Recommendations on Vatican/Coliseum tours
 

The more I research tours of the Vatican, the more confused I become. There are multiple tours, multiple suppliers, and I don't know which way to turn. We will only do this once, so we would like to do it well. We are also interested in the Coliseum and Forum tours. Does anyone have any advice to what to do, or not to do, who to use or not to use? Any advice would be great. We thought we would do the Vatican one morning and the Coliseum the next. We only have three days. Can't afford private tour, but it appears that it might be worth the financial sacrifice to get a skip the line, small group tour. HELP!

I wouldn't bother with a tour if you know what you'll be looking at when you go through the Forum. Go to the ticket office for the Palatine fairly early in the morning--just up the Via di San Gregorio from the one for the Forum. There are usually not many people there and the ticket for the Palatine also covers the Forum and the Colosseum.

OTOH, unless you know what you're looking at (that is, don't have a good guidebook or a pretty good knowledge of Roman history), the Forum is "just different piles of stones." So if you can get a good tour guide, it may be worthwhile. Don't have any advice on that, however.

We took the tour of the Vatican museum and the Sistene Chapel through the Vatican's own website. It gives you a set time to meet in the lobby, and is a good enough tour with headsets.

The tour will end in the Chapel, from which you want to exit to the left, and go into St Peter's without going outside and getting in line for St Peter's. This was the best Rick Steve's tip ever! You might have to ask someone in the chapel to direct you.

For the colosseum and the forum, we found a guide was needed more than most other places. We walked up and took our pick of guides,waiting outside. Ours was a history teacher, and he really added life to the ruins m

>>>Can't afford private tour, but it appears that it might be worth the financial sacrifice to get a skip the line, small group tour<<<

All tours skip the lines. The cheapest tours are the ones offered by the sites, not outside tour operators. You can book a tour directly with the Vatican (32€ total - 16€ ticket + 1.5€ earphones + 10.50€ guide + 4€ booking fee) or you can book an entrance only ticket (16€ + 4€ booking fee) with them and still skip the line. If you book an entrance only ticket you can rent an audio guide for 7€.

http://mv.vatican.va/3_EN/pages/z-In...i_audio01.html

Ditto for the Colosseum. A tour of the Colosseum is 18€. One that includes the underground and top tier is 22.50€. Entrance only ticket is 12€ (good for two days - one entrance to each area). They also have audio guides for rent.

Smaller, private tours by outside companies will be more.

Fodorites and Rick Steves----now that's the kind of tip we need, Thanks Tabernash2.

I have used Context Tours twice for the Vatican and once for the Forum (have been taking my grandkids to Rome - 2 down, 4 to go). I wouldn't dream of doing this without a guide (and my granddaughters really appreciated the education that they got from the guides). The tours are a bit expensive, but well worth it in my opinion, for a once-in-a-lifetime experience. All guides have been terrific. Groups are small - no more than six in a group.

>>>Fodorites and Rick Steves-<<<

You can download Rick Steves' walking tours for the Vatican Museums and Colosseum/Forum on ITunes for free.

It might have just been me, but I got very confused with the Rick Steves podcast in the Forum. I think we entered at a different place than he starts, and I couldn't figure out what was what. As I said, though, it could have just been me!

I don't have any guides to recommend, but I'd really strongly suggest getting one at least for the Forum. Otherwise, as mentioned above, everything pretty much looks like a pile of rocks. I had a Blue Guide with me that helped a bit, but if I do it again, I'll get a guide.

A tour for the Vatican Museums definitely helps (I've done that both ways), but if I had to pick one of the two I'd pick the Colosseum/Forum over the museums.

I tried booking for end of July with the Vatican and they were booked for every day I suggested that week.

>>>travelmamana on May 31, 13 at 8:07pm
I tried booking for end of July with the Vatican and they were booked for every day I suggested that week.<<<

You must be doing something wrong as I see availability for entrance tickets only and tours for all days except Sunday (they are closed). They only book two months out at a time. Did you try to book before you were within two months?

I just returned from my first trip to Rome a couple of weeks ago. We did the 8:30 am Semi-private Colosseum Underground with Ancient Rome tour with Dark Rome. It was expensive, but we felt if was worth every penny. Most of the tour in the Colosseum was in the special access areas of the arena floor, underground and 3rd tier. It didn't seem like we spent much time in the forum area, but that could have been because I was enjoying the tour so much. The guide was very good and spoke clear English. We did the Pristine Sistine Tour tour with Walks of Italy. Again, this was a great tour with an excellent guide. Sometimes the tours are worth the extra money just so you don't waist time looking for the entrance to the attraction. I wound recommend the small group tours. The 10-12 person groups seemed to be pretty good.

I have used Daniella Hunt several times in Rome and she is excellent. I agree that it is worth having a tour guide in the Forum. Haven't done the Vatican tours with her but a friend did and was happy with the tour.

http://www.rome-tours.com/tours.php

We used Walks of Italy for Colisseum/Forum and for Vatican. Worth every penny. All of their guides are licensed ( have to pass extensive testing) , groups are small (12-15).

Kybourbon- I emailed them and got direct emails from the Vatican saying there was no availability- 3 emails to email with different date requests. :/

And I requested a tour for 6 but not a private one. I'm sure they have tickets with no tours.

Why would you e-mail instead of booking on their website? It clearly shows tours available for every day the last week of July when I select 6 people(except on Wed.)

Vatican Museums and Sistine Chapel:

http://biglietteriamusei.vatican.va/...action=booking

Vatican Museums and St. Peter's also have 6 spots every day.

Kybourbon- I just went online again and booked! Thank you!!! Last week, those same dates had no green light next to them. So I took a chance at emailing directly to double check on availability before I went with another tour company. I made requests 3 times with different dates and each time received an email back saying the dates were unavailable. Odd, not sure what to make of that. Well glad it's done! I did want the art and faith tour, sounded interesting but only an 11:30--I think we would all be starving by the time we get out. So I booked the regular 3 hour tour, starting at 9 am. Thanks for taking the time to help me!

Can't thank you all enough for your responses! Great help. We did get a Scavi tour confirmed, so we're good to go on that one. Would we want to do another tour same day as Scavi. They booked us in at l:45 pm.