Skip the Line Private Tour: Vatican Museums and St Peter's Art History Walking Tour

Meet and greet the tour guide outside the main entrance of the Vatican Museums, a collection of galleries of classical and Renaissance art masterpieces, including the Sistine Chapel frescoes. Walk inside through a special reserved door without any waiting. This access is even faster than the priority lines.

Once inside, there are more than nine miles of art, so follow along with the guide who will point out the highlights and explain the story behind each work of art.

Stop at the Vatican Pinacoteca art gallery, featuring some of the most influential paintings in the world like Caravaggio’s Deposition from the Cross, Da Vinci’s unfinished St. Jermone and Raphael’s Transfiguration.

See the hundreds of Roman busts and statues inside the Chiaramonti Museum, then roam the Octagonal Courtyard to see Apollo Belvedere, a celebrated marble sculpture and the Laocoon, one of the most famous ancient sculptures in the world. Then exit directly into the Gregorian Etruscan Museum to see the many bronze figurines and Etruscan tombs.

Finally, visit Raphael’s Rooms, four interconnected rooms with frescoes painted by Renaissance artist Raphael; the six-sectioned Gallery of Candelabra, with Roman copies of Hellenistic originals and some great second century candelabra, from Otricoli; the Gallery of Tapestries, featuring the drawings from many of Raphael’s pupils; and Gallery of Maps, on the west side of the Belvedere Courtyard featuring a series of painted topographical maps of Italy.

Go to the Sistine Chapel to see Michelangelo’s Creation of Adam and the Last Judgement and St. Peter’s Basilica to see Pietà, one of Michelangelo’s earlier sculptures depicting the body of Jesus on the lap of his mother Mary after the Crucifixion.

The tour ends just outside St. Peter’s Basilica.