I won’t be turning Catholic just yet

I didn’t get an audience with the Pope when I visited Rome last weekend. But given that he’s a borderline commie, an open borders advocate and an increasingly fervent evangelist for the climate-change religion, we probably wouldn’t have found much to say to one another. Nice art collection, though.

Well, it would be if you had it to yourself which of course you don’t. Even in the autumn off-season, the Vatican museums feel like shuffling in the midst of a zombie horde from The Walking Dead. I’m surprised the frescoes in the Sistine Chapel haven’t peeled off by now, what with the collected acid exhalations of the 25,000 tourists who pass through every day.

There’s only one way to do it: book the 8 a.m. Smug Tour, where you pay over the odds for privileged early access ahead of the crowds. Then reward yourself afterwards with a cappuccino in the gardens outside the café and watch the unwashed masses being prepared for their cultural experience.