Rome, Italy
 

I am planning a 2 week trip to Rome in June 2008. What is the best area of Rome to stay in? I am planning the trip for our 35 wedding anniversary. I was looking at staying in a B&B or are there some hotels that are reasonable. I am not sure how long to stay in Rome and where to go from there. Help please.

Hi Jake,

Give us some more info and we can help.

Have either of you visited Italy before? Where?

Are you saying you plan Rome plus other destinations?

What are your interests? Art? History? Food and wine?

How many nights do you actually have? does 2 weeks include travel days? Where are you traveling from?

Have you considered renting an apartment? Much better for a longer stay than a B&B and less $$ than a hotel, usually.

Answer Dayle's questions and you'll get lots of help. Also, tell us how much you want to spend per night for a hotel. In Rome, I highly recommend the Piazza Navona/Campo dei Fiori/Pantheon area. Close to most of what you want to see, good bus connections, dozens of good restaurants nearby.

From the end of your post, it sounds as though you want to see more places than Rome. With 13 nights in Italy, I would do this:

Fly into Venice, spend 4 nights there.
Train to Florence, 4 nights there with one or two daytrips to Tuscan towns (maybe one by bus to Siena and one by train to Pisa & Lucca if you really want to see the tower).
Train to Rome, 5 nights there, fly home from Rome.

Dayle/SusanP, My husband has been to Rome on business once and he did manage to see some sights while he was there. Together we have been to England and Scotland 4 times and Germany once.

We will be flying from Detroit, Michigan Flying out on Friday, May 30 arrive in Italy on May 31 and return home on Sat., June 14....14 nights total. Our interests are history, food and art. No, I had not considered renting an apt. because I thought it would be too expensive. I was thinking we would fly into Rome and spend 5 nights there and then rent a car and drive up the coast to tuscany. My concern is how hard it is to drive in Italy and find our way around. In Rome we will walk and take public transportation. I really wasn't thinking of going to Venice. Tell me if I am wrong. Thank you so much for your help.

Hi, this year we stayed in a lovely B&B in the Trastevere. The area is charming , in itself very lovely.
and also near all mayor attractions.
The name is arco del lauro. You can read about it in Tripadvisor where it is highly rated. That is how I found it.

Jake - telling you where to go and what to do and for how long to stay is all dependent on what kind of traveler you are, whether you intend to return to Italy sometime, etc.

Personally, I love to travel slowly. I am not the "If it's Tuesday this must be Belgium" travel-type. So I would definitely say, spend a good number of days in Rome and then go to Florence and Tuscany.

If you click on my screen name you will find a somewhat recent trip report on Florence and Tuscany and I will be happy to answer any questions you may have.

Good luck.

I stayed 4 days in Rome, and I found it definitely not enough. I think 2 weeks is a reasonable length, and you won't feel very tired by spreading the walking distances throughout.
I think the best area would be around the Termini (main train station), since it's well connected to all parts of the city, although it's a bit dirty and chaotic. But then, since you have two weeks, you can probably try more than 2 B&Bs.
Now I didn't want to look that I am advertising (others have suggested). Go to this site: www.venere.com, and choose Rome, you can see a lot of reviews to see that others have to say about which hotels or B&Bs they've liked or disliked when they stayed in Rome.

http://en.venere.com/hotels_rome/#o=...00000&sb=1

This link is sorted by price. Hope this helps. There is a 4% discount code if you want to book a hotel (most can be cancelled free), let me know if you need that code. Cheers

Jake,

I just returned from driving 7 days in Italy, 5 of which were in tuscany and I flew home from Rome myself. I would definitely consider it. The roads can wind a bit, but the signs are excellent!

I have been reading again and I strongly disagree I think the Termini area is not nice at all. I would avoid it, from the Tastevere we had excellent bus transportation or we walked all over. When we had to take a train to Firenze we caught a bus and it was perfect.
I think in most Italian cities NOW unfortunatelly areas close to the Terminis have gone down, down...they are seedy ..not nice at all.

I'd spend a week in Rome then a week at the coast relaxing. In Rome most people, including me, prefer to stay in the Centro Storico (not being pretentious by using the Italian for historic centre - the CS is a well-demarcated zone which you can look up on a map). You can walk easily to nearly all of the sights from there, although I find it worth getting a bus to the Vatican and you can get the undeground to the Colosseum if you wish.

Graziella, glad to hear that you liked Arco del Lauro - we leave 9 days from today for 4 nights there. Was it easy to walk to the major sites from there or did you take a bus?

Jake, there's certainly nothing wrong with 5 nights in Rome and the other 9 in Tuscany. You ask if you're wrong about not going to Venice. Only you can decide that! Venice is wonderful, so I would want to include it, especially if you won't get back. Since you want to drive in Tuscany and don't mention Florence, after 4 nights in Venice you could spend 5 in Tuscany, then 5 in Rome. I prefer to start in Venice because many of the flights out of there are very early in the morning.

With art being important to you, I would think you'd at least want to do a daytrip into Florence from your Tuscan spot. So much of the world's great art is there (not that you won't find plenty in Rome, and Venice if you decide to go there).

We stayed at the Exedra, and it was really romantic. Got a great deal, I believe thru Expedia.

Jake11--We recently stayed in rome for a week and found that it was wonderful to have that much time. I think you could find apartments that would be better value than hotels
PSGMARTINO--We stayed in Rome for a week not too far from the Arco del Lauro. We were in the ghetto area across the Tiber and went back and forth across the Isola Tiberina many times to Trastevere. We found our apartment near Piazza Mattei to be an ideal location for walking all over. You are a little farther out in Trastevere,but only a few minutes more. It is a really interesting and charming area of the city

There is a thread called Public Transportation from Trastevere that should be helpful.

I agree with Graziella that the Termini area is not a very pleasant area to stay

Hi PSG Martino, we did both walk and sometimes took a bus. At night late a taxi.
Crossing Ponte Cestio+Ponte Fabricio we were right in the Ghetto, in itself very interesting,from there we walked taking V del Teatro di Marcello to Pza del Campidoglio. Nearby there is the Foro Romano,and if you feel like walking more at the end of Via dei Fori Imperiali, stands the Closseo.
We are big walkers.
We even walked the same way, ( Via Teatro di Marcelo) to Piazza Venezia, taking Via del Corso and walking towards Pza del Poppolo, we went to la Fontana de Trevi. If the Fontana is at the right of Via del Corso, equidistant on the left is the Panteon. Sometimes if we were tired we took a bus from Via del Corso.
To go to the Vatican, we walked across the bridges
and took a bus on Lungo Tevere de ....? The bus comes often. Forgot the number.
We went several times in that direction, because we had the Scavi Tour and visited the Vatican, and on Sunday went to Mass, which was amazing. IF you go to mass do not missed . At the end of the Mass the Pope spoke from a high balcony.
A good street to go around from the ADL is Via della Lungareta. The street was very important in the medieval city. It is good to get around, and very interesting to be on it, along its length one past some of the area's most important monuments, as well as numerous small piazzas and side streets. Once you find out how to get to it , it is very close to ADL but have to find it out for yourself. Via de la Lungaretta takes you to Santa Maria in Trastevere.
Another important street important to get around and lovely too, is Via Giulia.
This is a long,straight street built by Julious II at the begining og the 16 th century. ( Famous at Christmas time) we found it very convenient to walk from ADL to Piazza Farnese and from there to Campo dei Fiori..
First we walked along the Tiber on the Trastevere side, then crossed Ponte Sisto and inmediately to our left is Via Giulia.
To come from the airport we found excellent the service offered by ADL, a nice, new chauffered car
for 34 euros. Cheaper than the train, taxi combitation. I was going to tip the driver, but then I realized that he did not expect one . Besides I had been told before at ADL that tip was not expected.
We went to Firenze and came back. Both times we took a bus to the Termini, If I recall right we took it at Pza Gelli, under a statue, of course check in ADL,
the bus final stop is at the Termi. We felt this simple bus drive saved us at least 15 euros each way. It was a good feeling to do it as the Romans do.I hope this helps you.
We were very lucky in Rome no one stole anything from us, however , we had a bad experience in Madrid and realized that all Europe is becoming more and more dangerous of pickpockets than ever. So be very careful.
Piazza Navona is not that far either.

I agree that renting an apartment in Rome is a great idea -- but start soon. We found that while we liked the idea, all the apartments left did not have air conditioning. After a hot day walking all around town, coming "home" to a hot apartment in July didn't sound attractive, so we ended up booking at a hotel with A/C.

When people on this post say "agree that Termini is not a very nice area to stay" that is in fact a very imprecise way to describe the area. There are a number of different areas in and around Termini, so it depends on which area you are talking about.

The Esquilino area near Termini is one of the loveliest, most tranquil, as well as ancient areas in all of Rome (and I am speaking specifically of the area around the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore-which is breathtaking to see when its frescoes on the front of the church are lit up at night). This area has it all: great local trattorias, gelaterias, some very good hotels: Antico Palazzo Rospigliosi, (former Pope's home) and the beautiful Mecenate Palace Hotel, which is one of the top-rated hotels in Rome on trip advisor, with a fab rooftop terrace that looks onto SMM, to name just two that are located right in front of and to the side of SMM; excellent transportation (Termini is about a 5-6 minute walk, internet points abound, and the great sightseeing hop on/off buses of Rome-the red general sightseeing bus, but the yellow Christiana bus-that stops at all the major churches/basilicas of Rome and the other sights, are also right there-I couldn't like an area of Rome any better.

So quiet at night you could leave the windows open and hardly hear a vehicle on the road-yet right in the thick of things-

Is the Esquilini near the Termini ?I thought it was between Via Merulana and and Via Giovanni Lanza not exactly near the Termini. I thought it was closer to the Colosseum, but I might be wrong. I stand on my opinion that near the Termini in general terms it is not the nicest area in Rome. I found it seedy and unpleasant all together. In general in my ITalian cities, to-day areas near the Terminis are not ideal.

We have reserved an apartment in Rome for 110 Euro/night for 2 people. A B&B was going to cost at least 140 Euro a night for the two of us. So even though we'll have to fix our own breakfast we'll save a little money.

We are staying in the Piazza Navona area, so it will be quite central to all the sites, etc.

We booked our apartment through www.sleepinitaly.com.

Graziella, thanks so much for the detailed information about getting around from Arco del Lauro. The streets you mention using Via Guilia and Via della Lungareta sound great - We are big walkers normally - this trip we'll have our kids with us, and I'm hoping that they'll enjoy walking as much as we do. There's so much to see in Rome, at every turn, so I think we'll be fine - if not, we'll hop on a bus. We also arranged for transfer from FCO to ADL through Lorenza. Only 6 days before we leave! Can't wait.

Thanks again for posting.