5 days in Rome

Just got back from a week in Rome. Your in for a real treat. We did a walking tour one night and really enjoyed it. Also in the evenings around the Campo di Fiori there are some great musicians playing in the square at night. Fun to have a glass of wine and enjoy the atmosphere. We found the Trastevere area to have the best food. Used Dark Rome for coliseum, forums, and Palatine Hill. Borghese Gallery was ok. Really enjoyed the park surrounding the area. Loved Hadrians Villa. More intact than the forums and you really got a feel on how Romans really lived. Favorite tour. Used through eternity for the Vatican tour. So much to see and do. Easily spend a day there. Irish pubs for a change if you get tired of pasta. Campo di Fiori in the mornings for fresh fruit cups and fresh squeezed juice.

Toss in Ostia Antica also. When I was there earlier this month there weren't a lot of tourists. Had an amazing time wandering around the ruins and only a couple things are roped off unlike the Roman Forum. It was rome's anceint seaport town of 60,000. Easy access with a Metro and Train ride all using a single metro ticket. It's near the FCO airport.

Just got back from 4 days in Rome so it's fresh on my mind. I absolutely loved the Forum/Colloseum, and would have liked to have explored even more. Just walking around at night, when the lights soften the city is magical. Maybe this is a minority opinion, but I'd skip the Vatican Museum on a first visit unless you can arrange a private tour when it is closed. It was so packed with tour groups and people and we went in the afternoon (1pm on a Tuesday, which is supposedly a good day). I don't recall it being that packed when I went 10 years ago. It may have had something to do with the Egyptian and Greek antiquities areas being closed and renovated. The flow was often down to one line, one way; very stuffy and claustrophic. By the time we got through, had no enthusiasm left to do St. Peter's. Shopping and strolling along Via Del Corso and side streets is fun, especially the quiter, more elegant ones off the beaten path. The crowds diminish and it feels like a small village. Make sure to see the Pantheon and go inside -- it's an easy stop but awe-inspiring. have a great trip!

Hi
my best suggestion before you go is to visit Ron in Rome and get the link to the bus routes, you can download the routes (and numbers). This will both save your time when you are there, and your legs. There are small electric buses but these can at times be full. check out the metro and trams. regards

In spring and fall the Vatican offers Friday night access to the museums for small groups. We were in the 1900 group of about 150 and could wander about until 2300. There was also a second group entering at 2100 of around 150. We were in awe of so many things but especially the Sistine Chapel where we sat and listened to Rick's explanation of each panel we'd downloaded onto our Kindle fire. With only 300 in the entire place you would practically have it to yourself. Check their website next spring or maybe start looking in February. Having the entire place open to only 300 people and wandering through at a leisurely pace is a RARE opportunity not to be missed.

You can't go to Rome and miss the Sistine/St. Peters and Vatican Museum! Get a tour if you must, and the night-time option sounds good. Just make sure to go to the Sistine Chapel first, as there are no lights, and as dusk approaches, you won't be able to see it well! (As of September this year, there were no lights)
Go to the Church and Museum after, if they let you walk around independently. Agree with the poster regarding the food in Trastevere. Look on Trip Advisor for restaurants, but there are many. Unfortunately, even Trastevere has been "discovered" by tourists. My favorite restaurant is close to the Vatican, "Piacere Molise." Very small, very little English spoken, and Very Few Tourists! Its on Via Candia. I also love Campo Di Fiori, and Piazza Navona. Both just over the bridge from Trastevere. Depending on where you stay, you can start on one side of the river, and connect to these areas on foot.

I don't believe in "must sees". Everyone is different and has different likes and dislikes. The best suggestion is to get a guide book and read up on the sites and then decide for yourself what you wish to see and what you wish to skip. I've read all the previous posts and while there are some suggestions I agree with but there are also several that I strongly disagree with. This is why it's so important to decide for yourself and not take the advice of a random stranger on a forum when it comes to what YOU "must see". A guide book will give you information about each site which can help you determine if it's something you may wish to see or not. Each guide book will list their "top sites". These are usually the busiest sites because they are listed first and that is where most people visit. If you dig through the guide books you'll find hundreds of less visited sites that are just as good (or better) than the "top sites". I don't know if you like museums or not (another reason why random suggestions are not the greatest idea) but Rome has tons of great museums and galleries such as the Borghese, capitolini museums, palazzo altemps and the palazzo valentini. For historical sites Rome has tons of those also including the baths of caracalla, trajans markets, the ara pacis and the colosseum combo. These are only a few examples of what Rome has to offer. Donna Donna

In Rome there are tons of must sees and only you can figure out what you think you would enjoy. However, in order to start planning your days, reading the RS Rome book is a start. Look at the RS Rome week long tour, this will give you a good idea of what you can do every day. Also you can go on Hulu and Youtube and see the RS shows of Rome for free. This will show you what there is to see. You can also look at the Rome and Italy scrapbook entries and see photos of what people did and saw on the RS tours. This will give you a visual of what you make enjoy.
Also listen to the free RS podcasts and you can download them from itunes. I think all of this will enable you to plan your five days in Rome. Keep in mind you may want to return to Rome because there is so much to see. I have been to Rome four times, twice for a week and I hope to go back next year. Have a great time.

Thank you all so much so far I am looking into all your suggestions! And Donna maybe I should have made myself more clear I want to know other peoples "must see" so that I can look them up and see if it would be something we would want to see! You never know somebody could have a obscure must see that travel guides don't have listed that could end up being the highlight of our trip!!! Again thank you everyone for your input so far!!!! I truly believe in using as many resources I can to help with this trip!

Just wanted to metnion to treat yourself and not miss the Borghese Gallery while you're in Rome. All of the big sites are spectacular, but this is a heavenly little gem that is often overlooked. Pack a lunch and take the bus to the beautiful gallery that is housed in a little mansion. After your tour, take your lunch out to the beautful grounds just outside and eat and take a nap on the grass! It was one of my favorite excursions in Rome. Enjoy!!

...one other thought is Walks of Italy. We used this company for a small group tour of the Vatican and a private tour of Pompeii. They were both excellent. The great thing is it will allow you to skip the lines that you may encounter at the Vatican. We met the guide for an early morning tour of the Vatican, there were 4 others in our group..it was wonderful and absolutely hassle-free. You can reach them at [email protected]

A quality small-group tour is one way to decrease the stress of the Vatican Museums. I use Context, which limits group size to 6, so you don't have the added stress of trying to keep track of the guide in big group and use those annoying earpieces. It's more like walking through with a friend who shows you the highlights of the collection. It's Context Travel/Context Rome. St Peter's first thing in the morning is magical. Quiet, respectful. Reflection invited. I like the view from the roof of St Peter's (up the elevator; climb the dome only if desired). Definitely the Borghese. There are also wonderful small museums, depending on your interests. I really love the Galleria Doria Pamphilli (both for the opportunity to see an aristocratic town home and wonderful art). It's also really quiet. There are amazing Byzantine mosaics in some of the early churches, if that interests you. Santa Prassede is my favorite church in Rome, and S Maria in Trastevere also has beautiful mosaics, as does San Clemente. A wonderful day trip, a little over an hour by train from Termini, is Orvieto. Lovely hill town with beautiful cathedral and good restaurants(although I'm not sure when the town fully opens for the 'season'). Another possibility is some of 'underground' Rome options... the opportunity to explore excavations under contemporary buildings. I'm aware of those associated with churches (the Scavi at the Vatican, San Clemente, etc), but i know there are other sites. Nero's Golden House was fascinating; go if it's open, but I think it's closed for fairly indefinitely. With 5 days, I'd probably schedule 1 day for the Vatican, 1 day for imperial Rome, maybe 1 day for day trip, and allot the other days based on personal interests.

I am just now on my return trip home after almost a month traveling around the northern half of Italy. I have become a big fan of small group tours, especially in Rome. I used mostly Walks of Italy, but there are other very good companies as well, including Dark Rome. I found that professional guides in Italy are uniformly excellent, highly informed about the sites covered and the city in general, friendly and enthusiastic, good talkers and English speakers. They know the highlights and best vantage points for seeing and photographing. And a special talent, a guide NEVER gets lost, which I can certainly not say about myself, often lost in frustrating ways, sometimes endlessly lost, it seemed. For the Vatican, I took Walks in Italy's Pristine Sistine tour, entering the Vatican Museum and Sistine Chapel at 7:30 AM, and having both places almost to ourselves. When we passed through part of the Museum later, as well as the exit section of the Sistine Chapel, both were jam packed, a totally different experience. We ended up at St. Peter's in the late morning, and could remain there as long as we wanted following the conclusion of the tour. My personal advice would to be plan for just one major "site" or tour per day, leaving the other part of the day for poking around a neighborhood, exploring a market, or whatever. I found that when I tred to do one major site or tour in the morning and another in the afternoon, I ended up rushing from one to the other, and really uncomfortably exhausted at the end of the day.

Congratulations on your trip. Last year, we were in Rome for four nights and LOVED it. It's a massive, extremely walkable city and at no time did we ever feel unsafe. All of the biggest highlights have been listed in the comments above. I don't have anything different to add. However, I did read an article recently that suggested Vatican officials might consider severly limiting the number of people who can enter the Sisteen Chapel due to the stress such throngs of people have on the art work. The crowds are undeniable, and a tour group with skip-the-line access is the best way to go. St. Peter's and the Vatican museums are wonders to see, and I encourage you take advantage of them while you're there. Because the city is so safe, so walkable and so large, one of our great pleasures was to just aimlessly walk the streets stopping in at random outdoor bars and restaurants that look inviting, even if for just a quick glass of wine or coffee. However you choose to fill your days, you're probably going to leave feeling like you only saw a small slice of Rome. I envy your trip. Enjoy.

Stephanie, This whole thread points out exactly what I was saying. There isn't a single site mentioned by other posters that isn't listed in a guide book. Guide books are the source for finding those "hard to find" places. They are usually at the end of each chapter after the "big, not to be missed" sites. If you just wanted a list of what people consider the top sites you could have easily come up with that on your own by opening your guide book. The colosseum, forum, palatine hill (combo site) Vatican museums. St peter's basilica, pantheon, piazza navona Borghese gallery Spanish steps trevi fountain Ostia Antica
Hadrians villa These sites are always mentioned and most people visiting Rome already plan to see most of them. My point was that aside from the "top draws" there are hundreds of other sites to see. Whether they will be of interest to you or not depends on what you like and don't like. I, personally, don't like the spanish steps but you always see them mentioned. It was a total waste of my time the first (and last) time I visited them. I went by what others had said were "must sees" and learned the hard way that I needed to make my own list based on research. I understand what you're saying and I'm not trying to be a b**ch. I'm trying to save you a lot of time by suggesting you make your own list without the influence of others. This way you'll see exactly what you want to see and not what others consider important. Donna

Amen, Donna!