Insight Guides: Experience Rome

Insight Guides

• Publisher: Insight
• ISBN:
  9781786715906
• Edition: 2
• Topic: Personal Development
• Subtopic: Travel

With incomparable architecture, lively and generous people and world-beating coffee and gelato, Rome is truly one of Europe's great cities. Be inspired to visit by the new Insight Guide Experience Rome, a beautifully-packaged full-colour guide to this rich and varied city.
Inside Insight Guide Experience Rome:
A brand-new series covering all the very best experiences on offer.
Stunning, colourful photography brings this beautiful city and its people to life.
Local expert authors guide you to authentic Roman experiences and fresh discoveries.
A dip-in "In the mood for..." section suggests the best places to go for fine dining, ancient history, romance and family fun, amongst others.
The neighbourhoods sections contain our selection what to see and do from an insider's perspective, from the historic centre to picturesque Trastevere and the Vatican City to upmarket Via Veneto and Villa Borghese.
Detailed, high-quality maps throughout will help you get around and our Essentials A-Z section give you all the practical information you need for planning a memorable trip.

About Insight Guides: Insight Guides has over 40 years' experience of publishing high-quality, visual travel guides. We produce around 400 full-colour print guide books and maps as well as picture-packed eBooks to meet different travellers' needs. Insight Guides' unique combination of beautiful travel photography and focus on history and culture together create a unique visual reference and planning tool to inspire your next adventure.

'Insight Guides has spawned many imitators but is still the best of its type.' - Wanderlust Magazine

Tridente and Trevi

Ming Tang-Evans/Apa Publications

Join the city’s high society for a refined Roman brunch at Ciampini

Alamy

While breakfast in Rome can be a brief exercise in personal space, vying for a cappuccino and pastry at the local bar, the Roman brunch is an altogether more leisurely lesson in style. The chic, family-owned Caffè Ciampini holds court in a quiet square where any day of the week politicians and patricians, artists, activists and office workers enjoy light fare.

Although it is just off the Via del Corso, Rome’s busiest street, the manicured Piazza San Lorenzo in Lucina is a calm backwater. Here nattily dressed parents chat while well-pressed children run unboisterously, the fur-clad toy-dog set sip Prosecco, and hand-tailored gentlemen exchange political gossip and advice on grooming. You are more likely to overhear multilingual discussions about politics, literature and education than directions to the nearest monument.

Caffè Ciampini has a satisfying brunch/light lunch menu of salads, sandwiches and pasta dishes. Of particular excellence is the club sandwich, a refined double-layer white-bread tramezzino with eggs and cornichons. In summer, enjoy the home-made iced tea and gelati, including the superb chocolate variety. From November to February, the hot chocolate with fresh whipped cream is ideal to ward off the cold. If it is raining or too chilly, head upstairs to Caffè Ciampini’s rustic tea salon.

The best time for people-watching? Try lunch (around 1pm) or aperitivo hours (from 6pm).

Ciampini; Piazza San Lorenzo in Lucina 29; tel: [phone]; www.ciampini.net; Mon–Sat 7.30am–7.30pm; [map] D3

Examine Caesar Augustus’ 1st-century BC altar in its 21st-century AD home at the Ara Pacis

Ming Tang-Evans/Apa Publications

One of Rome’s most important monuments is the Ara Pacis, a 1st-century-BC ‘Altar of Peace’, housed in Richard Meier’s purpose-built glass-and-travertine museum. The altar, which was used for sacrifices, commemorates Caesar Augustus, Rome’s first and most powerful emperor, who ruled from 27 BC to 14 AD, extending Pax Romana to its furthest corners of Europe and the Mediterranean.

Surrounding the altar is a richly decorated white marble wall with friezes depicting 100 figures, including the imperial family in procession. Coloured lights are occasionally projected onto the altar to show how it would have appeared in antiquity.

Res Gestae Divi Augusti (The Deeds of the Divine Augustus) is inscribed on the outside of the museum. This first-person account of the life of the emperor, the adopted son of Julius Caesar, explains the origins of the dynasty; elsewhere, the family tree is laid out with imperial portrait casts.

Meier’s minimal box was hugely controversial when it opened in 2006. By contrast, across the Via di Ripetta are the decaying ruins of the huge mausoleum that Augustus built for himself, but this is not open to the public.

For those craving a good Roman pizza, walk to the other side of the Mausoleum of Augustus to find ’Gusto (Piazza Augusto Imperatore 9; tel: [phone]; [map] C3) in the Fascist-era Piazza Augusto Imperatore. In the same building, but behind it on Via della Frezza, is Gusto’s cheese bar, while at Piazza Augusto Imperatore 28 is Gusto’s fish-inspired trattoria. All very good.

Ara Pacis, Lungotevere in Augusta at via Tomacelli; tel: 06-0608; www.arapacis.it; Tue–Sun 9am–7pm; charge; [map] C4

Watch the action in the magnificent Piazza del Popolo from the Pincio Terrace

Dreamstime

Piazza del Popolo, the ‘People’s Square’, is one of Rome’s largest open areas and the traditional forecourt to the city, which means this is the best place to spy a slice of daily life. And there is no better viewing point than the panoramic Pincio Terrace, at the top of the steps that lead up from Santa Maria del Popolo. The finest artworks to behold in this treasure-filled church are two luminous paintings by Caravaggio – The Conversion of St Paul and The Crucifixion of St Peter – which attest to the painter’s genius.

The church flanks Porta del Popolo (also known as Porta Flaminia), the entrance gate incorporated into the 3rd-century AD Aurelian walls.

The square marks the top of the Tridente (the Trident), an area formed by the three major roads into the city: Via di Ripetta, Via del Corso and Via del Babuino. These converge on the south side of the square, at the junction of the twin churches of Santa Maria in Montesanto and Santa Maria dei Miracoli, dating from the 1660s.

Piazza del Popolo was given its present grandeur by the architect Giuseppe Valadier in 1822, his sweeping double semicircles echoing Bernini’s colonnades that embrace St Peter’s Square.

The extensive piazza can contain thousands of people, making it a natural venue for concerts and exhibitions, performances and flash mobs, public New Year’s parties and concerts, market events, as well as international celebrations and ceremonies like World Cups and papal coronations when crowds gather in front of large screens.

‘Meet me at the obelisk’ means a rendezvous at the piazza’s central fountain, and this is where you will find Roman children, tired tourists and the odd busker. Four lions guard a 24 metre-high obelisk, brought to Rome by Augustus Caesar in 10 BC after his conquest of Egypt and originally placed in the Circus Maximus.

On either side of the southern curve are the piazza’s two famous feuding cafés – left-wing Rosati (tel: [phone]) and right-wing Canova (tel: [phone]), whose regulars from the film world once included directors Federico Fellini (Rosati) and Pier Paolo Pasolini (Canova). Today, choice in where you enjoy your afternoon coffee or evening aperitivo is based less on ideology and more on how much sun you’d like to soak in, and it celebrity sightings are still common, so keep your eyes open.

Locals lo...

Table of contents

• How To Use This E-Book
• Rome Overview
• In the Mood for…
• Neighbourhoods
• Centro Storico
• Tridente and Trevi
• The Vatican, Borgo and Prati
• Colosseo and Celio
• Trastevere and the Gianicolo
• Villa Borghese, Via Veneto and Flaminia
• Quirinale, Repubblica and Esquilino
• Aventino, Testaccio and Piramide
• Essentials