The first thing I must say about Rome is that it’s better not to have a hotel too close to the train station. It’s a bit loud at night, which is generally when you’re trying to sleep and don’t want loudness.
Our hotel had quite nice rooms, but wasn’t in the best part of town. Also, all of the rooms opened up onto the marble staircase, which created some more noise problems. Marble is very echo-y, you know.
It was, however, well-situated in terms of transportation. Rome doesn’t hold a candle to Paris in this respect, as the only metro lines are two- one vertical and one horizontal- right in the center of the city. There is a tram system and buses, but we only tried out the tram. The difficult thing is to decide which thing you want to sacrifice- transportation or peace and quiet? That will determine where you choose to stay in the city.
There is a Rome pass, like there is for Paris, but again, it isn’t as sophisticated or economical. I believe you can choose two museums/historical sites for free admission, and with the rest have a discount. I’m not certain about the details since we didn’t buy the pass.
There were plenty of restaurants within walking distance, and they all had their menus up outside, as per usual. This is a very helpful practice. Most of them were in English as well as Italian and French. My recommendation is to eat only dinner at a restuarant, and go somewhere else for dessert. The places that are dedicated to gelato, for instance, will have a much better selection and quality than a typical restaurant.
We also found that places dedicated to pizza have a much better pie than than those others with lots of variety. This seems like common sense, I know, but it’s important to know where to get good pizza and gelato in Rome. Unfortunately, I don’t have any specific restaurants to recommend- except one, near Termini station, that had really nicely done veal cutlets. I’ll have to search for the name and fill it in when I find it.
All in all, we knew less, saw less, and experienced less of Rome than Paris. I don’t know if there will be a next trip, but if there is, I’ll hopefully be more prepared. I hope I can help anyone interested in visiting, too. If you have a question, don’t hesitate to comment and ask it. I’ll do the best I can to answer!
