Vatican Garden stroll

Yesterday we went to the Vatican garden for a private visit. The Vatican gardens are on the hill behind St-Peter's Basilica. The front of the hill facing the Tiber river was flattened in 400 AD to make way for the first basilica built by Emperor Constantine. You enter the garden area by the main gate of the Vatican Museum on Viale Vaticano. The gardens are divided in two parts, one is in the English style (wooded area) and the other is in the Italian style with ornamental piazzas and sculpted bushes and topiary and decorated with ancient statues. Our guide pointed out that the statues and other antique fragments are not museum quality and this is why they are use in this fashion in the garden. You also find a heliport in the garden for the Pope's helicopter which takes him to his summer palace at Castel Gandolfo a 40 minute ride East of Rome near the Villa of Emperor Hadrian. He use to take the train, a train station was built in 1931 by the Fascist Government for the Pope and it links with the Italian railway system.
The elegant beaux arts style train station is today used as a duty free shop for all the diplomats who are accredited to the Holy See. Freight trains come in on the Papal railway bringing luxury goods all duty free. The is also a large radio antenna and station for Radio Vatican broadcasting to the world in several languages and a large palace for the seat of the government of the Vatican which is headed by Cardinal T. Bertone who is Governor of the Vatican and Secretary of State (foreign Minister), the de-facto no.2 of the Papal State. At the back of the garden there is an old tower which rises high above the hill. Pope John XXIII had the tower converted into an apartment for himself in 1960. Pope Benedict XVI uses it today, this is where his older brother lives with 5 cats.
Yes the Pope is a cat person can't be such a bad guy. The guide pointed out that the tower which has a fortress look is in fact very luxurious and has a spectacular view of Rome. We walked throughout the garden and it is a trek because it is all up-hill. Beautiful and serene, with rare trees and plants and numerous fountains and water cascade, 35 gardeners work none stop tending to this garden. There is also 55 green parrots nesting in the garden and you see them flying around.

It is a surreal place, unlike any royal garden I have ever seen. I use the word ''royal'' because the Pope is a Sovereign Pontiff, Per example the Pope does not walk in the garden but is driven around in a black Mercedes Benz limousine license plate SCV 1. How do I know this, well our guide at the beginning of the tour told us that if during our visit we should see this car approach, we should stand back and look meek and mild in the presence of the shadow of God on Earth, or words to that effect.

There is also in the garden a Papal Academy of Science which is housed in a building copied from the ruins of the Palace of Emperor Nero. Lots of gods and goddesses frolicking around and mosaics of birds, fish and flowers. The underlined message is that science is OK as long as it has the blessing of the Universal Holy Roman Catholic Church.

In our little group, there was what I call Taliban Catholics, people who are only interested in things where the Pope has been or has touched. Per example the heliport, it is just a helicopter pad with a statue of the Polish Virgin of Czestochowa. Or the Piazza redone for John Paul II with the original Altar from Lourdes.

On the whole I was not terribly impressed by the gardens, though beautiful. The most interesting point for me was to see the back of St-Peter's and the Vatican government buildings, you realize that the Holy See is much more than a church or a religion. There was also a dose of propaganda in the visit itself, pretty heavy stuff. If you are not Catholic is comes off somewhat offensive.

At the end of the tour someone asked the guide about St-Peter's Cathedral, this fellow was not Catholic, she quickly corrected him pointing out that St-Peter is NOT a Cathedral but merely a parish church for all Roman Catholics though a big one. It cannot be a Cathedral because it is not in Rome but in the Vatican State, the Cathedral of Rome is St-John Lateran where the Pope is the Bishop.