 My family (my husband and two teens - ages 16 and 13) and I recently went on a cruise that left from the Port of Civitavecchia, and since we flew into Rome we decided to fly in early both to see the city and to help we get acclimated to the time zone! We flew out of Newark Airport and our 9:00pm flight was delayed slightly, and so we began our vacation off right with a late “european dinner” in the terminal. Once we were in the air, the flight was uneventful and fairly comfortable - we flew Norwegian Air straight through to Rome… arriving there around 14:30 (2:30pm)... and with a 4:30pm tour booked, we knew we’d have to hurry to make it - even by “Italian time”.  We booked four tours in advance through Viator.com mostly because they have a large selection of tours to choose from all in one place and included reviews to help decide. We choose: Day 1: 4:30pm Cooking Class in Rome: Make your own Pizza Day 2: 9:00a Faster Than Skip the Line: Vatican, Sistine Chapel, and St Peter’s Basilica Tour 1:30p Gladiator Gate and Arena Floor Special Access Colosseum Tour 7:00pm Roman Gladiator School: Learn How to Become a Gladiator I was slightly hesitant to book this much - however in the end I knew we most likely wouldn’t be back in Rome for a very long time, so felt that with this being the start of our trip - we would be okay. I DO NOT recommend booking this much on the other end of a seven day cruise like this! Once we landed in Rome (Leonardo da Vinci-Fiumicino Airport) it took us about 1.5 hours to get through the airport and to the transfer car I had pre-booked for us - drivers all meet their parties outside of baggage claim. Once we found our driver in the slew of last names on white papers - we followed him to his vehicle - not a close walk, so allow time for this as well. Two things to note here. First, all of our pre-booked transfers asked for payment at time of service, with an extra fee for charging it to a cc, so we paid in euros we had just gotten from the airport ATM. Second, our driver as well as many of the drivers we got didn’t speak English very well. Thankfully, Google Translate came to our rescue when we needed to ask him if he would wait and take us to the tour meeting point after we dropped off our bags. We were hoping that the tour was on Italy time and started late. Since it seemed like our driver thought he could help us, we started the 40 minute drive from FCO to the Suites Del Popolo in Rome. We choose to stay at this Bed and Breakfast, found on Booking.com, in the hopes it would give us a more authentic feel of living in Rome. This B&B was located in a “neighborhood” setting and also had four beds in one room, which is quite unusual, as many brand name accommodations only offer rooms for 2 or 3 in a room.  We really underestimated how much time it would take us to get out of the airport and settled in our room. The Inn Keeper, Luciano, contacted me via What’s App and asked me to let him know once we were leaving the airport. In our hurry to get out and on our way, I forgot I could only send him a message over WIFI and so never let him know we were on our way, so he wasn’t there when we arrived and this delayed us further. In addition, while the room was lovely and definitely was more authentic than a standard hotel - it wasn’t in a location where we could just hail a taxi, so Luciano did call one for us. Our previous driver from the airport had left (clearly not able to wait for us after all) and we were on our way. Unfortunately we were too late to make the pizza - but the tour guide at the venue authorized our tour cost to go to the dinner that was included in the price! So we got the best of the tour anyway! The restaurant was located in Piazza di Pasquino, and quaint area with many places to eat and get gelato - and the pizza was delicious and the perfect first meal of our trip. While the actual tour group ate inside we were seated outside on the “street area” which really gave us the feeling of being in Italy. We enjoyed watching the comings and goings of others, including the tiny cars that clearly were made for the small streets of Rome! After dinner we of course headed just a stone’s throw away for the first of many gelatos of this trip! With gelatos in hand we headed out exploring - we had asked the maitre d’ about where we should go from there and unbeknownst to us, we were very close to Piazza Navona, the Pantheon and the Trevi Fountain! We wandered (is it wandering if you have a map?) as long as our weary travelled bodies could and then we took a taxi back to our Bed and Breakfast. Before heading to bed we filled out our breakfast order for the morning and I texted Luciano (free wifi in the suite) about hiring a taxi in the morning. Tips from Day 1
 The next day we got an early start in order to make it to the meeting point we were given for our Vatican tour. Our breakfast was delivered right on time and we were ready to roll, when we were told that there were no taxi’s to be found in the area (insert scratching head emoji here). In broken English Luciano assured us that the train “right down the street” would be “no problem” and “less money.” Now, I am not averse to taking subways in any city - I lived in Brooklyn for a while and feel that this is generally a part of the experience when travelling. However, with the short amount of time that we had in Rome I had decided taking taxi’s would be more efficient and cause less family stress. - Boy was I right! Our “short walk, down the street” had us guessing the entire way -- remember I don’t have WIFI at this point, so no downloading any train apps, and with my husband rushing to not be late, my 16 year old daughter trying to take charge and me bringing up the rear trying to get them to slow down so I could make sure we were heading the right way -- it was a recipe for disaster. The worst part about all of this is that once we arrived (4 minutes late) we were told that the Vatican was closed due to the Pope being in office! Now this is a risk that all the tours make clear could happen, and it would mean we would get our money back - but we WANTED to see the Vatican and this was the only day we had to do it. So, with our next tour at 1:30, we took up a conversation with one of the many tour sellers all along the streets outside the Vatican and ended up booking a tour between our next two afternoon tours - what were we thinking? We weren’t! More on that later. So we asked someone where we should walk to and they directed us to the Castel Sant’ Angelo - located in Parco Adriano - a green space shaped like a star by the edge of the Tiber River…. It offers some great views of the Vatican Obelisk as well as a great location for teen instagram photos! Lunch was a bit of a fail as we ended up at a restaurant near the Vatican that was hardly a true Italian eatery… but with two hungry kids and a tour to get to at 1:30… lunch was lunch. Then, we walked the distance to the colosseum tour meeting point. This was a walk that was a bit longer than we thought, but that allowed us to see so much of the city.  As I mentioned I had booked our Tours through Viator.com - but each tour is provided by a private tour company - this one was by Walks - Italy, Spain & Greece. The meeting point was easy to find and the check in process was clear and easy. We were given our ear pieces (to hear the tour guide no matter where she was) and we headed off to the entrance of the Colosseum. A note here about the term “English speaking” that I didn’t really consider: all of our tour guides were listed as English speaking (clearly what we needed) however, each of them spoke English with heavy Italian accents. My 16-year-old daughter loved this aspect as she said it made it more authentic. I, however, needed to focus very hard to understand exactly what they were telling us - even making sure at times I could read their lips! It wasn’t always the accent, but the phrasing and lack of the correct English word needed to tell us something as well that had me puzzled. Our tour included special access to the Arena Floor so we entered via a separate entrance, with hardly a wait. Once we entered we had an area on the floor to ourselves. The floor is currently being excavated so itis full of scaffolding, but still a fascinating vantage point to view the entire Arena from!  So back to the Vatican Tour issue - in order to join another tour to get into the Vatican that day (our last day on Rome) we had to cut our Colosseum Tour short - leaving before we went to the Roman Forum and Palatine Hill. I am not even sure what we missed out on there! We were instructed to be at the Italy Wonderers tour office at 3:15 sharp for a 3:30 departure walk to the Vatican - and so we were - and the man who sold us the tour greeted us. He then casually mentioned that there would be a brief line for security that the group couldn’t pass by as usual due to some reason that I don’t really remember. This seemed reasonable and we waited to leave, and waited and waited, and waited. Turns out that apparently our guide was late due to the last tour being late, due to the back up, due to the Pope being there. SO knowing we had to be at our next tour at 7pm and with the tour company admitting we wouldn’t make it, they refunded some of our money back. In the end we waited (with our tour guide) in the same security line that the public waited in, only to almost “run” through the Vatican - including the Sistine Chapel, where we were herded through like cattle. As this was happening our Italian English speaking tour guide was saying things that were lost on me. I was not impressed and in the end I think we could have done the whole thing on our own the same way. Moving onto our last and most fun tour - Roman Gladiator School: Learn how to become a Gladiator! This “tour” was provided by Sculoa Gladiatori Roma… and it was less a tour than a fun way to learn about Gladiators! It was located a bit out of the way to the south and wasn’t signed very well. However, once we found it, the hosts were very welcoming. Since we were early we were led to a studio to wait, where there was a vending machine with drinks and snack. We weren’t really sure what we had gotten ourselves into as the studio walls were covered with modern day photos of Gladiators and Greek Goddesses in parades and at fairs! We ended up being the only family there when we first began in their makeshift Gladiator Museum - but were eventually joined by a father and son duo. Our Gladiator Teacher took us through a brief history of the gladiators - allowing us to try on and touch many of the helmets and weapons on display, which my 13-year-old found fun! We then headed out to the “training area” and were given our gladiator tunics to wear and then the training began! We were taken through a few obstacles to warm up and then given nerf type swords to learn some basic maneuvers with them! Our Trainer also challenged the kids to build a weapon used on the ground that would trip up the horses - a puzzle of sorts… we were eventually given wooden swords and shields and set upon one another to duel. The whole experience was very fun and entertaining as our trainer was very funny in his teaching and delivery!! The best part? When we were done, they had a driver available to take us back to our suite. It was a great way to end a very crazy day!
Tips from Day 2
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