I took this shot as we left St Peter’s basilica — this is the church in Vatican City from which the Pope gives his most famous mass.

Besides the massive amount of chairs for the regular mass, there were a few stacked. The thing that struck me as the strangest was the tractors being used to cart all of the chairs around.

A place that is supposedly the holiest in all Christendom using such tools seemed a bit out of place. But then again, so was I.

Trevi Fountain in Rome. Once you manage to work your way through the massive crowd, it is customary to throw coins into the fountain over your shoulder.

We both threw one each.

I’d heard of Trevi Fountain; it was on our list of things to see in Rome, but I had no idea what it was (besides being a fountain, obviously), where it was, or why I wanted to see it. When we first arrived in Rome, we took the subway from the main (Termini) station to Barberini station.

As we exited the subway, we were immediately facing a statue which, for some reason, assume was Trevi Fountain. If you know Rome at all, you’ll know it’s not, but I’ll continue. We found our hotel and the next morning passed by the statue. It was then I found the fountain we’d seen is actually one of Triton, not the famous fountain.

A day or two later, we came across Trevi Fountain (whether by luck, design or intent I cannot remember) and the difference is staggering. Trevi Fountain may not look large in the photo (I hope it does), but it’s a few stories high and incredibly wide. It is also totally surrounded by people sitting, standing, pushing and taking photos.

Normally I’d remove the people from this shot, but I intentionally left them in to try and get a feel of what it’s like to be there, and to try and give you a sense of scale (look at the people at the left of shot). It’s huge! What’s surprising is that the other side of the fountain is just a regular building (like the one on the right). I think it was a government or city administrative building, but one can’t be sure.

The Roman Colosseum; a cropped stitch of 5 or 6 shots taken from very close to the Colosseum.

When I first saw the Roman Colosseum, I felt a little let down. For close to four weeks we had seen beautifully-kept buildings dating back hundreds of years. Now, after watching countless movies, TV shows and documentaries on the Roman empire, many of which featured the Colosseum in a big way, here it was.

And it was trashed. Well, not trashed, but it was no way near as well-kept as most of the other places we’d been. I new it was significantly older than most of the other places we’d been, too, and I’ve seen photos and video of the site many times. The small amount of disappointment wore off as we walked around the site.

Even though it is in rather poor condition (what did I expect, it’s bloody old!) it’s still an amazing and magnificent sight to behold. Walking up the very-steep stairs, my mind was cast back to the millions of Romans who climbed the same stairs on their way to see a bloody spectacle.

So, after the initial letdown, I realised what an amazing thing it was to see, and suddenly realised how lucky I am to have been able to finally see the Roman Colosseum… let alone the Roman Forum and where Nero watched Rome burn to the ground.

The original result from the stitch is actually wider than a regular photo, but I decided to crop it down to a regular photo’s format. On the right there was not a lot more, but on the left are some nice, tall trees.

If you’re going to photograph God rays (Crepuscular rays), the best place to find them is above Saint Peter’s, pointing directly at the Vatican City, right?

Taken from the roof of Castel Sant’Angelo.

A bit disappointed that I’d forgotten to switch from ISO1600 back to something more useful. We’d been inside the castle, so obviously the higher sensitivity was needed but it’s still annoying; I seemed to do this quite a bit and it’s really an annoying design “feature” of the 350D that it doesn’t show you the ISO setting.

A few steps to the right might have had the God rays pointing directly at the church but I don’t think it really matters. Some great symbolism here, I think.

A statue of Saint Michael stands in Castel Sant’Angelo, Rome.

Legend holds that Saint Michael appeared atop Castel Sant’Angelo to herald the end of a massive plague that swept through Rome in 500AD. This marble statue was placed at the top of the castle in 1500AD but two-hundred years layer replaced by a bronze statue. The bronze statue still stands above the castle, but I prefer this one. It’s more of a classical sculpture and I love the bronze wings too.

The castle supposedly had a tunnel connecting it directly to Saint Peter’s church, which is now in the Vatican City and the castle was used by Popes to hide from attacks and city sieges.

In the left hand (the one visible in this shot), the statue originally held a sword, which was sheathed to herald the end of the plague. I assume it was bronze but there’s not much info that I’ve found so far.

It seems as though people were much taller in ancient Venice.

Obviously the large door — or what might have once been a door — has a far smaller door now nestled within. For scale, there is a person standing (and two other people nearby, who appear to be tourists).

Why the door and/or frame was this big in the first place? I have no idea. I also have absolutely no idea where this was, beside it being Venice, which makes it difficult to find out more about the location.

Shortly after we arrived in Venice, a massive downpour soaked us to the bone. This shot is the calm after the storm, where the water was amazingly still.

While we were in Venice, we learned about it’s history and architecture. Since I knew little of Venice, other than it being famous for it’s water, and sinking to due being built on sand, I learned a lot.

Something I didn’t know — and something that is evident in this photo — is that Venice (as a port) originally serviced the Middle East and not Italy. Because of this, a lot of Venetian design is Middle Eastern. Look at the windows right in the centre of the photo, you’ll see rounded outlines reminiscent of Turkish and even Russian design.

Much later, Venice began servicing Italy, which they saw as a lucrative market, which is why it now looks more Italian. Examples such as this are everywhere in Venice and it’s fun to try and spot them (since you’re lost all the time, may as well try and have fun with it!).