Vatican Museums And Sistine Chapel Guided Tour

We were disappointed with the overall experience. While our guide was extremely knowledgeable, we felt too much time was spent in certain areas and not enough in others. As a result, we missed several things we were looking forward to seeing. The biggest disappointment was not getting to visit St. Peter’s Square. We were told it was an all-or-nothing decision because some members of the group had already seen it and wanted to end the tour early. If we are fortunate enough to return in the future, we will purchase tickets well in advance and explore on our own. We paid significantly more for this tour and did not feel the experience delivered the value we expected.

Do not recommend, I buy the ticket for Mondey only to get the call in the morning that I can’t use them dur to busy day.🤬

We visited the Vatican on a very rainy day so everyone was soaking wet in the very long queues. Our group of twenty had to wait a short while outside but our guide Sylvia soon got us in. Everywhere in the Vatican was busy, crowds in every part but Sylvia was an excellent guide who managed to keep us together and steer us onward. She was very knowledgeable about the history and intrigues of the Vatican and the amazing artworks and put it over in an interesting and entertaining way. The highlight for us was the Sistine chapel, even though we only had ten minutes in there it was worth the effort and the cost.

Excellent experience, Touristation has a very organised set-up and the staff were very helpful. The vatican Museums are spectacular and the guide Marina was perfect. 100% recommended

The tour was quite interesting. Mr Fernando was well versed on the historical events . He merged the stories events and photos so very that it felt like reliving the actual moments in that time. It was worth every minute. Mr Fernando gave washroom breaks and ensure we were all present as a group before moving on. I will definitely recommend your firm to my colleagues. Thanks cece n Rob

A very well organised trip, lovely to skip the long queues and the Vatican museums, Sistine Chapel & Peter’s Basilica were just amazing! Our tour guide Fernando was a terrific guide, very knowledgeable and good humoured too! Thank you for a great experience. Janet & Conor (visitors from Ireland 🇮🇪)

Our tour guide Sylvia was excellent! Unfortunately, the audio did not always work well so you had to stay close to the tour guide in order to hear, particularly since the Vatican Museum was very crowded. We went during the Christmas Holidays and it was busy. I cannot imagine how crowded it would be during the peak season.

It was a neatly organized guided tour. The guide was very knowledgeable and was very friendly. I originally had a tour booked in different language by mistake. But when I requested if they can support by putting me in a English tour, Elena from Touristation was very friendly and put me along with a English batch.

The tour felt rushed, mostly due to the crowds involved. It was difficult to hear and keep up with the tour guide. At times the group was strung out trying to stay together. Often the radios would begin to cut out as we pushed to keep up in the crowds. Often the guide had moved on to another object, after talking about the current object. Many times we were not able to keep up and the guide was gone when we arrived at the object being discussed. We were rushed through and would of liked to stay a little longer inside.

Excellent. The staff was very kind, they helped me!!!! It was a nice experience for us!!!!! Thank you so much staff, you make me happy!!

Raffaella from Touristation Roma is AMAZING!!! She is very welcoming, friendly, thoughtful and knowledgeable. I would highly recommend seeing Raffaella if you are in Rome and need to book any tours. She is the BEST!!! Salvatore, Marcella & Joshua Palumbo 🙂

Terrible experience, the organization suck, the people under the sun for hours Is unacceptable, the option "skip the line" it's a lie, and the people that work at the Museum are very rude...

Excelent services! Nice talking, O could understand everything that the trip guide has explained! Everything was very good, very punctual organised! Thank you Touriststation

Great experience! The staff were very nice and helpful, would recommend. Their office location is right outside the museum which is convenient

We did the 3:30 tour on the 4th June 2024, and whilst the skip-the-line pass was a great inclusion to the tour as we could see many waiting in the incredibly long queue we found the tour it’s self to fall short and the tour guide incredibly rude. There were multiple points in which we felt insulted and disregarded by our guide and we not the only ones; when the majority of the group expressed that they felt she was going too quickly she’s brushed it off and took no action, she was asked to speak louder and slower as she was not using the microphone correctly and hardly anyone could understand the information. Additionally she would rush us through the site and missed multiple rooms with no chance to absorb the art and significance of what we have paid over £80 to enjoy and learn about. When people needed the toilets she only let them and beginning of tour as “the queues are too long” later on and she would not wait. When people in the group did enjoy the surroundings for longer than the 30 seconds maximum she gave us she would be rude and hurry them along with no basic manners. There are multiple points in which the corridors create a bottleneck and if a member of the group became slowed by this she outwardly and proudly showed her frustration, despite the fact she herself had informed us that the Vatican can have 10s of thousands visitors a day. At the end of the tour she stated that those that were slow were not used to large cities particularly directed at 3 Australians in the group that all have experience in these situations, she also directed this at myself who grew up in London, a crowded and fast-paced city. I understand that the museum shut 3.5hours after our tour but if this result a tour should not be offered at this time. Another issue we had was that we were told to be 15 minutes early for our tour and the guide herself was at least 10 minutes late and whilst this may seem to not be a dramatic delay the heat and lack of places to sit in the office made it tricky for many people, if customers are expected to be early they should at least be on time. Perhaps with a different tour guide the experience would be improved but I would recommend this company for a tour.

Marti was a wonderful tour guide. I appreciated her knowledge, sense of humor and personality. I appreciated her professionalism and insider facts. I loved the walk through the long hallway. Wonderful tour. Highly recommend.

The Sistine chapel and Basilica are stunning. We loved our tour guide and all of the knowledge she had regarding the history and art. Our experience with Viator itself has been awful. We understand that this is a third party connection, however our tour time had changed and no one from Viator had reached out to inform us and we almost lost our tour. Also our youngest child should have been admitted as free due to his age and we paid full price for the tour. Both issues should not have occurred. We will no longer be using Viator to entrust hundreds of dollars worth of tours that have the potential for being lost.

An amazing visit to this museum. You could easily spend a day in it and you should if you’re travelling off peak and into art and everything a museum offers. There is a lovely outside space to have a pit stop if weather good and to rest the legs. Highlight was Sistine chapel, fab to say we were in the space of the famous ceiling painted in fresco by Michaelangelo in early 1500s, an amazing highlight..

Very interesting tour. The plus of a good guide must be emphasized. There is so much to see. With good guidance the history comes alive. Marzy was our guide and she was excellent.

Our guide was fantastic. She knew a lot but did not overwhelm and was witty too. The communication on where to meet and what to expect was clear and easy. Great experience!

Directions for meeting place were easy to follow. Although a tour cost more the no line waiting, the informative guide are things i would not want to trade for a cheaper ticket. This is my second time to the Vatican with a guide and i learned even more this time.

Fantastic tour with an outstanding guide! Best English speaking guide of our entire trip! And her enthusiasm & knowledge of the artists & their works was excellent as well as contagious! Her crowd control & wonderful personality made this an exceptional experience!!

The guide was extremely knowledgeable. However, her microphone worked inconsistently and we missed much of what she was saying. She made the best of it by stopping , bringing the group close and providing information. She described thoroughly what we could expect in the Sistine chapel. The skip-the-line feature was absolutely wonderful. There were thousands of people in Rome this weekend and lines were massive

The tour guide was very knowledgeable about every aspect of the tour. He told us background information on the subjects not just data. We were actually trying to hear everything he said. Other tours were scattered.

The museums and chapel are amazing, and would recommend getting a tour. But the technology on this your did not work very well. As soon as the guide went further than 5 meters away walking, we could not hear in the radio. Some people left the tour early. We stayed but would prefer better technology that we got on other tours

I did a lot of research on different tours and selected this one because the Viator description stated that there would be 10 or fewer people on the tour. We arrived for our 3pm tour to find it was a group of approximately 30, and the tour organizer said, “Vatican tours are always 20 minimum, but you can take it up with the tour operator”. It felt like a bait and switch, and they refunded a small portion of our tour cost, but no explanation or apology. That said, it was the most crowded place and tour I can recall, the tour guide was knowledgeable and engaging, and God help whoever is in there if there is an emergency because it is unlikely there is safe way to evacuate in an orderly manner when overlapping tour groups are shuffling along trying to keep up with their tour guide. In retrospect, I’m not sure the best way to see the Vatican museums and Sistine Chapel, but that wasn’t it.

The guide didn't have a good English, ran thru the building, to the point that I caught myself actually running to reach the tour guide, so I could hear what he was saying, the group was enormous, about 50 ppl, no room for questions and the radio had interference all the time, unless you were side by side the tour guide (in that case you wouldn't need a radio), simply awful, money grab. Do it on your own, take the time to appreciate the art and the history, by reading signs that are everywhere.

The whole day went smooth as glass from start to finish. Our guide, Sylvia, was like a walking Vatican history professor!

Great tour! Our guide was very knowledgeable as she took us through the stunning Vatican Museums and Sistine Chapel.

Unfortunately I had an injury and missed the visit. I tried contact through trip advisor to cancel, to no avail. I could not get through via the web page .

Tour was unorganized. We started tour late. Option to tour garden was not an option as we were told the Pope toured gardens in the afternoon and our friend at the Vatican had never heard that. Info was not clear on app. Disappointing. The guide was knowledgeable but was sometimes not heard due to being too far ahead. It was all very rushed.

It was a very crowded day. The place was filled with people and we were told this is normal. The guide was very informative and we totally enjoyed our tour despite the crowd.

We met our tour guide, Monica, across the road from the headquarters. It was a largish group but as Monica said, she never loses anyone. Great knowledge given to us though a personal radio and earpiece. It was a very interesting tour ending at the Sistine chapel, which was breathtaking. I would highly recommend this tour, lots of things are pointed out that I would have just walked past.

Good experience especially inside sistine chapel. But there was a delay on our tour, because of a busy day at vaticano that day

First time using this tour company and I loved them. Very good your guide and helpful with questions in general. Loved this tour. Amazing to see and spend time in Chapel. The guide said goodbye before we walked into the chapel so we could stay as long as we wanted. Worth the $ for sure. 5 stars all around.

Amazing experience, really enjoyed the tour through the Sistine Chapels and the Vatican Museums, would definitely go again with my family as it was a brilliant experience

Fantastic tour the guide was super. The Sistine chapel is amazing. I would suggest this tour and I would suggest Touristation agency

Amazing experience. Our guide Paul had very interesting commentary, the chapel and vatican museum is definitely worth going to

Unmissable visit with passionate guides , realable service and punctuality... Raffaello Michelangelo ....the beauty of the Pinacoteche with Leonardo San Girolamo...and much more to see...

This is the second time I have taken this tour. The Vatican Museums and Sistine Chapel have so much to see, learn and explore that a 3 hour tour is simply not enough. Touristation staff and the guide Paolo were impeccable.

learned a lot thanks to the guide who was so good with her explanation of the vatican the staff are nice and very helpful could do it again!

We were told that we could only do a guided tour at 15:30 h. Price: $ 97 for 2 people. The tour then started half an hour behind schedule and we were ushered like cattle into the Vatican Museum (Dec 30, 2019). We spent another half hour receiving headphones and secondary tickets?? By then it was 16:30 h. The guide did her best to keep us together and went on and on about this piece of art and that piece of art. By the time we reached the Sistine Chapel it was nearly 18h and we were told that the Basilica was closed and so we didn't get to see that part of the tour. The next day I went back to Touristation to tell them about this and was told that "sorry the Pope decided to close the church, nothing we can do" When I got back home, I emailed them for at least a partial refund and never got an answer. Avoid this company!!

Was helped by Lucrezi and it was all very well explained and laid out and super easy! Got to skip the line and not too pricey.

We booked a guided tour of the Vatican through Headout website, which was run by Touristation. We paid €364 for 4 adults and 3 Teenagers. It was for a set time and the advert on the official Headout Vatican site mentioned it was for a limited number of people. When we arrived at the Vatican, they began gathering people from various places and various groups and aggregated them at Piazza. We were a group of 57 people being guided by a lady called Carlotta, whose first language was Italian. While she was a nice polite lady, her English is heavily accented and not very clear. Imagine such a guide guiding a group of 57 people. While walking around, she would be at least a hundred feet away from some people in the group. How in the world someone is supposed to see, when she points it out. Added to that, as she goes into another room, audio is lost to people at the back. We would have done much better to go by ourselves. We couldn't even do that, as the tickets to St Peter's Basalica was with her and we had to be with her to get in. This is a classic example of a company cheating customers by misrepresenting and miselling. We will be pursuing legal means for this case of cheating. Vatican shouldn't endorse such companies. They should de-authorise this company. This is cheating going on in the house of God in the name of God.

In all of Rome I found no one more helpful than Roberta. She went the extra mile calling and helping me find my way. A true bright spot in our trip. Thanks!!

Avoid it ,they are not helpful at all. If you want to avoid the huge lines just go to a tourist office near Vatican and buy your ticket there the time you want it. Don't book it online because if you are late 5 minutes they will punish you by paying again.

Cheguei no horário mas fui atendido 15 minutos depois do meu passeio. Queriam me cobrar uma taxa extra de 5 euros. Muitos atrasos, quase 2:00 horas de espera. Péssima experiência. *_*_*_*_ I arrived on time but was attended 15 minutes after my tour. They wanted to charge me an extra fee of 5 euros. Many delays, almost 2:00 hours of waiting. Terrible experience.

We had a visit foreseen at 13:00 (online reservation a week before) At 12:45 it is announced that the guide is already gone ! Another visit is organised at 15:00. (Two hours lost !) At 14:30 (an half hour early to be sure to kept the guide) it is announced that there is in fact no guide ! The hostess proposed us another ticket and that we have to ask a refund to Booking (TOURISTATION does not refund the ticket!). We have finally purchased a skip the line ticket. A week later we have still no news from Touristation nor Booking !

Very friendly guide and very interesting visit despite the world on both places We definitely recommend this visit