Visite privée : le Vatican avec entrée de bonne heure

Our guide, Valentina, met us at the entrance of the Vatican Museum. She knew just how to navigate the museum and basilica to make sure we got to see all the important works. Even though it was crowded, we were in all the right places at the right times. Valentina’s knowledge was impressive, having been an art history major in college. The Vatican is home to so many famous works of art, we feel we were able to see as much as is possible in a 3½ hour tour.

I will refrain from listing our guide’s name here, but she was highly disappointing. This was a private tour with just my family of four. She made little effort to customize the tour to our interests. In fact, she didn’t even ask our names or where we were from for almost an hour. She was very proud of her 20+ year career as a guide and spend an unusually great amount of time telling us about tour logistics and her relationships with the authorities there at the Vatican. Her style was not a good fit with our family and she didn’t try to match our style at all. She was giving a master class in a art history while we were just trying to understand the basics about how the Vatican is it’s own country. As you can imagine, our teens tuned out after a short time. The other big disappointment had nothing to do with our guide. The description of this tour offers early access ahead of the crowds. This should have been clear that early access simply means you are entering when it opens, not earlier than the standard opening. We met at 7:30am. The Vatican opens at 8:30am. The early access got us in with the earliest guests, but it was just at the standard opening time. When I questioned our guide about this, she had to read the description I showed her to even understand what I was talking about. Then she asked to read the whole thing so she could make sure she delivered whatever it said. She contracts with these tour companies and has no idea what’s being sold to her guests. Overall very frustrating and we were eager to have it end. We met her at 7:30am, entered the museum at 8:30am and she departed at 10:15. Poor value for our money and I would choose a different company and vetted guide next time.

We couldn't have asked for a better tour guide - Hillary was the best! We are a family of 5 (adult kids) and we ALL loved this tour. Her knowledge of the museums and the history of Vatican City is off the charts. Thank you!

Great tour, this place is so much bigger than you expect though so please give yourself extra time to check out more of the museum!

Our tour guide was incredibly knowledgeable and told us stories about historical times and events throughout the whole tour which was awesome. We did have to wait a little to get in but we were one of the first groups to get in once they opened the doors. It would be impossible to see and learn everything there and our tour guide made sure we got the essentials and she was very detailed. Would definitely recommend!

We had an amazing tour with Monica. She was so wonderful with our kids 11yr and 12yr. On our next trip to Rome we will use her again.

Valentina made our private tour wonderful from start to finish! She was knowledgeable, friendly, informative, and patient with us. She greeted us warmly even though we were 20 minutes late darn GPS and still found ways to help us get around the lines that we would have missed had we been on time. It seemed that one or another member of our family of five was always straggling off or behind, standing in awe in front of some amazing painting or sculpture and she never scolded us. The history! The antiquity! If you have the option, I definitely recommend going 'private tour.'

Excellent experience. Our tour guide was very knowledgeable. We learned much about the art and artists as well world history. The pace was perfect and our guide was delightful. She also gave us a great restaurant recommendation for our last night in Rome. Nancy and Tom, San Francisco, CA

This was my favorite tour in all of Italy. Our tour guide was AMAZING and catered to what we were interested in... giving us more time if we wanted it and less if it was something we weren't terribly interested in. She was so enthusiastic and knowledgeable about everything!! It was money well spent for our family. We didn't mind having to get there a bit early, since we didn't want to be rushed through the Vatican. I definitely recommend this if you have a family of 4-6 people!