Hi, We will be visiting Rome next month. Can someone please recommended a good tour conductor for visiting Vatican museum. A 3 to 4 hour tour, but not too expensive. Is it necessary to book it online or can we book it after reaching Rome ? Thanks for any suggestions.

I think you need to book in advance as tours tend to book up. Some aren't offered every day. A lot of people seem to like Context and they have a 3 hour tour (75€).

The Vatican's own tours are the cheapest (31€), but are only two hours. If you wanted to do that, you could stay in the museum after your tour and rent their audio guides to visit other areas of the museums.

Enjoy Rome has a 3 hours tour for E32 plus admission.

http://enjoyrome.com/walking/vatican.html

Thanks for your response.

We chose Walks of Italy for the Vatican Museums/Sistine chapel.

We strongly considered Context and the reason we went with Walks was the guides go straight to the Sistine chapel at the 8am tour, with Context they leave that up to the individual guide.

The other issue was late arriving participants...Walks does not wait on the late, while Context waits 10-15 minutes. On tours where being early is the advantage to seeing something with fewer crowds, I do not want to wait on those who can't get there on time.

They both get great reviews on Fodors and Trip Advisor, your "musts" and deal breakers may be different than mine. Walks takes groups of. 10-12' while Context takes 6-8, I think.

Thanks Denisea, will certainly consider your suggestions.

Great suggestions! I am building my file on our trip for 2013.

Context takes no more than 6. I just did two tours with them in June (one Vatican and one of the Coliseum/Forum) and they were outstanding.

denisea - where do you go after the Sistine Chapel? Back to the beginning of the museums?