Dumb Tour Question

From the videos I have seen of TheRomanGuy and WalksofItaly, they have live guides. In the Sistine Chapel, no guide or visitor is allowed talking.

A lot of their reviews (on their tour home page) from travelers will usually give a shout out to the guide they had. It seems many are very pleased with the tours they take. Depending on the tour (with the exception of a stated, "all day tour"), on average they are mostly no more than 3 hours max; some shorter.

(I'm not going to dissuade you one way or the other from taking a tour or two while in Rome. Two of the more popular companies have smaller groups. A lot of Rome's attractions can be seen independently. Some people are really interested to know the deep history narrated by a professional. Yes, you can read up on it; self tour and use an audio guide too. You have some options. Find a balance and do what works for you.)

Adding: Rome is a walking museum itself. A surprise around every corner. Say, if a person has a fascination with Churches, there are tons to visit; usually with very small or no crowding compared to St. Peter's Basilica, of course.

He is right. You need time to walk around Rome and just enjoy it by yourselves.. Do not overdo tours. Or, why a tour, go to the places you want on your own. Buy tickets online before leaving home.

Do certain tour companies have live speaker tour guides and others use
the headphones? Or do all companies use both?

Contact the tour companies that interest you to find out directly. Get your info from the source.

To be in that part of Europe in the summer means stifling hot weather with potentially not much access to A/C including what could be your hotel accommodations.

Know that before you go and find out from the tour companies about A/C if that is important to you.

Totally agree with husband! There’s more to see in Rome than you could ever hope to see...so don’t try to do it all.

If you do want to book a private guide to take you somewhere in particular have a look at www.toursbylocals.com

Those big packs of roving tours just drive me nuts!

What is your reasoning behind booking tours each day all day? If safety, not really required. If information, it could lead to overload and exhaustion (which leads to 'hating' a place) and only information from one perspective. Perhaps balance out some tour days with independent days. Or, you take the tours and let him do his own thing. Not everyone wants the same out of travel and isn't life grand that there are options to do either or neither?
As to whether they are live speakers or headphones, best to ask directly as things can change. Consider that in close quarters or busy sites, headphones may be required to reduce the noise pollution of numerous tour leaders all talking loudly at once.

He doesn't want each of our days spent on all day tours in both Rome
and we are going to do Pompeii too.

There is no need to spend ALL day, EVERY day on guided tours. My husband and I tend to only take tours when it's mandatory to do so to access certain sites but for complex attractions, such as the Forum/Palatine, they can be helpful for understanding what you're looking at. The length of most guided tours also run around 2-3 hours or so; not entire days unless you book one of that length.

But your particular challenge is having very little time in Rome: only 1.5 days (and that 1/2 day is a jet-lagged arrival day) and part of another the night before you fly home.

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/italy/rome-tour-43c76a34-6648-42d7-9005-cd6bb1980a54

I wouldn't book ANY tours for arrival day in case your flight is delayed or cancelled. That leave you with just one full day to work with. If you want to see the most-visited attractions (Colosseum/Forum/Palatine and Vatican Museums) I'd absolutely book tours so you can make the most efficient use of your very short time. This is going to be a LOT of ground to cover /information to digest in one day so the services of a leader who knows the ropes will be an advantage.

I believe you are doing Pompeii from Positano? We did the scavi on our own with a book and map purchased at the entrance + a lot of reading before the trip. It was also my 2nd time there so I already knew some of the details. That 2nd time did take us the lion's share of a day but that's what we'd planned for. The scavi is HUGE; we couldn't cover it all in 5+ hours we gave it before pooping out.

We were at Pompeii on New Year’s Day 2013, and there weren’t a lot of people, except for one enormous Russian group, who completely filled up the main room in the bathhouse, and (maybe to be heard throughout the big group) the guide was really, really loud. We stepped outside for 4 minutes to let them move on, and went back in to see the baths without the loud narrative in Russian. By the way, if you’re really in to ancient ruins from that volcanic eruption back in AD 79, the ruins at Herculaneum (aka Ercolano) are also well worthwhile. A more compact site that an Pompeii, but well worth a visit there, too.

So maybe headphones aren’t such a bad deal. We’ve tended to take tours that were either private or with very small groups, so having a speaking guide worked for us. I don’t recall headphones except for one time in Toledo, Spain.

P.S. There are no dumb questions, but hopefully this wasn’t a dumb response.

Thanks Kathy, I agree. The day we arrive we are going to walk around and see the sites. Like you said, see the Spanish Steps, Trevi, Pantheon etc. If we go to the Colosseum and it's not crazy maybe we will do a tour. But we are leaving that day open and not booking anything. My plan was to book a morning tour of the Vatican on the 2nd day for the morning - 3 hours tops and I guess hold off on Colosseum and hope we can make it fit to do a tour on the fly either the evening we arrive or that next day. Or perhaps do it the 3rd day when we come back for our flight if all else fails. Sorry for the rambling.

And yes visit Pompeii from Positano is the plan. Sorry didn't respond to that.

Personally I like tours with live guides. Simply because you can ask questions but I am kind of a history nut and, as someone call it, I like deep history. I am always interested in the how and why of a situation and often you cannot get that from the printed word or a podcast. We tend to book 3 to 4 hour morning tours so that we have the pm to explore on our own and to follow-up from the morning tour. My preference is for the headset where you hear the guide through the headphones. That reduces the need to stay close to the guide to hear the comments and allows you to wonder a short distance from the group if you want to see something closer. By time I spend all that money to get there, I want the maximum benefit and often means a live guide.

We pick and choose very carefully which sights we want a tour/ guide, and which we can manage on our own. Our first visit to Colosseum we used Walks of Italy and had a fantastic guide- so this next trip we will visit on our own and use our "tour" dollars elsewhere.

With such a short amount of time in Rome I would say prioritize! Do either Vatican or Colosseum. I'd lean towards Colosseum just because it is such an important sight and actually easier to get to /more central than the Vatican entrance. I would have found it very confusing without a guide for first visit.
The Vatican is important as well BUT the only part of that tour I really enjoyed was the early entry to Sistine- the museum was wall to wall people and honestly I couldn't wait to get out of there.

There are so many churches with fabulous art in Rome- all free to enter- perhaps that would be enough to satisfy you both?
RS Heart of Rome walk mentions guide a few of these churches- right on the route -pop in for a few min.

As Girasole says- Rome itself is a living museum. Don't stress about should we or shouldn't we do this tour or that. Pick one (or none!), fit the rest of your limited time just wandering and discovering. You will be back.

ETA- Going to throw another suggestion out there- I believe you said you wanted to have dinner in Trastevere? What about a walking food tour on your 2nd night in Rome- lots of fun and perhaps husband would be more agreeable to that?
Eating Europe does fantastic tours

https://www.eatingeurope.com/rome/

Use EATWELL10 discount code

I totally agree with Frank's comments 2 opinions above mine. Love tours, and guides that use headsets so you can hear them clearly. Quite honestly, the Vatican would just be a bunch of faceless art and Colosseum/Forum a pile of rubble without a guide to bring it to life for me. Have you looked at Through Eternity Tours? Live guides and by far the best tour company I've used anywhere in Europe.

Yes Allen, I've so far looked at Roman Guy, Walks of Italy, Dark Rome and Through Eternity. Trying to find one that fits our needs the best but all soooo similar!

And yes visit Pompeii from Positano is the plan

You have worked out the logistics for this? In July it will be HOT and traffic on the Amalfi Coast road moves at a 'parade' pace. Plan accordingly.

RS has a very good audio tour of Pompeii. ( it is what we used )

I've not yet, we thought we would ferry over there. But haven't gotten much further on Pompeii yet.

A driver/tour of Pompeii from Positano might be the very best use of your “tour” dollars

I've not yet, we thought we would ferry over there. But haven't gotten
much further on Pompeii yet.

Not sure taking boats the entire way is what you meant but you can't ferry to Pompeii from Positano. You're going to have to use land transit for all or part of your trip, For example. you could take a ferry to Sorrento and commuter train from there. Or hire a private driver from Positano and back as Christine has suggested. That's not how we would do it - my stomach cannot handle a backseat ride on twisty roads plus would be more $$ than we'd want to fork over - but everyone's budget/ preferences are different. There are multiple ways to do it - although not there and back totally by sea - and no right or wrong as long as it works for you.

Yes that’s what I meant!