lmavolio

Hi All - Any recommendations on worthwhile walking tours in Rome & Venice or am I better off doing all of the sites on my own? Do many sites in Rome offer free English speaking tours with the price of admission? If so, it might be worth skipping the traditional walking tours that provide overviews of the Colisseum, Pantheon, etc. and do a walking tour that is a little more off the beaten path (Trastavere for example)? Also, in Venice, is it worth it to do a walking tour or just get lost and explore on your own! Any advice would be appreciated! Thanks - Laura

Statia

I can't comment on Rome, but my suggestion for Venice would be to get a good guidebook and explore on your own. The city is very compact and easy to get around. And, of course, getting lost in Venice is half the fun.

Jocelyn_P

For Rome, check scalareale.com. They are highly regarded here and have numerous walking tours to choose from; I think you can even customize your own with a private guide.

gnrbernstein

I did some great self-walking tours of Rome using walking tour maps from Thomas Cooke. I also find that the DK Eyewitness Books have great walking tours outlined. That is one of the main reasons we buy that book.

Any good guidebook (we also use Lonely Planet) will give you in depth information of all the sites to help you explore on your own.

Keep in mind these things with guided tours - being able to see, hear and understand your guide, walking with groups of people that may not be very courteous (particularly an issue if you don't smoke and others in your group do), and not moving at your own pace.

~gnr~

almesq

I'm going to Rome next month for the first time, and looked into a lot of tours. Based on comments here, I wanted to book several with Scala Reale, but some were sold out. So, I have booked a Vatican tour with Scala Reale, and both a Colosseum and evening stroll tour with Romewalks.com, which look very good and have gotten some good comments as well. I also saw some positive remarks about Through Eternity.

sandi_travelnut

We're going to use http://www.romanpromenades.com/ for a walking to of the forum in December. They offer many tours at a reasonable price.

gard

Hi

I would like to recommend the ?Secret Itinerary? tour at the Palazzo Ducale (Doge?s Palace). The tour was interesting and the guide was entertaining and his English was great. The rest of the time we just walked around on our own basically..well, weith the help of our guidebook I have posted a trip report with pictures on my personal homepage www.gardkarlsen.com Maybe you can find some useful information there. Get in touch if you have any questions or comments.

Regards
Gard
Stavanger, Norway

Lorac1127

We took the Scala Reale Vatican/St. Peter's tour and loved it. What we also enjoyed very much was that when you book a tour with them, they have a package at your hotel desk with information on Rome, a map and they also give you an orientation tour of a neighborhood near your hotel which we thoroughly enjoyed.

The only tour we did in Venice was the Secret Itineary tour at the Palazzo Ducale. Although our guide must have been a last minute replacement because her English was not very good, we still enjoyed the tour...and the rest of the palazzo is spectacular.

almesq

I've been looking into the secret itinerary tour at the Doge's palace--can you book that right at the palace where you get your tickets, or do you have to make arrangements through a tour company in advance? Thanks.

Lorac1127

Our hotel made the reservation for us. You could ask your hotel to make the reservation or you could call The number for reservations the palazzo directly: 011 39 041-520-9070.

Lorac1127

Almost forgort, be sure to ask for the English-speaking tour...if English is what you want.

WillTravel

Would there still be walking tours available in either Rome or Venice in late December and early January?

sandi_travelnut

Our Forum tour that I mentioned above will be in December.

almesq

Thanks Lorac, I'll contact my hotel and ask them if they can take care of it for me.

mackie17

We did the vatican tour with Scala reale in Rome. It was great! We did ancient Rome with a private guide - ok - wish we were able to book with scala reale.
Many of the other sites in the city we saw on our own just walking around; Spanish steps, trevi fountain, piazza navona, piazza del popolo, etc.

have fun!

Melissajoy

See St. Peter's Basilica on your own. It's awesome...it will take your breath away. Take your favorite guidebook with you for some info, or do what we did...Rip the pertinent pages out of your favorite guidebook...after all, if you return to Italy another year, you will probably want to buy a new guidebook anyway.

But do consider hiring a licensed guide for the Ancient Rome area...a pile of ruins is not nearly as meaningful without a guide. We saw the Ancient Rome area on a private 3-hour walking tour just for our family, and Francesca Caruso, who grew up in Rome, was excellent, and she's fluent in English and Italian. Her e-mail is [email protected] We saw the Colosseum with her, which enabled us to skip the long line, plus the Roman Forum, House of the Vestal Virgins, Piazza del Campidoglio, Mammertine Prison, the Pantheon, and more, together with Francesca. Her fee is 40 euros per hour for your group or family.

By contrast, we saw Pompeii on our own, but it just didn't mean as much without a guide.

As for Venice, it's so romantic and unique and charming that you can enjoy Venice very much without hiring a single guide. That's not to say a guide wouldn't be able to add something to your experience. I'm just saying some things speeak for themselves, whereas other things really require a lot of explanation.

We liked Rick Steve's Mona Winks book.

Whatever you do, DON'T join a large tour group. I've never seen so many bored-looking people as I saw on large tour groups in Italy! Small tours are fine, especially ones just for your family.

We also saw the VAtican Museums in Rome on our own. We had a couple of guidebooks, but it's impossible to look up every painting in a guidebook...Get a guidebook that covers the highlights, and choose a favorite painting or sculpture to admire in each room! It seemed to me that tour groups were mostly a hindrance in the VAtican Museums, as people I saw in tour groups couldn't all see the leader, couldn't all see the painting, and couldn't all hear the tour leader either. So they were following a group around the museum trying to get a peak at art through a crowd, basically. In an art museum, I'd say more than 5 people in your tour group would be a crowd.

I recommend these maps: Streetwise Rome, Artwise Rome, Streetwise Venice, and Artwise Venice. They are plastic-coated and come with a street and piazza index. They really help a lot.

drdkc

For what it is worth...we use La Scala Reale, as recommended by many on this site for our Rome tours. We had a varied experience....If you can, try and arrange to tour the Vatican and San Pietro with Chris...he was unbelievably informative, and we found the tour fascinating, and it made our entire weekend trip to Rome worthwhile..we 6 were quite well travelled and enjoyed his knowledge and insights immensely. On the other hand, the next day we used La Scala for the Forum and found it rather a wasted morning...so in our opinion...it depends on the specific guide. We had arranged our Forum/Palatine tour with a specific recommended guide, sadly she was a no show....anyhow...9 cheers for Chris and the Vatican...he was great!!!!!I don't think it is ossible to tour either of these sites unguided and get much out of them, however. As an aside, please, please please see the Museo and Gallerio Borghese....you will never forget the sculpture!!!!

Bjorn

I highly (HIGHLY) will recommend the walking, and even biking, tours of EnjoyRome (www.enjoyrome.com). English spoken only, and guided by very well educated English speaking students of arts, architecture and history. You never never will regret, and the tours also give you a perfect base for later walks on your own. The "Vatican" and the "Ancient Rome" tours were fantastic.
Bjorn, Oslo