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Evening & 1 Full Day in Rome - Help Maximize Our Time

Posted by on

Hi, we have a short stopover in Rome, the week after next. We arrive at FCO on a Sunday at 4:15pm, and depart on a Tuesday at 10am. So, that gives us Sunday evening and a full day Monday. We're staying near Termini.

We'd like advice to maximize our short visit. We're a young couple; wife has never been to Rome, and I visited as a teenage. We can walk a lot, and we want to get in as much as we can. I realize we really only have time for a whirlwind check-the-boxes visit.

  • What can we do Sunday evening? It'll probably be 7pm by the time we check in. Piazza Navona & Trevi Fountain. What else Colosseum at night, perhaps?

  • (When) should we visit St Peter's Basilica on Monday? We definitely don't have time for the Vatican Museums. I've read mixed things about the lines at the Basilica early AM vs late afternoon. Not sure if it's better to wake up early and get to the Basilica at 7am on Monday and hope there's no lone, or to try to time it to get there at 6pm

  • What else should we do on Monday? We're okay with not going inside the Colosseum and just seeing it from the outside, so we don't have to deal with the lines. Should we even buy the Collosseum - Forum - Palatine Hill ticket? Capitoline Hill worth it for the views?

Thanks for the advice!

Posted by
2768 posts

Sunday Eve I agree with Pantheon, Trevi, Navona. Add Campo di Fiori and Spanish Steps. This is the “heart of Rome” walk from Rick’s guidebook and is nice at night. I’d wander this area, get dinner outside with a nice view.

Monday I’d try for St. Peter’s early. Climb the dome too. Then Colosseum/Forum from the outside. Getting a ticket to go into the Forum/Paletine could be good. I agree going into the Colosseum could be too much. Walk around Capitoline Square, great views of the Forum. This area is lit well at night, so it’s a good evening option

Posted by
194 posts

My wife and I had almost the same amount of time there last year, and we did everything that Mira described. It was a full 1.25 days, but we really made the most of our time there. Wander that first afternoon/evening to take in all the "free" sites and get a feel for the city. Enjoy an Aperol spritz with a view of a piazza, grab some street food to go, get some gelato, and soak it all in.

The key for us on the one full day was signing up for the earliest Walks-of-Italy skip-the-line tour of the Vatican/St. Peters we could find. Likewise, we had reservations for a skip-the-line tour of the Colosseum in the early afternoon. To maximize our time in both, we took a cab from Vatican to Colosseum area. We topped it off with a delightful dinner in the Trastevere neighborhood, finishing with one last gelato sitting on the steps of the fountain in front of the Pantheon.

Saw just enough to feel I'd "been to Rome", while definitely whetting our appetite for a longer stay the next time around.

Posted by
7 posts

Thanks to both for the reply. Some follow-up Q's:

1) At Capitoline Square, are the viewpoints of the Forum/Colosseum easy to find? I also read there are views of the Vatican from there.

2) How much of Forum / Palatine can actually be seen from the street w/o going inside?

3) Among the things that are good at night: Pantheon, Trevi, Navona, Spanish Steps, Campo di Fiori, is it worth visiting any of these in the day as well?

Posted by
194 posts

We didn't make it to Capitoline Square. You really should go in the Forum / Palatine if you can. The Pantheon isn't open at night, so if you want to go inside (which you really should do), you'll need to do that before 6:30pm.

Posted by
7 posts

One more Q: are these Basilica "skip the line" audio guide tours sold by 3rd parties all total scams? I'm reading mixed things -- that you still have to wait in the security line. Do these "skip the line" tours somehow get you to the front of the security line?

Posted by
3112 posts

Go to the left or right of the city hall building in Capitoline Hill square for views of the Forum. You can see a lot of it from the view points.

Campo dei Fiori is a market during the day, so the vibe is very different between day and evening. If you visit Campo dei Fiori in the evening, you may want to make the 10-minute walk over to Trastevere, which is very lively in the evening (even on a Sunday) and has some good dinner options. Trastevere is much quieter during the day.

Posted by
1059 posts

That evening walking the old center (Piazza Navona, Trevi fountain, to Spanish steps along with dinner will probably be enough. I’d devote your full day to Roman Forum and Capitoline hill to start with and go from there. You could almost do the same walk the night before and it’s totally different during the day. You definitely don’t need to go inside the Colosseum. There’s actually not much to see on Palatine hill, and you could skip that. Capitoline Museum can make for s nice air conditioned break if it’s blazing out. Pantheon takes no time to see.

Even early, you may find the lines at the Vatican disheartening. Unless you’re Catholic and/or visiting the Vatican has a deep meaning to you, you’re allowed to not see it this time. It’s big, but it’s not necessarily the best (controversial opinion.) as an option, I would suggest visiting one of the many smaller churches in Rome (Santa Maria Della Victoria, San Pietro in Vincoli, etc.) which are easier to visit and filled with artistic treasures.

Anytime someone has so little time in a place like Rome I advise to scale your plans even further back, then add on as you feel up to it. You’ll never see it all, so just make sure to enjoy what you see.

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