Skip the Colosseum and Vatican in Rome

ROME - There was no escaping it. Try as one might, there was no way out but to go with the dense flow of sweaty humanity.

This was the Vatican Museum with its endless galleries of some of the finest art Western civilization had ever produced and scores of highlights obstructed from full view by fellow journeymen, many of whom were trying to make the most of a once-in-a-lifetime experience.

One hapless tourist took pictures of the explanatory panels, unable to stand still and actually read them, before being swept up and moved along, up to the next masterpiece hidden from proper view.