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No trip to Rome would be complete without a visit to the Vatican Museum and the Sistine Chapel. This was on my must do list. As I started researching, I realized that it was important to buy tickets to a tour ahead of time or wait in line for hours hoping to get in before they closed. Since I didn’t want to spend my day waiting in line, I started looking into tours of the Vatican and Sistine Chapel. That is when I came across the after-hours tour, guaranteeing that you would miss the crowds.

Yes, the tour cost more than general admission or even one of the normal guided tours. And our tour officially started in the Vatican Museum while the museum was still open to the public. So there were a lot of people in the main rooms. But the tour I booked included “secret” rooms that were not open to the general public or most other tours. You can see some of the photos from those rooms in another post titled the Vatican Museum.

But back to the Sistine Chapel. This was the part of the tour that was completely after hours. During normal hours, there are literally hundreds of people in the Sistine Chapel at any given moment in time There is no talking permitted, no photography permitted, and you are herded through like cattle with a few brief moments to try to take it all in.

Our group of twelve, plus the tour guide – had the entire place to ourselves. Except for the guards of course. There are always a few guards there. The tour guide asked the guards if we could take a few photos and their response was if we could take photos without looking like we were taking them, then they would look the other way. I was able to snap a few amazing photos while we were in there. As you can see, it’s very impressive and beautiful and overwhelming. We had about twenty minutes of time in the Chapel, while our tour guide pointed out various items of interest. And where we could sit and gaze upon a true masterpiece.