Vatican Museums

We are in Rome prior to a cruise and have requested tickets for the Papal audience morning of Wed Sept 27th. Hoped to visit the museums and Sistine Chapel in the afternoon but they seem closed as could find no openings even for private tours so will have to visit again on the Thursday.

Some questions which hopefully someone can answer.

Papal Audience: I read that it starts at about10. to 10.30 am and lasts about 1.5 hrs so ending about noon. The website indicates tickets are required but I also read that in summer anyone can just attend without a ticket. Is Sept 27th summer? Anyone that has attended this that can provide more clarity would be great.

We wish to visit the Vatican Museums especially the Sistine Chapel and so will go back on the Thursday. We planned on just purchasing the individual tour tickets. Is it difficult to navigate through the museums without a guide or use of their audio guides? Has anyone found any on line sources which detail an itinerary?

Tried to edit my original post but couldn't.

While searching for info on visiting the Vatican Museums I see lots of sites offering to provide individual and group tickets promising you skip the line. Is there any advantage to using one of these tour companies over just booking direct with museivaticani.va? Which also indicates that you skip the line?

You apply for tickets to the Vatican website for the Wednesday audiences in St Peters Square .

Pre Book Vatican Museum Tour tickets on line direct via Vatican Museum website to avoid paying middleman commissions . Date and time specific . Avoids a 1km long queue. (This joint is a gold mine, putting through 25,000 plus people per day !!!) . You will find a choice of guided, or un guided tours . TIP: The escorted Vatican Gardens Tour gets you into the beautiful Vatican gardens, then you are released into the Vatican Museums including the Sistine Chapel afterwards .

We spent five days in Rome after our cruise. The Vatican was number one on our wish list since we are Catholic and we were celebrating our 50th Anniversay. We bought two tours to the Vatican. They were:

Dark Rome Papal Audience- We rate this very highly and will remember it the rest of our lives! We were front row as the Pope rode through. I had made a sign with scrap paper and my lipstick that said "Married 50 years, Catholic, from USA". Pope Frances saw and read my sign, then gave us a thumbs up sign and then a blessing. Afterwards, a Vatican Photographer came by with a coupon. The coupon allowed us to buy picture of this great event and you can clearly see the Pope and us. . It was a long day since we met the tour guide early, we waited hours to actually see the Pope, but that time before he arrived was very special also with people singing, chanting and visiting with other nationalities that were there for the same reason- to see Pope Frances! It was well worth the $47pp we paid for the tickets.

Walks of Italy Pristine Sistine Early Entrance- We enjoyed this tour also. We had time in the Sistine Chapel with very few people. The rest of the tour though was pretty hectic and it was hard to keep up with our tour guide due to the huge amount of people. Tickets were around $103pp.

We visited the Tuesday and Wednesday after Easter, so I imagine the crowds were larger than normal. If anyone has questions let me know.

I wish I could figure out how to post pictures!