My husband and I have been back for a few weeks so I thought it was time to submit a trip report. We had a fantastic time with perfect weather for the entire trip. I'm already plotting how we can get back. Our trip was focused on ruins, churches, museums, eating, walking and just totally immersing ourselves in Rome. Shopping is something I only do when forced.

Before I get into details, I want to say something about shoes and clothing, since a lot of people have questions about what to wear in Italy. I had it hammered into me that sneakers and jeans are a definite no. Well, after a week in Rome and Venice I can tell you that if you are under 30 you can completely disregard the no jeans and sneakers rule. Every Italian I saw under 30 wears them and a lot of people between 30 and 40 wear them. The catch is that no one is wearing mom jeans (if you are unfamiliar with this term go to youtube and search "Saturday Night Live mom jeans" for a hiliarious fauxmercial)or sneakers that look like they've been in your closet for the better part of a decade.

I have one piece of advice specifically about shoes. You MUST have shoes that are comfortable. If you are planning a trip with a lot of walking, having good shoes is your top priority. If that means that you walk around Venice in a pair of old beat up sneakers or sandals, so be it. If people are snickering about your awful shoes, which I doubt, you won't care because unless you speak Italian you won't be able to understand them anyway. Even if you could understand them you will be so awestruck by the view over the Rialto Bridge that you won't care. On the other hand, blistered or aching feet will definitely detract from the view. Anyway, onto the meat of the trip report.

Day 1 - April 21
We arrived in Rome at 9am from our JFK connection. We only checked one 24 inch suitcase, so we were able to get out of the airport quickly. We had a driver meet us in the airport and took us to our hotel - the Albergo del Senato. It was a wonderful way to arrive in the city. The driver spoke limited English, but enough to point out the sights as we made our way to the Pantheon piazza.

We got to the hotel at about 10am. The reviews at tripadvisor are right - it is a great hotel. I LOVED the location next to the Pantheon, and the staff is great. We rearraged some things in our suitcases and jumped right into exploring the city.

The first thing we saw was the Pantheon, of course. I'm not much of a writer, so I won't even try to put into words how magnificent it is. Then we wandered around ans saw some small churches, the Trevi Fountain, Spanish Steps, and Piazza Navona.

Lunch was at a small restaurant back towards the Pantheon. I'm blanking on the name of it, but it is in the Rick Steves Book. It is the wine shop restaurant. It was a nice meal. We were the only people there not speaking Italian. I had a simple pasta dish that was really good.

After lunch, we went back to the hotel. It was about 1:30 pm and we were hoping we could get into our room. Not only could we get into the room, we received a free upgrade to a junior suite. It was room 102, which had a great view of the Pantheon. If anyone is thinking of staying at the Senato and is concerned about the noise with a Pantheon view room, don't worry about it. Once we closed our windows the room was very quiet. We unpacked and had a short nap.

At about 4, we went to the Palazzo Massimo, part of Rome's National Museum. It was great. We saw amazing sculptures, frescoes, and mosaics. I couldn't believe that we were looking at the frescoes from Livia's house. After the museum we walked across the street to the Santa Maria degli Angeli. It is a church designed by Michelangelo that originally part of the Baths of Diocletian.

For dinner, we planned on going to Der Pallero. For some reason I didn't think they took reservations, but I was wrong. We got there at 7, and I figured we would have no problem getting a table. Wrong. Even though no one was there yet, the host told me that I would need to come back in 20 minutes and if someone failed to keep their reservation we could get a table. We were too tired for that, so we walked over to the Campo dei Fiori and had no problem getting a table at La Carbonara. I had a salad and pasta and I can't remember what my husband had. The food was okay, which is to say that I liked it, but it wouldn't win any awards. However, the atmosphere was great.

After dinner, we wandered back to the hotel and had some gelato and went to bed.

Stay tuned for day 2.

We're planning on going to Venice and the Veneto hill towns during the same period next year. Can't wait to hear about Venice!

Day 2 April 22 - Rome

After a good night sleep (thank you ambien) I got up early to wander around the Pantheon. I was outside by about 7am and I was basically alone in the piazza. Just me and some shop owners getting ready for the day. It was wonderful. I know a lot of people want to sleep in and relax on vacation, but that's not for me. I can sleep at home. Seeing Rome when in the early morning is not to be missed. After wandering for about 45 minutes, I went back to the hotel to get ready for the day. After breakfast at the hotel, which was a good selection of pastries, yogurt, cereal, and some hot dishes,we had a walking tour of the Forum, Palatine Hill and Colosseum at 9.

The company we used for the tour was Access Italy. It was a private tour, which was great because the guide tailored the tour to exactly our interests. The fee was 60 euros per hour and the tour was 3 and 1/2 hours. Not cheap, but having a guide when you are looking at ruins really helps you understand what you are looking at. Anyway, our guide met us at our hotel at 9 and we started out. It took us about 40 minutes to work our way over to the Forum, as we took short detours to look at the interesting things along the way. This was good, because although he spoke fluent English, it was heavily accented. It took about 30 minutes for me to easily understand him. One of the things I loved about the tour was that he took us into a museum, I think it was the Capitoline Museum, and we went up to the top where there is a restaurant with a rood deck. It had absolutely beautiful view, and I wouldn't have found it without the guide.

We started down into the Forum and we stopped at one of the vendors who sells souvenirs and the guide borrowed one of the books that have pictures of the ancient sites with overlays that show what they looked like thousand of years ago. He gave us an overview of the forum and used the book to help us picture it as it was. I was planning on buying one of these books to take back for my kids, so I bought one from the vendor. I'm sure the guide does this routinely and gets a kick back from the vendor, but it was really helpful and I didn't care about the kickback. It was one of the smartest purchases I made on the trip. We used it several times that day and other days, and my kids really like it. If you are going to the Forum (and seriously, how do you got to Rome and not go to the Forum?)I highly recommend getting one of these books.

The Palatine Hill area is just about as amazing as the Forum. Unlike the Forum, however, it is quiet. The Colosseum was, of course colossal. Of the three -Forum, Palatine Hill, Colosseum - the Colosseum is the one I would not feel compelled to return to when I'm next in Rome. It is wonderful, but the history at the Forum and the Palatine Hill is more interesting to me.

After the tour, we said goodbye to the tour guide and made our way back to the hotel. It was close to 2pm, and we were starved, so we asked the front desk staff where we should eat. It was Sunday, so our options were limited. He took us outside and pointed directly across the piazza to a restaurant kitty corner to the Pantheon, Scusate Ritardo. I had a salad and tagliolini pasta with wild mushrooms and my husband had a salad, pizza, and the house wine. The food was excellent. It wasn't cheap, about 65 euros, but sitting outside on a beautiful day with a view of the Pantheon was wonderful.

We went back to our rooms after lunch for a nap. At about 4:30 I went by myself to the Il Gesu church. It was about a 5-10 minute walk. This church is the mother church for the Jesuit order, and to say it is over the top doesn't do it justice. I spent about 45 minutes there. If you are a church person, you don't want to miss it. I wandered back to the hotel and got ready for dinner.

Dinner was at Les Etoiles. It is at the top of Atlante Star hotel, which is a stone's throw from the Vatican. The main attraction is the view. It has a rooftop garden seating area that unfortunately for us isn't open until May, but even the inside seating has spectacular views of the Vatican. We had a window table and eating dinner while watching the sun set and seeing the Vatican lit up was really something. The food didn't completely live up to the view. Our salad and pasta courses were great. In fact, my pasta was the best I had in Italy. My husband had a steak and I had veal and both were nothing great. If I had it do again, I'd still go, but I would just order two first courses. As you might be guessing, it isn't a cheap meal. I think it was about 170 euros.

After dinner, we took a cab back to the hotel and had gelato for dessert, enjoyed hanging out in the piazza at night, and went to bed.

Enjoying your report, as we've stayed at Albergo de Senato a couple of times and the location can't be beat.

Day 3

We woke up really early for our trip to the Vatican. We had arranged a private tour with Ludovica Giuriati's tour company. The website is www.romeguide.net My in-laws used Ludovia when they were in Rome several years ago, and they loved her.

A driver picked us up at the hotel at 7:10am. We went to the Vatican where we met our tour guide, Flaminia. She was at the front of the line. We had tickets to get into the Vatican at 8am. While we were waiting we chatted and she gave us a history of the Vatican. Unlike my tour guide from our Forum tour, Flaminia spoke perfect unaccented English. This is because she grew up both in the U.S. and in Italy. Many tour companies say that their guides are fluent in English, but I learned from our first tour of the Forum (with a different company) that there is a difference between a fluent English speaker and a native speaker.

At 8am we went into the museum and we went directly to the Sistine Chapel. We were basically alone in the Map Room - absolutely amazing- and there were only about 15 people in the Chapel, which was beyond amazing. We spent about hour in the Chapel. This is where our guide really shone. First, Flaminia told us to look at the floor when we walked in and not to look up until we reached the other end of the room, because this is how the room was meant to be entered. She wanted us to see the ceiling for the first time from the correct perspective. She talked about how Michelangelo "won" the commission, and how he physically did it. She took us panel by panel and showed us how Michelangelo changed the composition of the panels as he moved from the back to the front of the room, and gave us many more details that I will spare everyone. The other thing that was great, was that since this was a private tour, when I said I wanted to walk around by myself for a few mintues, she said no problem. By the time we were ready to leave, the room was much, much more crowded. I will always remember the quiet of when we first walked in.

From there we decided to head to the Basilica. Flaminia gave us a wonderful tour, and again I really appreciated the private nature of the tour because my husband and I spent some time wandering around by ourselves.

After the Basilica, we weren't sure what we wanted to do next, so Flaminia suggested San Clemente. What a great suggestion. It is a fascinating example of how Rome has been building on top of ruins on top of ruins for centuries. She showed us many details that we would have missed if we were on our own.

At this point it was close to 1pm, and Flaminia suggested that we might like to see synagogue in the old Jewish ghetto. We were ready to be on our own, so he dropped us off and we said goodbye to Flaminia. Before she left us, she gave us some suggestions for lunch in the area. I really can't say enough good things about her and her company. Yes, she cost a lot more than my guide from Access Italy, but she was also much much better.

The tour of the synagogue was very interesting and we ate a small restaurant behind the synagogue. Unfortunately, I can't remember the name. I had a simple pasta dish and a delicious deep fried artichoke.

We walked back to the hotel, and we took a much needed nap. At about 4 we set off for Trastevere. We really enjoyed wandering around the neighborhood, which was so different from everywhere else we had been in Rome. Sure, there were still alot of tourists, especially at Santa Maria, but it was great being out of the main tourist areas.

We had dinner at La Cisterna for 7:45. If you are planning on visiting Trastever, you really have to eat here. The food was excellent, but the main attration is the service. I think the average age of the waiters was about 75. We asked our waiter, Romeo, how long he had been working there and he told us that he started on April 18 1956. He was hilarious. I actually took a picture with him and my husband. This was my favorite restaurant from our trip.

After dinner, it was back to the hotel.

Dear Clareita:
I really enjoyed reading your report. Great info about Ludovica Giuriati's tour company. Sounds like they offer many services that we would be interested in...limo transfers, tours in and out of Rome, etc. Interesting about what you said about them speaking "perfect unaccented English"..that is definitely a plus.

How was your stay at Albergo del Senato? How much time did you spend in Rome?