Vatican early admission

[spunkarella]

Does anyone have experience with early admission to the Vatican museum? For $67 each, Dark Rome offers to let you into the museum at 7:30am and guide you directly to the Sistine Chapel, 15 minutes before other tour groups and 1.5 hours before individuals.

Do you think this would be worth it? Everyone I've talked to that has been to the Sistine Chapel comes back complaining about the crowds ruining the experience.

We will be in Rome for 4 nights. We have a Scavi tour scheduled for Tuesday afternoon. If we do early admission to the Vatican, we would go Tuesday morning and do Vatican/Scavi/St Peter's the same day.

If it's not worth the $67, what about going to the Vatican museum first thing Wednesday morning during the Papal audience? That would save about $90 but would mean doing the Scavi and St. Peter's Tuesday afternoon and the Vatican museum Wednesday morning.

[Deleted]

the only thing I can comment on from your post is that the crowds definitely ruin the experience. I was there the week before Easter and the place was packed. I mean you were shoulder to shoulder with people and it didn't help that it rained & hailed on our way there so we were cold and wet.

You are supposed to be silent in the Sistine Chapel....people were RUDE and were talking LOUDLY and guards were constantly telling them to be quiet. It was the most disappointing part of my whole trip to Rome

[mdgirl]

We did an early admission tour with Walks Inside Rome and it was totally worth it. There were only 6 people in our group and when we were in the Sistine Chapel I think there were 20 people total. We went back to it at the end of the tour and it was insane how crowded it was. Plus our guide was super knowledgeable and I think we got a lot more out of the entire museum being with her.

This uploaded crooked, but this was the crowd to get into the Sistine around noon.

[spunkarella]

Jul 15, 2014 8:57:04 GMT -5 @sfgal530 said:

I'm not sure if $67 will be a high enough barrier to entry to keep the crowds minimized. You might consider posting this on TripAdvisor where you probably can find people who have done it.

The true private tour sounds amazing, but is definitely out of our budget.

Reviews are good, and I think we would end up with about 50 people in the chapel. Part of the lower cost is that they basically dump you in the chapel, no real tour guide but I think that's fine with me.

[CloudBee]

The crowds are heavy, so I would consider this. However, tour groups can be HUGE so I would want more insight on the reality of how many people would be sharing the space with us.

[spunkarella]

Jul 15, 2014 9:44:57 GMT -5 CloudBee said:

The crowds are heavy, so I would consider this. However, tour groups can be HUGE so I would want more insight on the reality of how many people would be sharing the space with us.

Their website says they are the only operator that can get in at 7:30 (15 min before others) and they are limited to 2 groups of 20 people each. So still sharing the space, but about 50 people total with guards?

I've heard the chapel is very small, but how small is small? Would 50 people still feel crowded?

[starlily]

We didn't know that you could get in early to the Vatican museums if you were with a tour group. We wish we had.

This is one of the few times I recommend going with a tour group. It's worth the time you'll save.

[Deleted]

Depends on the time of year and time of day. I went in March and June both in the morning. The Chapel, and they museums, weren't really packed in either occasion.

The Scavi tour is really awesome though, and compared to that the Sistine Chapel was underwhelming.

[Norticprincess]

We used Dark Rome(on the advice of my college roommate who'd worked for them) for our Vat tours, didn't do the early tour. They were great we only had 12or so in our group. We had gone in Nov.

[sicilygirl]

50 people in there would be totally fine! It was definitely crowded and miserable when we were there (and was literally the only place we felt that way about on our entire trip to Italy). I say the $67 is worth it!

[stinkyfeet]

Jul 16, 2014 10:04:06 GMT -5 ribollita said:

Jul 15, 2014 8:57:04 GMT -5 @sfgal530 said:

We didn't do the early admission but we did a private tour of the Vatican after it closed so we were the only people in the Sistine Chapel and that was amazing. You could lay down on the floor and just look up to see all of the ceiling. They also let us take as many photos as we wanted.

That experience was 100% worth it, but it is hard for me to say if what you mentioned is. I'm not sure if $67 will be a high enough barrier to entry to keep the crowds minimized. You might consider posting this on TripAdvisor where you probably can find people who have done it.

We did this too. It was amazing!!

OP I would totally do it.

who did you do this private tour with??? We are going in november & im researching things now