I kept a journal while we were in Rome. My intention was to write in the journal every night. I wanted to capture the little details of each day.

When I looked at Day 3, I just laughed. There was no details, just three lines of text:

• Vatican Museum
• Sistine Chapel
• Dinner at the Abbey Theater

This was by far my most physically challenging day. We logged 14.8 miles walking that day, so it is no surprise that I fell asleep before writing of any of the details of the day.

The Vatican Museum was so full of beautiful art, it was almost overwhelming. We did take a guided tour and our tour guide was fantastic. She was thoughtful and patient and incredibly knowledgeable. We were in a group of about 40 people and she did a fantastic job keeping us together among approximately 25,000 daily visitors.

I could have taken a picture of every sculpture and painting. It was all so incredibly beautiful. I’m so thankful for that they have gone to great lengths to preserve these sculptures and paintings (and so much more) for generations to come.

I didn’t expect the museum to be so large and to have so many representations of historical events and moments in time.

The tour ends in the Sistine Chapel. You could spend days in that room and never really see everything. I found a seat along the side next to lovely people from France that we had met the evening before at dinner! It was such a treat to meet such warm and genuinely kind people and find them the very next day! (Fransios and Aysseline, I’ll be emailing you very soon!)

We ended the day with dinner at The Abbey Theater, an Irish pub that Julia recommended from when she was studying abroad. We decided she may have been slightly homesick when she was raving about the hamburgers Now, the gelato place across the street that she recommended, The Frigidarium, was amazing.

I wish I had pictures of The Sistine Chapel to share with you, but no pictures or videos are allowed.