Vatican Museum

A trip to the Vatican City is never complete without a visit to the fabled Sistine Chapel. However, once admitted, prepare yourself for much more. The most swift-footed traveler on a time budget will have trouble reaching the Chapel in less than two hours. An endless maze of hallways, adorned with floor to ceiling visuals will arrest even those with the faintest stains of artistic appreciation. Perhaps, just as stunning, yet not quite regarded in the same manner as the Sistine Chapel, are the two rooms commissioned by Raphael. The quaint, diminutive spaces will have anyone cranking their heads in all directions, trying to make sense of the floor to ceiling mural. Plato, Socrates, and Aristotle leap off the wall in the most unassuming of ways, in Raphael’s most famous work, The School of Athens. It is a piece that encompasses the true essence of ancient Greek thought and draws the viewer into that moment of time. You may just catch yourself daydreaming of that age.

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In a museum that houses everything from paintings by Caravaggio and Leonardo da Vinci to the famous Egyptian Book of the Dead, it might be hard to choose a single place to rest your gaze. You can circle the Greek or Roman statues you might have only seen in textbooks before this, puzzle out centuries-old Italian cartography, or even count the brushstrokes in a Renaissance painting. After that, though, make sure to to raise your eyes to the heavens--or in this case, to the museum's spectacularly decorated ceilings. They might be carved or painted--at times it's very hard to tell--but they'll definitely grab your (and your camera's) attention. Just make sure, reluctant or not, to force your attention back down before you start walking, or you may well find yourself tripping over a few other awestruck travelers.

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