Today was Vatican Tour day. We were surrendering whatever amount it would take to get through a tour to see the Vatican Museum, Sistine Chapel, as well as St. Peter’s Basillica. We woke up at 7 am, ate breakfast, and hauled tail to get to the tour meeting place before they left. It was a Korean tour, so I was free to attend, but I didn’t get any headphones to listen. I had a book, and planned to get an audioguide, so the guide himself was redundant for me anyway. I knew what was going on.
We got on the “dangerous” Rome subway. The stories I heard before I actually WENT on the thing made it sound like there were thieves and pick pockets at a 10 to 1 ratio to actual subway riders. We didn’t see any. Just be smart with your bags people.
We literally RAN to get in line as far up as possible before the place opened. It curved around two or three blocks. We waited out in the sun for around two hours before even getting into the Vatican itself. We even got to eat some ice cream when I ran out across the street to grab some for the wait. The line wasn’t really all that bad considering the wait. The annoying people in the Florence Uffizi made THAT line way worse. Soon enough, we were through security, and into the Vatican proper.
The tour guide told me I had to run to get this audioguide while he was telling people where to go. I deposited my passport, got the map, and was told to return to this spot later and return the audioguide to get my passport back at this same location. THIS WAS CRITICALLY IMPORTANT. The guide told us he would tell me the time to tell me when to go return my audioguide. All I had to do between that time and the rest of the tour was to just hang around and be ignorned by him. He would do these really lame jokes in Korean, and force people to give him a high five. Everyone EXCEPT me, and a Japanese guy who was doing the same “hang around the tour thing” I was with his friend. He and I got completely ignored by the guy. He would do things where he would go down the lines, slapping hands, then get to me, pass me over, then keep going. What the hell?
Anyway, we did the Vatican Art gallery. I saw Raphael’s “Transfiguration”. That I found pretty kick ass. “Madonna and Child” paintings were like the “Baby on Board” of the Renaissance in my opinion. So many to count.
Eventually we worked our way outside of the museum, and got to a courtyard. Then we had to sit through some more lame jokes while the guy explianed about the Sistine Chapel. Then, in a near non-stop march, we were squirted through halls filled with art we had no time to see, then shat out into the Chapel itself. Your first reaction, to look up and gape, is immediately proven wrong, as there are steps, and more people, and men yelling “Move down!”. From there, you are supposed to look up in awe. 90% of the people didn’t see the TINY signs saying “NO PICTURES”, so, of course, EVERYONE was taking pictures, with flash, all the time. Way to destroy art, ignore rules, AND make the thing a cheap, hollow experience guys.
The people trying to restore order in the Sistine Chapel were the most ineffective people I’ve EVER seen. Their entire job was clapping every few minutes and yelling, “NO PHOTO! NO PICTURE! PLEASE!” The people taking pictures outnumbered them 200 to one, and they didn’t actually DO anything to the people taking pictures except politely requesting, again, not to do it. To be honest, it wasn’t all I was expecting. I’ve seen better stuff in churches in this trip already. (Frescos in the church I visited in Florence yesterday were better.)
I didn’t take any pictures. I follow the rules on tours. I don’t do anything to break the rules while on vacation. I am a law abiding citizen and a very good traveler. Let me tell you how I ended up in the Vatican Police Station anyway. After the Sistine Chapel tour ended, there was, somewhere, a miniscule, poorly signed, incredibly badly placed way of getting back to the beginning of the museum to return your passport. I was waiting for my tour guide to point it out for me, because I didn’t see it anywhere. He didn’t tell me anything, so I thought I could get back to it from St. Peter’s Bascilica.
We went onto the tour of St. Peter’s Bascilica. Now THAT is a big freaking church. The Pieta was gorgeous. The Chinese tourists we saw had some TERRIBLE manners, using St. Peter’s statue and lucky toe as their personal picture studio. Of everyone we’ve run into on tours, the Chinese have definately had the least consideration for everyone else anywhere we see them.
After the tour ended, we went up to the guide. “Hey, were do we drop off this audioguide?”
“Mama Mia! I got to tell you to return that earlier. The museum is closed. You can’t give that back now. Go ask someone in information. Goodbye!”
You’ve GOT to be kidding me. A tour guide ditching someone when they can’t get a passport. Fucker.
We went chasing down people for information. One guy pointed us towards a police man at the exit. Another pointed us in the exact opposite direction. Another pointed us at the Swiss Guard. These guards were keeping people from walking around the non-tourist parts of the Vatican.
A little inside information about the Swiss Guard. Some of them are complete dicks. At least, the people WE encountered on guard at first were. When we were getting information some Australians needed to get their passports too. They had less excuse than I did, but said they didn’t see the signs either. I told you it was poorly signed! Anyway, we had to wait until 6 PM, when the passports were moved from the museum to the police station. 90 minutes. No, you can’t wait in the police station for the passports. You had to wait with everyone else. Also, you can’t sit on the steps. Stand up. Leaning on buildings will just leave you covered in bird shit. They weren’t guarding us or anything, but there really wasn’t anywhere we could go and return back to the place we needed to be without having to go through a line again.
We had to wait 90 minutes. The tour guide was LONG gone, otherwise there would have been a murder that WOULD have landed me in the Vatican jail for sure. As the guards changed on their shift, they got more friendly. While the first set of guards would deny anyone a picture, force people to stand up immediately, and be stiff around anyone. The later guards seemed like actual people. The later guards also let tired people rest for a few minutes before moving on, and posed with children. We stood the entire time time though, just to show them we weren’t going anywhere.
At 6:00 PM sharp, we showed up for our passports. We got waved on to a gate with a police officer. The police officer told us to meet the next police officer, who would escort us in. We met him as the Australians arrived to go with us. We thought we couldn’t have been the only ones to make the mistake. He said it was a common mistake. As we went in, we saw some robed men that got salutes from the police. We also saw the Vatican Gas Station. It was kind of neat, like a weird private tour. We got escorted up to the second floor of the Police office, and they passed us our passports. They had made copies. I saw a picture of my passport photo and whatnot. I have a file at the Vatican! Beware!
Anyway, after we got out of the police station, we left the Vatican and headed back to the hostel. We saw some other people walking in that forgot to turn in their audioguides too going the opposite way.
In discussing our day at the dinner table, knew our guide sucked compaired to EVERYONE else’s much more than before. Turns out that there are multiple tour guides using the same meeting points at close to the same time. We got on one of the crappy tours people at the hostel didn’t know about, and got the least professional guide anyone had heard of when we explained our problems over dinner. My wife was positively FUMING about it, but everyone else had a good laugh.
Word of advice: A good audio guide and book is better than a crappy tour guide any day. Also, getting held in the Vatican against your will sort of sucks.
