Vatican Museums: Evening Tour With Wine Tasting, Private Group

We had a tour cancelled last minute by LivTours so we booked this one through Welcome Italy. It turned out great, Driver picked us up near our Air B&B. Driver dropped us off at a restaurant. We met our tour guide inside where we were served a truly delightful light dinner. Wine, apps, and dessert were included with the tour. Loved it! Then we walked with our guide to the Vatican where we started our tour. Guide was very knowledgeable, did a great job providing historical and current information. Skipped right through lines. Never rushed us until the very end because we needed to meet our driver to go home. Did not rush us through the Sistine Chapel, we had plenty of time to stand and gaze around. We did not have time for the gift shop but we took our time elsewhere. Take note, Peter’s Basilica is not part of this tour. It’s only Vatican Museums and Sistine Chapel. Loved it though. Great tour!

The guided tour throughout the Vatican museum was well planned and enjoyable, but we would have liked the time accorded for the tour to have been longer, at least 3 hours. The transport to and from locations was good as well. However, the dinner/ wine tasting that followed was a complete letdown. Also, it would be better if the time communicated for the tour stayed the same and not changed more than once and in such an unprofessional communication manner. We had no references or more complex communication given from the guide, we didn’t even know her name or any other information about her that is supposed to be given before the tour.

Wonderful day and personable experience! I have mostly pros: wonderful tour guide, lovely dinner, very private experience. The tour itself was fabulous. It was the logistics that we were kinda bummed about. cons: The description notes: "head to the Vatican Museums, where you have skip-the-line access. Once inside, see the Sistine Chapel and countless other masterpieces. Then, continue to your next stop: a traditional restaurant where you can enjoy a classic Roman dinner. A private tour makes for an intimate way to explore the Vatican Hotel pickup and drop-off are included for your convenience" ......... so I chose this tour mainly for the hotel drop off and pickup. We were picked up at our hotel no problem and we were under the impression we were heading right to the Vatican based on the description above. For that reason we had a relatively late lunch because we figured we wouldn't be having dinner til close to 9. They ended up dropping us off for dinner first so we just kinda disappointed because we weren't that hungry because we were under the expectation that we were eating after the tour. This didn't ruin our tour, we just weren't super hungry at the time. Lovely dinner and staff though! We had the restaurant to ourselves and the food was good. Also another disappointment: .....we were not provided transportation back to the hotel. After we left the Vatican our tour guide told us if we needed to get back to pay for a taxi. It clearly states we would be dropped back to our hotel after the tour. Since we didn't account for this extra expense and didn't want to waste $ on a taxi, we ended up walking 1 hour back to our hotel in 90 degree heat which kinda put a damper on our night.

Maria was an excellent guide through the museums. We had just enough time to see the beautiful works of art. My children also enjoyed learning all about the Vatican. It was wonderful!

Outstanding tour! Highly recommend!!! We were very impressed with the tour guide’s knowledge & how accommodating she was as well!!! The dining experience was a wonderful experience as well!! We loved the restraint chosen by Viator!!