Fabolous and Eternal - Rome!
This is without a doubt one of the most
fascinating places in the world and a top of many bucket lists.
I was lucky enough to be able
to go there this year for a couple of days as well as last year for a day. Even
one day is enough to sense and enjoy the great atmosphere of this town which is
definitely magical!
So in this post what I want to
share are a couple of tips and tricks for how to get the best of it. Of course separately
I will also share the top destinations to visit and how to organize it, but in
this one my idea is to post more about how we did it and not which sights we visited.
Sunrise
One of the best times of the day
to catch great light and enjoy the empty streets without many tourists on your
pictures and without the crowd in which it's hard to recognize who's trying to
rob you and who simply doesn't have any sense for personal space.
My absolutely beloved place in
Rome is Di Trevi Fountain which is why we went there for the sunrise. Maybe
there are better places with more spectacular views and where the light is
better. After all, from Di Trevi you can't exactly see the sunrise
itself.
I know about the St Peter's
Dome. There are great park suggestions as well. However it's good to keep in
mind that during the summer the sunrise is much earlier: between 5am -6 am and
the Dome opens after 8 am. So no matter how amazing it may be, in July it's
simply not possible.
Another great option is the
bridge at the main entrance of the Castel Sant'Angelo - from there you can
actually see the sun coming over the river - it's nice indeed and I recommend
it for sure!
Rome Free Tour
This is something I mandatory
do whenever I visit any city and I do the best possible to go on such walking
tour as soon as possible during my holiday - on the first day if I can!
But Why?? - Because it gives an
overview of the main town attractions, educates and gives a bigger chance to
indeed feel the city you visit, its culture and people.
Amongst the highlights of our
tour were an amazing ice cream recommendation, showing a great buffet
restaurant which I really wish I knew earlier and the most important - the
guide took us to see some "hidden" Bernini treasures, thought us how
to diversify the architecture styles (as an economist this is very far from my
area of expertise which explains why it was interesting for me) and told us
about the Di Trevi fountain (sorry - I guess I won't stop mentioning this one
all over this post).
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| Meeting point for the tour are the Spanish Steps |
Buffet restaurants and street
food - a very suitable option for when you are on foot all day. Last year when
we went to Rome for a day, we went for the street food option - click here for the whole post on our first half off
the day. We were literally sitting at the fountain steps looking at the
Pantheon and it was amazing - the whole colorful atmosphere, the rest of the
people around... was very nice! So we did it again but after dinner - took
something to drink and sat at the same fountain - the below picture is from
this exact evening.
And now buffet restaurants - we
found one just across the street from the queue for the Vatican museums.
(Please pre-book the tickets for the museums - it would literally save you
hours standing in the burning sun at a place with absolutely no shadow!) For 10
Euro per person (or actually 9, not sure now) we could enjoy the open buffet
with all types of things to eat - from salads to alternative hot and cold
appetizers through pizza, pasta and diversity of desserts. What I like the most
about buffets is that I can choose and eat just a little bit from everything
that seems good to me - so I don't need to order one salad and then be unable
to taste the pizza - at the buffet I can try it all! (As you can imagine - I
did!)
The other one was so close to
Di Trevi Fountain that it was a shame I hadn't seen it earlier myself. It's
called Bistrot del Quirino and as the guide said - in the food they put
the most precious spice - love. All was delicious! And in the 10 Euros per
person you also have water included. Totally worth a try!
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| Bistrot Quirino |
Another great recommendation
was L'Antica Birreria Peroni - tasty, with great staff and budget-friendly.
Ice-Cream
In my previous Rome posts I
have shared where the Grom gelateria at Piazza Navona was.
Now - we did manage to eat ice
cream for "only" 20 euro which I'm not sure was that worthy - after
all this is approximately equal to what we gave for lunch at the Quirino.
Luckily, our guide pointed us
to the best ice cream in the world as he advised, not just because of the taste
but also because of the good ingredients they use. And indeed it was delicious.
2 portions with 2 tastes each were 7 Euro. Much better! It was the Gelato di
San Crispino, again very close to the Trevi fountain.
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| Enjoying San Crispino Ice Cream at the Trevi Fountain |
Sunset
The Aqueduct park - all the
other locations were not as good as this one. Indeed it's a bit far and you
need to take the subway (think it was 18 or 24 stops from the Vatican, not sure
how many exactly). But it's a wild park, much more natural than my expectations
and the sunset was great there!
Last but not least - when to go
In terms of visiting museums
and still enjoying a budget-friendly holiday you should keep in mind that a
number of Rome museums including Galleria Borghese, Colosseo, Castel
Sant'Angelo and many more offer free entrance on the first Sunday of each
month. The Vatican Museums are accessible free of charge on the last Sunday of
the month. To make sure this is still valid at the time you travel, I'd suggest
you double check for any changes before you go. Except for Galleria Borghese,
you won't be able to reserve tickets in advance though so will need to queue to
enter.
Xoxo,
Elle
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