Craig left Julie, Nina and I to fend for ourselves and we decided to go to McDonalds. Craig is avoiding McDonalds while travelling and as a consequence so was I until then. The three of us had just conquered the roman metro and we were hungry and we entered the slowest McDonalds queue in existence, and I am not exaggerating it took about 20 minutes to get served in a queue of about 4 people. We then ate Big Macs with italian soap operas playing very loudly in the restaurant and the servers giving out free ice cream. Quite different from NZ and it was really, really good. After the McDonalds Nina felt tired and decided to go to the Vatican later. Julie (barely sober) and I went to St Peters Basilica.

You need to cover your shoulders and midrift top go in. No shorts and tiny skirts either. They searched our bags (well glanced at mine and hunted through Julie's) and then we joined another queue for clothes inspection. Julie's chest was showing too much so she had to hold her cardigan tightly around her neck while we were inside the church. I don't think that the guards were really qualified to give fashion tips. One set had pillows on their heads and blue costumes like they had come out of a dress up box. Another set of guards had a stripy version with those hats that the PhD people wear at graduation with a feather. The rest of the guards are Swiss!

The basilica is huge and you wander around and the whole place is like a giant work of art. The roof, the walls and the dome are all sculptured and works by Raphael and Michaelangelo are just sitting in there. The Vatican has it's own postal service and it is meant to be much better than the italian one so Julie and I sent postcards. We missed the Sistine Chapel because it closed at 15:20. After that Julie and I started our trip back to the hostel. We went via the Spanish steps which looked different in the day free of denim clad italian fellows. We did take a wrong turn in the metro though and came out of the metro next to some sort of equestrian showjumping area (????) we had to turn around and go back.

That night after salad and fruit salad for dinner we chatted to the beauty therapist from Mt Eden, a greek Australian and Star the hostel organiser and then slept. Nina got stuck in the loo because she can't use a key properly but with some prompting from the 8 people in the dorm she freed herself and the next morning Craig and I left for Greece. We had a train at 09:37 then a ferry at 13:30 (we barely made it as the train was late and we had to get a taxi) and then arrived in Patras at 12:15 today again late and had to get a bus to Athens (that took 3 hours, faster than the train!!). Athens is a bit grotty but the hostel is cool (we ended up in one by chance as we met the guy as we came out of the big, full HI one) and the people running it are friendly, the bartender is called George and feels that Craig and I really need some Ouzo. So off I go, if you hear no more the Ouzo got me.