It wasn’t probably the best time of the year for a visit to Rome – a long hot weekend in August, locals were on vacation and tourist dominated the scene. Temperatures were up to 35 degrees and made it difficult to enjoy. Additionally, four days, including the day of arrival and the day of departure, is very little time to discover the impressive monuments of this big city. It’s full of history, churches, palaces and other impressive buildings – the city is a huge museum.
Vatican Museums
Been traveling since early hours, arriving in Rome in the later morning, finding our way to the hotel and checking in, it was already midday and everyone was pretty hungry. So we started, searching a restaurant around our Hotel in the suburb of Trastevere. After having had a delicious Pizza and a coffee in a – don’t laugh – beautifully decorated, authentic self-service restaurant, we decided to visit the Vatican Museums and the “Capella Sistina”.
Having heard all these stories of queuing up 2km and more for getting in scared us a little, but we got lucky! Arriving there a about 3:30pm, there was almost no queue and it still left us with 2 1/2 hours visit. OK, you´ll probably tell me, “only 2 1/2 hours” for the Vatican?”. Well, for us it was more than enough! It’s true, one can probably spend days in there investigating all the impressive arts and architecture, but we actually got exhausted by seeing so much of it on such a small room. Anyway, it’s spectacular – at the beginning! When you enter the first room, the place just overwhelms you, and it goes on and on and on … until you reach the Sistine Chapel, which is definitely the gem of the Vatican. One great piece of art! All those paintings by Michelangelo and Raphael, which seem to reach out to you and the painted curtains which look so real, you want to move them away to see what’s behind – really impressive!
When we left the Sistine Chapel, we passed by nearby St. Peter’s Place and stepped in to the St. Peter’s Basilica. I’m not a big fan of churches, at least not of their golden interiors, but this one is definitely a must see. It has he largest interior of all churches in the world and it’s beautifully decorated!
Rome
The second day we started with a visit to the “Castel Sant’Angelo”, which is actually not a castle but a mausoleum, the Mausoleum of Hadrian. It’s mostly interesting because of its cylindrical form and its great views over Rome. From there we walked to the city center, strolled around its nice cobblestone streets, had some tasty “gelato”, sitting on the spanish steps and fought our way through hundreds of other tourists to get a look at the Trevi Fountain. Just horrible! Not the Trevi Fountain itself, which is really beautiful, but the number of tourists standing and sitting around it or trying to get there, which we actually formed part of.
In the afternoon we had a reservation in the “Galleria Borghese”. Since they only accept a certain number of visitors every two hours, one has to make a reservation in advance. And I highly recommend to do so! It has a great collection of art, of which most impressed me the works of Bernini. His statues feel so real, almost alive!
Leaving the museum we walked through the surrounding park, the Villa Borghese gardens, later left it at Piazza del Popolo and stopped for having a Pizza at Romes coolest Pizzeria “Gusto”. It was actually a pretty good Pizza and not expensive at all …
Gladiator??? Emperor???
Sunday we had planned our visit to the Colosseum, the Forum Romanum and the Palatinum. At the Colosseum we actually ran into the 2km queue of people waiting to get in, but we’ve been a little smarter. We booked the tickets in advance over the internet and could pass all the queue! All the queue! We passed all the people waiting there and got right to the entrance, without having to wait at all. Fantastic! And again I was a little disappointed by the sights. The historical monuments and ruins of Syria and Lebanon and their authenticity are still in my mind and hard to beat. But still, both, the Colosseum and the Forum Romanum are very impressive sights and definitely a must see! Walking through the ruins, one can really imagine what Rome was like some 2000 years ago, close his eyes and feel like an emperor or maybe a gladiator …
Later in the afternoon, after having a short break, some cold drinks, we stepped by the Basilica di San Giovanni in Laterano, the seat of the bishop of Rome. I already told you that I’m not a big fan of churches interiors, but this one also wasn’t too bad.
Trattoria
On our last day, we decided to take it easy and just walked around in the old city in the morning and later in the suburb, where our hotel was located, Trastevere, before leaving to the airport in the afternoon. The only place of interest we stepped into this morning was the Pantheon.
So far, we have seen Trastevere only at night, or in the mornings when we left the hotel. It’s actually the part I liked most of Rome! Its nice little cobblestone streets and its piazzas are filled with restaurants and bars. At night it gets pretty lively and feels like a good place to be – away from all the sights …
Rome is a “must seen” city.
The pictures are great, and I looks like you could take some pictures inside the Sixtine Chappel (lucky you!). In my visit some Vatican bouncers “suggested” me not even dare.
Places like a little cafe near the Agripa’a Parthenon worths a visit to Rome.
Thanks! There are actually no pictures of the Sixtine Chapel! The same bouncers made the same suggestions to me …
You are probably confused then with other pictures of the Vatican Museums.