Logistics with Vatican Museum Early Entry & Breakfast

Visiting the Sistine chapel is part of the Vatican Museums visit. It is at the end of the museums tour.

I believe that once you exit the Sistine chapel, you cannot go back into the Vatican Museums unless you buy another ticket. (I may be mistaken. I visited the Vatican museums a couple of years ago with a Vatican guide. After The Sistine Chapel visit, we went through the passageway. She left us at the terrace to St. Peter's Basilica. Things may have changed.)

Check out their official website for accuracy and policies.

http://m.museivaticani.va/content/museivaticani-mobile/en/collezioni/musei.html

I did an early morning entry to the Vatican Museum with a tour group. We (the tour) did a bee line for the Sistine Chapel. After we were done there, we took another route back to the entrance of the museum. We did not "swim upstream". It was the route you would take to leave the museum without going to St Peters. We did not leave the museum, and if you did, I do not know if you could get back in.

Depends

You will be allowed into the Vatican Museum at 7:15 and breakfast is at 7:30. It will take you about roughly 20 minutes to get to the SC walking at a decent clip - I don't believe they will allow you into the chapel before 8am (we did City Wonder's First Entry to the SC and Vatican Museum tour - we were the first tour group allowed in at 7:30 and walked straight to the SC through empty halls and still had to wait until they dropped the rope). We left via the left door and made our way around the museum at our leisure - as we had a whirlwind guided tour on the way to the SC, it made sense to do it that way. By 9am we started to see people and by 10am the museum was pretty crowded.

Thanks for the replies.

If I understand them correctly, I can exit SC via the left door which will take me back to the INSIDE of the museum entrance WITHOUT EXITING the museum and start my RS audio from there.

Yes, you understand correctly. HOWEVER the Rick Steves audio tour (which I've used and is excellent!) begins back at the beginning, in the area not too far from where you first came in. To get there from the Sistine Chapel, you will yes, exit LEFT from the Chapel, and then walk through a series of long straight hallways that are NOT on the Rick Steves audio tour (you don't go back through any rooms that you came through to get to the Chapel), but these hallways do have some lovely sculptures and other art. You will eventually get back to near where you originally entered, and taken the escalators up to the museum. If you stand with your back to the escalators, the Pinocoteca - the paintings - will be off to your right. (I suggest that you do take a look in there; there are some magnificent paintings). Off to your left is the "Pine Cone Courtyard" and that's where the Rick Steves audio tour begins. If you download the RS audio tour, there is a map in the audio tour, and this will make some sense. If you follow the audio tour all the way back through the museums, you will end back up in the chapel. You MAY be allowed by the guards (don't ask... just walk slowly and confidently) through the RIGHT exit out of the Chapel which will lead you very shortly to St. Peter's Basilica. If you are able to take the right exit at this time, it will save you about a mile (yes, really) of walking BACK through the museums, one more time, and many blocks outside of walking around to the Basilica. There have been discussions on this Forum about the ethics of exiting to the right, if you are not with a tour group, but Rick's Rome guide suggests trying it; I've been able to do so twice. You decide. If the guard stops you, you may be able to wave your "Early Entry and Breakfast" ticket at them and try and persuade them to let you exit that way.

Thank you so much for the details. Super helpful.

The Sistine Chapel is still going to be there, it isn’t going
anywhere. I’m not sure why you want to “race ahead,” you’re not going
to miss anything.

The reasoning for hitting the Sistine first is to miss the public-entry mob, a large portion of which will be stampeding directly to the Sistine the second they are let in the door. Unfortunately, lots of folks have little interest in anything BUT the chapel, thus the reason it's badly overcrowded and noisy during most regular hours. It certainly was a complete zoo when we saw it some years ago: not an experience I'd like to repeat. Fortunately, I'd seen it back in the 70's before it became overrun.

Companies which offer early-entrance tours - such as Walks of Italy's "Pristine Sistine" - tout beating the crowds to the chapel as a value piece of the premium-priced ticket: these tours also go directly to the chapel and then visit other parts of the museum. Our OP has paid a premium price for early entry primarily for this benefit. As you also booked the breakfast option I'm surprised the chapel wasn't already very crowded if you took your time getting there once released into the museums?

carcassone, what you might do is observe where the early-entrance tours in the chapel exit and follow their lead? You just don't want the door reserved for tour groups, at the back of the chapel, which leads into basilica; once out that door you can't return to the museums. Still, at the hour of morning you'll be visiting, I doubt most tours would be exiting that door anyway so I wouldn't worry about getting confused.

I agree with Kathy - by getting to the SC as quickly as possible, they can check it out and if they do decide to head back the way they came, they will be avoiding the mass of people heading that way when the general public is allowed in.

Our City Wonders tour went straight there at 7:30am and then we were free to visit the rest of the Vatican Museum at our leisure. Getting to the SC before rope drop at 8am, we spent a good 15+ minutes in there with no more than 2-3 dozen other people

It wasn’t packed, it was just a medium-sized crowd and completely
quiet since the guards reminded everyone to keep the silence

Then you were very lucky! :O)
People were packed shoulder-to-shoulder over 10 years ago, and many were blatantly ignoring the guards CONSTANT loudspeaker requests for silence. Same for not taking photos. And it was hot and stuffy. Just firsthand experience of the thing in zoo mode, and I know we haven't been alone in that experience.

Some random stuff about the Vatican mobs:
https://blog.ricksteves.com/cameron/2019/09/rome-skip-sistine/
https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/italy/pristine-sistine-a28ef72e-f18b-4508-9dd6-878f801dfbd1
https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/italy/best-way-to-tour-vatican-end-of-january
https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/italy/rome-attractions-where-a-guided-tour-strongly-recommended