Quick Details
Meet your guide just steps from the Vatican and enjoy priority entrance as we head past the queues and straight inside the Vatican Museums. See the major works of art ranging from ancient Greek and Roman sculptures to Renaissance masterpieces, and learn how the two are closely intertwined. Much of this tour will be dedicated to the rooms of Raphael and the extraordinary frescoed ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. From the commissioning of this colossal masterpiece to the finishing touches applied by Michaelangelo Buonarroti, your guide will help you to discern between myth, fact, and popular Hollywood fiction regarding this majestic work of art.
After spending ample time inside the Sistine Chapel you may remain inside the Vatican Museums as long as you like, or exit and visit St. Peter’s Basilica on your own.
After a break for lunch, regroup at the Colosseum and enjoy fast track entry to the vast arena, the Icon of Rome built in 72AD to seat up to 50,000 spectators. Once inside, your guide will paint an accurate picture of the Gladiator games that took place in the Roman Empire’s most impressive arena, helping you to decipher between fact, fiction, and the images portrayed by big-screen Hollywood blockbusters.
After walking around the perimeter of the Colosseum, gaze down onto the arena floor and beneath to the maze-like underground level where man and beast awaited their moment of glory or met their fateful death.
With the Colosseum behind you, travel even further back in time as you enter the Roman Forum: the true heart of Ancient Rome with monuments dating as far back as the 7th century BC. Learn of the legendary founding of Rome on the Palatine hill and how a she-wolf rescued and nursed the young twins Romulus (the first King of Rome) and Remus after they washed up on the banks of the Tiber River, and how these famous twins would pave the way for future tyrants, Emperors, and even Caesars who declared themselves Gods throughout the rise and fall of the Roman Empire.