The Sistine Chapel (Day 2 part 2)

I woke up this morning and realized that I didn't even mention the Sistine Chapel in the post yesterday. Originally, we went to the Vatican assuming that we would just do a self-guided tour, but there as a very long line to get in and we got a pretty good deal on a tour, so we decided to take the tour. The tour really culminated in the Sistine Chapel.

The Chapel itself is much smaller than I had imagined. Also, I didn't realize that all the walls were painted about 30 years before the ceiling - the masters that trained Michelangelo and Rafael were responsible for the walls, I actually liked the walls better than the ceiling. The colors in the entire room are amazing. One of the things that impressed and surprised me the most was how vivid the colors still are after 500 years. That being said, I was less impressed with the ceiling than I had hoped to be. Because the colors are so bright, the images so large, and the characters so muscular I felt like I was looking at a 500 year old comic book rather than a masterpiece. I didn't take any pictures, mostly because it is strictly forbidden to do so. Search the web, I'm sure can find pictures of it and you can see what I am talking about. That being said, it was pretty amazing to see something that I have heard about and imagined all my life.