Check the long line of people in the background of this image, waiting to to get inside St. Peters.
There were probably several thousand people waiting to go through security in order to enter the basilica.
Luckily we had arrived earlier ! Once inside, St. Peters "absorbs" a lot of people, and with the exception of
the mob in front of Michelangelo's "Pieta" to get "their picture", the basilica is a very pleasant place to visit.