Hi everyone
I've booked a RC 8 night cruise for July starting from Barcelona. I'm usually a big planner for trips, but Rome is confusing with its security checkpoints plus quota for tourist attractions. Since the tours from the cruise are extremely expensive, I'm planning to focus on the Vatican and view all the other free sites instead, including the colosseum exterior. However, there seems to be official guide for the Vatican museum & Sistine Chapel, which sounds good for the price, but I have a few questions: (if anyone has any experience with them)
1) My ship supposedly arrives supposedly at 7am, and I plan to get off the ship as soon as possible. We have no booked excursion from the cruise. If we take the shuttle and commuter train, is it practical to get to the official tour by 10:30?
2) Does the official tour give access to St. peter's basilica via the "special" entrance? I'm seeing that it was closed due to COVID, but I cannot find updated info.
3) Do the official Vatican tours or all tours allow you the skip-the-line?
4) I assume for climbing the dome/cupola, we could buy the tickets at the basilica itself without having to re-lineup again, correct?
Thank You! Of course, we are open to booking non-official vatican tours as well as long as they allow us to see everything that's on our wishlist.
