the beach (so weird being on the beach only two weeks after being surrounded by multiple feet of snow during the coldest weekend in years in Interlaken, Switzerland).