3 Day Guide to Rome Italy😍🇮🇹

Welcome to Rome, Italy. In this video we're going to share everything from what to do, where to stay, how to get around and of course most importantly what to eat. Rome is a remarkable city with one of the richest histories in the world. As the birthplace of the Roman Empire, its legacy spans thousands of years. It's home to hundreds of incredible historical sites, must-visit attractions and of course world-class food. If you're new around here we're Rhett and Claire, full-time travellers from South Africa. We travel to the most beautiful popular destinations around the world to bring you everything you need to know about visiting a country. We've just kicked off an epic two-week journey through Italy to visit some of the most iconic destinations in the world, from the romantic canals of Venice, to the dreamy Amalfi Coast, to the rolling hills of Tuscany and everything in between. If you're interested in travelling to Italy then be sure to subscribe for all the upcoming videos. We arrived here yesterday from Venice where we spent the afternoon exploring the iconic canals. We took a train here that was approximately four hours long and we've come to what we believe is the most visited destination in all of Italy. This is Rome. This is our Airbnb here in Rome. It's actually right across the street from the Vatican City. You can even see St. Peter's Basilica from our window. The Vatican City is its own country although you don't need a passport to explore it. So hopefully we get to go there during our time here and maybe we'll even climb to the top of that dome. We're paying around 100 euros per night and that's excluding the tourist tax. Every tourist that comes to Italy has to pay this tourist tax and it varies per city. In Rome it is six euros per person per night. They'll usually ask you for this fee upon check-in but sometimes at checkout too. Most people are pretty surprised by this fee when they arrive here so now you know about it and you're welcome. If you're a first-time visitor to Rome you can't go wrong with staying in the historic center. It's one of the most beautiful areas of the city and has hundreds of hotels and restaurants to choose from. Other good areas to stay in are Prati where our accommodation is. It's across the river from the major sites so you will need to do more walking or use public transport. We'll discuss how to get around later in the video. Prati is really close to the Vatican City and has some affordable accommodation and restaurant options. Monti gives a small boho village vibe filled with boutique stores, bars and some great restaurants. It's also very close to the Colosseum. Across the river is the vibey Trastevere a popular place to stay and known as the foodie hub of Rome. The Jewish quarter or ghetto is a great area too. It's conveniently located and is filled with some amazing restaurants serving Roman Jewish foods. For the most budget friendly accommodation you can look at the Roma Termini area. It's not the most attractive part of town and does come with a bit of a reputation as being slightly unsafe. We passed through here multiple times though and didn't feel unsafe. There were always so many people out and about. Anything bad happening is pretty unlikely. We'll include some incredible accommodation options for all different budget types in our resource pack and that also includes our google maps link which has all the best spots throughout Italy. Good morning we are out and early and we have come to the one the only Trevi fountain and everyone else got the same idea as us to come after the sun rises. It's before seven o'clock and there's absolute tons of people here as well. Everyone looks so pretty guys. We all did so well to dress up for our photos here. It is like the number one photo spot in the whole of Italy anyway. Realistically though we're probably not up bright and early enough. I would recommend coming here at like 5 30 sharp. We were here at seven and it's quite full. Honestly either come bright and early in the morning or come late in the afternoon or even evening because in the middle of the day this is what Trevi fountain actually looks like. I don't know if it'll be as enjoyable. This morning even before seven it's busy but you could at least walk around fine and get a spot quickly. Just shove in and say sorry take a photo. But in the middle of the day I think there's absolutely no way you'd get down there. So yeah just keep that in mind. But as a perk if you do come in the middle of the day and it's so hot while you're standing here because it'll be super sunny. There's water fountains that you can just get free water while you're here and most of the tourist attractions in Rome have free water. So that's at least a budget tip. Nice. Get water fountain water. Trevi fountain itself was one of the original watering holes basically water supplies for the city. So you know it's fresh and it's great. And isn't it iconic drinking the water right here from Trevi fountain. I love it. Good deed done. At the end of every day they collect all these coins like thousands of euro worth of coins and it all goes to charity. I love that. We're about to leave. It's 7 30 in the morning and it's actually quieter now than what it was when we got here. I think the morning rush has actually gone. All the content creators are going to piss off like us now and it's pretty chill. So that's a tip. Actually come at 7 30. Not in July and August though. I think it'll be packed but we're here in June. I don't know if we mentioned that but we're here in June just before peak season. There are lots of crowds but I've seen it gets way worse here in Rome in July and August. Right right by Trevi fountain there's a beautiful cafe that you can sit at and have chocolate stuffed croissants and cappuccino right in front of the Trevi fountain but there's a massive line there already which is bleak. I'm sad. Those croissants better be worth it. That line was massive. Anyway most of the cafes here have a big big line so we're going to just make our way towards our next spot and just find a cafe really. Anyway in the hopes of getting a croissant and a coffee what a way to start the day. Really just walk around corners here in Rome and bump into historical sites like they littered all over the city. This is the Pantheon and we didn't even know it was here we just bumped into what is this? I'm like this is the Pantheon he's like no way. At the time we bumped into the Pantheon it wasn't yet open so we decided to grab some coffee and croissants from a highly rated cafe right across the road and wait for it to open at 9am. By the time we finished coffee the lines were already super long but we've got a tip for you to avoid waiting in those long lines. This is an architectural marvel with its perfectly symmetrical ceiling and is the best preserved ancient Roman building in Rome. All the huge pillars were brought from Egypt and it's one of the first buildings to use poured cement to make the roof. Welcome to the Pantheon. They started construction in 27 BC and finished about 150 years later so this is literally 2000 years old and honestly it looks in pristine condition. It looks modern the actual dome itself looks so modern and new I can't even fathom that it's over 2000 years old. I just don't know how they actually built this dome it's the largest freestanding dome in the world and there's a huge hole right in the middle and the natural light obviously comes in but so does the rain and then on the floor here they've got little holes so obviously all the rain just seeps through into the ground below it's very very interesting. One big tip actually there's three lines one for if you bought your ticket beforehand if you could buy online on the website then there's a cash line which was super super long and then the shortest line of them all was the credit card line which is on the far right of the building that's what we used we literally walked into this Pantheon first tapped my Apple Pay and we were in so highly recommend you guys do that. It literally felt like we were cheating but we were let in first the credit card line is let in first and it's so quick and easy and you don't even have to book tickets in advance so there's your tip. Honestly guys this is why you follow Rhett and Claire just we've got all the tips for you don't watch. So the Pantheon opens at 9 a.m and this is what it looks like at 9 15. Pretty busy but not too bad honestly it's such a massive area so the crowds don't really matter and bother you at all. Just a short walk from the Pantheon is Piazza Navona another thing to do here in Rome. He's broken. Piazza Navona. That's a reality in Europe sometimes your favorite buildings will be under construction it's only to keep them pretty There are so many different ways of getting around the city first the metro we used it the most and so did a lot of tourists it was always packed use google maps to see where the nearest station is and what time the metro runs you can tap your visa card on the turnstile machines in the station please be aware of your belongings on the metro pickpockets are very real in Italy this attention a pickpocket video didn't go viral for no reason second and the option we used a lot too were the buses they're never on time though so if you're in a rush be warned you can just jump onto the bus and tap your card on the scanner to pay the fare you can also purchase the Rome pass card which is a tourist card that gives you reduced price tickets to many city highlights and unlimited use of the public transport for three days comment Rome pass and we'll reply with the link you can also check out this website for the bus schedules and fares e-bikes these are a fun affordable and slightly dangerous way to get around you can download the Lime app or even use the Uber app to allocate an e-bike that'll be lying somewhere near you you load your card onto the app for payments and scan the bike whenever you're ready to use one they are white meter taxis in Rome and it taxi is the main app to call them the price of taxi fares can be super inflated so use with caution and finally walking you can totally walk to all attractions if you stay in a central location in the old town Rome is very walkable in fact be prepared to do a minimum of 15 000 steps a day here we use the metro to get to our next thing to do a world wonder and the very reason you come to Rome and that's the Colosseum obviously we booked our Colosseum tour on GetYourGuide because it's the easiest and most convenient way you can also use the official site on the screen now to book individual tickets or guided tours but we found that the guided tours were either sold out or not available on that site with GetYourGuide you at least get to read the reviews and make sure you're getting a good experience book a few weeks in advance and make sure you do get a guide because there's just so much to learn in the Colosseum the Roman Forum and the Palatine Hill as well the tour will also help you skip the crazy long lines we'll link the highest rated tour down below in the comments and description for you we're just booking the earliest tour possible before the crowds roll in as I mentioned most tours include three stops first the Colosseum we have entered the Colosseum and we've learned so much already about the animals that were brought here for the big battle I don't think people realize how much of an architectural marvel this place actually was the sails that were above to keep all of the spectators out of the sun this is the inspiration for all stadiums today and it worked very much like a general stadium I didn't actually know that each arch was an entryway there's Roman numerals to mark and you had your little terracotta ticket and you were assigned a seat just like normal stadiums and you had to give your little terracotta plank to one of the officials and they showed you to your seat how bizarre I must admit all these statues and images around this Colosseum are brilliant they give you a real look inside what the Colosseum actually looked like many many years ago there were beautiful statues absolutely everywhere it must have been incredible coming here back in those days I told you these statues are epic this is exactly what the Colosseum used to look like look at the beautiful statues all around look at the wooden pillars that the ropes were attached to for those that don't actually know what the Colosseum is it was basically an arena where people would come and watch other people fight so you get gladiators you get slaves fighting for their freedom and sometimes they wouldn't just fight each other they'd fight other animals even rhinos lions tigers all of that right down there is the Colosseum stage floor which would have been in wood which is now broken and then underneath the stage floor they would have cages where they would hold the tigers and then they'd be brought up on an elevator into the arena and the whole crowd would see oh my goodness this man is going to fight the tiger and often the men fighting the animals were unarmed they had no armor on them it was really an unfair fight and they're basically just coming here to watch people get killed by an animal just for entertainment I want to know in the comments would you guys come if you lived in the roman times would you come to watch a fight in the arena here today's age we basically just watch the world cup final and the most entertainment we see is Zinedine Zidane headbutting somebody but back in the day they used to actually watch people get eaten it's crazy would you have done it would you have come and watched let us know in the comments below there was this trend recently where you had to ask your husband or your boyfriend how often they think about the roman empire I asked red a couple of months ago and he's like I think about the roman emperor all the time nearly on a daily basis I was in hysterics I should have filmed it all the boyfriends watching I bet you're the same you guys are obsessed with the roman empire it was obviously the best empire once you visited the world wonder you'll then walk over to the roman forum passing the arch of Constantine built in the 6th century to celebrate the first christian emperor the forum was the very center of the roman empire and as it was known then the capital of the western civilized world the roman empire lasted about a thousand years it started in 500 BC and ended in 500 AD it's now just a bunch of ancient rubble but if you can use your imagination you can picture the daily lifestyle of romans here there were markets courts jails emperors roaming around with gods and gladiators animals food produce and so much more and everything was covered in white marble we highly recommend watching this rick steves youtube video to learn all about it if you don't end up coming here to learn for yourself the final stop the palatine hill was just as the name suggests a hill filled with towering palaces it's one of the seven famous hills in rome and where the emperors themselves used to live if you don't know what get your guide is yet that surprises me honestly because get your guide is by far the best platform you can have on your travels to book all of your tour experiences on all your entry tickets guides all sorts of fun things every experience that you've seen here in rome has been booked on get your guide and that's because there's a couple of perks number one you can cancel up to 24 hours in advance and get a full refund we all know the travels don't always go to plan number two there's an app that you can download onto your phone and have all of your tickets ready there your dates your meeting points qr codes to scan it's just so so organized it makes doing the fun experiences on the tour so much easier so we highly recommend going down in the description of this video or checking out the first pin comment we'll link all the tours we did in rome plus more and we'll also link our italy wish list with you guys which has so many fun epic tours that you can do during your time here in italy good morning everyone it's another day here in rome and we've got something so exciting planned we actually took it really easy this morning because after the coliseum tour yesterday our bodies are broken like my feet are so sore we definitely not used to walking as much coming from south africa i don't know how you guys do it in europe like it's so much walking dude anyway i just wanted to mention one thing rome is a bustling bustling city guys there is so much going on there are so many tourists here we are here in june early june there's so much traffic and noise and ambulances going past and there's so much to do in this city it is like full on this is our room here we have such awesome views of all the tourists passing here by the vatican but listen to when i open the window how intense all the windows in rome have to be double glazed otherwise it's just too noisy but anyway let's head out and rome has some of the best food in all of italy and this area that we've come to today trastevere has the best food in all of rome and the best way to explore the food in rome is to do a food tour you guys know how much we love food tours and we do them in every city that we can possibly do them in just such a great way to learn what foods you actually like eating in a country so i really like to do them pretty much early on in our trips really get an idea of what you like to eat you get a taste of the culture you get to meet so many locals it's just a great way to immerse yourself in a country so trastevere hopefully we're pronouncing it correctly actually means across the river they called themselves trasteverians and they say that they have everything across the river so there's no need to go into the city they're very proud of their little suburb first off is to try two of the most famous cheese here in rome we all know cheese is such a big part of the italian cuisine we've tried parmigiano and we've tried peperino roma which is actually the cheese used to make carbonara and cacio al pepe which is the most famous pasta dish here in rome when you cheers here in italy you have to say salute you have to maintain eye contact you cannot cross arms with anybody and you have to tap on a surface before you have a drink if you break any of those rules you get seven years of bad luck so don't do that guys oh you can also smell the beautiful smell so this is pork slow roasted pork called porchetta i wish you could smell it it smells phenomenal be careful because it's greasy greasy what a good start what the heck christmas on a piece of bread oh it smells phenomenal this is supli classico which is basically risotto in a napolitano sauce and cheese deep fried and it's super popular here in rome only found in rome and you do find variants of this throughout italy but this one is the og it's so good and i've seen it all over the internet i'm so excited to be trying it this is also like a takeaway apparently fast food the place is super popular sometimes it has lines outside for meters luckily we are here early and we got them i already see a lot of locals lining up there now as we're leaving to get there supli on the go and we always say eat where the locals are that's when you know the quality of food is top notch and once again we booked this tour on get your guide as usual we book all of our tours on there it's just such an easy way to find the best guides because you can go and check out the reviews and let's see what people have said about them so you know you're going to get a good experience and obviously the link to this specific tour if you do want to come on it will be in the description for you guys and you can also scan the qr code right here so when we first arrived in italy it was perfect temperatures not even that hot it's now like 33 degrees not even summer yet it's gonna get to like 40 okay so we are having roman style of pizza everybody's going to have three different flavors made of pizzas another salute it's now beer with pizza apparently that's the way you have to eat your pizza here in rome is to couple it with a beer you're not allowed to separate the two tastes like beer i don't drink beer guys very crispy at the bottom we just learned the fascinating origins of the margherita pizza so pizza was invented in the city of naples and queen margherita herself she was born and lived in the north of italy where pizza did not exist she made a trip down to naples city and she went to this restaurant and she saw this type of food called pizza now pizza was originally actually for the lower class citizen for the poor people so it wasn't that popular amongst the royals anyway they knew she was coming to visit the restaurant where the pizza was the best and most famous in and they decided to make a pizza that was based over the italian flag so they used basil for the green color mozzarella for the white and a tomato base for the red in the flag and she tasted the pizza and she loved it so much she asked them to name it after her so that's why the margherita pizza is called the margherita pizza after queen margherita herself how insane thank you queen margherita for the margherita and she's known as the first food influencer in history and if you're wondering where queen margherita is actually buried she's buried in the pantheon when you see all this around don't be scared you can drink from that okay so for that reason i always recommend to carry bottle of the water so you can refill it and this is the lifesaver during the summer and if you don't have water there is also a trick how to drink from it so you have to tap it from from down and then it's going from the top so it's very convenient to have to drink it in this way as well so this is the app and if i will zoom out oh you see all these water fountains because rome is known for being the city of the churches and fountains oh majestic i've come to a very special and super old restaurant to have some more wine some bruschetta and of course tried some pasta absolutely delicious currently standing in the basement of the restaurant which is as old as the colosseum itself and literally has some of the same bricks that we saw at the colosseum and they only discovered this basement a couple of years ago and in the basement were two statues that were stolen the statue of the man and then the horse itself so they were stolen from outside the pantheon and they found them in this basement of this house right behind me is where jewish families lived and on the floor the plaque says that they were deported in 1943 and taken to Auschwitz and obviously they didn't make it out of Auschwitz but just crazy to reflect on the fact that in 1943 Mussolini and Hitler obviously were in partnership and they obviously agreed send all the jews from Italy to Poland crazy to see the little bits of history everywhere even the most recent history like that so beautiful and peaceful walking around this neighborhood it's contrast to where we're staying across from the Vatican where it's super loud we did want to stay in Trastevere when we were looking at accommodation but it is a little bit on the pricier side and we just couldn't find anything in our budget around every corner there's just so much history here it's so cute look at this beautiful building behind us I love Trastevere apparently a lot of tourists come here in the morning for lunch and for dinner just to eat because they have really good affordable food this side what are we having? Gelato! Time to finish this tour Stracciatella chocolate and stracciatella and panna which is cream on the top it's the real roman way there are a few rules when finding the best most authentic and high quality gelato in Italy first the gelato must be covered by metal lids at all times to preserve the correct temperatures and never openly displayed and second they must be pale and natural in color any bright colors mean there's been artificial flavors added no food tour in Rome is complete without a gelato at the end red got a pistachio and chocolate ice cream not ice cream sorry I can't say that gelato it's so good and that's the end of our tour guys highly recommend doing this tour as soon as you get to Rome because not only do you roam around Rome and learn all the history of the city you also get to learn through the food absolutely love food tours guys cannot recommend them more go check the link down in the description to do this exact tour it's our last evening here in Rome and all we really wanted to do during our time here in Rome is to grab a takeaway pizza and come and eat it in front of one of the world wonders and that's what we've done tonight the Colosseum light up so beautifully in the evening honestly think it's so worth it coming here at night time at sunset to see it anyway we grabbed some cheap pizzas and that's gonna be us for the evening this is so cute two pizzas and the beer for 17 euro and the view was priceless and totally worth it oh cute we obviously could not cover absolutely everything to do in Rome we spent just three days here but here's a list of other things to do definitely a cooking class to learn how to make pasta and tiramisu and just have the most amazing time then the inside of the Vatican there's Saint Peter's Basilica and the museum's Sistine Chapel which looks incredible inside like we said I'll get your guide wishlist will be linked below for you and that's it we hope you enjoyed the video don't forget to give it a like it really helps more people find our channel and we'll see you in the next one